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Over Six Billion Served
Home To The World's Best Liberal Thought And Humor
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In This Edition
Noam Chomsky explores why, "We Are All Complicit."
Uri Avnery asks, "Who Needs A Camel?"
Sam Harris concludes, "Science Must Destroy Religion."
Sheila Samples warns, "Go To The Light!"
Jim Hightower explores why, "George W Wants Corporate Governance."
Ted Rall remarks, "18-Year-Olds Too Immature To Serve In The Military."
Robert Scheer reports, "Abramoff's Crimes Are Indicative Of Deeper Cesspool."
Frank Scott explains, "Capitals Punishment."
Robert Parry finds the, "Elusive Truth Behind The Hariri Hit."
Norman Solomon says, "Journalists Should Expose Secrets, Not Keep Them."
Adam Cohen has a, "Question For Judge Alito: What About One Person One Vote?"
Jack Abramoff wins the coveted "Vidkun Quisling Award!"
Arianna Huffington is, "Debunking Bush's NSA Lies: A Handy Pocket Guide."
Howard Zinn looks forward to, "After The War."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department 'The Landover Baptist Church' asks, "Is the Xbox 360 Cooler Than Jesus?" but first Uncle Ernie looks to the future in, "Forward Into The Past!"
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Rex Babin with additional cartoons from Derf City, Micah Wright, Ward Sutton, Lisa Casey, Rico Dog, Internet Weekly.Org, Mike Lane, Bush Speaks.Com and NEFF.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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 Forward Into The Past By Ernest Stewart Nothing can change the shape of things Nothing can change the shape of things... To come! Shape Of Things To Come --- Max Frost & The Troopers
2006 may well be the turning point for good or bad for the next generation. If by some chance the Rethuglicans hold on to power come November whether by hook or by crook or another Diebold fix the end of the world (as we know it) may be upon us. My American Taliban friends assure me it is coming summer 2007! Logic dictates that the Rethuglicans, the Junta and their Nazi church pals are history just as soon as the polls open next November. But then again how did Bush get close enough to pull off coup #2 by having Diebold and others steal the 2004 election? After of course losing the 2000 election to Al Gore when Katie (the Ho) Harris, brother Jebthro and the Extreme Court pulled off coup #1 (for those of you keeping score). Logic certainly dictated that after all the obvious treason, sedition, war crimes, crimes against humanity, attempted genocide, torture, theft of trillions of dollars, etc. etc. etc. surely the Rethuglicans would have been swept from power in November 2004 and the Republic would be restored! Right? WRONG! So to say I have a few qualms about 2006 is to say the least, the very least! Of course the Democrats could somehow, somewhere find their missing spines and stand up to this outrage but for the last three selection periods they were singing as one, "Don't rock the boat." I guess when your as rich as the average Sinator or corpo-rat goon you have too much to lose to start serving the people. So no, I don't look for the Dems to ride to the rescue in ten months time, do you? A couple of turning points are fast approaching. Whether or not Sammy (the coat hanger) will be anointed on the Extreme Court to take the place of an even bigger Bee-Yotch than even Sammy himself! Those are some big shoes to fill Sammy! Also the renewal of the Traitor's Act er Patriot's Act sunset clauses which were extended for 5 weeks when the Con-gress dropped it's agenda and adjourned last year. We can look forward to more Valerie Plame like scams as the leaks continue to pour out of the Fuhrer Bunker and other lairs in Foggy Bottom. This of course would be nothing new and means nothing as the Matrixed media spins and spins and spins, again nothing new. I'm not looking for the Sheeple to awake before it's too late to do anything so if 2006 is going to come out with a happy ending in November it's up to all of us to do whatever, whenever we can! NOW is time for ALL good folks to come to the aid of the human race! Make a difference in 2006, nobody else can make it happen but you! Whether we go forward into the future or forward back into the past is entirely up to you America!
Rex Babin makes his 6th trip to The Cartoon Corner... Rex was the first professional cartoonist to join our little band of merry pranksters back around the turn of the century. Rex is a Pulitzer nominee who is editorial cartoonist for the Sacramento Bee. Welcome back Rex! ******************************************** We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
 We Are All Complicit Noam Chomsky I turned with interest to Oliver Kamm's critique of the "crude and dishonest arguments" he attributes to me (Prospect, Nov. 2005), hoping to learn something. And I did, though not quite what he intended; rather, about the lengths to which some will go to prevent exposure of state crimes and their own complicity in them. His substantive charges are as follows. To demonstrate "a particularly dishonest handling of source material," Kamm alleges that "[Chomsky] manipulates a self-mocking reference in the memoirs of the then US Ambassador to the UN...to yield the conclusion that Moynihan took pride in Nazi-like policies." Kamm wisely evades the statements of Moynihan that I quoted from his 1978 memoirs. The topic is Indonesia's 1975 invasion of East Timor, condemned by the Security Council, which ordered Indonesia to withdraw. But the order had no effect. Moynihan explains why: "The United States wished things to turn out as they did, and worked to bring this about. The Department of State desired that the United Nations prove utterly ineffective in whatever measures it undertook. This task was given to me, and I carried it forward with no inconsiderable success." He then refers to reports that within two months some 60,000 people had been killed, "10 percent of the population, almost the proportion of casualties experienced by the Soviet Union during the Second World War" - at the hands of Nazi Germany, of course. His comparison, not mine, as Kamm pretends. And his clearly expressed pride: there is not the slightest hint of self-mockery, and the only "manipulation" is Kamm's, in his desperate effort to deny truly horrendous crimes of state; his state, hence his complicity. Far more Timorese had been killed by the time Moynihan's memoirs appeared in 1978, thanks to immediate US military and diplomatic support (or as Kamm prefers, Ford's "indolence, at best"), joined by the UK in 1978 as atrocities were peaking, and continuing through the final paroxysm of violence in August-September 1999, until Clinton finally ordered a halt a few weeks later, under great international and domestic pressure. Indonesia instantly withdrew, making it crystal clear who bears responsibility for one of the closest approximations to true genocide of the post-war period. A noteworthy performance on the part of someone who condemns the "amoral quietism" of those who do try to expose and terminate the terrible crimes of their own state, where their actions can have the greatest effect. According to Kamm, I "deployed fanciful arithmetic to draw an equivalence" between 9-11 and Clinton's destruction of the al-Shifa pharmaceutical plant, which produced half of Sudan's supplies. The equivalence is, again, his fanciful construction. Discussing the "horrendous crime" committed on 9-11 with "wickedness and awesome cruelty," I mentioned that the toll may be comparable to the consequences of Clinton's bombing of the Sudan, about which I said nothing further. This single phrase was a considerable understatement, judging by the "fanciful arithmetic," which Kamm again scrupulously ignores, and which, as he surely knows, I reviewed in detail in response to Kamm-style fabrications about this phrase. The review includes the assessment of the German Ambassador to Sudan in the Harvard International Review that "several tens of thousands" died as a result of the bombing and the similar estimate in the Boston Globe by the regional director of the respected Near East foundation, who had field experience in Sudan, along with the immediate warning by Human Rights Watch that a "terrible crisis" might follow, reporting very severe consequences of the bombing even in the first few weeks. And much more. One might wonder whether Kamm would react with his customary "amoral quietism" if al-Qaeda had carried out a comparable act in a country where people mattered. And if some enthusiastic supporter of al-Queda then resorted to sheer deceit to dismiss it as insignificant. It is instructive that none of the reports I cited aroused Kamm's ire when they appeared, and that he also fails to refer to prominently published conclusions that go well beyond the equivalence he fabricates, charging that the US bombing had "appalling consequences for the economy and society" of Sudan (Christopher Hitchens, Nation, June 10, 2002). The crimes of 9-11 were appalling enough, but plainly did not have such consequences. Kamm claims that I provided no evidence to support the judgment that the US was bombing Afghanistan with the knowledge that it might lead to the death of millions of people. It takes real talent to miss the extensive evidence cited in the few pages I devoted to these matters. The citations include the New York Times report three weeks before the bombing that Washington "demanded [from Pakistan] the elimination of truck convoys that provide much of the food and other supplies to Afghanistan's civilian population," and the Times report that the numbers at risk of starvation were estimated to have risen by 50% a month later, to 7.5 million. Also cited are reports in the Times of the bitterness of fleeing aid workers who said that "The country was on a lifeline and we just cut the line" by threatening to bomb; the report by the UN World Food Program that the threat forced them to reduce food supplies to 15% of what was needed and later that the bombing itself caused them to terminate it entirely; warnings by major relief agencies of a likely "humanitarian crisis of epic proportions in Afghanistan with 7.5 million short of food and at risk of starvation"; and a great deal more. Also included was the urgent plea by 1000 Afghan leaders in late October to terminate the "bombing of innocent people" and to adopt other means to overthrow the hated Taliban regime, a goal they believed could be achieved without slaughter and destruction; and the denunciation of the bombing by one of the anti-Taliban leaders who was most respected by Washington and Hamid Karzai, Abdul Haq, who described the bombing as "a big setback" for efforts to overthrow the Taliban from within, carried out because Washington "is trying to show its muscle, score a victory and scare everyone in the world" but "don't care about the suffering of the Afghans or how many people we will lose." I could not include the later warnings by Harvard's leading Afghan specialist that the bombing was leaving "millions of Afghans...at grave risk of starvation" (International Security, Winter 2001-02), though I did later, as Kamm doubtless knows. Once again, much more instructive than the transparent falsification is Kamm's cold indifference to the reports he claims do not exist. Kamm next refers to my critique of some of the arguments offered to give a retrospective justification for the bombing of Kosovo, which, as anticipated, led to shocking atrocities. The critique was based on a simple and accurate reductio ad absurdum: exactly the same logic should have led those who advanced these arguments to call for the bombing of Washington. For Kamm, this "gives an indication of the destructiveness of Chomsky's advocacy," because I failed to consider that some reader might call for bombing of Washington - someone with brain damage so severe as to be unable to comprehend an elementary reductio, perhaps. To demonstrate further how my "political judgments have only become more startling over the past decade," Kamm cites my statement that the situation in Bosnia is "not so simple." For Kamm, it must be simple, contrary to mainstream scholarship; by doctrinal necessity, apparently. I deteriorated further as a "prophet of the amoral quietism of the Major government," in Kamm's rendition, by "depicting Milosevic's regime as a wronged party": namely, by documenting the fact that NATO "moved at once to violate" the agreements it had signed to end the Kosovo conflict. He again wisely avoids argument, knowing that what he quotes is fully accurate. Another illustration he gives of my "dubious arguments leavened with extravagant rhetoric" is my correct statement that Bush's "pretenses for the invasion [of Iraq] are no more convincing than Hitler's." He does not try to refute the statement, but rather offers it to show that I "liken America's conduct to that of Nazi Germany" and that my "judgment of the US" is that it is comparable to Nazi Germany, a "diagnosis [that is] central to Chomsky's political output." The inference is too ridiculous for comment, and he does not tell us of his objection to the actual, and radically different, statement. Proceeding further to demonstrate my "central" doctrine, Kamm misquotes my statement that "We have to ask ourselves whether what is needed in the United States is dissent - or denazification." The context, which he again omits, is a 1968 report in the New York Times of a protest against an exhibit at the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry where children could "enter a helicopter for simulating firing of a machine gun at targets" in Vietnam, with a light flashing when a hit was scored on a hut -- "even though no people appear," revealing the extremism of the protestors. This was a year after the warning by the highly respected military historian and Vietnam specialist Bernard Fall that "Vietnam as a cultural and historic entity...is threatened with extinction ...[as]... the countryside literally dies under the blows of the largest military machine ever unleashed on an area of this size."
Apart from misquoting and omitting the crucial context, Kamm also fails to tell us how one should react to this performance, apart from his own standard reaction of tacit acquiescence to horrendous crimes and his dedicated efforts, failing with impressive consistency, to find something to criticize in the efforts to terminate state crimes for which he and I share responsibility, particularly so in a free society, where we cannot plead fear in extenuation for silent complicity.
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 Who Needs A Camel? By Uri Avnery A drunkard blacks out. His companions pour cold water on him. The drunk opens one eye, licks the water and says: "I don't know what that is, but it won't sell!" I was reminded of this when I read the draft of the Labor Party's political program, which has just been presented by a committee of experts. It has been said that a camel is a horse drafted by a committee. Leaving aside the insult to the humped animal (in Arabic, the words for camel and beauty are closely related) we can say that committees, by their very nature, are not creative bodies. There is no need to believe in God, and not even "intelligent design", to know that no committee could draft a noble Arab horse. The political program that Amir Peretz is being asked to adopt is no horse, and even a camel it ain't. The committee to draft the horse is composed of several well-known personalities: Dave Kimche, a senior Mossad veteran; Uzi Baram, a former MK from the dovish wing of Labor; Yuli Tamir, who was a member of Peace Now long ago; Avi Primor and Alon Pinkas, former Foreign Office officials. Dalia Rabin is also a member, perhaps on the assumption that being the daughter of Yitzhak Rabin confers some kind of expertise. He who appoints a committee generally knows what its conclusion will be. This committee is composed of moderate doves, something called in up-to-date political jargon "center left". Not too radical, God forbid. And nor is its political program. The committee affirms that a Palestinian state must be set up - and that's good. It comes out against further interim agreements and also against the idea of a "provisional Palestinian state" - two ideas much favored by Ariel Sharon and included in the inane "Road Map" - and that's good, too. It also demands a time-table for the conclusion of the negotiations. But then comes a shocking sentence: "Only if the negotiations fail, will unilateral steps be considered, as a means of last resort." What do these words say? They turn the whole paragraph into an ultimatum. Either you accept our offer, or we shall realize it unilaterally. Of course, only as a last resort. But we shall decide when the time for the last resort has come. In simple words: the committee kicks Sharon's "unilateral steps" out of the front door, only to let them in through the back door. Christians who believe in the devil know that one of his feet is a horse's hoof. Generally the devil succeeds in hiding it, but from time to time it slips out under his cape. The "last resort" is the hoof of Satan. Moreover, the committee states that the negotiations will be held with the "elected Palestinian leadership". Nice and proper. But the committee is not satisfied with this. It also takes the opportunity to tell the Palestinians who they must elect, by adding the words "while rejecting any negotiations with Hamas". And what if the Palestinians insist on electing Hamas, of all parties, and Hamas constitutes the Palestinian leadership? In this case, will there be no negotiations, so that we turn at once to "unilateral steps" a la Sharon? This is clearly a silly approach. The rejection of Hamas is based on the organization's refusal to recognize the very existence of Israel and its call for its destruction. But if it is ready to enter into negotiations with the elected government of Israel in order to arrive at a permanent peace, it does already recognize it in practice. More than that, the Palestinian authority derives its status from the Oslo agreement, which is based on the official mutual recognition between the Government of Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization. When Hamas takes part in the Palestinian elections, its very participation constitutes effective recognition of Israel. All this reminds one of bygone days, when the Labor governments rejected any negotiations with the PLO, using the very same arguments. Have they learned nothing and forgotten nothing? Further: Jerusalem. Like Sharon, like Netanyahu, the program states that "Jerusalem is the united capital of the State of Israel". True, the committee does agree to re-examine the municipal map and exclude several villages and neighborhoods surrounding the city. This means, probably, villages like Abu-Dis and Azarieh, which never belonged to Jerusalem until their annexation after the Six-day war. Fine as far as it goes. But the program tacitly supports the annexation of all the Arab East Jerusalem neighborhoods, such as the Old City, the Temple Mount, Abu-Tur, Sheik Jerakh and much more. Altogether, it gives the Palestinians far less than the Clinton formula ("what is Jewish to the Israelis, what is Arab to the Palestinians"). The story is told that Napoleon once entered a German town and was not received with the customary 101 cannon salute. When the mayor was called to explain this insult, he produced a long list and started reading: "Number one, we have no cannons." Napoleon interrupted him: "That's enough. No need to read any further." This can also be said about a program that includes the annexation of East Jerusalem. No need for further paragraphs. No Palestinian - or Muslim - could agree - neither Fatah nor Hamas, neither today nor in a hundred years. One can turn at once to the "last resort". Leaving Jerusalem, we can move straight to Hong Kong. There, in the Chinese island, the committee found a truly original inspiration. Some 107 years ago, in the heyday of British imperialism, when China was down and out, the captains of the Empire wanted to take possession of Hong Kong, a Chinese island of great strategic value. For some reason, they did not want to annex it outright, preferring a gimmick. China was compelled to "rent" it out for 99 years, and it became a British crown colony. Now the program proposes a similar gimmick: the Palestinian Authority will rent the "settlement blocs" to Israel for 99 years, and Israel will pay the rent in money or territory (also rented for 99 years?) And what will Israel do in the rented areas? Cover it with settlements to the last centimeter. So what will it return in 99 years? It is hard to imagine a Palestinian who can distinguish between this idea and the annexation proposed by Sharon. Or a Palestinian who cares much what will happen in 99 years time. What are all these gimmicks for? I am not so nave as not to know the purpose of election platforms. They are there to attract votes and are forgotten the day after. But these particular tricks are no good even for this purpose. The committee obviously thinks that Peretz's real program would frighten the voters. So it submits a cut-down, laundered version, in the hope of appealing to people in the mythical center, who are now eyeing Sharon. It is also clear that the formulators wanted to stitch together a program that would enable the Labor Party in due course to enter into a coalition headed by Sharon. But that is a miscalculation. These elections are not a choice between programs, but a choice between three personalities: Sharon, Netanyahu and Peretz. Nobody cares much who is the candidate number 9 or 13 on the Labor, Likud or Kadima list. They will vote for a leader who looks to them like a man who can lead the state. In this respect, Sharon stands head and shoulders above the others. The Labor election campaign must convince the public that Amir Peretz is a leader who is consistent, sure of himself, and, more than anything else, who is not afraid at all, a Prime Minister who does not cave in, who knows what he wants, who has clear solutions for all the problems. A program that is shallow, wishy-washy and stitched together in patches will not convince anyone that Peretz is the man.
No point patching together a camel. The people want a knight on horseback.
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 Science Must Destroy Religion By Sam Harris Most people believe that the Creator of the universe wrote (or dictated) one of their books. Unfortunately, there are many books that pretend to divine authorship, and each makes incompatible claims about how we all must live. Despite the ecumenical efforts of many well-intentioned people, these irreconcilable religious commitments still inspire an appalling amount of human conflict. In response to this situation, most sensible people advocate something called "religious tolerance." While religious tolerance is surely better than religious war, tolerance is not without its liabilities. Our fear of provoking religious hatred has rendered us incapable of criticizing ideas that are now patently absurd and increasingly maladaptive. It has also obliged us to lie to ourselves - repeatedly and at the highest levels - about the compatibility between religious faith and scientific rationality. The conflict between religion and science is inherent and (very nearly) zero-sum. The success of science often comes at the expense of religious dogma; the maintenance of religious dogma always comes at the expense of science. It is time we conceded a basic fact of human discourse: either a person has good reasons for what he believes, or he does not. When a person has good reasons, his beliefs contribute to our growing understanding of the world. We need not distinguish between "hard" and "soft" science here, or between science and other evidence-based disciplines like history. There happen to be very good reasons to believe that the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941. Consequently, the idea that the Egyptians actually did it lacks credibility. Every sane human being recognizes that to rely merely upon "faith" to decide specific questions of historical fact would be both idiotic and grotesque - that is, until the conversation turns to the origin of books like the bible and the Koran, to the resurrection of Jesus, to Muhammad's conversation with the angel Gabriel, or to any of the other hallowed travesties that still crowd the altar of human ignorance. Science, in the broadest sense, includes all reasonable claims to knowledge about ourselves and the world. If there were good reasons to believe that Jesus was born of a virgin, or that Muhammad flew to heaven on a winged horse, these beliefs would necessarily form part of our rational description of the universe. Faith is nothing more than the license that religious people give one another to believe such propositions when reasons fail. The difference between science and religion is the difference between a willingness to dispassionately consider new evidence and new arguments, and a passionate unwillingness to do so. The distinction could not be more obvious, or more consequential, and yet it is everywhere elided, even in the ivory tower. Religion is fast growing incompatible with the emergence of a global, civil society. Religious faith - faith that there is a God who cares what name he is called, that one of our books is infallible, that Jesus is coming back to earth to judge the living and the dead, that Muslim martyrs go straight to Paradise, etc. - is on the wrong side of an escalating war of ideas. The difference between science and religion is the difference between a genuine openness to fruits of human inquiry in the 21st century, and a premature closure to such inquiry as a matter of principle. I believe that the antagonism between reason and faith will only grow more pervasive and intractable in the coming years. Iron Age beliefs - about God, the soul, sin, free will, etc. - continue to impede medical research and distort public policy. The possibility that we could elect a U.S. President who takes biblical prophesy seriously is real and terrifying; the likelihood that we will one day confront Islamists armed with nuclear or biological weapons is also terrifying, and it is increasing by the day. We are doing very little, at the level of our intellectual discourse, to prevent such possibilities. In the spirit of religious tolerance, most scientists are keeping silent when they should be blasting the hideous fantasies of a prior age with all the facts at their disposal. To win this war of ideas, scientists and other rational people will need to find new ways of talking about ethics and spiritual experience. The distinction between science and religion is not a matter of excluding our ethical intuitions and non-ordinary states of consciousness from our conversation about the world; it is a matter of our being rigorous about what is reasonable to conclude on their basis. We must find ways of meeting our emotional needs that do not require the abject embrace of the preposterous. We must learn to invoke the power of ritual and to mark those transitions in every human life that demand profundity - birth, marriage, death, etc. - without lying to ourselves about the nature of reality.
I am hopeful that the necessary transformation in our thinking will come about as our scientific understanding of ourselves matures. When we find reliable ways to make human beings more loving, less fearful, and genuinely enraptured by the fact of our appearance in the cosmos, we will have no need for divisive religious myths. Only then will the practice of raising our children to believe that they are Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or Hindu be broadly recognized as the ludicrous obscenity that it is. And only then will we stand a chance of healing the deepest and most dangerous fractures in our world.
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Folks at the White House stay pretty busy these days just trying to untangle the lies George Bush keeps telling every time he opens his mouth. For example, back in April 2004, Bush explained to a cheering audience and an unchallenging press corps in Buffalo about "eavesdropping" on Americans -- "When you think 'Patriot Act,' constitutional guarantees are in place when it comes to doing what is necessary to protect our homeland, because," he said earnestly while leaning over the podium, his hand on his heart "--because we value the Constitution."
Bush? Value that (insert Lord's name in vain) piece of worthless paper? I think not. From his actions and manner of speech, it is doubtful that Bush has read either the US Constitution or the holy book upon which he placed his hand twice and swore to preserve, protect and defend it.
After the New York Times reported last week that Bush authorized the National Security Agency (NSA) to cast a wide net to spy on American citizens' e-mail and phone calls without seeking warrants from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court, Bush went on the offense, saying yeah, he did it, and he was gonna keep on doing it, cause he was the president and -- like he told Washington Post's Bob Woodward -- that means he doesn't have to explain to anybody why he does anything...
That apparently includes the FISA court, which has the audacity to require "probable cause" before approving wiretaps on American citizens. In Bush's defense, when you're huntin' and chasin' and smokin' out evil lurkers and plotters and planners, you don't have time to stop and fill out two or three million pieces of paper. Like Attorney General Alberto Gonzales says, the (insert Lord's name in vain) Constitution is a quaint little thing, but we live in a new world order now, and any constraints on "this president" are just too cumbersome.
In an October speech, Bush said, "Our country is at war, and the executive branch has an obligation to protect the 'Merican people. We are aggressively doing that. We are finding the terrorists and bringing them to justice," he said, pausing for effect, then added, "and anything we do is within the law..."
Vice President Dick Cheney agrees. He says they must have complete control and flexibility and unlimited power, even if this means they have to make up the law as they go along. While speeding home from the Middle East in time to break a Senate tie on a bill that raises Medicaid payments for the poor and elderly while, at the same time, allowing states to cut their Medicaid services, and cuts child-care payments for social bottom-feeders, Cheney snarled that there "is a hell of a threat" out there, and the president's authority under the (insert Lord's name in vain) Constitution must be "unimpaired."
Cheney says "the vast majority" of Americans support Bush spying on them, and warned that any "backlash" would not be against Bush, but against the critics who dared question Bush's illegal and quite possibly treasonous bits of derring-do. Cheney is adamant that he, er -- Bush -- is above any court and outside any law. Those who disagree can just go (insert word depicting doing sexual "wild thaing") themselves.
Besides, Cheney might have added, they've been doing it for four years -- collecting information on American citizens by tapping directly into the US telecommunication system's main arteries without first getting warrants -- and nobody seemed to care. According to the Times, these corporate behemoths supported and assisted the spying operation -- storing information on citizens' calling patterns and giving it to Bush since 9-11.
Got that, sports fans? Since 9-11. And the NSA is not the only one. According to Capital Hill Blue's Doug Thompson, the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security and "dozens of private contractors are spying on millions of Americans 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year."
It got so blatant that a former NSA agent who quit in disgust over use of the agency to spy on Americans, told Thompson, "We're no longer in the business of tracking our enemies. We're spying on everyday Americans."
And, when there's treason afoot, one can hardly leave out the vicious and wacky Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld. A couple of years ago, Rumsfeld had this great idea for not only spying on Americans, but building a profile on every citizen who travels, uses credit cards, talks on the telephone or works or plays on a computer.
He called his new toy the "Total Information Awareness" (TIA) Program, and put the disgraced Iran-Contra felon John Poindexter in charge of it. When a furious Congress killed the program, Rumsfeld said, "Fine. They can have the name." He then moved it to the Pentagon's covert "black bag" program, out of Congressional sight or oversight, and renamed it the "Terrorist Information Awareness" (TIA) system. Thompson says the program is "alive and well and collecting data in real time on Americans at a computer center located at 3801 Fairfax Drive in Arlington, Virginia."
It's difficult to gauge either the height of awareness or the depth of outrage of the American public because the corporate media steadfastly refuses to shed even a glimmer of light on the myriad of scandals this administration is hiding out there in plain sight.
The shock of 9-11 thrust the people of this country into a depressing twilight zone, a "loyalty-oath" atmosphere where they stumble around in the dark, afraid to speak -- afraid to think. Any anger they feel about the president of the United States committing an impeachable offense by covertly spying on them and openly admitting it will fade as the media psycho-flogs them into believing the criminal here is the whistleblower who shone the light on the illegal surveillance, not the traitor who broke the law.
The irony of Bush, the NSA and Gonzales whipping up a criminal investigation into who dared tell the public that they were breaking the law will be lost on far too many Americans. Those who do understand, yet choose to stand mute and hope for the best should weigh the loss of their civil liberties against the violence, murder, vicious lies, and especially the sheer animosity Bush feels toward all but the wealthiest Americans.
They should take a look at the backgrounds and goals of the beady-eyed war vultures who control Bush; who are urging him to destroy everything in his path -- not the least of which is the (insert Lord's name in vain) US Constitution. They should ask themselves what they would do if they woke up in the middle of the night to find an invader in their bedrooms, pawing through their personal belongings. Would they silently bow their heads, or would they turn on the light and scream bloody murder at the top of their lungs?
Truth doesn't just radiate light -- it IS light. If Americans would raise their heads and look around, they would see there are flashes of light everywhere -- especially on the Internet.
Americans have come to a fork in the road and, like the great philosopher Yogi Berra once said, they need to take it. They need to go to the light.
Then, those (insert Lord's name in vain) (insert word depicting one born out of wedlock) will get what they so richly deserve.
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The owners of corporations are the shareholders - those people who have bought the company's stock. But ownership in the corporate model buys you no democratic control. Take the board of directors, which is the official governing body of the corporation you "own." As a shareholder, you get to vote for the board members - but the ballot gives you no choices!
Only the candidates hand-picked by the CEO are listed. Your only option is vote for or against the corporate-dictated candidate. But - get this - even if you and 99.9 percent of the other shareholders get together and vote against the CEOs choice, the corporate candidate still wins, assuming the candidate is smart enough to vote for himself (and, by the way, they're nearly always men). Under the self-rigged corporate rules, it just takes only a single vote to elect the chosen candidate.
As if this soviet-style electoral system does not give corporate executives enough control over owners, CEOs are now taking extraordinary steps to assure that they get no interference from pesky shareholders. It seems that more and more of these shareholders/owners have been showing up at the annual board meeting to raise issues and even raise a ruckus about how the place is being run. So, to fend off even this minimal democratic intrusion, corporations have begun hiring surveillance firms to snoop on their own owners, targeting shareholders who might "cause trouble." Of course, the corporate interpretation of "trouble" is to have anyone dissent from what the top executives are doing.
This is Jim Hightower saying... On second thought, this sounds exactly like the kind of government Bush has in mind for us.
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NEW YORK--It was 1982. I was 18 and snotty and wanted to see the world. And so, a few days after a brief chat with an army recruiter operating out of a strip mall on Stroop Road across from my local soon-to-be-closed municipal swimming pool, I rode the bus to downtown Dayton to take the Armed Forces Qualifying Test.
The AFQT was ridiculously easy. The math, I remember, was at about a fifth-grade level. My biggest challenge was remembering material that I'd digested years earlier. But the guys around me--they were all guys--were visibly struggling, sighing and staring vacantly at the acoustical tiles suspended from the ceiling. My mom's phone rang a few days later. It was my recruiter.
"I've got to tell you, we haven't seen scores like this in years," he said. "We can offer you an amazing career." If my fellow test-takers reflected the typical military applicant pool, I wasn't surprised these recruiters were impressed. Compared to some of the idiots I'd sat next to downtown, I must have seemed like a perfect cross between Einstein and Eisenhower.
"We can guarantee you a fast-track to full officer," the recruiter promised. "We'll station you anywhere you want. You can write your own ticket."
"What about this text in the enlistment agreement, where you say you can send me anywhere?"
"Oh, that's just technical. Nothing to worry about."
Uh-huh. He may have been lying about my "unprecedented" test scores, but I knew they'd send me to whichever unappealing war zone most suited their needs.
Still, I was flattered by their interest in me. I'd just finished a grueling freshman year at Columbia, where I was one of the dumbest students in most of my engineering classes. After having been ranked first in calculus during high school, it was a brutal fall from grace. The Army might be my chance to shine--a world where many of my peers were likely to be, well, stupid. Why keep working my ass off for a "C-" in thermodynamics because some brilliant Asian guy messed up the grade curve? Big fish, small pond, you know.
I asked the recruiter for a few days to think things through. Soon his higher-ranking colleague, in charge of finding cannon fodder for the entire state, took over his campaign of harassment. "We can offer you $5,000 for college when your first tour is over," he said. "But Columbia costs $13,000." He didn't have much to say about that.
Then I had a dream, perhaps inspired by some movie I'd since forgotten, placing me under a driving rain, obviously at boot camp, being ordered by a sergeant to perform an absurd number of push-ups. I hate push-ups. Finally, in cliched form, I suggested that he have sex with himself. The scene flashed forward to my court-martial for insubordination. When I awoke I knew that I wasn't suited for military life. I had always chafed under discipline, even when it was meted out by someone I respected. My response could prove disastrous were I to find myself ordered around by the wrong person.
As I write this now, at 42, I'm a different person. I know I could handle the same Army I shunned at 18. I've tolerated idiotic bosses and uncomfortable living arrangements and I understand that hierarchy is required to maintain a cohesive organization. I'm in better physical condition than I've ever been. I know when to keep my mouth shut.
Moreover, I know now that wars are fought for economic reasons. I'm aware that the military exists to open and protect markets for big corporations and to conquer and control regions with energy resources and conduits thereto. The United States, instead of promoting democracy, is the single greatest enemy of democracy and self-determination in the world, repeatedly supporting dictators and overthrowing elected regimes. And I know that wars kill. I've watched war transform sentient human beings into boxes of freight. If I enlisted now, I'd go with my eyes wide open, without risk of "Born on the Fourth of July"-style disillusionment.
But I'm smarter now because I'm 42. Eighteen-year-olds have no business entering the military.
On January 2 the New York Times profiled Katherine Jordan, an 18-year-old Army recruit from rural Kansas who, when she'd enlisted a year before, had doubted the war would continue. Now she was preparing to ship off to fight in Iraq. Reading her comments emptied a pit in my stomach. "I don't know the facts [about the war in Iraq] as much as I should," said Private Jordan. "What I know is that we're protecting our country still. We're concentrating on keeping insurgents away from the United States."
I thought of my flirtation with the Army when I was her age. As a history buff I was better versed than Jordan about the nature of resistance movements. I was old enough to remember the old arguments about Vietnam, how we needed to fight "them" over "there" in order to keep them from coming here, and that those supposed dangers never materialized after the fall of Hanoi. But I hardly knew anything about Middle Eastern history, Arabic culture, or Islam.
I was less naive than Katherine Jordan but I didn't know enough to make an intelligent decision about whether or not the war against Iraq was justified, much less whether it was worth risking my life. I was a pretty smart 18-year-old. Which means nothing.
Most 18-year-olds have lived their entire lives in the same community. Few have traveled abroad, held a full-time job or been forced by experience to understand that death means that you're really gone forever and you're never coming back and your body rots away and everyone stops talking about you. Fewer still comprehend that wars that are pumped up as glorious soon turn sour, that people come home without arms and legs, that veterans are forgotten and disposable and frequently sleep outside.
Congress agrees that 18-year-olds aren't mature enough to drink alcohol. Rental car agencies refuse to lease automobiles to 24-year-olds. Surely military service, in which a citizen may be ordered to blast people to bits with heavy ordnance, requires more maturity than consuming a Miller Lite or piloting a Ford Focus down an Interstate highway. Conversely, soldiers take extraordinary risks. They should possess sufficient life experience to understand and accept those risks before being permitted to undertake them.
Congress ought to raise the minimum age of military service to at least 30. Not only do older recruits make better soldiers--ask any officer--they'll be more realistic veterans after the fighting ends.
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 Abramoff's Crimes Are Indicative Of Deeper Cesspool By Robert Scheer January 4, 2005 - Top Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff is set to sing, and his long list of former buddies in Congress and the Bush Administration are quaking in anticipation of possible indictments stemming from the consummate Beltway hustler's crass reign as the king of K Street. "Casino Jack," a former head of the College Republicans and a "Pioneer"-grade fundraiser for the Bush 2000 campaign, pleaded guilty to three felony counts of conspiracy, mail fraud and tax evasion in D.C. yesterday and is set to appear in Florida today to plead guilty to fraud and conspiracy on separate charges. Abramoff and other defendants also must repay over $25 million to defrauded clients and $1.7 million to the IRS. But most important for the nation is that Abramoff is now detailing the massive web of corruption he spun inside the Beltway which has already snared a top Bush official, procurement chief David H. Safavian, on charges of lying and obstructing a criminal investigation, and reportedly threatens dozens of other D.C. players. "When this is all over, this will be bigger than any [government scandal] in the last 50 years, both in the amount of people involved and the breadth to it," Stan Brand, a former U.S. House counsel who specializes in representing public officials accused of wrongdoing, told Bloomberg News. "It will include high-ranking members of Congress and executive branch officials." Some of the Wild West feel of this Beltway corruption was captured in Saturday's Washington Post expose, "The DeLay-Abramoff Money Trail." It documents in chilling detail how, among other scams, Abramoff funneled a portion of the millions he had been skimming from Indian casino operators with a cool million from two Russian energy moguls through a shell organization called the U.S. Family Network - and from there into the coffers of politicians in a position to help his clients. Ironically touting its commitment to "moral fitness" for the nation, the front group with the multi-million dollar budget had a single staff member housed in the backroom of a capital townhouse it owned and rented out to other organizations linked to Abramoff and Tom DeLay - the latter's staffers called it, ominously, DeLay(tm)s "safe house." This is apparently why DeLay felt the need to tout the U.S. Family Network in a 1999 fundraising letter as "a powerful nationwide organization dedicated to restoring our government to citizen control." It was run by Edwin A. Buckham, DeLay's former chief of staff, whose lobbying firm, the Alexander Strategy Group, carried Delay's wife Christine on its payroll. But the moral "fitness" of such cronyism pales in comparison to the scandal of how Abramoff drummed up support for his varied clients under the cover of conservative morality. For example, in order to block the ambitions of a rival tribe to the Choctaw Indians who had paid Abramoff millions, the U.S. Family Network sent a mailing to Alabama residents warning shrilly that, "The American family is under attack from all sides: crime, drugs, pornography, and one of the least talked about but equally as destructive - gambling. We need your help today to prevent the Poarch Creek Indians from building casinos in Alabama." The letter conveniently failed to mention, however, that the U.S. Family Network had received at least $250,000 from the gambling proceeds of the Choctaws. In another scam detailed in the Post story (which could be quickly optioned by Hollywood for a thriller), players in the mafia-dominated Russian energy industry slid a cool $1 million payment through a now-defunct London law firm into the U.S. Family Network's account - which was, de facto, a slush fund for the Abramoff-DeLay network. Citing the Rev. Christopher Geeslin, who served as a titular leader of the U.S. Family Network, the Post reported that Buckham told the reverend the payment was intended to secure Delay's support on legislation forcing the International Monetary Fund to bail out the faltering Russian economy without demanding the country raise taxes on its energy and other profitable industries. Right on cue, DeLay found his way onto Fox News Sunday to take up the Russian's viewpoint: "They are trying to force Russia to raise taxes at a time when they ought to be cutting taxes in order to get a loan from the IMF," he said. "That's just outrageous." The IMF backed down.
This is just an initial peek into the sordid world being revealed by Abramoff and two of his key cronies now spilling the beans to federal investigators. But in the bigger picture, what we are witnessing is the death throes of the GOP "revolution" which once promised to restore morality to Washington but instead sank far deeper into the cesspool of corruption.
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 Capitals Punishment By Frank Scott We begin the year with war, its death and financial tolls soaring, and whispers of Democratic disagreement rising to a crescendo of murmurs. When one called for immediate troop withdrawal, party leaders explained why we must continue the bloodbath, but in a more liberal way. And that's the good news. A massive power surge couldnt help brighten the dim bulbs in our administration. The only thing protecting a disgraced president from impeachment is an equally disgraced opposition. The increasing paranoia of leadership and its weakening grip on reality are causing serious problems for collective sanity. During the holiday shopping orgy, some complained that the real meaning of Christmas was forgotten, whatever it is. Parishioners of faith celebrate the birth of a divine savior for humanity, while ministers of mammon celebrate the birth of massive profits for capital. These two groups usually agree, since they evolve from similar messianic myths of the market; they stash their cash in the same cathedrals of the faith: banks. But with secular and religious cults adrift on capitals precarious sea of debt, social conflicts are increasing. If our loony leader claims he's saving the Titanic, shouldn't we be cheering as it sinks? Can we expect less than idiocy, given an opposition that sees neither a ship nor an iceberg? The belated call for an exit strategy from Iraq - weasel words for get the hell out - has revived Viet Nam era language; if we cut and run , as draft dodging politicians say, our troops will have died for nothing. So we must stay and have more troops die for, um, something. Many Americans and most Iraqis want us out, but that means little to the petro-zionist cabal enjoying this biblical blood bath. They advocate another Viet Nam era strategy; changing the color of the bodies with an air war, so our troops can return while we continue murdering from the skies. That's what Christmas really meant, and what the new year will mean, under the control of forces that punish reason as the practice of terrorist traitors and holocaust deniers, so labeled by zealots who have made that bloody event holier than Christmas, and less subject to criticism. Opposition to the Iraq slaughter grows among the previously comatose in our media, but a global majority has long known this was even worse than ordinary wars. While picking on helpless nations is nothing new, this particular savagery is Americas most horrifically stupid, in an area where we were already intensely disliked. Now, we have increased the size of an international volunteer army, united in hatred for the USA. Brilliant. Our regime denies that it torture its victims; it only kills them. It claims bringing democracy to iraq, as its blundering stupidity creates a theocracy. And it tries an alleged war criminal in a court that would make a lynch mob blush, and will more likely raise Saddam to heroic stature. Can we believe anything these people tell us? No. The American political scene is approaching the conditions of a mental health crisis center, its subjects babbling in tongues and communicating with imaginary beings. Disregarding reality can seem a sensible defensive response on the part of the citizenry, but theres no escaping a situation edging closer to mass lunacy. The criminally treacherous war policies relied on the word of hustlers and psychotics, whose tales of terror moved a cowardly congress to support this crusade for God, Petroleum and Israel, not necessarily in that order. Anyone offering nightmarish nonsense about Saddams schemes was believed, and why not? These people accept biblical prophesies that should terrify us if we think about them, which is probably why we don't. But wed better. The intense contempt and disrespect shown among believers in equally irrational explanations for reality is part of the growing paranoia of established power in its newly threatened position. Spying on domestic activists is accompanied by an international assault on speech or thought which contradicts established belief systems about the natural, or more often, super natural world. Its no wonder that so many people behave erratically, given an environment that defies reason. To counter the rule of these fanatic thought police, people who respect others whatever their spiritual faith might be, and who believe in freedom for all viewpoints,urgently need to assert themselves. Belief in a market, controlled by an invisible hand which frees individuals to compete equally despite their material inequality, is no more based on science than is faith in a universe created and controlled by an invisible man who benefits only some, at the expense of all others. There is a serious problem when verifiable facts about the origins of our social problems and their affect on humanity are disregarded, while unverifiable fiction about the origins of the universe and its allegedly most important people are regarded as divine truth. We should respect belief systems that preach human equality, but reject fanatic faiths that teach divisive doctrines of superiority that turn us against one another.
The sincerely deviate who maintain control by employing the cynically
devout are only part of the problem. It is the system which breeds them
that is inflicting capitals punishment on the earth and all its
people.
Whether in Iraq, Palestine or New Orleans , we suffer under individual
fanatics because we allow their irrational system to govern our
societies. Under the global domain of capital, we share the same
material fate, no matter what immaterial faith we may embrace. And it
will be disastrous, unless we create a material expression of our
beliefs that is respectful to all humanity. That is impossible under
the
present system, no matter which fundamentalist or fanatic occupies its
highest offices. |
 Elusive Truth Behind The Hariri Hit By Robert Parry The conventional wisdom solidifying around the Feb. 14, 2005, assassination of Lebanon's former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri is that Syrian intelligence agencies did it. But the sad reality is that the chief United Nations investigator so rushed to judgment that the truth may now be lost forever in a maze of geopolitics. Chief U.N. investigator Detlev Mehlis is withdrawing from the investigation, but not before submitting a second report on Dec. 10, 2005, that sought to salvage the tattered reputation of his earlier report that had relied heavily on two dubious witnesses to implicate senior officials of the Syrian government. One of those witnesses - Zuhair Zuhair Ibn Muhammad Said Saddik - was later identified by the German newsmagazine Der Spiegel as a swindler who boasted about becoming "a millionaire" from his Hariri testimony. The other, Hussam Taher Hussam, recanted his testimony about Syrian involvement, saying he lied to the Mehlis investigation after being kidnapped, tortured and offered $1.3 million by Lebanese officials. In his follow-up report, Mehlis countered by asserting that Hussam's recantation was coerced by Syrian authorities who allegedly threatened Hussam's family. But the conflicting accusations already had given the investigation the feel of "a fictional spy thriller," as the New York Times noted. [NYT, Dec. 7, 2005] Political Agendas The pursuit of truth has been further confused by the various political agendas swirling around the case. The Bush administration has sought to use the Hariri investigation to press for regime change in Syria; anti-Syrian Lebanese politicians have seized on the report to isolate Syrian sympathizers in Lebanon; and Syrian leaders have complained that they're being framed both by internal and external enemies who want to destabilize the government. There is also the complex question of motive. Hariri, a wealthy businessman with close ties to the Saudi monarchy, had many enemies who might have wanted him dead, either for his business or his political dealings. After the Feb. 14 attack, a videotape was delivered to al-Jazeera television on which a Lebanese youth, Ahmad Abu Adass, claimed to have carried out the suicide bombing. According to the video, Hariri was targeted by Islamic militants because of his work as "the agent of the infidels" in Saudi Arabia. The first U.N. report relied on the two now-discredited witnesses - Saddik and Hussam - to dismiss the videotape as part of a disinformation campaign designed to deflect suspicion from Syria. But it is true that Hariri offended Syrian authorities by opposing the continued tenure of Lebanon's pro-Syrian president. Syria's former Vice President Abdul-Halim Khaddam said Syrian President Bashar Assad had an angry confrontation with Hariri several months before the assassination, though Khaddam - now in exile - stopped short of implicating Assad in Hariri's murder. [NYT, Jan. 3, 2006] Forensic Progress Amid the fog of the region's convoluted geopolitics, one of the few bright spots in the Hariri probe has been progress in the forensic investigation - particularly the mystery of the white Mitsubishi Canter Van that was seen on a security camera rolling toward Hariri's motorcade immediately before the explosion. The first U.N. report described the van as the vehicle that delivered the bomb. Investigators even identified the precise vehicle from numbers found in the debris, including a piece of the engine block. The investigation learned that the van had been stolen in Japan four months earlier, but the report showed little effort to investigate who might have stolen the vehicle and how it got from Japan to Lebanon. After the first report was released in October, I wrote an article suggesting that possibly the most promising hope for cracking the case was to pursue more aggressively the forensic leads, particularly who last possessed the van. [See Consortiumnews.com's "The Dangerously Incomplete Hariri Report."] The second U.N. report does reveal some progress on this front. Japanese police have concluded that the van likely was shipped, either in whole or in parts, to the United Arab Emirates, a Persian Gulf state known as a center for contraband in the Arab world. U.N. investigators also have sought help from "UAE authorities to trace the movements of this vehicle, including reviewing shipping documents from the UAE and, with the assistance of the UAE authorities, attempting to locate and interview the consignees of the container in which the vehicle or its parts is believed to have been shipped," the report said. On the Lebanon end, however, security officials said they had no record of the identification numbers from the van's engine or chassis on any vehicle registered in Lebanon. So it may be hard - or even impossible - to determine who took possession of the vehicle after it left the UAE and then presumably passed by ship through the Suez Canal to a port on the Mediterranean Sea. But it clearly would help the investigation to know where the vehicle landed and who picked it up. "This line of enquiry remains in its early stages," the report said. As the U.N. probe grinds on and a new investigator is chosen to replace Mehlis, the press attention will likely remain focused on the pressure brought to bear on Syrian authorities to get them to cooperate more fully.
But the forensic evidence - both following the van's trail and possibly tracking the source of the explosives - could offer the best hope of finally learning the truth and possibly bringing Hariri's killers to justice.
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 Journalists Should Expose Secrets, Not Keep Them By Norman Solomon Journalists should be in the business of providing timely information to the public. But some -- notably at the top rungs of the profession -- have become players in the power games of the nation's capital. And more than a few seem glad to imitate the officeholders who want to decide what the public shouldn't know. When the New York Times front page broke the story of the National Security Agency's domestic spying, the newspaper's editors had good reason to feel proud. Or so it seemed. But there was a troubling backstory: The Times had kept the scoop under wraps for a long time. The White House did what it could -- including, as a last-ditch move, an early December presidential meeting that brought Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger and executive editor Bill Keller to the Oval Office -- in its efforts to persuade the Times not to report the story. The good news is that those efforts ultimately failed. The bad news is that they were successful for more than a year. "The decision to hold the story last year was mine," Keller said, according to a Washington Post article that appeared 10 days after the Times' blockbuster Dec. 16 story. He added: "The decision to run the story last week was mine. I'm comfortable with both decisions. Beyond that, there's just no way to have a full discussion of the internal procedural twists that media writers find so fascinating without talking about what we knew, when, and how -- and that I can't do." From all indications, the Times had the basic story in hand before the election in November 2004, when Bush defeated challenger John Kerry. In other words, if those running the New York Times had behaved like journalists instead of political players -- if they had exposed this momentous secret instead of keeping it -- there are good reasons to believe the outcome of the presidential election might have been different. Chiseled into the stone facades of some courthouses is the credo "Justice delayed is justice denied." The same might be said of journalism, which derives much of its power from timeliness. When egregiously delayed, journalism is denied -- or at least severely diminished. Yet quite a few prominent journalists have expressed a strange kind of media solidarity with the Times delay of the NSA story for so long. Consider how the Washington Post intelligence reporter Dana Priest, for instance, responded to a request for "your opinion on the NY Times holding the domestic spying story for a year," during a Dec. 22 online chat. "Well, first: I don't have a clue why they did so," Priest replied. "But I would give them the benefit of the doubt that it was for a good reason and, as their story said, they do more reporting within that year to satisfy themselves about certain things. Having read the story and the follow-ups, it's unclear why this would damage a valuable capability. Again, if the government doesn't think the bad guys believe their phones are tapped, they underestimate the enemy!" Also opting to "give them the benefit of the doubt," some usually insightful media critics have gone out of their way to voice support for the Times news management. Deferring to the judgment of the executive editor of the New York Times may be akin to deferring to the judgment of the chief executive of the United States government. And as it happens, in this case, the avowed foreign policy goals of each do not appear to be in fundamental conflict -- on the meaning of the Iraq war or the wisdom of enshrining a warfare state. Pretenses aside, the operative judgments from the New York Times executive editor go way beyond the purely journalistic. "So far, the passion to investigate the integrity of American intelligence-gathering belongs mostly to the doves, whose motives are subject to suspicion and who, in any case, do not set the agenda," Bill Keller wrote in an essay that appeared in the Times on June 14, 2003, shortly before he became executive editor. And Keller concluded: "The truth is that the information-gathering machine designed to guide our leaders in matters of war and peace shows signs of being corrupted. To my mind, this is a worrisome problem, but not because it invalidates the war we won. It is a problem because it weakens us for the wars we still face." (By the way, Keller's phrase "the war we won" referred to the Iraq war.) The story of the NSA's illicit domestic spying is not over. More holes are appearing in the Bush administration's damage-control claims. Media critics who affirm how important the story is -- but make excuses for the long delay in breaking it -- are part of a rationalizing process that has no end. "The domestic spying controversy is a story of immense importance," Sydney Schanberg writes in the current Village Voice. The long delay before the Times published this "story of immense importance" does not seem to bother him much. "The paper had held the story for a year at the administration's pleading but decided, after second thoughts and more reporting, that its importance required publication." Such wording should look at least a bit weird to journalistic eyes, but Schanberg doesn't muster any criticism, merely commenting: "From where I stand (I'm a Times alumnus), the paper should get credit for digging it out and publishing it." Professional loyalties can't explain the extent of such uncritical media criticism from journalists. Many, like Schanberg, want to concentrate on the villainy of the Bush administration -- as if it hasn't been aided and abetted by the New York Times' delay. Leading off his Dec. 24 column with a blast at George W. Bush for "asserting the divine right of presidents," the Los Angeles Times media critic Tim Rutten proceeded with an essay that came close to asserting the divine right of executive editors to hold back vital stories for a very long time. Dismissing substantive criticism as the work of "paranoids," Rutten gave only laurels to the sovereign: "The New York Times deserves thanks and admiration for the service it has done the nation." A cogent rebuttal to such testimonials came on Dec. 26 from Miami Herald columnist Edward Wasserman, who wrote: "One of the more durable fallacies of ethical thought in journalism is the notion that doing right means holding back, that wrong is averted by leaving things out, reporting less or reporting nothing. When in doubt, kill the quote, hold the story -- that's the ethical choice. But silence isn't innocent. It has consequences. In this case, it protected those within the government who believe that the law is a nuisance, that they don't have to play by the rules, by any rules, even their own." While many journalists seem eager to downplay the importance of the Times' refusal to publish what it knew without long delay, Wasserman offers clarity: "Didn't the delay do harm? We know that thousands of people were subject to governmental intrusion that officials thought couldn't be justified even under a highly permissive set of laws. We also know that because knowledge of this illegality was kept confined to a small circle of initiates, the political system's response was postponed more than a year, and its ability to correct a serious abuse of power was thwarted. I don't know what the Times' brass was thinking. Maybe they just lost their nerve. Maybe they didn't want to tangle with a fiercely combative White House right before an election. But I do believe that withholding accurate information of great public importance is the most serious action any news organization can take. The reproach -- 'You knew and you didn't tell us?' -- reflects a fundamental professional betrayal."
Perhaps in 2007 we will learn that the New York Times had an
explosive story about other ongoing government violations of civil
liberties or some other crucial issue, but held it until after the
November 2006 congressional elections. In that case, quite a few
media critics and other journalists could recycle their pieces about
giving the Times the benefit of the doubt and appreciating the
quality of the crucial story that finally appeared.
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 Question For Judge Alito: What About One Person One Vote? By Adam Cohen When Samuel Alito Jr. applied for a top job in the Reagan Justice Department, he explained what had attracted him to constitutional law as a college student. He was motivated, he said, "in large part by disagreement with Warren Court decisions, particularly in the areas of criminal procedure, the Establishment Clause, and reapportionment." The reapportionment cases that so upset young Mr. Alito were a series of landmark decisions that established a principle that is now a cornerstone of American democracy: one person one vote. There has been a lot of talk about the abortion views of Judge Alito, President Bush's Supreme Court nominee. But his views on the redistricting cases may be more important. Senator Joseph Biden Jr., the Delaware Democrat who will be one of those doing the questioning when confirmation hearings begin next week, said recently that Judge Alito's statements about one person one vote could do more to jeopardize his nomination than his statements about Roe v. Wade. Rejecting the one-person-one-vote principle is a radical position. If Judge Alito still holds this view today, he could lead the court to accept a very different vision of American democracy, one in which it would be far easier for powerful special interests to get a stranglehold on government. Even if Judge Alito has changed his position on the reapportionment cases, the fact that he was drawn to constitutional law because of his opposition to those rulings raises serious questions about his views on democracy and equality. The one-person-one-vote principle traces to the Supreme Court's 1962 decision in Baker v. Carr. At the time, legislative districts had wildly unequal numbers of people, and representatives from underpopulated rural districts controlled many state legislatures. In Maryland, 14 percent of the voters could elect a majority of the State Senate, and 25 percent could elect a majority of the State House. In Alabama, the county that includes Birmingham, which had 600,000 people, got the same number of state senators - one - as a county with barely 15,000 people. In Baker v. Carr, Tennessee voters challenged their state's unequal legislative districts, which had not been redrawn in 60 years. The Supreme Court had rejected a similar claim out of Illinois in 1946, saying it did not want to enter the "political thicket." But in 1962, the Warren court decided it had to enter the thicket to vindicate the rights of Tennesseans whose votes were being unfairly diluted. It ordered Tennessee's lines redrawn. Two years later, in Reynolds v. Sims, the court struck down Alabama's legislative districts. The Reynolds decision did what Baker had not: it established a clear mathematical standard. The court held that the equal protection clause required that "as nearly as is practicable one man's vote" must "be worth as much as another's." Baker v. Carr set off what a leading election law treatise calls "the reapportionment revolution." In nine months, lawsuits challenging district lines were filed in 34 states. They did not solve all the problems with legislative districting - the current court is still wrestling with partisan gerrymandering - but they made American democracy much fairer. As a Princeton undergraduate, Samuel Alito sided with Tennessee and Alabama in the reapportionment cases. What is unclear - and what senators will no doubt try to pin down - is whether he ever changed his mind. He cited his opposition to the reapportionment cases, apparently as a point of pride, in his application for the Reagan Justice Department job in 1985, when he was 35 years old and a midcareer lawyer. Baker and Reynolds seem so self-evidently correct today that it is hard to imagine that Judge Alito could still really oppose them. But there is a strong strand of antidemocratic thinking among far-right lawyers. Jay Bybee, who helped develop the Bush administration's pro-torture policy and is now a federal judge, has criticized the 17th Amendment, which requires that United States senators be elected by the people, instead of by state legislatures, as they once were. And an American Enterprise Institute scholar, writing in The Washington Times, recently defended Judge Alito by suggesting that Baker v. Carr was wrong. If Judge Alito was able to forge a conservative Supreme Court majority to overturn the reapportionment cases, the results would be disastrous. The next Tom DeLay-style redistricting in Texas could conceivably stuff most of the state's Democratic voters into two or three multimillion-person Congressional districts, while reserving the state's remaining 30 or so seats for Republicans. Small claques could control entire state governments - as they did until 1962. Whatever the chances of overturning the reapportionment cases, the Senate should ask Judge Alito what he so disliked about them. The idea that reapportionment is territory the court cannot enter was long ago rejected by the legal mainstream. Baker v. Carr and Reynolds v. Sims may have "activist" rulings, but for the most justifiable reason: to ensure that the democratic process is not rigged to thwart the will of the majority. Judge Alito has himself espoused more activist views, notably his legally dubious vote to overturn a Congressional ban on machine guns. One possibility is that Judge Alito, who was a member of an alumni group that opposed coeducation and affirmative action at Princeton, is at heart an elitist who believes the reapportionment cases simply made the country too democratic.
Judge Alito will most likely insist at his hearings that he feels bound by Baker v. Carr and Reynolds v. Sims. Even if he can be trusted, it will say a great deal about him if he supports one person one vote only because he believes that respect for precedent, or confirmation politics, requires it. Most Americans know, based on their innate sense of justice and the Constitution, why the pre-1960's way of electing legislators was not acceptable then and is not now. |
 Heil Bush, Dear bestechung mensch Abramoff, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your bribery of Con-gressmen and Sinators, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Copo-rat Goons," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at the "Fuhrer Bunker" formally 'The White House' on 03-15-2006. We salute you herr Abramoff, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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President Bush and his minions keep offering up "new and improved" (though already disproved) defenses for the NSA domestic spying operation.
David Sirota offers a terrific breakdown of the shifts from "it was legal" to "we needed to act faster" to "the paperwork was too hard."
Now we have a new White House strategy: straight-up lying.
(Here's what Holden had to say about it).
Of course, GOP loyalists have been quick to follow the administration's lead. In fact, over the holidays I ran into many prominent Republicans who dutifully mouthed the administration's talking points.
So, in case you, like me, run into Republicans in the course of your life -- or even if you only run into them on TV -- and feel the need for a quick response to set the record straight, here is a handy pocket guide.
Lie #1:
Trying to prove that he wasn't acting unilaterally and without oversight, the president has taken to claiming that the spy program was "constantly reviewed by Justice Department officials" -- making it sound to all the world that the initiative had received the law enforcement community's seal of approval.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
As the New York Times has reported, there was widespread concern about the legality of the program at the Justice department, with a number of high-ranking officials raising objections to it, including deputy attorney general James Comey, who refused to sign off on its continuation. Comey's refusal prompted Andy Card and Alberto Gonzales (in his role as White House counsel) to go to the bedside of then-Attorney General John Ashcroft, who was hospitalized for gallbladder surgery. But even Ashcroft had his doubts about the constitutionality of the program -- which tells you all you need to know about how dicey it really was.
Their concerns led the White House to add some restrictions to the program -- but these restrictions weren't actually very restrictive since they still allowed the NSA to listen in on whatever calls it wanted without having to get the specific approval of Justice Department officials.
So when Bush and company try to sell the idea that Justice was part of the no-warrant team, don't buy it. The program may have been "constantly reviewed" but it wasn't "approved."
Lie # 2:
Lie #2 is a companion to Lie #1's implication that everybody was on board with the spy program. It's the president's insistence that it was "reviewed by members of the United States Congress" and that it's "a program to which the Congress has been briefed."
Again, it sounds like the legislative branch was consulted and signed off on what the White House was doing. Again, not true.
Here are the facts: a very, very limited number of Senators and House members were briefed on the program -- with 14 of 535 senators and representatives receiving briefings over the last four years. What's more, those receiving these highly classified briefings were strictly prohibited from speaking about what they heard -- which kind of puts a crimp in one's ability to mount any opposition to the program. Former intelligence committee counsel Suzanne Spaulding offers chapter and verse on this "Congress has been briefed" smokescreen.
And getting briefed is a far, far, far cry from exerting oversight -- or even offering an opinion. As Tom Daschle puts it, "We were told we were being informed and not consulted."
Indeed, as Media Matters points out: "Of the seven Democratic lawmakers known to have been briefed by the program, three objected at the time and three more say they weren't given adequate information about the program." Jay Rockefeller put his objections into a letter to Dick Cheney, saying the program raised "profound oversight issues." Nancy Pelosi also put her concerns in writing. Bob Graham says his briefing left out any mention that the NSA would be listening in on calls of U.S. citizens. Even Jane Harman, the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, and a supporter of the program, told me over the weekend that she wants to introduce legislation to curb its excesses.
So much for the idea that Congress actually had a hand in this.
Lie #3:
Bush has repeatedly attempted to underplay the reach of the spy operation. "This is a limited program," he claimed recently , "designed to prevent attacks on the United States of America. And I repeat, limited. And it's limited to calls from outside the United States to calls within the United States."
Hogwash. First of all, it's not true that the program was "limited to calls from outside the U.S." Even the White House admits that the NSA listened in on calls initiated in the U.S. too.
Second, I don't know about you, but the fact that the NSA has eavesdropped on thousands of people doesn't strike me as "limited."
And how does that stat jibe with the president's claim that the warrantless wiretaps were "limited" to "known numbers of al Qaeda members or affiliates"? Are there really thousands of known al Qaeda members or affiliates in the U.S.?
Plus, the program allowed the NSA to tap into our telecommunication system's main arteries, creating what the New York Times termed "a large data-mining operation."
I guess it all depends on what your definition of "limited" is. And of "reviewed." And of "briefed." And of "lying through your teeth."
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The war against Iraq, the assault on its people, the occupation of its cities, will come to an end, sooner or later. The process has already begun. The first signs of mutiny are appearing in Congress. The first editorials calling for withdrawal from Iraq are beginning to appear in the press. The anti-war movement has been growing, slowly but persistently, all over the country.
Public opinion polls now show the country decisively against the war and the Bush Administration. The harsh realities have become visible. The troops will have to come home.
And while we work with increased determination to make this happen, should we not think beyond this war? Should we begin to think, even before this shameful war is over, about ending our addiction to massive violence and instead using the enormous wealth of our country for human needs? That is, should we begin to speak about ending war-not just this war or that war, but war itself? Perhaps the time has come to bring an end to war, and turn the human race onto a path of health and healing.
A group of internationally known figures, celebrated both for their talent and their dedication to human rights (Gino Strada, Paul Farmer, Kurt Vonnegut, Nadine Gordimer, Eduardo Galeano, and others), will soon launch a worldwide campaign to enlist tens of millions of people in a movement for the renunciation of war, hoping to reach the point where governments, facing popular resistance, will find it difficult or impossible to wage war.
There is a persistent argument against such a possibility, which I have heard from people on all parts of the political spectrum: We will never do away with war because it comes out of human nature. The most compelling counter to that claim is in history: We don't find people spontaneously rushing to make war on others. What we find, rather, is that governments must make the most strenuous efforts to mobilize populations for war. They must entice soldiers with promises of money, education, must hold out to young people whose chances in life look very poor that here is an opportunity to attain respect and status. And if those enticements don't work, governments must use coercion: They must conscript young people, force them into military service, threaten them with prison if they do not comply.
Furthermore, the government must persuade young people and their families that though the soldier may die, though he or she may lose arms or legs, or become blind, that it is all for a noble cause, for God, for country.
When you look at the endless series of wars of this century you do not find a public demanding war, but rather resisting it, until citizens are bombarded with exhortations that appeal, not to a killer instinct, but to a desire to do good, to spread democracy or liberty or overthrow a tyrant.
Woodrow Wilson found a citizenry so reluctant to enter the First World War that he had to pummel the nation with propaganda and imprison dissenters in order to get the country to join the butchery going on in Europe.
In the Second World War, there was indeed a strong moral imperative, which still resonates among most people in this country and which maintains the reputation of World War II as "the good war." There was a need to defeat the monstrosity of fascism. It was that belief that drove me to enlist in the Air Force and fly bombing missions over Europe.
Only after the war did I begin to question the purity of the moral crusade. Dropping bombs from five miles high, I had seen no human beings, heard no screams, seen no children dismembered. But now I had to think about Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the firebombings of Tokyo and Dresden, the deaths of 600,000 civilians in Japan, and a similar number in Germany.
I came to a conclusion about the psychology of myself and other warriors: Once we decided, at the start, that our side was the good side and the other side was evil, once we had made that simple and simplistic calculation, we did not have to think anymore. Then we could commit unspeakable crimes and it was all right.
I began to think about the motives of the Western powers and Stalinist Russia and wondered if they cared as much about fascism as about retaining their own empires, their own power, and if that was why they had military priorities higher than bombing the rail lines leading to Auschwitz. Six million Jews were killed in the death camps (allowed to be killed?). Only 60,000 were saved by the war-1 percent.
A gunner on another crew, a reader of history with whom I had become friends, said to me one day: "You know this is an imperialist war. The fascists are evil. But our side is not much better." I could not accept his statement at the time, but it stuck with me.
War, I decided, creates, insidiously, a common morality for all sides. It poisons everyone who is engaged in it, however different they are in many ways, turns them into killers and torturers, as we are seeing now. It pretends to be concerned with toppling tyrants, and may in fact do so, but the people it kills are the victims of the tyrants. It appears to cleanse the world of evil, but that does not last, because its very nature spawns more evil. Wars, like violence in general, I concluded, is a drug. It gives a quick high, the thrill of victory, but that wears off and then comes despair.
I acknowledge the possibility of humanitarian intervention to prevent atrocities, as in Rwanda. But war, defined as the indiscriminate killing of large numbers of people, must be resisted.
Whatever can be said about World War II, understanding its complexity, the situations that followed-Korea, Vietnam-were so far from the kind of threat that Germany and Japan had posed to the world that those wars could be justified only by drawing on the glow of "the good war." A hysteria about communism led to McCarthyism at home and military interventions in Asia and Latin America-overt and covert-justified by a "Soviet threat" that was exaggerated just enough to mobilize the people for war.
Vietnam, however, proved to be a sobering experience, in which the American public, over a period of several years, began to see through the lies that had been told to justify all that bloodshed. The United States was forced to withdraw from Vietnam, and the world didn't come to an end. One half of one tiny country in Southeast Asia was now joined to its communist other half, and 58,000 American lives and millions of Vietnamese lives had been expended to prevent that. A majority of Americans had come to oppose that war, which had provoked the largest anti-war movement in the nation's history.
The war in Vietnam ended with a public fed up with war. I believe that the American people, once the fog of propaganda had dissipated, had come back to a more natural state. Public opinion polls showed that people in the United States were opposed to send troops anywhere in the world, for any reason.
The Establishment was alarmed. The government set out deliberately to overcome what it called "the Vietnam syndrome." Opposition to military interventions abroad was a sickness, to be cured. And so they would wean the American public away from its unhealthy attitude, by tighter control of information, by avoiding a draft, and by engaging in short, swift wars over weak opponents (Grenada, Panama, Iraq), which didn't give the public time to develop an anti-war movement.
I would argue that the end of the Vietnam War enabled the people of the United States to shake the "war syndrome," a disease not natural to the human body. But they could be infected once again, and September 11 gave the government that opportunity. Terrorism became the justification for war, but war is itself terrorism, breeding rage and hate, as we are seeing now.
The war in Iraq has revealed the hypocrisy of the "war on terrorism." And the government of the United States, indeed governments everywhere, are becoming exposed as untrustworthy: that is, not to be entrusted with the safety of human beings, or the safety of the planet, or the guarding of its air, its water, its natural wealth, or the curing of poverty and disease, or coping with the alarming growth of natural disasters that plague so many of the six billion people on Earth.
I don't believe that our government will be able to do once more what it did after Vietnam-prepare the population for still another plunge into violence and dishonor. It seems to me that when the war in Iraq ends, and the war syndrome heals, that there will be a great opportunity to make that healing permanent.
My hope is that the memory of death and disgrace will be so intense that the people of the United States will be able to listen to a message that the rest of the world, sobered by wars without end, can also understand: that war itself is the enemy of the human race.
Governments will resist this message. But their power is dependent on the obedience of the citizenry. When that is withdrawn, governments are helpless. We have seen this again and again in history.
The abolition of war has become not only desirable but absolutely necessary if the planet is to be saved. It is an idea whose time has come.
... Rex Babin ...  |
Place your message here!
There are voters in the street
Bush keeps mockin' the free world
I see Bush is on a flight
Bush keeps mockin' the free world
We got those tax cuts for the right
Bush keeps mockin' the free world 
2005 In Iraq:
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Parting Shots...
Dear Pastor, I go to a secular high school because my stupid unsaved parents don't have decent jobs and can't afford to send me to a Christian school. So if you will, please excuse my poor grammar, as I present a question to you. I was visiting a friends house (someone who I had been witnessing to for about 2-years) and we sat down in his living room to play some video games. He had one of those new Xbox 360's that everyone is talking about. Well, now I know why everyone is going so nuts over them, because they are freaking incredible! I told my friend that his Xbox was amazing, and he afforded the opportunity to mention to me (because he knew I was always trying to get him to go to church) that the Xbox 360 is cooler than Jesus! Needless to say, I was so offended that I kicked his Xbox across the room and then proceeded to smash it against a wall. It is pretty much broken now and he is really peeved (that means upset) about it. Well, now my stupid parents are involved and all kinds of crap. His mom and dad want my parents to pay for the game system, which they can't do - because they can't afford it. What the heck am I supposed to do? How can faithful Christian witnesses like me compete with something that every kid in the world already thinks is way cooler than Jesus?
William Thorncastle I've been faced with some tough questions in the past, son - but the solution to your dilemma is quite simple. Creation Scientists here at Landover Baptist Church have been studying the Xbox 360 for several months (before it was even released to the general public). It was found to be made of plastic and metal and filled with electronicalized gizmos that enable it to be connected to a television set. Somehow (and keep in mind, we're Creation Scientists here, son - not engineers) the device is able to accept discs which play videos and video games on television sets in vivid colors. My suggestion to you is to ask your unsaved classmate the following questions. Then he'll see just how "cool" his Xbox 360 really is, when compared to Jesus Christ.
1. Can the Xbox 360 turn water into wine? I'm sure your unsaved friend will think twice about comparing Jesus to his Xbox 360 after you present him with these questions. As soon as you see him even slightly contemplate his eternal security - rush in at that moment of vulnerability and present him with the plan of Salvation immediately! Get him to confess Christ as his Savior, throw him in the trunk of your parents' car and dump him off in front of your local Baptist Church. They'll take care of the rest. God Bless You, and Good luck!
Pastor Deacon Fred |
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In This Edition
Senator Edward M. Kennedy explores, "Alito's Credibility Problem."
Uri Avnery recalls, "A Napoleon, Made In Israel."
James Moore has been, "Branded."
Sheila Samples reminds us that, "You Can't Go Home Again..."
Greg Palast visits, "No Child's Behind Left: The Test."
Ted Rall says, "Domestic Terrorists Attack Freedom Of The Press."
Robert Scheer chastises the Rethuglicans for, "Betraying Reagan's Revolution."
Nat Parry with a must read, "Alito And The Point Of No Return."
Robert Parry remembers, "Death Of An American Hero."
Norman Solomon follows the, "Axis Of Fanatics -- Netanyahu And Ahmadinejad."
William Rivers Pitt warns of the, "Attack On Iran: A Looming Folly."
Arizona Secretary of State Jan Brewer wins the coveted "Vidkun Quisling Award!"
Molly Ivins reports, "Texas Governor Stoops To A New Low."
Arianna Huffington tells the strange twisted tale of, "Abramoff and Rohrabacher."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department the fabulous Betty Bowers returns to say a prayer for "Pat Robertson's Prayer Death Squad" but first Uncle Ernie explains, "The American Pathocracy."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Pat Bagley with additional cartoons from Tom Tomorrow, Micah Wright, Lisa Casey, Steve Bradenton, Ben Sargent, Tom Toles and Old American Century.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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The American Pathocracy By Ernest Stewart
Ordinarily he is insane, but he has lucid moments when he is only stupid.
As birds of a feather flock together so do ideologues and if turning over a rock produces Georgie than turning over several more rocks reveals the likes of Kindasleezzy, Cheney, Rummy and the rest of the PNAC crowd. Making America the worlds leading Pathocracy. For those of you not hip to the term Pathocracy it simply means a form of government run by Psychopaths. While the Junta has always been look upon as a theocracy with Bush telling the word that he rules by Divine right with such loonies as the Crisco Kid i.e. former Generalissimo Ashcroft a man who pours a bottle of Crisco oil over his head to anoint himself with every time he gains some more power and although this obviously points to their lunacy they have until recently avoided the obvious. In the new movie "W" (which I co-wrote a bit of) we learn that they're all aliens from outer space which I think you'll agree explains a lot about the Junta but the real reason that they are like they are is that they are to a man and a women nuts, totally f-cking insane! Literally over the edge and gone, each living in their own little bizarro worlds. Led by a man that hasn't a clue about reality having never had to face it, who was never taught right from wrong but only that might makes right. Anyone in power that has thought different was purged or shut up, remember those Anthrax letters, Plame etc.? Even Colon Powell the well know liar who's lies from covering up the Mai Lai massacre to lying in front of the UN propelled him from an unknown major with no career chances through a 4 star general and all the way to Secretary of State couldn't bring himself to cover for the Junta anymore and had to go like many other politicians and military officers who spoke up and then either quit or got fired. Like Bush who sells himself as perfect and who has never made a mistake so are Kindasleezy, Rummy, Cheney (Brownies doing a heck of a job) and the rest all perfect, all spinning machines and all religious nut jobs, each and every one. If this had just stayed in Washington it wouldn't be so bad but it's spread everywhere. A good example would be the Secretary of State of Arizona; Jan Brewer Rethuglican, who recently behind the backs of the people took the old voting machines out and replaced them with untraceable, paperless ones from Diebold. When the people found out about it and how their votes would no longer count they protested and they were all labeled "anarchists" and "conspiracy theorists" by the traitor Brewer. Therein lies the major problem that we are fighting. Even if we were to bring the entire "Crime Family Bush" to trial and then hang the lot of them that would just be a drop in the bucket. The fascists whether politicians or corpo-rat goons have been controlling America since before we were even America. So to take America back for the people means to over come 400 years of fascism which is a lot easier said than done! Which is the primary reason it still goes on and on. Like McCain's anti-torture legislation that Bush signed but won't obey means nothing if the Fuhrer can side step it whether legal to do so or not. Who is going to prosecute Bush, Al "the Torturer" Gonzales? Oh please... The laws only apply to you and me and the Sheeple, not to our leaders, especially if they're insane!
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LBJ IRT
LSD LBJ
FBI CIA
For it's a land unknown to man where fantasy is fact.
Wow man look at all the trails...
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We get by with a little help from our friends!
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And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
 Alito's Credibility Problem By Edward M. Kennedy Every Supreme Court nominee bears a heavy burden to demonstrate that he or she is committed to the constitutional principles that have been vital in advancing fairness, decency and equal opportunity in our society. As Judge Samuel Alito approaches his confirmation hearings next week, the more we learn about him, the more questions we have about the credibility of his assurances to us. Consider these five areas: *1. 1985 job application: Alito was 35 when he applied for an important political position with Attorney General Ed Meese during the Reagan administration. Alito sought to demonstrate his "philosophical commitment" to Meese's legal outlook. He wrote that the 1964 Goldwater presidential campaign had been his original political inspiration, even though he was only 14 at the time. His views on the law, he said, were inspired by his "deep disagreement with Warren Court decisions." He strongly objected to "usurpation by the judiciary" of the powers of the president, and supported the "supremacy" of the elected branches over the judiciary. Not surprisingly, Alito got the job. The views expressed there raise serious concerns about his ability to interpret the Constitution with a fair and open mind. When this embarrassing document came to light, he faced a difficult decision on whether to defend his 1985 views or walk away from them. When I and others met him a short time later, he appeared to be renouncing them - "I was just a 35-year-old seeking a job," he told me. But now he's seeking another, far more important job. Is he saying that he did not really mean what he said then? *2. Membership in "Concerned Alumni of Princeton." In 1972, the year Alito graduated from Princeton University, a group of wealthy alumni formed Concerned Alumni of Princeton (CAP) to resist the growing influx of female, African American, Hispanic and even disabled students who were changing the face of Princeton "as you knew it." The university's most famous alumnus of the day, basketball star and later U.S. senator Bill Bradley, was invited into CAP initially but quickly found it "impossible to remain a member" because of CAP's "right-wing" views. A special committee of alumni, which included future Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, accused CAP of presenting a "distorted and hostile" view of the university. Alito joined CAP about that time, despite its purposes and reputation, and remained a member through 1985, when he cited his CAP membership as another qualification to join the Meese inner circle. In 1987, when he was nominated to be U.S. attorney for New Jersey, and in 1990, when he was nominated for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit, he did not mention his CAP membership to the Senate Judiciary Committee or to then-Sen. Bradley, who introduced him to the committee at the nomination hearing and endorsed him "100 percent." Bradley says today that had he known about Alito's long membership in CAP he would have had serious questions about it. Alito now says he can't remember anything at all about CAP. *3. Failure to recuse himself in the Vanguard case: In 1990, during the confirmation process on his nomination to the 3rd Circuit, Alito disclosed that his largest investment was in Vanguard mutual funds. To avoid possible conflicts of interest, he promised us that he would recuse himself from any case involving "the Vanguard companies." Vanguard continues to be on his recusal list, and his investments in Vanguard funds have risen from tens of thousands of dollars to hundreds of thousands. Nevertheless, in 2002 he failed to recuse himself when assigned to sit on a case in which three Vanguard companies were named parties and listed prominently on every brief and on his own pro-Vanguard opinion in the case. In this case, he and the White House have floated many excuses, but none provided any sensible explanation for his failure to keep his promise or follow his "personal practice" of recusing himself whenever there was any possible ethical question about his participation in a case. *4. His pledge to be absolutely impartial where the government is concerned: While chairing his confirmation hearings in 1990, I asked Alito how he could remain neutral in the cases that would come before him as a 3rd Circuit judge after his more than a dozen years of service representing the U.S. government. He stated that he would be "absolutely impartial" in all his cases. But in case after case involving the actions of U.S. marshals, IRS agents and other government officials, he has sided with the government and against the citizens, even when his fellow judges have told him he was off-base. *5. His promise to leave his personal beliefs behind when he became a judge: That's what he told me in 1990 he would do. But has he? In November 2000, at one of many Federalist Society meetings he spoke at, he indicated that he was a true believer when it came to the society's longstanding theory of an all-powerful executive. His endorsement of presidential power and his criticism of the Supreme Court for undermining it made clear that his philosophical commitment in 1985 still drives him.
Alito's words and record must credibly demonstrate that he understands and supports the role of the Supreme Court in upholding the progress we've made in guaranteeing that all Americans have an equal chance to take their rightful place in the nation's future. "Credibility" has rarely been an issue for Supreme Court nominees, but it is clearly a major issue for Alito. |
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A Napoleon, Made In Israel By Uri Avnery He was an Israeli Napoleon. From early youth, he was totally convinced that he was the only person in the world who could save the State of Israel. That was an absolute certainty, free of any doubt. He just knew that he must achieve supreme power, in order to fulfill the mission that fate had entrusted him with. This belief led to a complete integration of personal egocentrism and national egocentrism. For a person who believes he has such a mission, there is no difference between the personal and the national interest. What is good for him automatically becomes good for the nation, and vice versa. This means that anyone who hinders him from attaining power is really committing a crime against the State. And anyone helping him to come to power, is really doing a patriotic deed. This belief directed all his actions for decades. It explains the dogged determination, the tenacity, the unbending perseverance that became his trade mark and earned him his nickname "the bulldozer". This attracted admirers, who fell completely under his influence. It also explains his attitude to money matters. It has been said that he "does not stop at a red light", that "laws are not for him". More than once he was accused of accepting millions from rich Jews abroad. On the day before his fateful stroke, it came out that the police had formally accused him of receiving a bribe of three million dollars from a casino-owner. (It is quite possible that this raised his blood pressure and helped to cause the massive stroke.) But not all these millionaires expected a return. Some of them believed, as he did himself, that by supporting him, they were actually supporting the State of Israel. Can there be a more sacred duty than to provide an assured income to the Israeli Napoleon, so that he can devote his entire energy to the fulfillment of his historic mission? On his long journey, Sharon easily overcame such hurdles. They did not divert him from his course. Personal tragedies and political defeats did not hold him up for a moment. The accidents that killed his first wife and his oldest son, his dismissal from office after being convicted by a board of inquiry of "indirect responsibility" for the Sabra and Shatila massacres, as well as the many other setbacks, failures and disappointments that struck him throughout the years did not deter him. They did not divert him for an instant from his endeavor to achieve supreme power. And now it was all coming true. On Wednesday, January 4, 2006, he could be certain that in three months time he would become the sole leader of Israel. He had created a party that belonged to him alone and that was not only on track to occupy a central position in the next Knesset, but also to cut all other parties into pieces. He was determined to use this power to change the political landscape of Israel altogether and introduce a presidential system, which would have given him an all-powerful position, like that enjoyed by Juan Peron in his heyday in Argentina. Then, at long last, he would be able to realize his historic mission of laying the tracks on which Israel would run for generations, as David Ben-Gurion had done before him. And then, just when it seemed that nothing could stop him anymore, with cruel suddenness, his own body betrayed him. What happened resembles a central motif of the Jewish myth: the fate of Moses, whom God punished for his pride by allowing him a glimpse of the Promised Land from afar, but having him die before he could set foot on its soil. On the threshold of absolute power, the stroke hit Ariel Sharon. While he was still fighting for his life in hospital, the myth of "Sharon's Legacy" was already beginning to form. As has happened with many leaders who did not leave a written testament, every individual is free to imagine a Sharon of his own. Leftists, who only yesterday had cursed Sharon as the murderer of Kibieh, the butcher of Sabra and Shatila and the man responsible for the plunder and slaughter in the occupied Palestinian territories, began to admire him as the "Man of Peace". Settlers, who had condemned him as a traitor, remembered that it was he who had created the settlements and kept on enlarging them to this day. Only yesterday he was one of the most hated people in Israel and the world. Today, after the evacuation of Gush Katif, he has become the darling of the public, almost from wall to wall. The leaders of nations crowned him as the "great warrior who has turned into a hero of peace". Everybody agrees that Sharon has changed completely, that he has gone from one extreme to the other, the proverbial Ethiopian who has changed his skin, the leopard who has changed his spots. All these analyses have only one thing in common: they have nothing to do with the real Ariel Sharon. They are based on ignorance, illusion and self-deception. A look at his long career (helped, I may add, by some personal knowledge) show that he has not changed at all. He stayed true to his fundamental approach, only adapting his slogans to changing times and circumstances. His master-plan remained as it was at the beginning. Underlying his world view is a simplistic, 19th century style nationalism, which says: our people stands above all others, other people are inferior. The rights of our nation are sacred, other nations have no rights at all. The rules of morality apply only to relations within the nation, not to relations between nations. He absorbed this conviction with his mother's milk. It governed Kfar Malal, the cooperative village in which he was born, as it also governed the whole world at the time. Among Jews in particular it was reinforced by the horrors of the Holocaust. The slogan "all the world is against us" is deeply anchored in the national psyche, and is applied especially to Arabs. On this moral base the aim emerged: to establish a Jewish state, as large as possible, free of non-Jews. That could lead to the conclusion that the ethnic cleansing, begun by Ben-Gurion in 1948, when half the Palestinians were deprived of their homes and land, must be completed. Sharon's career began shortly after, when he was appointed to lead the undercover commando Unit 101, whose murderous actions beyond the borders were designed mainly to prevent the refugees from infiltrating back to their villages. However, Sharon became convinced quite early that another wholesale ethnic cleansing was impossible in the foreseeable future (barring some unforeseeable international event changing conditions altogether.) In default of this option, Sharon believed that Israel must annex all the areas between the Mediterranean and the Jordan without a dense Palestinian population. Already decades ago, he prepared a map that he showed proudly to local and foreign personalities in order to convert them to his views. According to this map, Israel will annex the areas along the pre-1967 border as well as the Jordan valley, up to the "back of the mountain" (an expression particularly dear to Sharon). It will also annex several East-West strips to connect the Jordan valley with the Green Line. In these territories that are marked for annexation, Sharon created a dense net of settlements. That was his principal endeavor throughout the last thirty years, in all his diverse positions - Minister of Agriculture, Minister of Industry and Trade, Minister of Defense, Minister of Housing, Foreign Minister, Minister of Infrastructure, and Prime Minister - and this work is going on at this minute. The areas with a dense Palestinian population, Sharon intended to hand over to Palestinian self-government. He was determined to remove from them all the settlements that were set up there without thinking. This way, eight or nine Palestinian enclaves would have come into being, cut off from each other, each one surrounded by settlers and Israeli army installations. He did not care whether these would be called a "Palestinian state". His recent use of this term is an example of his ability to adapt himself, outwardly and verbally, to changing situations. The Gaza strip is one of these enclaves. That is the real significance of the uprooting of the settlements and the withdrawal of the Israeli army. It is the first stage in the realization of the map: this small area, with a dense Palestinian population of a million and a quarter, was turned over to the Palestinians. The Israeli land, sea and air forces surround the strip almost completely. The very existence of its inhabitants depends at all times on the mercy of Israel, which controls all entrances and exits (except the Rafah crossing into Egypt, which is monitored by Israel from afar.) Israel can cut off the water and electricity supply at a moment's notice. Sharon intended to create the same situation in Hebron, Ramallah, Nablus, Jenin and the other areas. Is this a "peace plan"? Peace is made between nations which agree to create a situation where all of them can live in freedom, well-being and mutual respect and believe that that is good for them. This is not what Sharon had in mind. As a military man, he knows only truces. If peace had been handed to him on a platter, he would not have recognized it. He knew perfectly well that no Palestinian leader could possibly agree to his map, now or ever. That's why he did not intend to have any political negotiations with the Palestinians. His slogan was "we have no partner". He intended to realize all the stages of his plan "unilaterally", as he did in Gaza - without dialogue with the Palestinians, without considering their requirements and aspirations, and, of course, without seeking their consent. But Sharon did indeed intend to make peace - peace with the United States. He considered American consent as essential. He knew that Washington could not give its consent to his whole plan. So he intended to obtain their agreement phase by phase. Since President Bush has submitted to him entirely, and no one knows who will succeed him, Sharon intended to realize the main part of his plan within the next two or three years, before the end of the President's term in office. That is one of the reasons for his hurry. He had to come to absolute power now, immediately. Only the stroke prevented this. The eagerness with which so many good people on the left embraced the "Sharon Legacy" does not show their grasp of his plans, but rather their own longing for peace. They long with all their heart for a strong leader, who has the will and the ability to end the conflict. The determination with which Sharon removed the settlers from Gush Katif filled these leftists with enthusiasm. Who would have believed that there was a leader capable of carrying it out, without civil war, without bloodshed? And if this has happened in the Gaza Strip, why can't it happen in the West Bank? Sharon will drive the settlers out and make peace. All this, without the Left having to lift a finger. The savior, like Deus, will jump ex machina. As the Hebrew proverb goes, "the work of the righteous is done by others", who may be something quite other than righteous. Sharon has easily adapted himself to this longing of the public. He has not changed his plan, but given it a new veneer, in the spirit of the times. From now on, he appeared as the "Man of Peace". He never cared which mask it was convenient to wear. But this mask reflects the deepest wishes of the Israeli people. From this point of view, the imaginary "Sharon Legacy" can play a positive role. When he created his new party, he took with him a lot of Likud people, those who had come to the conclusion that the goal of "The Whole of Eretz Israel" has become impossible to attain. Many of these will remain in the Kadima party even after Sharon has left the tribune. As a result of an ongoing, slow subterranean process, Likud people, too, are ready to accept the partition of the country. The whole system is moving in the direction of peace. The "Sharon Legacy", even if imaginary, may become a blessing, if Sharon appears in it in his latest incarnation: Sharon the uprooter of settlements, Sharon who is ready to give up parts of Eretz Israel, Sharon who agrees to a Palestinian state.
True, this was not Sharon's intention. But, as Sharon himself might have said: It is not the intentions that matter, but the results on the ground.
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 Branded By James Moore There are times in which it is easy to be suspicious. We can get to that feeling fairly quickly if we even pay slight attention. I've been trying to get over this odd emotion for at least a year. I can't find any rationale for letting it go, though I want desperately not to have these thoughts. This week last year I was preparing for a trip to Ohio to conduct interviews and research for a new book I was writing. My airline tickets had been purchased on line and the morning of departure I went to the Internet to print out my boarding pass. I got a message that said, "Not Allowed." Several subsequent tries failed. Surely, I thought, it's just a glitch within the airline's servers or software. I made it a point to arrive very early at the airport. My reservation was confirmed before I left home. I went to the electronic kiosk and punched in my confirmation number to print out my boarding pass and luggage tags. Another error message appeared, "Please see agent." I did. She took my Texas driver's license and punched in the relevant information to her computer system. "I'm sorry, sir," she said. "There seems to be a problem. You've been placed on the No Fly Watch List." "Excuse me?" "I'm afraid there isn't much more that I can tell you," she explained. "It's just the list that's maintained by TSA to check for people who might have terrorist connections." "You're serious?" "I'm afraid so, sir. Here's an 800 number in Washington. You need to call them before I can clear you for the flight." Exasperated, I dialed the number from my cell, determined to clear up what I was sure was a clerical error. The woman who answered offered me no more information than the ticket agent. "Ma'am, I'd like to know how I got on the No Fly Watch List." "I'm not really authorized to tell you that, sir," she explained after taking down my social security and Texas driver's license numbers. "What can you tell me?" "All I can tell you is that there is something in your background that in some way is similar to someone they are looking for." "Well, let me get this straight then," I said. "Our government is looking for a guy who may have a mundane Anglo name, who pays tens of thousands of dollars every year in taxes, has never been arrested or even late on a credit card payment, is more uninteresting than a Tupperware party, and cries after the first two notes of the national anthem? We need to find this guy. He sounds dangerous to me." "I'm sorry, sir, I've already told you everything I can." "Oh, wait," I said. "One last thing: this guy they are looking for? Did he write books critical of the Bush administration, too?" I have been on the No Fly Watch List for a year. I will never be told the official reason. No one ever is. You cannot sue to get the information. Nothing I have done has moved me any closer to getting off the list. There were 35,000 Americans in that database last year. According to a European government that screens hundreds of thousands of American travelers every year, the list they have been given to work from has since grown to 80,000. My friends tell me it is just more government incompetence. A tech buddy said there's no one in government smart enough to write a search algorithm that will find actual terrorists, so they end up with authors of books criticizing the Bush White House. I have no idea what's going on. I suppose I should think of it as a minor sacrifice to help keep my country safe. Not being able to print out boarding passes in advance and having to get to the airport three hours early for every flight is hardly an imposition compared to what Americans are enduring in Iraq. I can force myself to get used to all that extra attention from the guy with the wand whenever I walk through the electronic arches. I'm just doing my patriotic duty. Of course, there's always the chance that the No Fly Watch List is one of many enemies lists maintained by the Bush White House. If that's the case, I am happy to be on that list. I am in good company with people who expect more out of their president and their government.
Hell, maybe I'll start thinking of it as an honor roll. |
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January 5th was the bloodiest day in Iraq since Bush's illegal invasion. As many as 140 were killed, including 11 US servicemen, and many more injured. Bush responded by suddenly summoning all living secretaries of state and defense to the White House for a skull session and photo op on what to do in the Middle East before he is completely overtaken by even more catastrophic success. He's willing to share the glory, and said he would "listen and take to heart" any suggestions offered, even from Democrats.
Except an exit plan, of course, and any suggestions of how to better equip or protect the "troops" who are thrown into an exploding nightmare where it's every man for himself. Good luck, soldier. Get out there and make us proud that you died for a noble cause...
Those of us who know that Bush is raving mad, destructively impulsive and totally incompetent suspect he was lining up former heavyweights to take the blame when the melt-down comes. The good news is this is Alexander Haig's last chance to be "in charge."
Haig will probably jump at it, even though he knows that he and his renowned counterparts are being set up as "patsies" for Bush's great madcap adventure in Iraq. This mess is so big, it's going to take more than a "few bad apples" to cover it up. I can just hear Bush now -- "I asked them what we should do, and they all agreed that I was doing a heckuva job, and we should stay the course. Hey, don't blame me. They had the same information I had..."
This "meeting" was nothing but another PR trick in Bush's announced campaign to whip the public back into line behind his "strategery" for winning the war and to con people into believing he plans to eventually bring what is left of our ground troops home. As soon as the cameras were turned off, the meeting was over and Bush, Rice, Cheney and Rumsfeld fled, leaving the former VIPs to find their own way out. It was a pitiful sight, and I can't help thinking it served them right for allowing themselves to be used in such a shoddy way.
But the media loved it. Associated Press writer Jennifer Loven crowed, "He (Bush) gambled that one-time high-level public officials, when personally summoned by the president, would resist temptation to be too critical. He was right." Loven assured us that Bush got support for his mission -- along with a few concerns -- and the right to claim that he was "reaching out."
Yeah. This guy is a real uniter, not a divider.
In his statement to the media, Bush said, "Not everybody around this table agreed with my decision to go into Iraq. I fully understand that. But these are good solid Americans who understand that we've got to succeed now that we're there. I'm most grateful for the suggestions they've given."
One "constructive idea" the secretaries broached, according to the White House, was to make sure that the military, not politicians in Washington, are determining troop levels in Iraq and making other on-the-ground calls.
Does anybody doubt that the secretary who came up with this bleak plan was none other than Donald Rumsfeld himself? Which, of course, means that it's business as usual, and the troops won't begin to come home until Rumsfeld says they can...
Meanwhile, the Green Zone in Baghdad finally has all the theaters, restaurants, hotels, swimming pools and golf courses it needs, so Bush is cutting off the promised reconstruction money for Iraq.
Except, of course, for the new billion-dollar embassy that will be more secure than the Pentagon. According to the UK Mirror, "The embassy will be guarded by 15ft blast walls and ground-to-air missiles and the main building will have bunkers for use during air offensives."
It gets better. "The grounds will include as many as 300 houses for consular and military officials. And a large-scale barracks will be built for Marines who will protect what will be Washington's biggest and most secure overseas building."
The source also said that the Bush administration has plans for four super bases across the country.
It doesn't matter if the crusty old New World Order patsies knew Bush has no intention of leaving Iraq until the last drop of oil is sucked from the region when they wandered out of the White House. Bush doesn't care what they think, so it also doesn't matter whether they advised against it if they did know.
That old adage must be true -- when you're in as deep as every single one of them is -- you can't go home again.
Mission Accomplished.
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New York -- Today and tomorrow every 8-year-old in the state of New
York will take a test. It's part of George Bush's No Child Left
Behind program. The losers will be left behind to repeat the third
grade.
Try it yourself. This is from the state's actual practice test. Ready, class?
And here's one of the four questions:
"The story says that in 1999, the sisters could not seem to lose at
doubles tennis. This probably means when they played
"A two matches in one day
OK, class, do you know the answer? (By the way, I didn't cheat:
there's nothing else about "doubles" in the text.)
My kids go to a New York City school in which more than half the
students live below the poverty line. There is no tennis court.
There are no tennis courts in the elementary schools of Bed-Stuy or
East Harlem. But out in the Hamptons, every school has a tennis
court. In Forest Hills, Westchester and Long Island's North Shore,
the schools have nearly as many tennis courts as the school kids have
live-in maids.
Now, you tell me, class, which kids are best prepared to answer the
question about "doubles tennis"? The 8-year-olds in Harlem who've
never played a set of doubles or the kids whose mommies disappear for
two hours every Wednesday with Enrique the tennis pro?
Is this test a measure of "reading comprehension" -- or a measure of
wealth accumulation?
If you have any doubts about what the test is measuring, look at the
next question, based on another part of the text, which reads (and I
could not make this up):
"Most young tennis stars learn the game from coaches at private
clubs. In this sentence, a club is probably a
"F baseball bat
Helpfully, for the kids in our 'hood, it explains that a "country
club" is a, "place where people meet." Yes, but WHICH people?
President Bush told us, "By passing the No Child Left Behind Act, we
are regularly testing every child and making sure they have better
options when schools are not performing."
But there are no "better options." In the delicious double-speak of
class war, when the tests have winnowed out the chaff and kids
stamped failed, No Child Left results in that child being left behind
in the same grade to repeat the failure another year.
I can't say that Mr. Bush doesn't offer better options to the
kids stamped failed. Under No Child Left, if enough kids flunk the
tests, their school is marked a failure and its students win the
right, under the law, to transfer to any successful school in their
district. You can't provide more opportunity than that. But they
don't provide it, the law promises it, without a single penny to
make it happen. In New York in 2004, a third of a million students
earned the right to transfer to better schools -- in which there were
only 8,000 places open.
New York is typical. Nationwide, only one out of two-hundred students
eligible to transfer manage to do it. Well, there's always the
Army. (That option did not go unnoticed: No Child has a special
provision requiring schools to open their doors to military
recruiters.)
Hint: When de-coding politicians' babble, to get to the real
agenda, don't read their lips, read their budgets. And in his last
budget, our President couldn't spare one thin dime for education,
not ten cents. Mr. Big Spender provided for a derisory 8.4 cents on
the dollar of the cost of primary and secondary schools. Congress
appropriated a half penny of the nation's income -- just one-half of
one-percent of America's twelve trillion dollar GDP -- for primary
and secondary education.
President Bush actually requested less. While Congress succeeded in
prying out an itty-bitty increase in voted funding, that doesn't
mean the extra cash actually gets to the students. Fifteen states
have sued the federal government on the grounds that the cost of new
testing imposed on schools, $3.9 billion, eats up the entire new
funding budgeted for No Child Left.
There are no "better options" for failing children, but there are
better uses for them. The President ordered testing and more testing
to hunt down, identify and target millions of children too expensive,
too heavy a burden, to educate.
No Child Left offers no options for those with the test-score mark
of Cain -- no opportunities, no hope, no plan, no funding. Rather,
it is the new social Darwinism, educational eugenics: identify the
nation's loser-class early on. Trap them then train them cheap.
Someone has to care for the privileged. No society can have winners
without lots and lots of losers. And so we have No Child Left Behind
-- to produce the new worker drones that will clean the toilets at
the Yale Alumni Club, punch the cash registers color-coded for
illiterates, and pamper the winner-class on the higher floors of the
new economic order.
Class war dismissed.
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NEW YORK--On December 31, 2005 the editor of the Columbia City Paper in South Carolina returned from a trip to find that someone had attempted to burn down his house. "Someone had taken all the jackets out of the hall and thrown them on the stove," Corey Hutchins told the Associated Press. "They turned the stove on and threw liquor bottles on the fire. Then they went upstairs and set fire to my bed, and came back down and threw library books on the fire on the stove."
Fortunately for Hutchins his arsonist was less than fully competent. His home sustained only minor fire and smoke damage. He noticed something disturbing. "Nothing was stolen. No money, no computers, guitar equipment."
Columbia police believe that the fire was set to send the scrappy alternative newspaper's editor a message. "You have any enemies?" Hutchins recalls the police officers on the scene asking. "I paused, said I was the editor of the Columbia City Paper. They just nodded, spit out their tobacco, told me 'well, someone's mad at you.'"
The FBI has opened an investigation. The paper is offering a $10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the arsonist(s).
This domestic terror attack is a direct assault on basic American civil liberties--more so than 9/11, which was not, contrary to George W. Bush's assertion, carried out because "they hate our freedoms." The freedom of the press guaranteed by the First Amendment, voluntarily ceded by newspaper editors and television news producers across the country, has found its Ground Zero in a despicable act of terror in Columbia. But most "journalists" remain oblivious.
Hutchins and publisher Paul Blake describe a mixed reception to their newspaper since it began publication last August, offering a "liberal angle in a city choking with conservatives."(Full disclosure: Columbia City Paper publishes my cartoons and this column.) Immediately unleashing a fierce barrage against entrenched power structures, City Paper broke the story of a sexual discrimination lawsuit at the University of South Carolina, and published the Governor's home phone number on a front page urging him not to sign off on the nation's 1001st modern-era execution. Their reportage hits close to home. "The crime reporting is a big deal around here," says Hutchins. "People can't believe we'll print a wife beater's address block in the paper."
This is just the sort of take-no-prisoners journalism that Americans crave but rarely see. The citizens of Columbia have responded. City Paper has become a must-read, already profitable in an industry where others are being forced to fold. But not everyone is supportive.
Blake calls the refusal of some local businesses to distribute the City Paper "a censorship problem." Angry letters and e-mails, including threats of violence, have followed controversial stories like a recent feature story filed from Iraq. "I get phone calls where grown men are in tears over an anti-Bush piece," says Hutchins. Now a homegrown terrorist has turned to violence to attempt to shut them up--and down. Here, undeniably, is someone who truly "hates our freedoms." And the silence of the Right--from local Republican politicians on up to the White House, sends a strong message of tacit consent.
Hutchins is certain that the arsonist was politically motivated. "Whoever did it didn't even go into my roommate's room," he notes. "I've lived in this town for four years, I've never made any enemies as far as I'm concerned."
The editor has resigned out of concern for his roommates' safety. "It's the best thing to do, I believe, to keep people I care about safe for the time being." Blake understands. "Corey's life really is in danger," he says. The terrorists have won.
Somewhere Ari Fleischer, the Bush Administration spokesman who warned that Americans "need to watch what they say, watch what they do," is laughing.
Hutchins, who has worked many weeks without pay to get Columbia City Paper off the ground, has been hit hard by the fire. If you'd like to help him get back on his feet, you can send donations via the Internet service PayPal to coreyhutchins@gmail.com. If you'd like to save a free press, write your Congressman.
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Betraying Reagan's Revolution By Robert Scheer January 11, 2006 - Oh what a tangled web these no-longer-young Republicans weave when first they practice to deceive! The plumb line that runs down through the cesspool of the festering Abramoff-DeLay scandal is the conceit that the scions of the Reagan Revolution, a generation of young Republican activists summoned by God and party, were morally superior creatures, who had only pure ideological motives for cutting the country's social-safety nets in the name of "small government." More than two decades before he pleaded guilty to felonies in two jurisdictions, Jack Abramoff was the hard-nosed chairman of the College Republicans, and his lieutenants were Harvard graduate Grover Norquist, who rose to political power as president of the American Taxpayers Association, and a young Georgia student named Ralph Reed, who would later become the face of the Christian Coalition. "Today, our party readies itself to mount the wave of the future," Abramoff sermonized as a 25-year-old at the Republican National Convention in 1984, as cited in Mother Jones magazine. "Will we ride that wave to glory, or will it send us crashing ashore? If we're the party of tax cuts, and not the party of 'ifs' and 'buts,' then we're riding our wave. . . . If we try to outspend big fat Tip O'Neill, or rush to Geneva to cut a deal, we'll crash ashore." Now, however, Abramoff has crashed and he threatens to take down Tom DeLay, who announced last week he will not attempt to regain his GOP leadership post in the House, even as he continues to fight his own indictment in Texas, which an all-Republican appeals court has just refused to dismiss. Meanwhile, two others who came up through the ranks of Republican youthful activism, Edwin A. Buckham and Brent Wilkes, can now be added to the web - growing with each new indictment and investigative news article - of DeLay-affiliated lobbyists, politicians and public officials who employed or benefited from a series of what appear to be front groups, slush funds and political money-laundering operations. Wilkes is up to his eyeballs in the case of disgraced Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-San Diego), who pleaded guilty in December to accepting $2.4 million in bribes from defense contractors trying to sell stuff to the Pentagon. Wilkes, in turn, was a client of Buckham, a key figure at the center of an influence-peddling investigation into his work at the phony front organization, the U.S. Family Network, which serviced Abramoff's clients. On Monday, Buckham announced that due to recent bad publicity, his prominent Alexander Strategy Group (ASG) lobbying firm was shutting down. It was ASG that paid Delay's wife at least $115,000 in consulting fees while selling the company's widely proclaimed access to her super-powerful husband. The lobby firm also provided office space to "Americans for a Republican Majority," Delay's fund-raising organization. No surprise, then, that when Wilkes wanted to gain influence in Congress in support of his quest to get the Pentagon to invest in products he was selling - but for which the Pentagon's inspector general found no real demand - he turned to ASG, paying at least $630,000 for the firm's services. President Bush, as he did with Enron and its politically well-connected execs, is reportedly looking to distance himself from these big-time GOP players going down like a house of cards in a Category 5 hurricane. And, as with Enron, where company chief Kenneth "Kenny Boy" Lay was tight with Bush and a key financial supporter of his campaigns, such protests will ring hollow to those paying attention because of the perpetrators' prominent work on the president's campaigns, transition teams, fundraising and even in his administration. Abramoff was a "patron" fundraiser for the Bush 2004 campaign, and served on the Department of the Interior transition team, while Wilkes served as Bush's California campaign finance co-chair. The scope of the scandal swirling around DeLay was perhaps best described by former Republican House Majority Leader Dick Armey, now a lobbyist: "Tom DeLay sent Buckham downtown to set up shop and start a branch office on K Street," Armey told the New York Times, referring to the row of lobby firms famously headquartered there. "The whole idea was: 'What's in it for us?'." Sounds accurate enough. But Armey's candid comment begs the question of why he and others in the Republican establishment didn't blow the whistle on this operation before the indictments came down. After all, bilking the Pentagon for millions, bribing officials and breaking campaign-finance laws is hardly small potatoes.
What irony that those once young Republicans, who hectored their elders about being more vigilant in defending the nation's taxpayers and security forces, should now end up accused of deeply betraying both.
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 Alito And The Point Of No Return By Nat Parry The U.S. Supreme Court nomination of Samuel Alito may represent a point of no return not only on the issue of abortion and other longtime conservative political targets but on the checks and balances that have been the cornerstone of American democracy. With Alito's confirmation to fill the swing-vote seat of Sandra Day O'Connor, George W. Bush could well consolidate a majority on the high court to endorse his expansive interpretation of presidential authority, including his insistence that his commander-in-chief powers are virtually unlimited throughout the indefinite "war on terror." But Alito might face a tougher confirmation battle than Chief Justice John Roberts did, in part because controversies over Bush's claims to unfettered Executive power have deepened over the past several months, such as the dispute over Bush's asserted right to conduct warrantless wiretaps of Americans. Objections also have been raised over Bush's use of "extraordinary rendition" of terrorist suspects kidnapped and shipped to countries that practice torture, the CIA's network of secret prisons where people are jailed without charge, the practice of subjecting U.S. detainees to abusive and degrading treatment, and privacy concerns regarding the USA Patriot Act, all of which relate to Bush's unprecedented view of presidential power. "Recent events overlap with some of the beliefs and behavior of Mr. Alito that are of greatest concern," Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., wrote in an e-mail message to supporters on Jan. 6. "We have a President who unilaterally orders wiretaps on American citizens without judicial oversight - and he has given us a Supreme Court nominee whose record indicates a belief that the Executive Branch operates above the law, including the power to ignore prohibitions on torture." Last year, when Roberts was asked by senators about his views on Executive power, he skillfully ducked the questions by saying it would be inappropriate for him to comment on matters that might come before the court. Roberts also had a limited record of judicial and legal opinions to ask about. [See Consortiumnews.com's "Roberts & the 'Apex of Presidential Power.'"] While Alito is certain to try the same strategy of brushing aside specific questions about his judicial philosophy, his paper trail of opinions is much more extensive than Roberts's record was. Swing Vote An even bigger difference is that Alito is replacing O'Connor, the swing vote, while Roberts was replacing staunch conservative William Rehnquist. So the court's balance is at stake and key senators have made clear that they will be expecting specific answers from Alito. The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Arlen Specter, and the ranking Democrat, Patrick Leahy, have issued letters to Alito warning him that he will be asked about Bush's warrantless domestic surveillance program, which Leahy called "one of several areas where the court's role as a check on overreaching by the Executive may soon prove crucial." Specter told Alito that he might ask what "jurisprudential approach" he would use in deciding whether Bush could legally order warrantless surveillance by virtue of his constitutional power as Commander in Chief or under a Sept. 14, 2001, congressional resolution authorizing "all necessary and appropriate force" against those responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks. Also of interest could be Alito's views on the "unitary executive," which holds that Congress lacks constitutional authority to put law enforcement power in the hands of regulatory agencies, such as the Securities and Exchange Commission, that are not directly accountable to the President. At a Federalist Society symposium in 2001, Judge Alito recalled that when he was in the Office of Legal Counsel in Ronald Reagan's White House, "we were strong proponents of the theory of the unitary executive, that all federal executive power is vested by the Constitution in the President." In 1986, Alito advanced this theory by proposing "interpretive signing statements" from presidents to counter the court's traditional reliance on congressional intent in assessing the meaning of federal law. Under Bush, these "signing statements" have amounted to rejection of legal restrictions especially as they bear on presidential powers. In December 2005, for instance, Bush used a signing statement to blunt the impact of the McCain amendment banning cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of detainees in U.S. custody. When Bush signed the bill, he reserved the right to bypass the law under his commander-in-chief powers. "The Executive Branch shall construe [the torture ban] in a manner consistent with the constitutional authority of the President . . . as Commander in Chief," the signing statement read. In other words, since Bush considers his commander-in-chief authorities boundless, he can choose to waive the torture ban whenever he wants. "The signing statement is saying 'I will only comply with this law when I want to, and if something arises in the war on terrorism where I think it's important to torture or engage in cruel, inhuman, and degrading conduct, I have the authority to do so and nothing in this law is going to stop me,'" said New York University law professor David Golove. Since signing statements essentially assert the President's right to interpret the law as he sees fit, the concept also challenges the traditional authority of the judiciary to act as final arbiter of legal disputes, an American check and balance that has served as a bulwark against Executive tyranny for more than two centuries. But judging from Alito's past statements, he's an advocate of expanded Executive power. In arguing for the "unitary executive" and interpretive signing statements, Alito wrote in 1986 that "since the President's approval [of a law] is just as important as that of the House or Senate, it seems to follow that the President's understanding of the bill should be just as important as that of Congress." [Washington Post, Jan. 2, 2006] With Alito joining a solid majority of right-wing justices on the U.S. Supreme Court, Bush's interpretations of laws could become not "just as important" as congressional intent but the decisive interpretation of what a law means, especially on "national security" issues such as torture of "terrorists," detention without trial, executions after military tribunals and the launching of wars. 'International Law?' Bush's contempt for international law has long been an open secret. Once when asked by a European reporter about the need for international law to govern the U.S. occupation of Iraq, Bush joked, "International law? I better call my lawyer." Bush also has asserted his right to make war, despite the fact that the Founding Fathers so feared an unwise Executive dragging the nation into an unnecessary conflict that the Constitution invested the power to declare war in Congress. Yet before the invasion of Iraq, the administration insisted that Bush didn't need authorization from either Congress or the United Nations Security Council to attack Iraq and commit U.S. troops. While Bush eventually did get a use-of-force resolution from Congress - supposedly to strengthen his hand in U.N. negotiations - he ordered the invasion of Iraq in March 2003 without U.N. approval. The attack defied the U.N. Charter's core principle that "all Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state." Bush's insistence about his unfettered commander-in-chief powers also has spilled over to domestic law, particularly his defense of electronic spying by the National Security Agency, which has the capability to scoop up millions of phone calls and e-mail communications by Americans. By ordering the NSA to eavesdrop on U.S. citizens without court-approved warrants, Bush appears to have contravened the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which set rules and established a special court for authorizing domestic spying when there's evidence that someone is operating as a foreign agent. Though the court has rarely denied a warrant and the law even allows the President to seek authorization retroactively when speed is of the essence, Bush chose to bypass the court and order surveillance without warrants. As for his legal rationale to hold people without charges as "enemy combatants," or to order torture of detainees, he cited his inherent commander-in-chief powers, and the congressional resolution passed on Sept. 14, 2001 in response to 9/11. "We're at war," Bush said, "and as commander in chief, I've got to . . . protect the American people." White House spokesman Scott McClellan claimed that "the American people strongly support the efforts that we're undertaking to save their lives." But even some Republican lawmakers questioned the spying program's legality. "There is no doubt that this is inappropriate," said Arlen Specter, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, promising Senate hearings when Congress reconvenes at the end of January. Legal Judgment Regarding the NSA surveillance, the Congressional Research Service, a non-partisan advisory arm of Congress, issued a memorandum on Jan. 5 stating that "to the extent that any of the electronic surveillance at issue may be outside the sweep of FISA or Title III, Congress does not appear to have legislated specifically on the subject, nor, by absence of legislation, to have authorized or acquiesced in such surveillance." The memorandum says "it appears unlikely that a court would hold that Congress has expressly or impliedly authorized the NSA electronic surveillance operations" and adds that "no court has held squarely that the Constitution disables the Congress from endeavoring to set limits" on presidential power over domestic surveillance. The memorandum's arguments could provide senators ammunition in the Alito confirmation hearings. The determination that the Constitution does not preclude Congress from setting limits on the power of the President in this area runs counter to the theory of the "unitary executive" that Alito has promoted throughout his career. Yet, while senators of both parties have criticized the NSA spying as well as Bush's insistence on his right to override the congressional torture ban, much of the blame for this behavior can be traced back to the failure of congressional oversight. As the Bush administration has noted, it briefed members of Congress repeatedly on the domestic surveillance program, but it wasn't until the New York Times reported on the program in December 2005 that anyone in Congress began raising public objections. One of those briefed, Rep. Jane Harman of California, the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said her chief concern was that the program had been disclosed. "I believe the program is essential to U.S. national security and that its disclosure has damaged critical intelligence capabilities," she said. Even when a few members of Congress, such as Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-West Virginia, did object privately, their protests were ignored. Since the days after the 9/11 attacks, the Bush administration has argued that Congress is powerless to set limits on presidential action to fight terrorism. "The government may be justified in taking measures which in less troubled conditions could be seen as infringements of individual liberties," White House lawyer John Yoo wrote in a memorandum on Sept. 21, 2001. He added that Congress has no authority to place "limits on the President's determinations as to any terrorist threat, the amount of military force to be used in response, or the method, timing and nature of the response." Ashcroft's Rules Besides the NSA spying, other early warning signals of creeping authoritarianism came from former Attorney General John Ashcroft, who lifted restrictions on the FBI conducting surveillance operations in May 2002. Reversing a policy in place since the COINTELPRO scandal of the 1970s, Ashcroft granted the FBI powers to carry out domestic spying against political organizations, religious groups and private citizens in the United States. The Ashcroft guidelines let FBI agents monitor political gatherings, Internet sites, electronic chat rooms and bulletin boards, libraries and churches without first showing any evidence of criminal wrongdoing. Under the previous guidelines, FBI agents needed to demonstrate probable cause or provide evidence from an informer that crimes were being committed in order to begin investigations. Undercover agents were not permitted to investigate groups that gather at places like mosques or churches unless investigators could first find probable cause or evidence that led them to believe someone in the group had broken the law. Ashcroft's 2002 guidelines simply stated that FBI agents could enter any public place and forum to observe, develop leads and investigate. Agents were authorized to search Web sites, online chat rooms and public databases. These new powers supplemented the already sweeping authority that was granted to law enforcement under the USA Patriot Act and its broad definition of "terrorism." Section 802 of the law defines terrorism as acts that "appear to be intended ... to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion," which could include confrontational protests and civil disobedience. Civil libertarians have warned that rather than improving security or combating terrorism, the new law and guidelines could be more useful in silencing critics of the Bush administration and chilling political dissent. One indication of how the government might use its expanded powers came in 2003, when the FBI sent a memorandum to local law enforcement agencies before planned demonstrations against the war in Iraq. The memo detailed protesters' tactics and analyzed activities such as the recruitment of protesters over the Internet. The FBI instructed local law enforcement agencies to be on the lookout for "possible indicators of protest activity and report any potentially illegal acts to the nearest FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force." Since then, there have been many stories about the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) harassing and intimidating political activists engaged in lawful protests. Before demonstrations at the 2004 Democratic and Republican national conventions, for instance, the JTTF visited the homes of activists, while FBI agents in Missouri, Kansas and Colorado spied on and interrogated activists. One target of these visits, Sarah Bardwell of Denver, Colorado, said, "The message I took from it was that they were trying to intimidate us into not going to any protests and to let us know that, 'hey, we're watching you.'" [NYT, Aug. 16, 2004] FBI Files Over the past few years, the FBI also has collected thousands of pages of internal documents on civil rights and antiwar protest groups. "The FBI has in its files 1,173 pages of internal documents on the American Civil Liberties Union, the leading critic of the Bush administration's antiterrorism policies, and 2,383 pages on Greenpeace," the New York Times reported. [NYT, July 18, 2005] Another group singled out by the FBI was United for Peace and Justice, which has facilitated many of the mass demonstrations against the war in Iraq over the past three years. Leslie Cagan, national coordinator for the coalition, said she was concerned that the FBI's counterterrorism division was discussing the coalition's operations. "We always assumed the FBI was monitoring us, but to see the counterterrorism people looking at us like this is pretty jarring," Cagan said. The Defense Department also has been delving into domestic spying and law enforcement, seemingly in violation of the Posse Comitatus Act, passed in 1878 to prohibit federal military personnel from acting in a law enforcement capacity within the United States, except where expressly authorized by the Constitution or Congress. The Defense Department announced its new domestic plans in a document called the "Strategy for Homeland Defense and Civil Support." The document sets out a military strategy against terrorism that envisions an "active, layered defense" both inside and outside U.S. territory. In the document, the Pentagon pledged to "transform U.S. military forces to execute homeland defense missions in the ... U.S. homeland." The Pentagon strategy paper also has a preemptive element, calling for increased military reconnaissance and surveillance to "defeat potential challengers before they threaten the United States." The plan "maximizes threat awareness and seizes the initiative from those who would harm us." In December 2005, NBC News revealed that the Pentagon has been conducting surveillance of antiwar groups such as the Quakers and campus-based counter-recruitment organizations. A secret 400-page document obtained by NBC listed 1,500 "suspicious incidents" over a 10-month period, including dozens of small antiwar demonstrations that were classified as a "threat." The NBC report followed a story in the Washington Post, which reported in November 2005 that the Defense Department has been expanding its domestic surveillance activities since 9/11, including creating new agencies that gather and analyze intelligence within the United States. The White House also is moving to expand the power of the Pentagon's Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA), created three years ago to consolidate counterintelligence operations. The White House proposal would transform CIFA into an office that has authority to investigate crimes such as treason, terrorist sabotage or economic espionage. The Pentagon has also pushed legislation in Congress that would create an intelligence exception to the Privacy Act, allowing the FBI and others to share information about U.S. citizens with the Pentagon, CIA and other intelligence agencies. The proposals have drawn criticism from some members of Congress, such as Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Oregon, who said, "We are deputizing the military to spy on law-abiding Americans in America. This is a huge leap without even a [congressional] hearing." Congressional Lapses While Wyden may be justified in his indignation that these measures are being implemented without congressional oversight, the reality is that even when Congress is informed, it often has ceded its authority to the Executive Branch or granted new powers to the Pentagon, the FBI and local law enforcement. Since the Sept. 14, 2001, resolution, which granted broad authority to the President in responding to 9/11, Congress has time and again surrendered its responsibilities and served to legitimize Bush's drive for unprecedented presidential power. This was seen in many ways large and small, including the hasty passage of the Patriot Act and the authorization of military force against Iraq. Most recently, Congress acted to essentially overturn a Supreme Court ruling that guaranteed access to U.S. courts for the detainees held in a legal black hole at Guantanamo Bay. In December 2005, the Senate passed an amendment that barred inmates from having further access to the courts, thus abrogating a 2004 Supreme Court decision recognizing the habeas corpus rights of Guantanamo prisoners. Human rights groups have criticized the measure, noting that it reverses long-standing habeas and due-process principles. Citing the Senate amendment, the Justice Department filed notice in federal courts that the administration will move courts to dismiss 186 pending petitions by detainees. Sen. Carl Levin, D-Michigan, who helped craft the amendment with Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., protested that the legislation was supposed to apply only to future cases, not pending petitions. But it seems that the senators have once again placed an inordinate amount of faith in the Bush administration that it would recognize limitations on its authority and respect the will of Congress. Now, by fulfilling its constitutional advise-and-consent responsibilities on Supreme Court nominees, the Senate has a chance to address these issues of presidential power and the Bush administration's overreaching. With Samuel Alito's unorthodox views on the separation of powers dovetailing with the controversy surrounding Bush's domestic spying and the debate over the Patriot Act, these issues promise to take center stage over the next weeks and months. Senators also could highlight the extraordinary deference towards police that Alito has shown as a Reagan administration lawyer and a federal judge. Of particular interest could be his opinion that it was justified for police to shoot a fleeing 15-year-old thief and his upholding of the strip search of a 10-year-old girl. [See Alliance for Justice report for more details.] What remains to be seen, however, is whether senators will actually take the action necessary to halt America's drift toward presidential authoritarianism.
Many Americans are shocked at how far the country has already traveled down this path - and are searching for ways to change direction. The Alito confirmation process may represent one of the last opportunities to do so. |
| Death Of An American Hero By Robert Parry "Hero" is one of the most abused words in the English language, often applied to people who simply face some danger or who do well in sports or business. But the word really should be reserved for someone who - in the face of danger - does the right thing. Hugh Thompson, who died on Jan. 6 at the age of 62 from cancer, was such a hero. In one of the darkest moments of modern American history - on March 16, 1968, in the Vietnamese village of My Lai - Thompson landed his helicopter between rampaging U.S. soldiers and a group of terrified Vietnamese villagers to save their lives. Circling over the village, Thompson was at first uncertain what he was witnessing. A bloodied unit of the Americal Division, furious over its own casualties, had stormed into a hamlet known as My Lai 4. Revenge-seeking American soldiers rousted Vietnamese civilians - mostly old men, women and children - from their thatched huts and herded them into the village's irrigation ditches. As the round-up continued, some Americans raped the girls. Then, under orders from junior officers on the ground, soldiers began emptying their M-16s into the terrified peasants. Some parents used their bodies futilely to shield their children from the bullets. Soldiers stepped among the corpses to finish off the wounded. American Heroes But there also were American heroes that day in My Lai, including helicopter pilot Hugh Clowers Thompson Jr. from Stone Mountain, Georgia. After concluding that he was witnessing a massacre, he landed his helicopter between one group of fleeing civilians and American soldiers in pursuit. Thompson ordered his helicopter door gunner, Lawrence Colburn, to shoot the Americans if they tried to harm the Vietnamese. After a tense confrontation, the soldiers backed off. Later, two of Thompson's men climbed into one ditch filled with corpses and pulled out a three-year-old boy who was still alive. Thompson, then a warrant officer, called in other U.S. helicopters to assist the Vietnamese. All told, they airlifted at least nine Vietnamese civilians to safety. When he returned to headquarters, a furious Thompson reported what he had witnessed, leading to orders that the My Lai killings be stopped. By then, however, the slaughter had raged for four hours, claiming the lives of 347 Vietnamese, including babies. "They said I was screaming quite loud," Thompson told U.S. News & World Report in 2004. "I threatened never to fly again. I didn't want to be a part of that. It wasn't war." For siding with Vietnamese civilians over his American comrades, Thompson was treated like a pariah. He was shunned by fellow soldiers, received death threats for reporting the war crime, and later was denounced by one congressman as the only American who should be punished for My Lai. Thompson responded by saying that he had done what he thought was right, even if that meant aiming guns at Americans to save Vietnamese. "There was no way I could turn my back on them," he later explained. False Hero But the appellation "hero" often lands on the wrong shoulders, giving credit not to people like Thompson who risk everything to do what is right, but rather elevating people who win acclaim by doing what is popular or expedient. That flip side of the Thompson lesson was learned by another American soldier serving in the same region in Vietnam, whose life in a sense intersected with Thompson's as they traveled in opposite directions, Thompson toward obscurity and the other toward fame. Several months after the My Lai massacre - but before the slaughter became a public scandal - Army Major Colin Powell was assigned to Americal headquarters in Chu Lai. As a senior staff officer, Powell was given the task of investigating allegations of Americal abuse of Vietnamese civilians. A letter had been written by a young specialist fourth class named Tom Glen, who had served in an Americal mortar platoon and was nearing the end of his Army tour. In the letter to Gen. Creighton Abrams, the commander of all U.S. forces in Vietnam, Glen accused the Americal Division of routine brutality against civilians. "The average GI's attitude toward and treatment of the Vietnamese people all too often is a complete denial of all our country is attempting to accomplish in the realm of human relations," Glen wrote. "Far beyond merely dismissing the Vietnamese as 'slopes' or 'gooks,' in both deed and thought, too many American soldiers seem to discount their very humanity; and with this attitude inflict upon the Vietnamese citizenry humiliations, both psychological and physical, that can have only a debilitating effect upon efforts to unify the people in loyalty to the Saigon government, particularly when such acts are carried out at unit levels and thereby acquire the aspect of sanctioned policy." Glen's letter contended that many Vietnamese were fleeing from Americans who "for mere pleasure, fire indiscriminately into Vietnamese homes and without provocation or justification shoot at the people themselves." Gratuitous cruelty was also being inflicted on Viet Cong suspects, Glen reported. "Fired with an emotionalism that belies unconscionable hatred, and armed with a vocabulary consisting of 'You VC,' soldiers commonly 'interrogate' by means of torture that has been presented as the particular habit of the enemy. Severe beatings and torture at knife point are usual means of questioning captives or of convincing a suspect that he is, indeed, a Viet Cong. ... "What has been outlined here I have seen not only in my own unit, but also in others we have worked with, and I fear it is universal." A Cursory Probe The letter's troubling allegations were not well received at Americal headquarters, where Glen's report ended up on Major Powell's desk. It was Powell's politically sensitive job to investigate the charges of the division's mistreatment of Vietnamese. Powell undertook the assignment, but did so without questioning Glen or assigning anyone else to talk with him. Powell simply accepted a claim from Glen's superior officer that Glen was not close enough to the front lines to know what he was writing about, an assertion that Glen has since denied. After a cursory review, Powell drafted a response on Dec. 13, 1968. He admitted to no pattern of wrongdoing by the Americal Division toward Vietnamese civilians. Powell claimed that U.S. soldiers were taught to treat Vietnamese courteously and respectfully. The Americal troops also had gone through an hour-long course on how to treat prisoners of war under the Geneva Conventions, Powell noted. "There may be isolated cases of mistreatment of civilians and POWs," Powell wrote. But "this by no means reflects the general attitude throughout the Division.... "In direct refutation of this [Glen's] portrayal," Powell concluded, "is the fact that relations between Americal soldiers and the Vietnamese people are excellent." Meteoric Rise Powell's findings, of course, were largely false, though they were exactly what his superiors wanted to hear. Powell's see-no-evil approach to controversies soon opened his way to a meteoric career as the most acclaimed political soldier of his era. After finishing his Vietnam tour, Powell earned plum assignments, such as a stint at the White House where he gained powerful mentors, such as future Defense secretaries Caspar Weinberger and Frank Carlucci. In the 1980s, Powell played a pivotal role in arranging the Iranian arms sales at the heart of the Iran-Contra Affair. He later employed his considerable personal charms to convince official Washington that the scandal was overblown and damaging to U.S. national security. Later, under President George H.W. Bush, Powell became the nation's first African-American chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and oversaw the military operations against Panama in 1989 and Iraq in the first Persian Gulf War in 1990-91. Awash in public acclaim after those lopsided military victories, Powell entered the pantheon of modern American heroes. Indeed, it seemed that no profile of Powell was complete without a reference to him as a "genuine American hero." In Campaign 2000, Powell's status played an important role in securing the White House for George W. Bush because many journalists and many voters assumed that Powell would restore a sense of maturity and wisdom to the federal government and to U.S. foreign policy. Instead Powell helped Bush lead the nation into the disastrous war in Iraq. In February 2003, Powell exploited his glittering reputation to go before the United Nations and sell the administration's false assertions that Iraq's Saddam Hussein was hiding weapons of mass destruction. Later, millions of Americans were shocked to learn that Powell had let himself be used to peddle dubious WMD claims, which have since led to the deaths of more than 2,200 American soldiers and tens of thousands of Iraqis. After resigning as Secretary of State -- but not before Bush gained a second term -- Powell conceded that his U.N. testimony was a "blot" on his reputation. But Americans might have been less surprised if they had understood Powell's real history. [See, for instance, Consortiumnews.com's series "Behind Colin Powell's Legend."] In modern America, it seems false hero-worship has become the equivalent of worshipping false idols in ancient times, though arguably believing in false heroes has proved more dangerous. Much of the mistake in trusting Colin Powell could be traced back to his blithe repudiation of Tom Glen's heartfelt warnings. Indeed, if Powell had done any serious examination of Glen's charges, Powell might well have learned about Thompson's first-hand account of the My Lai massacre just months earlier. My Lai Scandal It would take another hero from the Americal Division, an infantryman named Ron Ridenhour, to piece together the truth about My Lai. After returning to the United States, Ridenhour interviewed Americal comrades who had participated in the massacre. On his own, Ridenhour compiled this shocking information into a report and forwarded it to the Army inspector general. The IG's office conducted an aggressive official investigation, in marked contrast to Powell's slipshod review. Confirming Ridenhour's report, the Army finally faced the horrible truth. Courts martial were held against officers and enlisted men who were implicated in the murder of the My Lai civilians. Lt. William Calley, the platoon commander at My Lai, was sentenced to life in prison, but President Richard Nixon later commuted the sentence to three years' house arrest. Thompson's brave defense of those Vietnamese civilians, however, was lost in the mist of history, until he was interviewed for a documentary in the 1980s. That prompted a public campaign to honor Thompson and his crew as examples of true American heroes. Eventually, Thompson and two of his comrades, Colburn and Glenn Andreotta (who was killed in Vietnam three weeks after the My Lai massacre), were awarded the Soldier's Medal, the highest U.S. military honor for bravery when not facing an enemy. An emotional Thompson, who worked as a veterans counselor in Louisiana after leaving the military, accepted the award in 1998 "for all the men who served their country with honor on the battlefields of Southeast Asia." On March 16, 1998, Thompson and Colburn returned to Vietnam to attend a service at My Lai marking the 30th anniversary of the massacre. "I cannot explain why it happened," Thompson said, according to CNN. "I just wish our crew that day could have helped more people than we did." Referring to the ostracism he faced and the long delay in getting recognition for what he did at My Lai in 1968, Thompson told the Associated Press in 2004: "Don't do the right thing looking for a reward, because it might not come."
According to the AP, Colburn was at Thompson's side when the American hero of My Lai died in Alexandria, Louisiana, after a long battle with cancer.
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Axis Of Fanatics -- Netanyahu And Ahmadinejad By Norman Solomon With Ariel Sharon out of the picture, Benjamin Netanyahu has a better chance to become prime minister of Israel. He's media savvy. He knows how to spin on American television. And he's very dangerous. Netanyahu spent a lot of his early years in the United States. Later, during the 1980s, he worked at the Israeli Embassy in Washington and then became Israel's ambassador to the United Nations. By the time he moved up to deputy foreign minister in 1988, he was a star on U.S. networks. The guy is smooth -- fluent in American idioms, telegenic to many eyes -- and good at lying on camera. So, when Israeli police killed 17 Palestinians at Jerusalem's Al-Aqsa Mosque in October 1990, Netanyahu led a disinformation blitz asserting that the Palestinians were killed after they'd rioted and pelted Jewish worshipers from above the Wailing Wall with huge stones. At the time, his fable dominated much of the U.S. media. Later even the official Israeli inquiry debunked Netanyahu's account and blamed police for starting the clash. Now, with Netanyahu campaigning to win the Israeli election for prime minister in late March, he's cranking up rhetoric against Iran. His outlook seems to be 180 degrees from the world view of Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Yet in tangible political ways, they're well-positioned to feed off each other's fanaticism. The election that gave the presidency of Iran to Ahmadinejad last summer was a victory for repressive fundamentalism. Results have included a negative trend for human rights in the country and a more bellicose foreign policy. When Ahmadinejad declared in late October that "Israel must be wiped off the map," he did a big favor to the most militaristic of Israel's major politicians -- Benjamin Netanyahu -- who demanded that Prime Minster Sharon take forceful action against Iran. Otherwise, Netanyahu said in December, "when I form the new Israeli government, we'll do what we did in the past against Saddam's reactor, which gave us 20 years of tranquillity." Netanyahu was referring to Israel's air attack on the Osirak reactor in June 1981 to prevent Iraq from developing nuclear weapons. But now the idea of bombing Iran is nonsensical even to many analysts who are enthusiastic about Israel's large nuclear arsenal, estimated at 200 warheads. "Preemptive military attack is not a strategy for stopping the spread of nuclear weapons anymore; the changes in technology have made it obsolete." That's the current assessment from Larry Derfner, who often writes about Israeli politics for the Jerusalem Post. "Concealing a nuclear start-up is so much easier now than it was in 1981 and it's only going to get easier yet. Throwing fighter jets, commandos and whatnot at Iran is more than risky; it's almost certainly futile if not altogether impossible. Better for Israel and Israelis to forget about it and instead meet the Iranian threat by making this country's deterrent power even more intimidating than it already is." Derfner added: "A nuclear Iran isn't a cause for indifference but neither is it a cause for dread and certainly not for recklessness. A nuclear Iran is actually acceptable. We can live with it. The truth is we've been living here with threats very much like it all along." But Netanyahu has repeatedly emphasized that he wants to launch a military strike on Iran. "This is the Israeli government's primary obligation," he said. "If it is not done by the current government, I plan to lead the next government to stop the Iranians." The specter of Netanyahu and Ahmadinejad fueling each other's madness as heads of state is frightening. In such a circumstance, the primary danger of conflagration would come from nuclear-armed Israel, not nuclear-unarmed Iran. Candidate Netanyahu is a standard bearer for nuclear insanity. He's also an implacable enemy of basic Palestinian human rights. Many Israelis understand that Netanyahu is an extremist, and polls published on Jan. 6 indicate that the post-Sharon era may not be as hospitable to Netanyahu as initially assumed. For that matter, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad may not serve out his full four-year term as Iran's president. Evidently the hardline clerics who dominate the Iranian government got more than they bargained for when they threw their weight behind the Ahmadinejad campaign last June. In recent months, Iran's supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, has shifted more power to the governmental Expediency Council headed by the shady magnate Hashemi Rafsanjani, a relatively moderate political hack who lost in the presidential runoff last year. Ahmadinejad is good at making statements that cause international uproars, but he's having a difficult time exercising presidential leverage. "Even in Iran's mostly conservative parliament, the hard-line president has found himself unable to get traction," the Los Angeles Times noted on Jan. 2. "In a first for the Islamic Republic, lawmakers turned down four of the ministers Ahmadinejad asked them to approve. It took him three months and four candidates to seat an oil minister. Some reformist legislators even agitated for hearings on the president's 'lack of political competence.'" Using religious claims to bolster their quests for power, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Benjamin Netanyahu each stand to gain by pointing to the menacing fanaticism of the other. Yet many Iranians and Israelis recognize the grave dangers of such posturing. As tensions mount and pressures intensify, the White House might end up acceding to an Israeli air attack on Iran. Or the Bush administration may prefer to launch its own air strike against Iran.
Iran. Israel. The United States. Each country has the very real
potential to move in a better direction -- away from lethal
righteousness. But in every society, that will require more effective
grassroots efforts for peace and justice.
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 Attack On Iran: A Looming Folly By William Rivers Pitt The wires have been humming since before the New Year with reports that the Bush administration is planning an attack on Iran. "The Bush administration is preparing its NATO allies for a possible military strike against suspected nuclear sites in Iran in the New Year, according to German media reports, reinforcing similar earlier suggestions in the Turkish media," reported UPI on December 30th. "The Berlin daily Der Tagesspiegel this week," continued UPI, "quoted 'NATO intelligence sources' who claimed that the NATO allies had been informed that the United States is currently investigating all possibilities of bringing the mullah-led regime into line, including military options. This 'all options are open' line has been President George W Bush's publicly stated policy throughout the past 18 months." An examination of the ramifications of such an attack is desperately in order. 1. Blowback in Iraq The recent elections in Iraq were dominated by an amalgam of religiously fundamentalist Shi'ite organizations, principally the Dawa Party and the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI). Both Dawa and SCIRI have umbilical connections to the fundamentalist Shi'ite leadership in Iran that go back decades. In essence, Iran now owns a significant portion of the Iraqi government. Should the United States undertake military action against Iran, the ramifications in Iraq would be immediate and extreme. In the first eight days of January, eighteen US troops have been killed in Iraq, compounded by another twelve deaths from a Black Hawk helicopter crash on Saturday. Much of the violence aimed at American forces is coming from disgruntled Sunni factions that have their own militias, believe the last elections were a sham, and hold little political power in the government. If the US attacks Iran, it is probable that American forces - already taxed by attacks from Sunni factions - will also face reprisal attacks in Iraq from Shi'ite factions loyal to Iran. The result will be a dramatic escalation in US and civilian casualties, US forces will be required to bunker themselves further into their bases, and US forces will find themselves required to fight the very government they just finished helping into power. Iraq, already a seething cauldron, will sink further into chaos. 2. Iran's Armaments Unlike Iraq, Iran has not spent the last fifteen years having its conventional forces worn down by grueling sanctions, repeated attacks, and two American-led wars. While Iran's conventional army is not what it was during the heyday of the Iran-Iraq war - their armaments have deteriorated and the veterans of that last war have retired - the nation enjoys substantial military strength nonetheless. According to a report issued by the Center for Strategic and International Studies in December of 2004, Iran "has some 540,000 men under arms and over 350,000 reserves. They include 120,000 Iranian Revolutionary Guards trained for land and naval asymmetrical warfare. Iran's military also includes holdings of 1,613 main battle tanks, 21,600 other armored fighting vehicles, 3,200 artillery weapons, 306 combat aircraft, 60 attack helicopters, 3 submarines, 59 surface combatants, and 10 amphibious ships." "Iran is now the only regional military power that poses a significant conventional military threat to Gulf stability," continued the CSIS report. "Iran has significant capabilities for asymmetric warfare, and poses the additional threat of proliferation. There is considerable evidence that it is developing both a long-range missile force and a range of weapons of mass destruction. It has never properly declared its holdings of chemical weapons, and the status of its biological weapons programs is unknown." A MILNET brief issued in February 2005 reports, "Due to its position astride the Persian Gulf, Iran has constantly been a threat to the Gulf. The so called 'Tanker' wars in the late 1980s put Iran squarely in the bullseye of all nations seeking to transport oil out of the region. Even the small navy that Iran puts to sea is capable enough to harass shipping, and several cases of small boat operations against oil well heads in the Gulf during that period made it clear small asymmetrical tactics of the Iranian Navy could be quite effective." "More concerning," continued the MILNET brief, "is the priority placed on expanding and modernizing its Navy. The CSIS report cites numerous areas where Iran has funded modernization including the most troublesome aspect, anti-shipping cruise missiles: 'Iran has obtained new anti-ship missiles and missile patrol craft from China, midget submarines from North Korea, submarines from Russia, and modern mines.'" It is Iran's missile armaments that pose the greatest concern for American forces in the Gulf, especially for the US Navy. Iran's coast facing the Persian Gulf is a looming wall of mountains that look down upon any naval forces arrayed in those waters. The Gulf itself only has one exit, the Strait of Hormuz, which is also dominated by the mountainous Iranian coastline. In essence, Iran holds the high ground in the Gulf. Missile batteries arrayed in those mountains could raise bloody havoc with any fleet deployed below. Of all the missiles in Iran's armament, the most dangerous is the Russian-made SS-N-22 Sunburn. These missiles are, simply, the fastest anti-ship weapons on the planet. The Sunburn can reach Mach 3 at high altitude. Its maximum low-altitude speed is Mach 2.2, some three times faster than the American-made Harpoon. The Sunburn takes two short minutes to cover its full range. The missile's manufacturers state that one or two missiles could cripple a destroyer, and five missiles could sink a 20,000 ton ship. The Sunburn is also superior to the Exocet missile. Recall that it was two Exocets that ripped the USS Stark to shreds in 1987, killing 37 sailors. The Stark could not see them to stop them. The US aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt is currently deployed in the Persian Gulf, with some 7,000 souls aboard. Sailing with the Roosevelt is the Tarawa Expeditionary Strike Force, which includes the USS Tarawa, the USS Austin, and the USS Pearl Harbor. The USS Austin is likewise deployed in the Gulf. The Sunburn missile, with its incredible speed and ability to avoid radar detection, would do terrible damage these ships if Iran chooses to retaliate in the Gulf after an American attack within its borders. Beyond the naval threat is the possibility of Iran throwing its military muscle into the ongoing struggle in Iraq. Currently, the US is facing an asymmetrical attack from groups wielding small arms, shoulder-fired grenades and roadside bombs. The vaunted American military has suffered 2,210 deaths and tens of thousands of wounded from this form of warfare. The occupation of Iraq has become a guerrilla war, a siege that has lasted more than a thousand days. If Iran decides to throw any or all of its 23,000 armored fighting vehicles, along with any or all of its nearly million-strong army, into the Iraq fray, the situation in the Middle East could become unspeakably dire. 3. The Syrian Connection In February of 2005, Iran and Syria agreed upon a mutual protection pact to combat "challenges and threats" in the region. This was a specific reaction to the American invasion of Iraq, and a reaction to America's condemnation of Syria after the death of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, which was widely seen as an assassination ordered from Damascus. An attack on Iran would trigger this mutual defense pact, and could conceivably bring Syria into direct conflict with American forces. Like Iran, Syria's military is nothing to scoff at. Virtually every credible analysis has Syria standing as the strongest military force in the Middle East after Israel. Damascus has been intent for years upon establishing significant military strength to serve as a counterweight to Israel's overwhelming capabilities. As of 2002, Syria had some 215,000 soldiers under arms, 4,700 tanks, and a massive artillery capability. The Syrian Air Force is comprised of ten to eleven fighter/attack squadrons and sixteen fighter squadrons, totaling somewhere near 650 aircraft. Syria also possesses one of the largest arsenals of ballistic missiles in the region, comprised primarily of SCUD-derived systems. Iran, North Korea and China have been willing providers of state-of-the-art technologies. Compounding this is the well-based suspicion that Syria has perhaps the most advanced chemical weapons capability in the Persian Gulf. 4. China and the US Economy While the ominous possibilities of heightened Iraqi chaos, missiles in the Gulf, and Syrian involvement loom large if the US attacks Iran, all pale in comparison to the involvement of China in any US/Iran engagement. China's economy is exploding, hampered only by their great thirst for petroleum and natural gas to fuel their industry. In the last several months, China has inked deals with Iran for $70 billion dollars worth of Iranian oil and natural gas. China will purchase 250 million tons of liquefied natural gas from Iran over the next 30 years, will develop the massive Yadavaran oil field in Iran, and will receive 150,000 barrels of oil per day from that field. China is seeking the construction of a pipeline from Iran to the Caspian Sea, where it would link with another planned pipeline running from Kazakhstan to China. Any US attack on Iran could be perceived by China as a direct threat to its economic health. Further, any fighting in the Persian Gulf would imperil the tankers running China's liquefied natural gas through the Strait of Hormuz. Should China decide to retaliate against the US to defend its oil and natural gas deal with Iran, the US would be faced with a significant threat. This threat exists not merely on a military level, though China could force a confrontation in the Pacific by way of Taiwan. More significantly, China holds a large portion of the American economy in the palm of its hand. Paul Craig Roberts, writing for The American Conservative, said in July of 2005 that "As a result of many years of persistent trade surpluses with the United States, the Japanese government holds dollar reserves of approximately $1 trillion. China's accumulation of dollars is approximately $600 billion. South Korea holds about $200 billion. These sums give these countries enormous leverage over the United States. By dumping some portion of their reserves, these countries could put the dollar under intense pressure and send U.S. interest rates skyrocketing. Washington would really have to anger Japan and Korea to provoke such action, but in a showdown with China - over Taiwan, for example - China holds the cards. China and Japan, and the world at large, have more dollar reserves than they require. They would have no problem teaching a hegemonic superpower a lesson if the need arose." "The hardest blow on Americans," concluded Roberts, "will fall when China does revalue its currency. When China's currency ceases to be undervalued, American shoppers in Wal-Mart, where 70 percent of the goods on the shelves are made in China, will think they are in Neiman Marcus. Price increases will cause a dramatic reduction in American real incomes. If this coincides with rising interest rates and a setback in the housing market, American consumers will experience the hardest times since the Great Depression." In short, China has the American economy by the throat. Should they decide to squeeze, we will all feel it. China's strong hand in this even extends to the diplomatic realm; China is a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, and could veto any actions against Iran proposed by the United States. 5. American Preparedness American citizens have for decades taken it as a given that our military can overwhelm and overcome any foe on the battlefield. The rapid victory during the first Gulf War cemented this perception. The last three years of the Iraq occupation, however, have sapped this confidence. Worse, the occupation has done great damage to the strength of the American military, justifying the decrease in confidence. Thanks to repeated deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, recruiting is at an all-time low. Soldiers with vital training and know-how are refusing to re-enlist. Across the board, the American military is stretched to the breaking point. Two vaunted economists - one a Nobel Prize winner and the other a nationally renowned budget expert - have analyzed the data at hand and put a price tag on the Iraq occupation. According to Linda Bilmes of Harvard and Nobel Laureate Joseph E. Stiglitz of Columbia University, the final cost of the Iraq occupation will run between $1 trillion and $2 trillion, surpassing by orders of magnitude the estimates put forth by the Bush administration. If an engagement with Iran envelops our forces in Iraq, and comes to involve Syria, our economy will likely shatter under the strain of fighting so many countries simultaneously. Add to this the economic threat posed by China, and the economic threat implicit in any substantial disruption of the distribution of Mideast petroleum to the globe. If Iran and Syria - with their significant armaments, missile technologies and suspected chemical weapons capabilities - decide to engage with the relatively undersized US force in Iraq, our troops there will be fish in a barrel. Iran's position over the Gulf would make resupply by ship and air support from carriers a dangerous affair. In the worst-case scenario, the newly-minted American order of battle requiring the use of nuclear weapons to rescue a surrounded and imperiled force could come into play, hurling the entire planet into military and diplomatic bedlam. Conclusion: Is Any of This Possible? The question must be put as directly as possible: what manner of maniac would undertake a path so fraught with peril and potential economic catastrophe? It is difficult to imagine a justification for any action that could envelop the United States in a military and economic conflict with Iraq, Iran, Syria and China simultaneously. Iran is suspected by many nations of working towards the development of nuclear weapons, but even this justification has been tossed into a cocked hat. Recently, Russian president Vladimir Putin bluntly stated that Iran is not developing its nuclear capability for any reasons beyond peaceful energy creation, and pledged to continue assisting Iran in this endeavor. Therefore, any attack upon Iran's nuclear facilities will bring Russia into the mess. Iran also stands accused of aiding terrorism across the globe. The dangers implicit in any attack upon that nation, however, seem to significantly offset whatever gains could be made in the so-called "War on Terror." Unfortunately, all the dangers in the world are no match for the self-assurance of a bubble-encased zealot. What manner of maniac would undertake such a dangerous course? Look no further than 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. George W. Bush and his administration have consistently undertaken incredibly dangerous courses of action in order to garner political power on the home front. Recall the multiple terror threats lobbed out by the administration whenever damaging political news appeared in the media. More significantly, recall Iraq. Karl Rove, Bush's most senior advisor, notoriously told Republicans on the ballot during the 2002 midterms to "run on the war." The invasion of Iraq provided marvelous political cover for the GOP not only during those midterms, but during the 2004 Presidential election. What kind of political cover would be gained from an attack on Iran, and from the diversion of attention to that attack? The answer lies in one now-familiar name: Jack Abramoff. The Abramoff scandal threatens to subsume all the hard-fought GOP gains in Congress, and the 2006 midterms are less than a year away. Is any of this a probability? Logic says no, but logic seldom plays any part in modern American politics. All arguments that the Bush administration would be insane to attack Iran and risk a global conflagration for the sake of political cover run into one unavoidable truth.
They did it once already in Iraq.
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 Heil Bush, Dear Sekretar aus der Zustand Brewer, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your installation of Diebold machines guaranteeing us control of Arizona elections, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Republican Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at the "Fuhrer Bunker" formally 'The White House' on 03-15-2006. We salute you frau Brewer, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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Then, he was trying to draw attention away from his spectacular failure on public schools by convincing Texans that gay marriage was a horrible threat to us all. Now, he's trying to disguise the fact that the schools are in freefall by proposing we teach creationism in biology classes.
The funding of the whole school system is so unfair it has been declared unconstitutional by the Texas Supreme Court. All last year, Perry haplessly called special session after special session, trying to fix the problem, and couldn't get anywhere -- not an iota, not a scintilla of leadership.
Instead of facing the grave crisis that may yet result in the schools being closed down, Perry has blithely gone off on creationism -- teach the little perishers the Earth is 6,000 years old, that people lived at the same time as dinosaurs and who cares if the school building is falling apart?
Perry faced a potential primary challenge from State Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn. The Texas Republican Party is now so completely dominated by the Christian right, however, that a relative moderate like Strayhorn has no chance against Perry, who has been assiduously kissing the feet, to say the least, of the most extreme elements of the party. So Strayhorn announced she would seek election as an independent, and Perry played the creationism card. Gee, let's all have a big discussion about gays, creationism and covenant marriage -- that'll solve the state's staggering problems with schools and health care.
In case you missed it, the court decision everyone has been waiting for on teaching creationism in the schools came out on Dec. 20, and it explains, quite clearly, why creationism cannot be taught as science in this country. Because it isn't science, it's religion.
The decision in the Dover, Pa., school board case by Judge John Jones III, a Republican and Bush appointee, is well worth reading. It annihilates the case for teaching creationism. Calling creationism "intelligent design" changes nothing and is disingenuous to the point of being painful. Perry emphasized the equally disingenuous notion that there is "controversy" about evolution, supposedly two sides equally worth considering, so we should "teach the controversy." His spokesperson, Kathy Walt, actually said teaching different theories is part of "developing students' critical thinking skills." That's pathetic.
One hears evolution dismissed as "just a theory," as though all of science weren't based on theory and eternally subject to new evidence to the contrary. In science, gravity is "just a theory" -- and if you ever drop something and it falls up, they'll reconsider the whole theory for you. That's just how "theoretical" evolution is -- constantly subject to evidence and proof. But creationism cannot be tested and proved against evidence using the scientific method -- that is why it is not science, it is faith.
Meanwhile, it's heartening to note that political nincompoopery is not limited to Texas. A couple of recent quotes out of Washington, D.C., cause the jaw to drop. Our very own Tom DeLay, upon announcing he would quit as majority leader, said: "During my time in Congress, I have always acted in an ethical manner, within the rules of our body and the law of our land. I am fully confident time will bear this out." Good grief, the man was sanctioned three times by the House ethics committee last year alone.
Equally stupefying is the attempted emergence of Newt Gingrich, of all people, as an arbiter of ethics. Gingrich has been going about the media, holding forth on the shortcomings of today's Republicans. Let's see, that would be the same Newt Gingrich who originally started using the lobby as an arm of the Republican Party, right? Same Gingrich had the distinction of being the only House speaker to be reprimanded by his colleagues for ethical wrongdoing? Same Gingrich who was accused of misusing nonprofit organizations for political purposes, personally benefiting from political contributions, cutting a sleazy book deal and giving false statements to ethics investigators? Same Gingrich who was fined $300,000 for said lying? I thought it was that Gingrich.
They must really think we're morons.
On the general subject of political corruption, do not fall into the fatal error of cynicism. You do your country a great disservice by saying things like: "Eh, they're all crooks. Nothing anyone can do about it. Money will always find a way."
The answer is perpetual reform. Fix it, and if corruption comes back again, you just whack back at it again. The system as it is encourages corruption and must be changed. Public campaign financing is the best answer in the long-term -- all this "lobby reform" talk is hopelessly inadequate. Hang in, and raise hell -- this is a heaven-sent opportunity to clean it up. Don't blow the chance with cheap cynicism.
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Talk about going against the grain: while all in Washington are scrambling to distance themselves from Jack Abramoff, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher leapt to his defense Tuesday, telling AP : "They're portraying Jack as a monster. I see him more as a good person who's done bad things and has to be punished for doing bad things."
I get it: hate the sin -- and the mail fraud, the tax evasion, the bribery, and the federal conspiracy -- but love the sinner.
Rohrabacher tells the Los Angeles Times that he and Abramoff are longtime friends who socialized over the years with their families and dined together frequently. Abramoff hosted a baby shower for Rohrabacher and his wife when they had triplets in 2004, and the congressman let Abramoff use his name as a personal reference when the lobbyist applied for a $60 million loan to purchase a fleet of floating casinos in Florida.
"The last thing I'm going to do is kick a friend when he's down," said Rohrabacher. "I'm not excusing anything he did that was wrong or illegal. It's just a sad commentary on democracy that when someone falls, there's this feeding frenzy and people are abandoned by those they thought were their friends."
I'm not sure what democracy has to do with it, but it's hard to find fault with a guy standing by a friend -- and fellow screenwriter. That's right, besides sharing a conservative bent, the two pals are also members of the Brotherhood of the Would-Be Hollywood Players.
You may remember that Rohrabacher made headlines a few months back when it was revealed that he had opened doors in Washington for Joseph Medawar, a small-time Hollywood producer pitching a TV series about the Department of Homeland Security, after Medawar had paid $23,000 to option Baja, a 30-year old script the congressman had written.
Medawar has been charged with swindling dozens of investors by selling $5.5 million in stock in his production company (the one that was to produce the Homeland Security project) and spending the money on himself. While watchdog groups have called for an investigation into Rohrabacher's actions, the congressman/screenwriter has defended himself -- and his literary output.
"There was no quid pro quo," insisted Rohrabacher, saying that Medawar had wanted to "make at least one feature film a year that was pro-American. He remembered Baja and said that would be a good one for us to do. And I said, 'Fine. I have put a lot of work into that.'"
Just how much work became clear when the LA Times got a look at Baja, which had been knocking around Hollywood so long that, over time, its protagonist has gone from a conservative twentysomething Vietnam vet to a conservative twentysomething Gulf War vet.
As described by the Times, Baja is a standard-issue buddy movie featuring "high-octane action", "a little romance", and Rohrabacher's "own brand of humor", exemplified by this exchange between the two main characters, Bernie "Paz" Shulman and Roger Wallace:
Roger: 'Paz'? What kind of name is that?
One early fan of the script was Ronald Reagan, whose 1976 campaign Rohrabacher had worked on. After running into the future president at a party in 1978, Rohrabacher sent him a copy of Baja -- and soon received a handwritten note from Reagan, who felt the script had an "excellent locale for filming purposes plus action & suspense" but advised Rohrabacher to "clean up the language -- a few h--l's & d--n's yes but I'd drop all the words ending in '-itch, --it or -uck.'".
As for Abramoff, his short-lived stint as an ink-stained Hollywood wretch reached its high-water mark when he shared story credit on 1989's Red Scorpion -- an action thriller he also produced. The film starred Dolph Lundgren as a Soviet assassin who is sent to kill an African anti-Communist rebel leader but ends up switching sides and obliterating his Commie commanders ("He's a human killing machine," trumpeted ads for the Rambo-wannabe flick. "Taught to stalk. Trained to kill. Programmed to destroy. He's played by their rules... Until now.")
"The movie's reflective moments belong to Mr. Lundgren's sweaty chest," wrote New York Times film critic Stephen Holden at the time of Red Scorpion's release. And looking back on the film this April, Frank Rich wrote that it features "violence, bloodied beefcake... and crucifixion imagery anticipating The Passion of the Christ."
For the definitive takedown of Abramoff's cinematic oeuvre check out this terrific Washington Postpiece by Peter Carlson. I especially loved his comparison of the writing in Abramoff's movies and that found in the Abramoff e-mails uncovered by the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs:
Those now-infamous e-mails reveal Abramoff's hitherto undiscovered talent for writing brilliant lowlife dialogue. The best of the e-mails are reminiscent of the poetically raunchy dialogue in "Glengarry Glen Ross," David Mamet's Pulitzer Prize-winning play about sleazy real estate salesmen:
"Can you smell money?!?!?!" Abramoff asked in one e-mail.
"You iz da man! Do you hear me?! You da man!!" he wrote in another. "How much $$ coming tomorrow? Did we get some more $$ in?"
"That [expletive] idiot put my name on an e-mail list!" he wrote in a third. "What a [expletive] moron! He may have blown our cover! Dammit. We are moving forward anyway and taking their [expletive] money."
Ironically, Abramoff's e-mails contain better dialogue than Abramoff's movies. The man's a natural.
Agreed -- but it's not like Red Scorpion is without its conversational gems. Take this exchange between Lundgren's Lt. Nikolai and Ferguson, an irascible American journalist played by M. Emmett Walsh:
Ferguson: Man, what I'd give for a bacon-cheeseburger right now. Wash it down with an icecold glass of beer. Fuckin' A.
In a foreshadowing of what lay ahead for him in Washington, Abramoff's Hollywood foray was filled with intrigue, controversy, political fireworks, and shady financial deals -- including claims that Red Scorpion was partly bankrolled by South Africa's apartheid government. Because of these claims -- and because the film was shot in South African-controlled Namibia -- when it was released, Abramoff's film was placed on a UN list for having violated the organization's cultural boycott of South Africa's white supremacist government.
Fervent anti-Communism was another major bond between Rohrabacher and Abramoff. Fresh off a 4-year stint as chairman of the College Republicans, Abramoff helped organize a convention of anti-communist rebel leaders from all over the globe. Held in June 1985 in Jamba, Angola (the jungle headquarters of Jonas Savimbi's UNITA group), the rebel convention, dubbed the Democratic International, brought together representatives of the Soviet-fighting Afghan mujahedin, the Nicaraguan Contras, Laotian rebels, and Savimbi's forces. According to James Verini in Salon: "For several days they commiserated and compared notes, huddling together in thatched huts and signing an anti-Soviet pact." A letter of support from Reagan was read, and framed copies of the Declaration of Independence were handed out.
Hmmm... Afghan, Nicaraguan, Laotian, and African rebels all gathered together in the jungle for several days of anti-communist fellowship? You can't tell me that hijinx didn't ensue! I smell a gang comedy blockbuster here! A geo-political Animal House.
You cast Adam Sandler as a mujahedin, George Lopez as a Contra, Chris Rock as Savimbi, and Vince Vaughn as Abramoff. It can't miss.
And since it seems certain that Abramoff is going to have plenty of downtime, he should take a crack at the screenplay. Maybe his old pal Rep. Rohrabacher can swing by during visiting hours and they can knock out a first draft together.
Abramoff + Rohrabacher + Anti-Communist Comedy = Box Office Gold.
... Pat Bagley ...  |
Place your message here!
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While goin' the road to sweet Athy, hurroo, hurroo
With your drums and guns and drums and guns, hurroo, hurroo
Where are your eyes that were so mild, hurroo, hurroo
Where are your legs that used to run, hurroo, hurroo
I'm happy for to see ye home, hurroo, hurroo
Ye haven't an arm, ye haven't a leg, hurroo, hurroo
They're rolling out the guns again, hurroo, hurroo
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Parting Shots...
 A chronically constipated Pat Robertson tries to think of whom he wants God to kill next
Target: the Supreme Court
A "Got Your Back" Prayer Dear Mercurially Merciful Lord: O Lord, we come before you today because we are sure that, by now, you know that Brother Pat Robertson has turned to you in solemn Christian prayer to righteously beseech you to kill off a few Supreme Court justices that have rudely treated those pesky so-called "gays" with respect. With bracing candor, Brother Pat is calling this a "prayer offensive." Ever helpful in thinking of ways to kill off liberals, Brother Pat hints: ``One justice is 83-years-old, another has cancer and another has a heart condition." Call us timid, O Lord, but it makes us rather nervous when a man who just went through a bout of prostate cancer thinks it wise to ask his Creator to start going on a killing rampage, targeting people with cancer and heart conditions. After all, who will run the country if you take Dick Cheney from us? We are further concerned that you might respond to Brother Pat's imprecatory prayers in that mischievous, ironic way of Yours and, well, kill him, too. It is with your delicious penchant for technically giving people what they pray for in mind (like when John Kennedy, Jr. screamed, with the coarse impetuousness endemic in Democrats, : "Lord, do something to shut up that damned braying cokehead in Row A!") that we grow concerned for Brother Pat's safety. If indeed you are mulling over killing Pat again (and, perhaps, ruefully second guessing why you didn't act when you had the chance the first time), we are renewing the prayer we made when you first tried to kill Brother Pat Robertson with prostate cancer: O Lord, we know that you have your reasons for lifting your veil of protection away from Brother Pat's sinful crotch. Apparently Brother Pat has said or done something to vex you and provoke your famously itchy trigger finger. While many might assume that it was Brother Pat's profitable career of putting words in your mouth that got under your skin, perhaps, Brother Pat simply looked at you the wrong way. Any reader of the Bible knows that it is difficult to gauge exactly what will set you off. For example, we know that you turned Moses' yenta sister into a leper for simply asking a pesky question you found mildly intrusive, so there is a very good chance that Brother Pat has no idea what oversight led to the Lord turning on him and now wanting him dead. We recall, O Lord, how you told Oral Roberts years ago that if he didn't come up with one million dollars pronto, you would break his legs and then kill or otherwise inconvenience him. Perhaps, you struck a similar bargain with Brother Pat. Only this time, out of your understandable frustration over Brother Roberts beating you in your own bet, raised the stakes to such lofty levels that it was too much money for even Brother Pat to cough up without having to sell his beloved race horses or investments in Liberian gold mines. Nevertheless, we ask, O Lord, that you spare Brother Pat from your wrath. In lieu of that, we ask Jesus that you allow Brother Pat's illness to be prolonged enough to allow him to become weepy in scores of telecasts of the 700 Club so that the phone banks will peal like a Christmas carillon, as sobbing homemakers in trailers throughout this glorious land send in cash to your glory!
In your Glorious name Lord Jesus, this I pray. |
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In This Edition
President Al Gore Jr. says, "US Constitution In Grave Danger."
Uri Avnery denies the obvious in, "With Friends Like These..."
Paul Craig Roberts reports, "Bush Has Crossed The Rubicon."
Jim Hightower reveals, "The Nam's Mess."
Tom Engelhardt looks forward at, "The Year Of Living Dangerously."
Ted Rall recounts the slaughter of innocents in, "U.S. Drone Planes Have A Nearly Perfect Record Of Failure."
Robert Scheer visits, "Terrorism's Elusive Refuge."
Robert Parry reviews, "Bush & The Limits Of Debate."
Joe Conason wonders, "Will The Media Forget Tragedy In The Mines?"
Norman Solomon follows, "Ted Koppel: "Natural Fit" At NPR News And Longtime Booster Of Henry Kissinger."
William Rivers Pitt explores, "The New Fascism."
Wilbur Ross Jr. wins the coveted "Vidkun Quisling Award!"
Molly Ivins states the obvious, "Elevating Rep. Roy Blunt Will Not Improve Things."
Arianna Huffington watches, "Hillary Plays The... 'Plantation' Card?"
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department the 'Whitehouse.Org' says, "President Bush Berates New York Times" but first Uncle Ernie takes us down to, "Desolation Row Revisited."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Bruce Beattie with additional cartoons from Ward Sutton, Micah Wright, MoPaul, Tom Tomorrow, Daoud, Internet Weekly.Org, Micholson, Sacred Cow Burgers.Com and Andrew Pollack.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Desolation Row Revisited By Ernest Stewart
They're selling postcards of the hanging "It Never Ends, It Never Ends! --- Sam Kinison
Oh did you catch those real crocodile tears of joy carefully staged by Sammy (the coathanger's) old skank? Proof positive that the "Stepford Wives aren't fiction. Not since Pickles killed off her old lover for der Smirk has a women prostituted herself so low for some waste of space with power. Meanwhile all over America women are bending over, putting their heads between their legs and kissing the control over their wombs goodbye. In a year or two Sammy (the coathanger) will join the rest of the "Gang of Five"(tm) in overturning Roe vs. Wade. I'm not surprised except that it's taken this long. After all 98% of us are to some extent already slaves. If you doubt that statement twist up a fat one, light it up and pass it to that cop on the corner, or that cop on your roof top, or that cop in your wood pile or the cop that's knock, knock, knocking on your back door! "Hey officer want a toke?" Yeah go ahead and make my day! You'll find that the 13th amendment didn't really outlaw slavery, just the private ownership of slaves. Any American Talibaner will tell you that both Yahweh and his kid are down with slavery, in fact the bible oft times promotes it. You'll also find that your body doesn't really belong to you but to the state. Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's. In fact, if the Fuhrer says so, you will have no rights whatsoever, you won't even have the right to scream when they shove a broom handle up your ass at one of our many concentration camps! Speaking of which... I see the German Fuhrer, Angela Merkel came to Foggy Bottom the other daze to assure the American Fuhrer that Germany's on his side now. She also assured Bush that they're dusting off those black and silver uniforms again and shinnying up those spiffy sterling silver death heads till they shine like tears on a barb wire fence; Bush strummed his new guitar named "Brownie" and tried to sing "Angie" to her but couldn't remember the words being in awe of a real "Christian" Angel-a from Germany! See god really does work in mysterious ways. If you don't believe me just ask the Panzer Pope about it! Have I mentioned that old "history repeating itself again thingie" lately? Have I? Except this time the Fuhrer wears high heels and a corset and so does the Frau Fuhrer too! Add to that the fact that the Hippie Republic of Japan has destroyed their hippie constitution and picked up the Samurai Sword again. They're wanting to go off again on another one of those quaint, wonderful military adventures that they do so love to do and our west Taxus prairie monkey couldn't be any happier about it. This bodes well for an eventual nuclear war against China, Russia and India. So how do you like the Rethuglican "Contract on America" so far America, hmm...? Do you think you could get up off your fat, American ass and do something about this before it's too late or would that interrupt your 'pre-Super Bowl' festivities? Once again folks it's bread and circuses, bread and circuses! To control the Sheeple it really is that simple!
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We get by with a little help from our friends!
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And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
 US Constitution In Grave Danger By Albert Gore Jr. Congressman Barr and I have disagreed many times over the years, but we have joined together today with thousands of our fellow citizens-Democrats and Republicans alike-to express our shared concern that America's Constitution is in grave danger. In spite of our differences over ideology and politics, we are in strong agreement that the American values we hold most dear have been placed at serious risk by the unprecedented claims of the Administration to a truly breathtaking expansion of executive power. As we begin this new year, the Executive Branch of our government has been caught eavesdropping on huge numbers of American citizens and has brazenly declared that it has the unilateral right to continue without regard to the established law enacted by Congress to prevent such abuses. It is imperative that respect for the rule of law be restored. So, many of us have come here to Constitution Hall to sound an alarm and call upon our fellow citizens to put aside partisan differences and join with us in demanding that our Constitution be defended and preserved. It is appropriate that we make this appeal on the day our nation has set aside to honor the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who challenged America to breathe new life into our oldest values by extending its promise to all our people. On this particular Martin Luther King Day, it is especially important to recall that for the last several years of his life, Dr. King was illegally wiretapped-one of hundreds of thousands of Americans whose private communications were intercepted by the U.S. government during this period. The FBI privately called King the "most dangerous and effective negro leader in the country" and vowed to "take him off his pedestal." The government even attempted to destroy his marriage and blackmail him into committing suicide. This campaign continued until Dr. King's murder. The discovery that the FBI conducted a long-running and extensive campaign of secret electronic surveillance designed to infiltrate the inner workings of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and to learn the most intimate details of Dr. King's life, helped to convince Congress to enact restrictions on wiretapping. The result was the Foreign Intelligence and Surveillance Act (FISA), which was enacted expressly to ensure that foreign intelligence surveillance would be presented to an impartial judge to verify that there is a sufficient cause for the surveillance. I voted for that law during my first term in Congress and for almost thirty years the system has proven a workable and valued means of according a level of protection for private citizens, while permitting foreign surveillance to continue. Yet, just one month ago, Americans awoke to the shocking news that in spite of this long settled law, the Executive Branch has been secretly spying on large numbers of Americans for the last four years and eavesdropping on "large volumes of telephone calls, e-mail messages, and other Internet traffic inside the United States." The New York Times reported that the President decided to launch this massive eavesdropping program "without search warrants or any new laws that would permit such domestic intelligence collection." During the period when this eavesdropping was still secret, the President went out of his way to reassure the American people on more than one occasion that, of course, judicial permission is required for any government spying on American citizens and that, of course, these constitutional safeguards were still in place. But surprisingly, the President's soothing statements turned out to be false. Moreover, as soon as this massive domestic spying program was uncovered by the press, the President not only confirmed that the story was true, but also declared that he has no intention of bringing these wholesale invasions of privacy to an end. At present, we still have much to learn about the NSA's domestic surveillance. What we do know about this pervasive wiretapping virtually compels the conclusion that the President of the United States has been breaking the law repeatedly and persistently. A president who breaks the law is a threat to the very structure of our government. Our Founding Fathers were adamant that they had established a government of laws and not men. Indeed, they recognized that the structure of government they had enshrined in our Constitution - our system of checks and balances - was designed with a central purpose of ensuring that it would govern through the rule of law. As John Adams said: "The executive shall never exercise the legislative and judicial powers, or either of them, to the end that it may be a government of laws and not of men." An executive who arrogates to himself the power to ignore the legitimate legislative directives of the Congress or to act free of the check of the judiciary becomes the central threat that the Founders sought to nullify in the Constitution - an all-powerful executive too reminiscent of the King from whom they had broken free. In the words of James Madison, "the accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny." Thomas Paine, whose pamphlet, "On Common Sense" ignited the American Revolution, succinctly described America's alternative. Here, he said, we intended to make certain that "the law is king." Vigilant adherence to the rule of law strengthens our democracy and strengthens America. It ensures that those who govern us operate within our constitutional structure, which means that our democratic institutions play their indispensable role in shaping policy and determining the direction of our nation. It means that the people of this nation ultimately determine its course and not executive officials operating in secret without constraint. The rule of law makes us stronger by ensuring that decisions will be tested, studied, reviewed and examined through the processes of government that are designed to improve policy. And the knowledge that they will be reviewed prevents over-reaching and checks the accretion of power. A commitment to openness, truthfulness and accountability also helps our country avoid many serious mistakes. Recently, for example, we learned from recently classified declassified documents that the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which authorized the tragic Vietnam war, was actually based on false information. We now know that the decision by Congress to authorize the Iraq War, 38 years later, was also based on false information. America would have been better off knowing the truth and avoiding both of these colossal mistakes in our history. Following the rule of law makes us safer, not more vulnerable. The President and I agree on one thing. The threat from terrorism is all too real. There is simply no question that we continue to face new challenges in the wake of the attack on September 11th and that we must be ever-vigilant in protecting our citizens from harm. Where we disagree is that we have to break the law or sacrifice our system of government to protect Americans from terrorism. In fact, doing so makes us weaker and more vulnerable. Once violated, the rule of law is in danger. Unless stopped, lawlessness grows. The greater the power of the executive grows, the more difficult it becomes for the other branches to perform their constitutional roles. As the executive acts outside its constitutionally prescribed role and is able to control access to information that would expose its actions, it becomes increasingly difficult for the other branches to police it. Once that ability is lost, democracy itself is threatened and we become a government of men and not laws. The President's men have minced words about America's laws. The Attorney General openly conceded that the "kind of surveillance" we now know they have been conducting requires a court order unless authorized by statute. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act self-evidently does not authorize what the NSA has been doing, and no one inside or outside the Administration claims that it does. Incredibly, the Administration claims instead that the surveillance was implicitly authorized when Congress voted to use force against those who attacked us on September 11th. This argument just does not hold any water. Without getting into the legal intricacies, it faces a number of embarrassing facts. First, another admission by the Attorney General: he concedes that the Administration knew that the NSA project was prohibited by existing law and that they consulted with some members of Congress about changing the statute. Gonzalez says that they were told this probably would not be possible. So how can they now argue that the Authorization for the Use of Military Force somehow implicitly authorized it all along? Second, when the Authorization was being debated, the Administration did in fact seek to have language inserted in it that would have authorized them to use military force domestically - and the Congress did not agree. Senator Ted Stevens and Representative Jim McGovern, among others, made statements during the Authorization debate clearly restating that that Authorization did not operate domestically. When President Bush failed to convince Congress to give him all the power he wanted when they passed the AUMF, he secretly assumed that power anyway, as if congressional authorization was a useless bother. But as Justice Frankfurter once wrote: "To find authority so explicitly withheld is not merely to disregard in a particular instance the clear will of Congress. It is to disrespect the whole legislative process and the constitutional division of authority between President and Congress." This is precisely the "disrespect" for the law that the Supreme Court struck down in the steel seizure case. It is this same disrespect for America's Constitution which has now brought our republic to the brink of a dangerous breach in the fabric of the Constitution. And the disrespect embodied in these apparent mass violations of the law is part of a larger pattern of seeming indifference to the Constitution that is deeply troubling to millions of Americans in both political parties. For example, the President has also declared that he has a heretofore unrecognized inherent power to seize and imprison any American citizen that he alone determines to be a threat to our nation, and that, notwithstanding his American citizenship, the person imprisoned has no right to talk with a lawyer-even to argue that the President or his appointees have made a mistake and imprisoned the wrong person. The President claims that he can imprison American citizens indefinitely for the rest of their lives without an arrest warrant, without notifying them about what charges have been filed against them, and without informing their families that they have been imprisoned. At the same time, the Executive Branch has claimed a previously unrecognized authority to mistreat prisoners in its custody in ways that plainly constitute torture in a pattern that has now been documented in U.S. facilities located in several countries around the world. Over 100 of these captives have reportedly died while being tortured by Executive Branch interrogators and many more have been broken and humiliated. In the notorious Abu Ghraib prison, investigators who documented the pattern of torture estimated that more than 90 percent of the victims were innocent of any charges. This shameful exercise of power overturns a set of principles that our nation has observed since General Washington first enunciated them during our Revolutionary War and has been observed by every president since then - until now. These practices violate the Geneva Conventions and the International Convention Against Torture, not to mention our own laws against torture. The President has also claimed that he has the authority to kidnap individuals in foreign countries and deliver them for imprisonment and interrogation on our behalf by autocratic regimes in nations that are infamous for the cruelty of their techniques for torture. Some of our traditional allies have been shocked by these new practices on the part of our nation. The British Ambassador to Uzbekistan - one of those nations with the worst reputations for torture in its prisons - registered a complaint to his home office about the senselessness and cruelty of the new U.S. practice: "This material is useless - we are selling our souls for dross. It is in fact positively harmful." Can it be true that any president really has such powers under our Constitution? If the answer is "yes" then under the theory by which these acts are committed, are there any acts that can on their face be prohibited? If the President has the inherent authority to eavesdrop, imprison citizens on his own declaration, kidnap and torture, then what can't he do? The Dean of Yale Law School, Harold Koh, said after analyzing the Executive Branch's claims of these previously unrecognized powers: "If the President has commander-in-chief power to commit torture, he has the power to commit genocide, to sanction slavery, to promote apartheid, to license summary execution." The fact that our normal safeguards have thus far failed to contain this unprecedented expansion of executive power is deeply troubling. This failure is due in part to the fact that the Executive Branch has followed a determined strategy of obfuscating, delaying, withholding information, appearing to yield but then refusing to do so and dissembling in order to frustrate the efforts of the legislative and judicial branches to restore our constitutional balance. For example, after appearing to support legislation sponsored by John McCain to stop the continuation of torture, the President declared in the act of signing the bill that he reserved the right not to comply with it. Similarly, the Executive Branch claimed that it could unilaterally imprison American citizens without giving them access to review by any tribunal. The Supreme Court disagreed, but the President engaged in legal maneuvers designed to prevent the Court from providing meaningful content to the rights of its citizens. A conservative jurist on the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals wrote that the Executive Branch's handling of one such case seemed to involve the sudden abandonment of principle "at substantial cost to the government's credibility before the courts." As a result of its unprecedented claim of new unilateral power, the Executive Branch has now put our constitutional design at grave risk. The stakes for America's representative democracy are far higher than has been generally recognized. These claims must be rejected and a healthy balance of power restored to our Republic. Otherwise, the fundamental nature of our democracy may well undergo a radical transformation. For more than two centuries, America's freedoms have been preserved in part by our founders' wise decision to separate the aggregate power of our government into three co-equal branches, each of which serves to check and balance the power of the other two. On more than a few occasions, the dynamic interaction among all three branches has resulted in collisions and temporary impasses that create what are invariably labeled "constitutional crises." These crises have often been dangerous and uncertain times for our Republic. But in each such case so far, we have found a resolution of the crisis by renewing our common agreement to live under the rule of law. The principle alternative to democracy throughout history has been the consolidation of virtually all state power in the hands of a single strongman or small group who together exercise that power without the informed consent of the governed. It was in revolt against just such a regime, after all, that America was founded. When Lincoln declared at the time of our greatest crisis that the ultimate question being decided in the Civil War was "whether that nation, or any nation so conceived, and so dedicated, can long endure," he was not only saving our union but also was recognizing the fact that democracies are rare in history. And when they fail, as did Athens and the Roman Republic upon whose designs our founders drew heavily, what emerges in their place is another strongman regime. There have of course been other periods of American history when the Executive Branch claimed new powers that were later seen as excessive and mistaken. Our second president, John Adams, passed the infamous Alien and Sedition Acts and sought to silence and imprison critics and political opponents. When his successor, Thomas Jefferson, eliminated the abuses he said: "[The essential principles of our Government] form the bright constellation which has gone before us and guided our steps through an age of revolution and reformation... [S]hould we wander from them in moments of error or of alarm, let us hasten to retrace our steps and to regain the road which alone leads to peace, liberty and safety." Our greatest President, Abraham Lincoln, suspended habeas corpus during the Civil War. Some of the worst abuses prior to those of the current administration were committed by President Wilson during and after WWI with the notorious Red Scare and Palmer Raids. The internment of Japanese Americans during WWII marked a low point for the respect of individual rights at the hands of the executive. And, during the Vietnam War, the notorious COINTELPRO program was part and parcel of the abuses experienced by Dr. King and thousands of others. But in each of these cases, when the conflict and turmoil subsided, the country recovered its equilibrium and absorbed the lessons learned in a recurring cycle of excess and regret. There are reasons for concern this time around that conditions may be changing and that the cycle may not repeat itself. For one thing, we have for decades been witnessing the slow and steady accumulation of presidential power. In a global environment of nuclear weapons and cold war tensions, Congress and the American people accepted ever enlarging spheres of presidential initiative to conduct intelligence and counter intelligence activities and to allocate our military forces on the global stage. When military force has been used as an instrument of foreign policy or in response to humanitarian demands, it has almost always been as the result of presidential initiative and leadership. As Justice Frankfurter wrote in the Steel Seizure Case, "The accretion of dangerous power does not come in a day. It does come, however slowly, from the generative force of unchecked disregard of the restrictions that fence in even the most disinterested assertion of authority." A second reason to believe we may be experiencing something new is that we are told by the Administration that the war footing upon which he has tried to place the country is going to "last for the rest of our lives." So we are told that the conditions of national threat that have been used by other Presidents to justify arrogations of power will persist in near perpetuity. Third, we need to be aware of the advances in eavesdropping and surveillance technologies with their capacity to sweep up and analyze enormous quantities of information and to mine it for intelligence. This adds significant vulnerability to the privacy and freedom of enormous numbers of innocent people at the same time as the potential power of those technologies. These techologies have the potential for shifting the balance of power between the apparatus of the state and the freedom of the individual in ways both subtle and profound. Don't misunderstand me: the threat of additional terror strikes is all too real and their concerted efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction does create a real imperative to exercise the powers of the Executive Branch with swiftness and agility. Moreover, there is in fact an inherent power that is conferred by the Constitution to the President to take unilateral action to protect the nation from a sudden and immediate threat, but it is simply not possible to precisely define in legalistic terms exactly when that power is appropriate and when it is not. But the existence of that inherent power cannot be used to justify a gross and excessive power grab lasting for years that produces a serious imbalance in the relationship between the executive and the other two branches of government. There is a final reason to worry that we may be experiencing something more than just another cycle of overreach and regret. This Administration has come to power in the thrall of a legal theory that aims to convince us that this excessive concentration of presidential authority is exactly what our Constitution intended. This legal theory, which its proponents call the theory of the unitary executive but which is more accurately described as the unilateral executive, threatens to expand the president's powers until the contours of the constitution that the Framers actually gave us become obliterated beyond all recognition. Under this theory, the President's authority when acting as Commander-in-Chief or when making foreign policy cannot be reviewed by the judiciary or checked by Congress. President Bush has pushed the implications of this idea to its maximum by continually stressing his role as Commander-in-Chief, invoking it has frequently as he can, conflating it with his other roles, domestic and foreign. When added to the idea that we have entered a perpetual state of war, the implications of this theory stretch quite literally as far into the future as we can imagine. This effort to rework America's carefully balanced constitutional design into a lopsided structure dominated by an all powerful Executive Branch with a subservient Congress and judiciary is - ironically - accompanied by an effort by the same administration to rework America's foreign policy from one that is based primarily on U.S. moral authority into one that is based on a misguided and self-defeating effort to establish dominance in the world. The common denominator seems to be based on an instinct to intimidate and control. This same pattern has characterized the effort to silence dissenting views within the Executive Branch, to censor information that may be inconsistent with its stated ideological goals, and to demand conformity from all Executive Branch employees. For example, CIA analysts who strongly disagreed with the White House assertion that Osama bin Laden was linked to Saddam Hussein found themselves under pressure at work and became fearful of losing promotions and salary increases. Ironically, that is exactly what happened to FBI officials in the 1960s who disagreed with J. Edgar Hoover's view that Dr. King was closely connected to Communists. The head of the FBI's domestic intelligence division said that his effort to tell the truth about King's innocence of the charge resulted in he and his colleagues becoming isolated and pressured. "It was evident that we had to change our ways or we would all be out on the street.... The men and I discussed how to get out of trouble. To be in trouble with Mr. Hoover was a serious matter. These men were trying to buy homes, mortgages on homes, children in school. They lived in fear of getting transferred, losing money on their homes, as they usually did. ... so they wanted another memorandum written to get us out of the trouble that we were in." The Constitution's framers understood this dilemma as well, as Alexander Hamilton put it, "a power over a man's support is a power over his will." (Federalist No. 73) Soon, there was no more difference of opinion within the FBI. The false accusation became the unanimous view. In exactly the same way, George Tenet's CIA eventually joined in endorsing a manifestly false view that there was a linkage between al Qaeda and the government of Iraq. In the words of George Orwell: "We are all capable of believing things which we know to be untrue, and then, when we are finally proved wrong, impudently twisting the facts so as to show that we were right. Intellectually, it is possible to carry on this process for an indefinite time: the only check on it is that sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield." Whenever power is unchecked and unaccountable it almost inevitably leads to mistakes and abuses. In the absence of rigorous accountability, incompetence flourishes. Dishonesty is encouraged and rewarded. Last week, for example, Vice President Cheney attempted to defend the Administration's eavesdropping on American citizens by saying that if it had conducted this program prior to 9/11, they would have found out the names of some of the hijackers. Tragically, he apparently still doesn't know that the Administration did in fact have the names of at least 2 of the hijackers well before 9/11 and had available to them information that could have easily led to the identification of most of the other hijackers. And yet, because of incompetence in the handling of this information, it was never used to protect the American people. It is often the case that an Executive Branch beguiled by the pursuit of unchecked power responds to its own mistakes by reflexively proposing that it be given still more power. Often, the request itself it used to mask accountability for mistakes in the use of power it already has. Moreover, if the pattern of practice begun by this Administration is not challenged, it may well become a permanent part of the American system. Many conservatives have pointed out that granting unchecked power to this President means that the next President will have unchecked power as well. And the next President may be someone whose values and belief you do not trust. And this is why Republicans as well as Democrats should be concerned with what this President has done. If this President's attempt to dramatically expand executive power goes unquestioned, our constitutional design of checks and balances will be lost. And the next President or some future President will be able, in the name of national security, to restrict our liberties in a way the framers never would have thought possible. The same instinct to expand its power and to establish dominance characterizes the relationship between this Administration and the courts and the Congress. In a properly functioning system, the Judicial Branch would serve as the constitutional umpire to ensure that the branches of government observed their proper spheres of authority, observed civil liberties and adhered to the rule of law. Unfortunately, the unilateral executive has tried hard to thwart the ability of the judiciary to call balls and strikes by keeping controversies out of its hands - notably those challenging its ability to detain individuals without legal process - by appointing judges who will be deferential to its exercise of power and by its support of assaults on the independence of the third branch. The President's decision to ignore FISA was a direct assault on the power of the judges who sit on that court. Congress established the FISA court precisely to be a check on executive power to wiretap. Yet, to ensure that the court could not function as a check on executive power, the President simply did not take matters to it and did not let the court know that it was being bypassed. The President's judicial appointments are clearly designed to ensure that the courts will not serve as an effective check on executive power. As we have all learned, Judge Alito is a longtime supporter of a powerful executive - a supporter of the so-called unitary executive, which is more properly called the unilateral executive. Whether you support his confirmation or not - and I do not - we must all agree that he will not vote as an effective check on the expansion of executive power. Likewise, Chief Justice Roberts has made plain his deference to the expansion of executive power through his support of judicial deference to executive agency rulemaking. And the Administration has supported the assault on judicial independence that has been conducted largely in Congress. That assault includes a threat by the Republican majority in the Senate to permanently change the rules to eliminate the right of the minority to engage in extended debate of the President's judicial nominees. The assault has extended to legislative efforts to curtail the jurisdiction of courts in matters ranging from habeas corpus to the pledge of allegiance. In short, the Administration has demonstrated its contempt for the judicial role and sought to evade judicial review of its actions at every turn. But the most serious damage has been done to the legislative branch. The sharp decline of congressional power and autonomy in recent years has been almost as shocking as the efforts by the Executive Branch to attain a massive expansion of its power. I was elected to Congress in 1976 and served eight years in the house, 8 years in the Senate and presided over the Senate for 8 years as Vice President. As a young man, I saw the Congress first hand as the son of a Senator. My father was elected to Congress in 1938, 10 years before I was born, and left the Senate in 1971. The Congress we have today is unrecognizable compared to the one in which my father served. There are many distinguished Senators and Congressmen serving today. I am honored that some of them are here in this hall. But the legislative branch of government under its current leadership now operates as if it is entirely subservient to the Executive Branch. Moreover, too many Members of the House and Senate now feel compelled to spend a majority of their time not in thoughtful debate of the issues, but raising money to purchase 30 second TV commercials. There have now been two or three generations of congressmen who don't really know what an oversight hearing is. In the 70's and 80's, the oversight hearings in which my colleagues and I participated held the feet of the Executive Branch to the fire - no matter which party was in power. Yet oversight is almost unknown in the Congress today. The role of authorization committees has declined into insignificance. The 13 annual appropriation bills are hardly ever actually passed anymore. Everything is lumped into a single giant measure that is not even available for Members of Congress to read before they vote on it. Members of the minority party are now routinely excluded from conference committees, and amendments are routinely not allowed during floor consideration of legislation. In the United States Senate, which used to pride itself on being the "greatest deliberative body in the world," meaningful debate is now a rarity. Even on the eve of the fateful vote to authorize the invasion of Iraq, Senator Robert Byrd famously asked: "Why is this chamber empty?" In the House of Representatives, the number who face a genuinely competitive election contest every two years is typically less than a dozen out of 435. And too many incumbents have come to believe that the key to continued access to the money for re-election is to stay on the good side of those who have the money to give; and, in the case of the majority party, the whole process is largely controlled by the incumbent president and his political organization. So the willingness of Congress to challenge the Administration is further limited when the same party controls both Congress and the Executive Branch. The Executive Branch, time and again, has co-opted Congress' role, and often Congress has been a willing accomplice in the surrender of its own power. Look for example at the Congressional role in "overseeing" this massive four year eavesdropping campaign that on its face seemed so clearly to violate the Bill of Rights. The President says he informed Congress, but what he really means is that he talked with the chairman and ranking member of the House and Senate intelligence committees and the top leaders of the House and Senate. This small group, in turn, claimed that they were not given the full facts, though at least one of the intelligence committee leaders handwrote a letter of concern to VP Cheney and placed a copy in his own safe. Though I sympathize with the awkward position in which these men and women were placed, I cannot disagree with the Liberty Coalition when it says that Democrats as well as Republicans in the Congress must share the blame for not taking action to protest and seek to prevent what they consider a grossly unconstitutional program. Moreover, in the Congress as a whole - both House and Senate - the enhanced role of money in the re-election process, coupled with the sharply diminished role for reasoned deliberation and debate, has produced an atmosphere conducive to pervasive institutionalized corruption. The Abramoff scandal is but the tip of a giant iceberg that threatens the integrity of the entire legislative branch of government. It is the pitiful state of our legislative branch which primarily explains the failure of our vaunted checks and balances to prevent the dangerous overreach by our Executive Branch which now threatens a radical transformation of the American system. I call upon Democratic and Republican members of Congress today to uphold your oath of office and defend the Constitution. Stop going along to get along. Start acting like the independent and co-equal branch of government you're supposed to be. But there is yet another Constitutional player whose pulse must be taken and whose role must be examined in order to understand the dangerous imbalance that has emerged with the efforts by the Executive Branch to dominate our constitutional system. We the people are - collectively - still the key to the survival of America's democracy. We - as Lincoln put it, "[e]ven we here" - must examine our own role as citizens in allowing and not preventing the shocking decay and degradation of our democracy. Thomas Jefferson said: "An informed citizenry is the only true repository of the public will." The revolutionary departure on which the idea of America was based was the audacious belief that people can govern themselves and responsibly exercise the ultimate authority in self-government. This insight proceeded inevitably from the bedrock principle articulated by the Enlightenment philosopher John Locke: "All just power is derived from the consent of the governed." The intricate and carefully balanced constitutional system that is now in such danger was created with the full and widespread participation of the population as a whole. The Federalist Papers were, back in the day, widely-read newspaper essays, and they represented only one of twenty-four series of essays that crowded the vibrant marketplace of ideas in which farmers and shopkeepers recapitulated the debates that played out so fruitfully in Philadelphia. Indeed, when the Convention had done its best, it was the people - in their various States - that refused to confirm the result until, at their insistence, the Bill of Rights was made integral to the document sent forward for ratification. And it is "We the people" who must now find once again the ability we once had to play an integral role in saving our Constitution. And here there is cause for both concern and great hope. The age of printed pamphlets and political essays has long since been replaced by television - a distracting and absorbing medium which sees determined to entertain and sell more than it informs and educates. Lincoln's memorable call during the Civil War is applicable in a new way to our dilemma today: "We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country." Forty years have passed since the majority of Americans adopted television as their principal source of information. Its dominance has become so extensive that virtually all significant political communication now takes place within the confines of flickering 30-second television advertisements. And the political economy supported by these short but expensive television ads is as different from the vibrant politics of America's first century as those politics were different from the feudalism which thrived on the ignorance of the masses of people in the Dark Ages. The constricted role of ideas in the American political system today has encouraged efforts by the Executive Branch to control the flow of information as a means of controlling the outcome of important decisions that still lie in the hands of the people. The Administration vigorously asserts its power to maintain the secrecy of its operations. After all, the other branches can't check an abuse of power if they don't know it is happening. For example, when the Administration was attempting to persuade Congress to enact the Medicare prescription drug benefit, many in the House and Senate raised concerns about the cost and design of the program. But, rather than engaging in open debate on the basis of factual data, the Administration withheld facts and prevented the Congress from hearing testimony that it sought from the principal administration expert who had compiled information showing in advance of the vote that indeed the true cost estimates were far higher than the numbers given to Congress by the President. Deprived of that information, and believing the false numbers given to it instead, the Congress approved the program. Tragically, the entire initiative is now collapsing - all over the country - with the Administration making an appeal just this weekend to major insurance companies to volunteer to bail it out. To take another example, scientific warnings about the catastrophic consequences of unchecked global warming were censored by a political appointee in the White House who had no scientific training. And today one of the leading scientific experts on global warming in NASA has been ordered not to talk to members of the press and to keep a careful log of everyone he meets with so that the Executive Branch can monitor and control his discussions of global warming. One of the other ways the Administration has tried to control the flow of information is by consistently resorting to the language and politics of fear in order to short-circuit the debate and drive its agenda forward without regard to the evidence or the public interest. As President Eisenhower said, "Any who act as if freedom's defenses are to be found in suppression and suspicion and fear confess a doctrine that is alien to America." Fear drives out reason. Fear suppresses the politics of discourse and opens the door to the politics of destruction. Justice Brandeis once wrote: "Men feared witches and burnt women." The founders of our country faced dire threats. If they failed in their endeavors, they would have been hung as traitors. The very existence of our country was at risk. Yet, in the teeth of those dangers, they insisted on establishing the Bill of Rights. Is our Congress today in more danger than were their predecessors when the British army was marching on the Capitol? Is the world more dangerous than when we faced an ideological enemy with tens of thousands of missiles poised to be launched against us and annihilate our country at a moment's notice? Is America in more danger now than when we faced worldwide fascism on the march - when our fathers fought and won two World Wars simultaneously? It is simply an insult to those who came before us and sacrificed so much on our behalf to imply that we have more to be fearful of than they. Yet they faithfully protected our freedoms and now it is up to us to do the same. We have a duty as Americans to defend our citizens' right not only to life but also to liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It is therefore vital in our current circumstances that immediate steps be taken to safeguard our Constitution against the present danger posed by the intrusive overreaching on the part of the Executive Branch and the President's apparent belief that he need not live under the rule of law. I endorse the words of Bob Barr, when he said, "The President has dared the American people to do something about it. For the sake of the Constitution, I hope they will." A special counsel should immediately be appointed by the Attorney General to remedy the obvious conflict of interest that prevents him from investigating what many believe are serious violations of law by the President. We have had a fresh demonstration of how an independent investigation by a special counsel with integrity can rebuild confidence in our system of justice. Patrick Fitzgerald has, by all accounts, shown neither fear nor favor in pursuing allegations that the Executive Branch has violated other laws. Republican as well as Democratic members of Congress should support the bipartisan call of the Liberty Coalition for the appointment of a special counsel to pursue the criminal issues raised by warrantless wiretapping of Americans by the President. Second, new whistleblower protections should immediately be established for members of the Executive Branch who report evidence of wrongdoing - especially where it involves the abuse of Executive Branch authority in the sensitive areas of national security. Third, both Houses of Congress should hold comprehensive - and not just superficial - hearings into these serious allegations of criminal behavior on the part of the President. And, they should follow the evidence wherever it leads. Fourth, the extensive new powers requested by the Executive Branch in its proposal to extend and enlarge the Patriot Act should, under no circumstances be granted, unless and until there are adequate and enforceable safeguards to protect the Constitution and the rights of the American people against the kinds of abuses that have so recently been revealed. Fifth, any telecommunications company that has provided the government with access to private information concerning the communications of Americans without a proper warrant should immediately cease and desist their complicity in this apparently illegal invasion of the privacy of American citizens. Freedom of communication is an essential prerequisite for the restoration of the health of our democracy. It is particularly important that the freedom of the Internet be protected against either the encroachment of government or the efforts at control by large media conglomerates. The future of our democracy depends on it. I mentioned that along with cause for concern, there is reason for hope. As I stand here today, I am filled with optimism that America is on the eve of a golden age in which the vitality of our democracy will be re-established and will flourish more vibrantly than ever. Indeed I can feel it in this hall.
As Dr. King once said, "Perhaps a new spirit is rising among us. If it is, let us trace its movements and pray that our own inner being may be sensitive to its guidance, for we are deeply in need of a new way beyond the darkness that seems so close around us." |
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With Friends Like These... By Uri Avnery JUDAS ISCARIOT is headed for a makeover. According to news reports, cardinals close to the new pope recommend a change in the Catholic Church's attitude towards him: exit the treacherous Jew who turns the messiah over to the cohorts of the evil High Priest - enter the apostle who simply fulfilled his role in the divine design. After all, it was God who decided that his son should die on the cross. A well-intentioned effort, but a pathetic one. No Vatican decision can alter the image of Judas in the New Testament: a despicable informer who received "thirty pieces of silver" for his betrayal of the Son of God. No Christian who absorbs this story in his childhood will ever forget the picture of the contemptible traitor who kisses Jesus at the moment of betraying him to his executioners. Nothing will help except changing the biblical text itself, and that is, of course, not so easy. If one of the other 11 apostles had betrayed Jesus, the consequences would not have been, perhaps, so horrible. But since Judas sounds in many languages like "Jews", the betrayal is associated in the consciousness of Christians with Jews in general. Multitudes of Jews throughout history have been butchered because of this. The Nazi battle-cry "Judah Verrecke!" (Perish, Jews!") paved the way to the gas chambers. Perhaps this had some influence on the young neo-Nazi, Alexander Koptsev, who ran amok this week in the Moscow synagogue, stabbing and wounding ten people. That act lit up all the red lights. Again, "the rise of anti-Semitism in the world" became a major subject, again the alarm bells shrilled. There is indeed a growing danger of anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism - two different phenomena that can appear both together and separately. But it is not connected with primitive skinheads like the Moscow knife-wielder. It is much more dangerous, and the fuel that feeds them exists in other places and on other levels. IN ONE of the stream of speeches in which George W. Bush is now trying to defend his ill-fated invasion of Iraq, this week he let loose a sentence that should light all the red lights. In this sentence he castigated his opponents for asserting that he had attacked Iraq "for the oil and for Israel". He thus brought to the surface an assertion that had until then been openly voiced only by anti-Semitic marginal groups. They have put together three facts: (a) that the people who most aggressively pushed for the war were the neo-cons who play a major role in the Bush administration, (b) that almost all the important members of this group are Jews, and (c) that the occupation of Iraq has freed Israel from a significant military threat. Up to now, the American media have treated this allegation with contempt, as a ridiculous "conspiracy theory". Now that the President himself has spoken about it, it may become part of the legitimate public discourse in the United States and throughout the world. Therein lies a great danger for Israel. The entire Israeli establishment supported the American invasion. (When we, the opponents of the war, called a demonstration against it in Tel-Aviv, on the day when millions took to the streets all around the world, it was a small event, ignored by the media.) Now it may happen, as so often in history, that those responsible for the disaster will evade responsibility. George Bush will fade from memory in a few years. What will remain is the impression that Israel and the Jews dragged the poor US into a despicable adventure. BY SHEER CHANCE, this week saw the appearance of a book about the Iraq war that touches on the same subject - "State of War" by James Risen. Among other things, the book says that the Secretary of Defense and the neo-cons who dominate Washington did not listen to the American intelligence analysts, who advised caution when it came to Iraq, but to the Israeli intelligence people who flooded Washington and briefed high-ranking officials. According to Risen, it was the hard-line Israelis that Rumsfeld and his deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, were listening to, not the cautious CIA. "CIA analysts were often skeptical of Israeli intelligence reports, knowing that Mossad had very strong - even obvious - biases about the Arab world." After their visits, CIA officials would generally discount much of what the Israeli intelligence officers supplied, "Wolfowitz and other conservatives at the Pentagon became enraged by this practice," Risen writes. Wolfowitz is, of course, a very Jewish name. The obvious conclusion: it was the Israelis and their allies, the Washington Jews, who pushed the US into the war. AS IF that was not enough, Washington is now rocked by a big scandal that has a close connection with Israel. At its center stands a person called Jack Abramoff - again a name that discloses the Jewish identity of its owner. This Jack is a super-lobbyist, a symbol of the phenomenon that has turned American politics into a dirty stable of corruption, which even the mighty Hercules would have had trouble cleaning up. He skimmed the money of his clients, mostly Native Americans, put some of it into his own pocket and used the rest to bribe establishment figures, senators and congressmen. He gave them generous gifts, junkets around the world, suites in luxury hotels and other perks. Most of the beneficiaries were Republicans, but some crumbs were thrown to Democrats, too. Up to this point, it's nothing unusual, just bigger than usual. The lobbying industry is very well developed in Washington, which is infested by lobbyists like a hobo with lice. The pro-Israeli lobby is no different from all the others. The lobbyists corrupt everything. They bribe the politicians to make laws that will divert billions of public money into the pockets of their clients. They play a major role in financing the election campaigns of politicians, from the President himself down to the lowliest mayor. Only rarely is one of them caught and sent to prison, as may happen now to that Abramoff. What is special about Abramoff is that he is a fanatical Zionist. According to the stories published in the States, some of the money that he diverted was transferred to extreme settlers in the West Bank. Abramoff sent them military equipment for use against the Palestinians, and perhaps against the Israeli government. Among other items, he bought them camouflage uniforms, telescopic sights for snipers, night-vision binoculars and a thermal imager. American publications mention a settler named Shmuel Ben-Zvi from the Betar Illit settlement, a high-school buddy of Abramoff, who received this equipment. Ben-Zvi denied it, but the Senate committee has obtained e-mail messages from him lauding Abramoff for sending him "reinforcement", while Abramoff wrote him that "if only there were another dozen of you, the dirty rats would be finished." Abramoff himself claims that he is simply an idealist, who uses the money "put into his hands by God" in order to help Israel. He also financed a - probably fictitious - outfit of Syrian exiles, supported by Israel. One of the American publications mentions in this context the biblical Mossad motto: "By way of deception thou shalt make war" (Proverbs 24,6 - that's how it sounds in modern Hebrew, but the actual meaning of the words is in doubt. The English Bible renders it thus: "For by wise counsel thou shalt make thy war".) So that's how it looks to Americans: the man who has become a symbol of corruption is a Jew who supports Israel. AND AS IF that is not enough, either, another friend of Israel has also made waves in the American media. That's our old acquaintance Jerry Falwell, the leader of millions of American Christian fundamentalists, a friend of the late Menachem Begin. It may be remembered that Binyamin Netanyahu, our then Prime Minister, went to America in 1998 to meet President Bill Clinton. In those days, Clinton was trying to exert pressure on Israel in order to promote peace. Netanyahu was invited for this purpose. On the eve of his meeting with Clinton, Netanyahu met publicly with Falwell of all people, in front of a crowd of hundreds. Falwell, a sworn enemy of Clinton, reveals now that the meeting was deliberately planned as an affront to the President. Some days before that, another friend of Netanyahu's, William Kristol, one of the Jewish neo-con power-brokers, had publicly hinted that a huge White House sex-scandal was about to break. Immediately afterwards, the Monica Lewinsky scandal was unleashed and the public was informed that the President had had sex in the White House with the young intern with the very Jewish-sounding name. Two weeks before the Netanyahu visit, an American Jewish paper had published an ad demanding that the President abstain from pressuring Israel. The ad included a photo of Clinton taken from the back - the very shot of Clinton embracing Monica that was later published all around the world. Falwell practically brags that he helped Netanyahu to blackmail Clinton. If so, he was successful. No pressure on Israel materialized at that meeting. By the way, the magazine in which Falwell published his allegation, Vanity Fair, belongs to the publishing empire of Si and Donald Newhouse, generous contributors to the pro-Israel lobby. (Another high-profile leader of the Christian fundamentalists, Pat Robertson, declared last week that the stroke that felled Sharon was God's punishment for giving away a piece of the Holy Land to the Arabs. He later apologized, probably hoping to save an agreement he has with the Israeli government to build a huge tourist complex near the Sea of Galilee.) THE PICTURE that emerges for the American public is that Israel and the Jews dominate Washington and that the US government dances to their tune. That is, of course, a wild exaggeration, but many may come to believe it. That may not have any immediate influence, but constitutes a very serious long-term danger. When things repeat themselves again and again, the effect is cumulative. Such events must serve as a warning. The Israeli government and the leaders of the US Jewish community must think again about this danger. Disapproving words about "the rise of anti-Semitism" are not enough, what is required is a profound change of behavior. We must stop all contact with crooks, especially if they are Jewish, and with fundamentalists of all sorts. Everyone who has the best interests of Israel at heart must demand that. The matter concerns the national security of Israel, especially when the policy of our government is completely based on unstinting American support.
Ariel Sharon was too overbearing to consider this danger. Let's hope that his successors will be a little more sober.
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 Bush Has Crossed The Rubicon By Paul Craig Roberts Dictatorships seldom appear full-fledged but emerge piecemeal. When Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon with one Roman legion he broke the tradition that protected the civilian government from victorious generals and launched the transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire. Fearing that Caesar would become a king, the Senate assassinated him. From the civil wars that followed, Caesar's grandnephew, Octavian, emerged as the first Roman emperor, Caesar Augustus. Two thousand years later in Germany, Adolf Hitler's rise to dictator from his appointment as chancellor was rapid. Hitler used the Reichstag fire to create an atmosphere of crisis. Both the judicial and legislative branches of government collapsed, and Hitler's decrees became law. The Decree for the Protection of People and State (Feb. 28, 1933) suspended guarantees of personal liberty and permitted arrest and incarceration without trial. The Enabling Act (March 23, 1933) transferred legislative power to Hitler, permitting him to decree laws, laws moreover that "may deviate from the Constitution." The dictatorship of the Roman emperors was not based on an ideology. The Nazis had an ideology of sorts, but Hitler's dictatorship was largely personal and agenda-based. The dictatorship that emerged from the Bolshevik Revolution was based in ideology. Lenin declared that the Communist Party's dictatorship over the Russian people rests "directly on force, not limited by anything, not restricted by any laws, nor any absolute rules." Stalin's dictatorship over the Communist Party was based on coercion alone, unrestrained by any limitations or inhibitions. In this first decade of the 21st century, the United States regards itself as a land of democracy and civil liberty but, in fact, is an incipient dictatorship. Ideology plays only a limited role in the emerging dictatorship. The demise of American democracy is largely the result of historical developments. Lincoln was the first American tyrant. Lincoln justified his tyranny in the name of preserving the Union. His extralegal, extra-constitutional methods were tolerated in order to suppress Northern opposition to Lincoln's war against the Southern secession. The first major lasting assault on the U.S. Constitution's separation of powers, which is the basis for our political system, came with the response of the Roosevelt administration to the crisis of the Great Depression. The New Deal resulted in Congress delegating its legislative powers to the executive branch. Today when Congress passes a statute, it is little more than an authorization for an executive agency to make the law by writing the regulations that implement it. Prior to the New Deal, legislation was tightly written to minimize any executive branch interpretation. Only in this way can law be accountable to the people. If the executive branch that enforces the law also writes the law, "all legislative powers" are no longer vested in elected representatives in Congress. The Constitution is violated, and the separation of powers is breached. The principle that power delegated to Congress by the people cannot be delegated by Congress to the executive branch is the mainstay of our political system. Until President Roosevelt overturned this principle by threatening to pack the Supreme Court, the executive branch had no role in interpreting the law. As Justice John Marshall Harlan wrote: "That Congress cannot delegate legislative power to the president is a principle universally recognized as vital to the integrity and maintenance of the system of government ordained by the Constitution." Despite seven decades of an imperial presidency that has risen from the New Deal's breach of the separation of powers, Republican attorneys, who constitute the membership of the quarter-century-old Federalist Society, the candidate group for Republican nominees to federal judgeships, write tracts about the Imperial Congress and the Imperial Judiciary that are briefs for concentrating more power in the executive. Federalist Society members pretend that Congress and the judiciary have stolen all the power and run away with it. The Republican interest in strengthening executive power has its origin in agenda frustration from the constraints placed on Republican administrations by Democratic congresses. The thrust to enlarge the president's powers predates the Bush administration but is being furthered to a dangerous extent during Bush's second term. The confirmation of Bush's nominee, Samuel Alito, a member of the Federalist Society, to the Supreme Court will provide five votes in favor of enlarged presidential powers. President Bush has used "signing statements" hundreds of times to vitiate the meaning of statutes passed by Congress. In effect, Bush is vetoing the bills he signs into law by asserting unilateral authority as commander in chief to bypass or set aside the laws he signs. For example, Bush has asserted that he has the power to ignore the McCain amendment against torture, to ignore the law that requires a warrant to spy on Americans, to ignore the prohibition against indefinite detention without charges or trial, and to ignore the Geneva Conventions to which the U.S. is signatory. In effect, Bush is asserting the powers that accrued to Hitler in 1933. His Federalist Society apologists and Department of Justice appointees claim that President Bush has the same power to interpret the Constitution as the Supreme Court. An Alito Court is likely to agree with this false claim. Bush Justice Department official and Berkeley law professor John Yoo argues that no law can restrict the president in his role as commander in chief. Thus, once the president is at war - even a vague, open-ended "war on terror" - Bush's Justice Department says the president is free to undertake any action in pursuit of war, including the torture of children and the indefinite detention of American citizens. The commander in chief role is probably sufficiently elastic to expand to any crisis, whether real or fabricated. Thus has the U.S. arrived at the verge of dictatorship. This development has little to do with Bush, who is unlikely to be aware that the Constitution is experiencing its final rending on his watch. America's descent into dictatorship is the result of historical developments and of old political battles dating back to President Nixon being driven from office by a Democratic Congress.
There is today no constitutional party. Both political parties, most constitutional lawyers, and the bar associations are willing to set aside the Constitution whenever it interferes with their agendas. Americans have forgotten the prerequisites for freedom, and those pursuing power have forgotten what it means when it falls into other hands. Americans are very close to losing their constitutional system and civil liberties. It is paradoxical that American democracy is the likely casualty of a "war on terror" that is being justified in the name of the expansion of democracy. |
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If you create a mess, you don't then get to complain about there being a mess.
Apparently, the National Association of Manufacturers missed this lesson in kindergarten - probably too busy bullying other kids. The NAM recently issued a report deploring the widening gap between the number of highly skilled workers in America and the industry's need for such workers. Eighty-one percent of manufacturers report a moderate to severe shortage of technically skilled workers, wails the report.
Hello ... NAM ... might you have had a big hand in this mess? Let's talk taxes, for example. The NAM has been a prominent proponent and lobbyist behind George W.'s massive tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy. One result of this is that funding for job training and other educational programs has been slashed, at a time it should've been dramatically increased. Also, notice that when member corporations of NAM build or expand factories, they routinely demand that local school districts exempt them from the property taxes that fund technical education.
And who is it that has been leading the charge to bust labor unions? Why, it's been the NAM and its members doing this! Yes, they gain a lower-wage, more compliant workforce by ousting unions - but they lose something important to them and to our country: a partner in job training. It receives very little notice in the establishment media, but a chief advantage offered by unions is highly skilled workers who not only go through the unions' top-notch apprentice programs, but also are constantly updating their skills through ongoing union training sessions.
To say that America lacks a deep pool of skilled workers is to blame workers for a mess that those in power - including the NAM - have made. Rather than whine, the NAM should press Congress and states to launch a fully funded crash program to create a nationwide system of training academies that will tap into that pool of talent that now is stuck in dead-end jobs at McDonald's or Wal-Mart, giving them the skills to move up.
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2006 is sure to be the year of living dangerously -- for the Bush administration and for the rest of us. In the wake of revelations of warrantless spying by the National Security Agency, we have already embarked on what looks distinctly like a constitutional crisis (which may not come to a full boil until 2007). In the meantime, the President, Vice President, Secretaries of Defense and State, various lesser officials, crony appointees, acolytes, legal advisors, leftover neocons, spy-masters, strategists, spin doctors, ideologues, lobbyists, Republican Party officials, and congressional backers are intent on packing the Supreme Court with supporters of an "obscure philosophy" of unfettered Presidential power called "the unitary executive theory" and then foisting a virtual cult of the imperial presidency on the country.
On the other hand, determined as this administration has been to impose its version of reality on us, the President faces a traffic jam of reality piling up in the environs of the White House. The question is: How long will the omniscient and dominatrix-style fantasies of Bushworld, ranging from "complete victory" in Iraq to non-existent constitutional powers to ignore Congress, the courts, and treaties of every sort, triumph over the realities of the world the rest of humanity inhabits. Will an unconstrained presidency continue to grow -- or not?
Here are just a few of the explosive areas where Bush v. Reality is likely to play out, generating roiling crises which could chase the President through the rest of this year. Keep in mind, this just accounts for the modestly predictable, not for the element of surprise which -- as with Ariel Sharon's recent stroke -- remains ever present.
Who, after all, can predict what will hit our country this year. From a natural-gas shock to Chinese financial decisions on the dollar, from oil terrorism to the next set of fierce fall hurricanes, from the bursting of the housing bubble to the arrival of the avian flu, so much is possible -- but one post-9/11 truth, revealed with special vividness by hurricane Katrina, should by now be self-evident: Whatever the top officials of this administration are capable of doing, they and their cronies in various posts throughout the federal bureaucracy are absolutely incapable of (and perhaps largely uninterested in) running a government. Let's give this phenomenon a fitting name: FEMAtization. You could almost offer a guarantee that no major problem is likely to arise this year, domestic or foreign, that they will not be quite incapable of handling reasonably, efficiently, or thoughtfully -- to hell with compassionately (for anyone who still remembers that museum-piece label, "compassionate conservative," from the Bush version of the Neolithic era). So here are just four of the most expectable crisis areas of 2006 as well as three wild cards that may remain in the administration's hand and that could chase all of us through this year -- adding up, in one way or the other, to the political tsunami of 2006.
1. Iraq. Bush's war (and occupation) of choice has shadowed him like a boogeyman from the moment that banner over his head on the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln announced "Mission Accomplished" and he declared "major combat operations" at an end on May 2, 2003. On that very day, in news hardly noticed by a soul, one of the first acts of insurgency against American troops occurred and seven GIs were wounded in a grenade attack in Falluja. As either a prophet of the future or a master of wish-fulfillment, the President was never more accurate than when, in July 2003, he taunted the Iraqi guerrillas, saying, "Bring 'em on." Well, they've been bringing it on ever since.
Unwilling to face the realities of its trillion-dollar folly of a war and dealing with presidential polling figures entering free fall, the administration did the one thing it has been eternally successful at -- it launched a fantasy offensive, not in Iraq, but here at home against the American people and especially the media. A series of aggressive speeches, news conferences, spin-doctored policy papers, and attacks on the opposition as "defeatists who refuse to see that anything is right," all circling around an election likely to put an Islamic theocratic regime in power in Baghdad, pumped up the President's polling numbers modestly and, more importantly, caused reporters and pundits to back off, wondering yet again whether we weren't finally seeing the crack of light at the end of that tunnel. (Wasn't the President implicitly admitting to the odd mistake in Iraq policy? Wasn't he secretly preparing his own version of withdrawal? Weren't the Iraqis turning some corner or other?)
It's been a strange, brain-dead media era in which, far more than the American people, the pundits never seem to learn. Most pathetic of all, in what might have been a straightforward parody of the famed moment when a group of senior advisors from past administrations ("the Wise Men") met with President Lyndon Johnson and urged him to reconsider his Vietnam policy, the Bush administration gathered together 13 former secretaries of state and defense (including Robert McNamara and Melvin Laird from the Vietnam era) for a photo with the President. Also offered was an Iraq dog-and-pony show involving painfully upbeat reports from Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Peter Pace and Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalizhad. In return, the 13 former officials, including Colin Powell and Madeleine Albright, got a full 5-10 minute "interchange" with the President or (as the Dreyfuss Report did the math) all of 23 seconds of consultation time per secretary. It was the Wise Men (and Woman) Photo Op and it caught something of Bushworld and its peculiar allure.
However complicated the situation in Iraq may be, here's an uncomplicated formula for considering administration policy there in the coming year. After every "milestone" from the killing of Saddam Hussein's sons and the capture of Saddam himself through the "handing over" of sovereignty and various elections, things have only gotten worse. Remind me why it should be different this time? In fact, while the President warned endlessly about violence before the recent election, the violence since has been far worse with 28 Americans and hundreds of Iraqis dying in just a single tumultuous four-day period. Or put another way, whatever government may be formed in Baghdad's Green Zone, it will preside over a Bush-installed failed state, utterly corrupt (billions of dollars have already been stolen from it) and thoroughly inept, incapable of providing its people with anything like security. In fact, just the other day, two suicide bombers, dressed in the uniforms of "senior police officers" and with the correct security passes, made it through numerous checkpoints and into the well-guarded compound of the Interior Ministry where they blew themselves and many policemen up. Iraq's government, such as it is, has also proved incapable of delivering electricity or potable water, or of running its only industry of significance, the oil business (overseen by, of all people, Ahmed Chalabi), which is now producing less energy than in the worst moments of the Saddam Hussein/sanctions era. The country is already in a low-level civil war; its American-supported military made up of rival militias preparing to engage in various forms of ethnic cleansing; its police evidently heavily infiltrated by the insurgency; and its most important leaders are Shiite theocrats closely allied with Iran. The insurgency itself shows not the slightest sign of lessening.
Meanwhile, at home, figures as disparate as Congressman John Murtha and former National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski are demanding a military disengagement by the end of 2006 and in Brzezinski's case calling on the Democrats to come out against the war. ("Finally, Democratic leaders should stop equivocating while carping. Those who want to lead in 2008 are particularly unwilling to state clearly that ending the war soon is both desirable and feasible.")
Iraq is a minefield for the Bush administration. Prepare for it to blow this year.
2. Trials (and Tribulations) of Every Sort. Of course some of the description of Iraq above has become increasingly applicable to the Bush administration as well. It is, after all, run by fundamentalists and presidential cultists, presiding over what increasingly looks like a FEMA-tized, failed state, riddled with corruption, and at war with itself. In 2006, Bush and his associates face a quagmire of potential scandals, exposures of corrupt and illegal practices, and trials and tribulations of all sorts. There is, as a start, Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald, still on the Plame case job.
After a brief flurry of activity in November when the National Law Journal's 2005 "lawyer of the year" convened a new grand jury to hear further evidence, the Fitzgerald investigation dropped off just about everyone's radar screen. Fitzgerald, however, is a dogged character, playing things very close to the vest. No one can know what exactly he will do, but he is reportedly preparing material on Karl Rove for the new grand jury. It would be reasonable to expect that, sometime in the next two or three months, he might indeed indict "Bush's brain" and then, rather than winding down his investigation, turn from those who attempted to obstruct his view of the Plame case to the case itself. In other words, if you happen to be a betting soul, you might consider putting your money on the possibility that the Plame case investigation will reach ever higher in the administration -- and Fitzgerald seems carefully shielded within the Justice Department from administration tampering.
At the same time, even though former House Majority Leader Tom (the Hammer) DeLay got hammered and officially ended his bid to regain his leadership post last week, the Texas and Washington parts of the Delay corruption scandal are likely only to grow and spread. In Texas, DeLay's money-laundering case was not, despite his deepest wishes, thrown out of court and is now expanding into an election spending scandal involving the National Republican Congressional Committee and linked to the Abramoff case. Lobbyist Jack Abramoff, who plied endless (mostly Republican) congressional reps with favors and perks in return for influence, pled guilty last week to public corruption charges and turned state's evidence. He has claimed he possesses incriminating material on 60 congressional lawmakers (as well as many of their aides).
Last week, the Washington Post reported, federal prosecutors turned "up the pressure on a former senior aide to Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) in the clearest signal yet that the sprawling public corruption investigation is now focusing on House Republican leadership offices." Though the career prosecutors from the Justice Department's Office of Public Integrity who turned Abramoff, seem to have been reasonably insulated from administration pressure, the case threatens to hit the Republican Congress hard, just as the Plame case threatens to empty the higher realms of administration power. It looks like at least a limited number of cases will be brought against lawmakers this election year. Unlike Fitzgerald, however, the career prosecutors in the Abramoff case are overseen by a notorious Bush recess appointee, Alice Fisher. Her nomination was opposed even in a Republican-controlled Senate as she is without prosecutorial experience (though she has some experience in the subject area of Guantanamo interrogations and is tied to Tom DeLay's defense team). So look for future fireworks, conflicts, scandals, and plenty of leaks on this one.
In the meantime, the courts will be busy indeed. Just count a few of the ways: The question of whether Bush's warrantless NSA wiretaps have polluted other terrorism cases will hit the courts this year, while the kangaroo "military" tribunals in Guantanamo have just started up again, and various cases having to do with the limits of presidential power (or the lack of them) are likely to arrive, not to speak of the four Texas gerrymandering cases (think, once again, Tom DeLay) the Supreme Court has agreed to take up before the 2006 elections that could put five now-Republican seats in the House up for grabs. (A court already tarred by the 2000 election might rule surprisingly on this one.)
3. War with the Bureaucracy. Until quite recently, with an oppositionless Congress, increasingly right-wing courts, and a cowed media, traditional Constitutional checks and balances on administration claims of massive presidential powers and prerogatives have been missing in action. However, the founding fathers of this nation, who could not have imagined our present National Security State or the size of this imperial presidency, could have had no way of imagining the governmental bureaucracy that has grown up around these either. So how could they have dreamed that the only significant check-and-balance in our system since September 11, 2001 has been that very bureaucracy? Parts of it have been involved in a bitter, shadowy war with the administration for years now. It's been a take-no-prisoners affair, as Tomdispatch has recorded in the first two posts in its Fallen Legion series, focusing on the startling numbers of men and women who were honorable or steadfast enough in their governmental duties that they found themselves with little alternative but to resign in protest, quit, retire, or simply be pushed off some cliff. This administration has done everything in its power to take control of the bureaucracy. As hurricane Katrina showed with a previously impressive federal agency, FEMA, Bush and his officials have put their pals ("Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job"), often without particular qualifications other than loyalty to this President, into leading positions, while trying to curb or purge their opponents. At the CIA, for instance, just before the last election former Representative Porter Goss, a loyal political hack, was installed to purge and cleanse what had become an agency of leakers and bring it into line. Administration officials have, in fact, conducted little short of a war against leaks and leakers. To give but a single example, the origins of the Plame case lie in part in an attempt by top officials to administer punishment to former Ambassador Joseph Wilson for revealing administration lies about an aspect of Saddam Hussein's nonexistent weapons of mass destruction program. What those officials (as leakers, of course) did to his wife was clearly meant as a warning to others in the bureaucracy that coming forward would mean being whacked.
And yet, despite the carnage, as Frank Rich pointed out last Sunday (The Wiretappers That Couldn't Shoot Straight), the New York Times reporters who finally broke the NSA story did so based not on one or two sources but on "nearly a dozen current and former officials." Doug Ireland laid out at his blog recently how, despite fears of possible prosecution -- the first thing the President did in the wake of these revelations was to denounce the "shameful act" of leaking and the Justice Department almost immediately opened an investigation into who did it -- one of them, former NSA analyst Russell Tice, has gone very public with his discontent. He has already been on Democracy Now! and ABC's Nightline, saying that "he is prepared to tell Congress all he knows about the alleged wrongdoing in these programs run by the Defense Department and the National Security Agency in the post-9/11 efforts to go after terrorists." He claims that the NSA spied on "millions" of Americans, including, it was revealed recently, a Baltimore peace group.
The war with the bureaucracy and even, to some extent, with the military -- high-level officers, for instance, clearly leaked crucial information to Rep. Murtha before his withdrawal news conference -- will certainly continue this year, probably at an elevated level. The CIA has been a sieve; the NSA clearly will be; at the first sign of pressure, expect the same from career people in the Justice Department; and an unhappy military has already been passing out administration-unfriendly Iraq info left and right. Administration punitive acts only drive this process forward. Any signs of further administration weakness will do the same.
The "warriors" in the bureaucracy will, in turn, fuel further media and congressional criticism. Congress, worried about next year's election, is an exceedingly fragile pillar of support for the President. Conservatives, as Todd Gitlin pointed out in a recent Los Angeles Times op-ed, are alienated or worse; certain Republican senators are angry over the way the administration is sidelining Congress. Even some right-wing judges have been acting out. And, of course, there's the possibility that, in some chain-reaction-like fashion, the dike will simply burst and we will catch sight of something closer to the fullness of Bush administration illegality -- sure to be far beyond anything we now imagine.
4. Election 2006. Count on it being down and dirty. This could be a street brawl because, with the Republican loss of even one house of Congress, the power to investigate is turned over to the Democrats as we head into a presidential election cycle.
Consider points 1-3 above: Iraq as a rolling, roiling, ongoing disaster, Republican congressional representatives and administration figures under indictment, bureaucrats leaking madly, possible seats put into play in Texas, presidential polls dropping -- all having the potential to threaten an administration already filled with the biggest gamblers in our history and capable of doing almost anything if they think themselves in danger. So what can the President and his pals draw on?
Administration Wildcards
Court-packing: As Noah Feldman pointed out recently in the New York Times Magazine, the rise of the imperial presidency has a history that goes back to Thomas Jefferson's decision to conclude the Louisiana Purchase, while the presidency's outsized "war powers" go back at least to Abraham Lincoln. The President has long had powers unimagined by the founding fathers, but the Bush administration still represents a new stage in the obliteration of a checks-and-balances system of government. Last week, in an important, if somewhat overlooked, front-page piece in the Wall Street Journal ("Judge Alito's View of the Presidency: Expansive Powers"), Jess Bravin reported on a speech Sam Alito gave to the right-wing Federalist Society in 2000 in which he subscribed to the "unitary executive theory" of the presidency ("gospel," he called it) which puts its money on the supposedly unfettered powers of the President as commander-in-chief. This theory has been pushed by administration figures ranging from the Vice President and his Chief of Staff David Addington to former assistant attorney general and torture-memo writer John Yoo. As Alito put the matter in his speech: "[The Constitution] makes the president the head of the executive branch, but it does more than that. The president has not just some executive powers, but the executive power -- the whole thing." And Yoo put it even more bluntly while debating the unitary executive theory recently. In answering the question, "If the president deems that he's got to torture somebody, including by crushing the testicles of the person's child, there is no law that can stop him?" he responded, "No treaty."
Evidently, John Roberts subscribes to the same view of presidential powers (as Harriet Meirs certainly did, at least when it came to George Bush). In other words, the administration is trying to pack the Supreme Court with judges who are, above all, guaranteed to come down on the side of the President in any ultimate face-off with Congress or the courts. This is surely the real significance of the Alito nomination, should it go through. In any Constitutional crisis-to-come the "commander-in-chief" is trying to predetermine how things will fall out if his own power is at stake.
Terrorism: From September 11, 2001, the terrorism/fear card has certainly been the most powerful domestic weapon in the administration's arsenal. In the event of a major (or several smaller) terrorist strikes in this country, the Bush administration could certainly be the major beneficiary, but even that is no longer a given. History tends not to happen quite the same way twice and no one knows whether, under the shock of such an event or events, the post-9/11 moment would simply be repeated or whether Americans might feel that this administration had completely betrayed them. A terrible war, lousy government, hideous crisis management, and then, on the one thing they swore they did best -- protecting the country from terror -- failure. Still this is certainly an administration wild card.
Wag the Dog Strategies: In a crisis of power, there is no reason to believe that the officials who already led us into Iraq might not be willing to gamble on a Wag the Dog strategy - that is, launching an operation they had been hankering for anyway that might also turn attention elsewhere. Rumors and speculation about a massive air attack on Iran (or on "regime change" in Syria) have been kicking around since at least the spring of 2005. These have begun circulating again recently. Such a thing is certainly possible (more so, obviously, should Benjamin Netanyahu happen to win the Israeli election in March), but whether the effect of this on the administration's fortunes would be positive for long is also unknown. It certainly seems one path to madness, not just in Iraq but also on the oil markets. (If you happen to be a devotee of oil at $100 a barrel, you might quickly get your wish.)
Is a Constitutional Crisis in the Cards?
Until 2005, it wasn't that the Bush administration didn't make more than its share of mistakes; thanks to 9/11, it simply had plenty of wiggle room. It could always turn attention elsewhere. It always had the fear and terror cards ready to be played. These days, turn people's attention elsewhere and they're likely to see yet more disaster, corruption, incompetence, and illegality. In 2006, the administration has a lot less wiggle room than it used to. Polling figures reflect that vividly. When new disasters hit, whether in Iraq or New Orleans, it's becoming harder to take American eyes off them.
Let me then offer one of those predictions -- surrounded by qualifications and caveats -- that all writers should be wary of. If in a bitter, dirty mid-term election, filled with "irregularities," one house of Congress or both nonetheless go to the Democrats, which I believe possible (despite their low polling figures at the moment), expect the investigations to begin. Expect as well that the Bush administration will then trot out that "obscure" presidential philosophy of power and claim that the Congress has no right to investigate the President in his guise as Commander-in-Chief.
That is why the Alito nomination is so crucial and why 2007 may prove the year of constitutional crisis in the United States.
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NEW YORK--In the dark, pre-dawn hours of Friday, the thirteenth of January, near the Afghan-Pakistani border, the buzz of an unmanned robot plane broke the silence. Half a world and 12 and a half time zones away, someone on the sixth floor of CIA headquarters keyed a command into a computer. The digitized message, relayed through the building's circuitry and transmitted skyward, bounced along an array of aircraft and satellites before arriving at the RQ-1 Predator drone plane hovering above the Bajaur region of Pakistan's Federally Administrated Tribal Areas (FATA). Four AGM-114N Hellfire II missiles, each purchased by American taxpayers from Lockheed Martin at a cost of $45,000, streaked off toward the hamlet of Damadola, five miles into Pakistan.
The four missiles, each carrying enough explosives to take out an armored vehicle, slammed into three local jewelers' houses at 950 miles per hour, nearly twice the speed of a passenger jet at cruising altitude. "The houses have been razed," reported a neighbor, a member of the Pakistani parliament. "There is nothing left. Pieces of the missiles are scattered all around. Everything has been blackened in a 100-yard radius." The target of this latest assassination attempt via missile strike, Al Qaeda second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahiri, wasn't there. At least 22 innocent civilians, including five women and five children, were killed. "They acted on wrong information," a Pakistani intelligence official said of the Americans.
The political fallout is devastating. The Pashtun tribesmen of FATA, still enraged at the militarization of an autonomous region that regular Pakistani army troops first invaded in 2004, are threatening a general uprising. As tens of thousands of people chanted "death to America" at protest marches across Pakistan, the regime of U.S. puppet dictator General Pervez Musharraf--weakened by the West's failure to provide earthquake aid in Kashmir--was pushed to the brink of collapse. After Musharraf: the first civil war in a nuclear power.
This was only the latest botched U.S. attack. Eight days earlier, another attempt to kill al-Zawahiri failed when a missile blew up a house in the Saidgi area, also in the FATA, based on another incorrect report. Eight innocent civilians died.
If insanity is repeating an action in expectation of different results, the assassination-by-joystick squad at Langley is clearly nuts. How many must die before they notice that precision airstrikes are anything but?
In the wake of 9/11 the Pentagon went gaga over unmanned aerial vehicles. "These systems...park over the bad guys, watch them continually, never give them a break," said Dyke Weatherington, UAV chief in Donald Rumsfeld's office, in 2002. "The other aspect is that we're doing that without putting service members at risk." But history belies Rumsfeld's assurance that the Predator-Hellfire program has a "darned good record."
On February 4, 2002 a Predator fired a Hellfire missile at three men, including one nicknamed "Tall Man" who was mistaken by CIA operators for the 6'5" Osama bin Laden, near Zhawar Kili in Afghanistan's Paktia province. "The people who have the responsibility for making those judgments made the judgments that, in fact, they were Al Qaeda," said Rumsfeld. They were not. The victims were desperately poor civilians gathering scrap metal from exploded missiles to sell for food. The U.S. has not apologized.
On May 6, 2002 a Predator fired a missile at a convoy of cars in Kunar province in an attempt to assassinate Afghan warlord Gulbuddin Hektmatyar because he opposes puppet ruler Hamid Karzai. Hekmatyar wasn't there. At least ten civilians were blown to bits. Hektmatyar, understandably perturbed, has since declared himself and his militia our mortal enemies. No apology there either.
And now the massacre in Pakistan.
Mishaps are unavoidable due to the Predator's design limitations. Image resolution is too fuzzy to make out much of anything at 10,000 feet up. Fly the drone lower than that and it becomes vulnerable to anti-aircraft fire. Assassinations by unmanned aircraft seem doomed to failure--out of thousands of sorties, the Defense Department can only point to a single success, the alleged Hellfire killing of Al Qaeda's supposed "number five guy" in Pakistan last year. But it's not just drone planes. Attempted assassination bombings attempted by flesh-and-blood pilots haven't fared better.
Ronald Reagan ordered an airstrike on Libyan leader Moammar Khadafi's home in Tripoli. Khadafi survived, but his baby daughter and 37 others were killed. In 1998 Bill Clinton ordered Tomahawk cruise missiles fired at Osama bin Laden's training camp in Afghanistan and a pharmaceutical plant in Sudan. Bin Laden wasn't there, but dozens of others died; the Sudanese facility turned out to be an innocuous aspirin factory. At the start of the 2003 invasion of Iraq George W. Bush ordered 40 cruise missiles fired at a Baghdad restaurant where Saddam Hussein was reported to be eating dinner. He wasn't. No Baathist officials died. Fourteen members of two Christian families, mostly women and children, did.
Incompetence and poor intelligence are not exclusive to us. Though brutal, the 9/11 attacks fell far short of their planners' immediate goals. Tens of thousands would have died at the World Trade Center had the hijackers known that New Yorkers start work at nine. And even if one of the two Washington-bound planes had struck the White House, Bush was in Florida at the time.
Targeted killing by aerial bombardment, whether it's carried out by pilots, hijackers or computer-guided drones, is an inherently flawed concept--too easy to contemplate, too hard to carry out, and too ham-fisted to execute without also killing civilians. Intelligence is faulty, guidance systems fail, imagery is fuzzy. When the target of an assassination is present, small bombs can't ensure success and big bombs invariably result in "collateral damage." Technology hasn't changed everything. You can't know what's going on on the ground from the air.
Civilized nations should band together to renounce and outlaw these sloppy and obscene aerial assassination attempts, which send the terrifying message that killing civilians is acceptable in the pursuit of justice. But if the international community can't go that far, they can at least ban the use of unmanned vehicles like the Predator. Murder by mistake is bad enough when a human being can be held accountable.
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Terrorism's Elusive Refuge Bush was never serious about Afghanistan and it shows By Robert Scheer What's up with Osama bin Laden? Remember when capturing him "dead or alive" and eliminating his Afghanistan-based al Qaeda, as President Bush promised, was what the war on terror was all about? Instead, the president got distracted with his idiotic invasion of Iraq where al Qaeda had been effectively banned by Saddam Hussein, the secular dictator the United States deposed. Now we are left holding the bag in two desperate countries with bleak futures where perpetrators of Sept. 11 are reportedly thriving and guerrilla warfare and terrorist bombings have continued to increase. "Al Qaeda is quickly changing, and we are not," Timothy J. Roemer, a member of the bipartisan Sept. 11 commission appointed by Bush, warned last month. "Al Qaeda is highly dynamic, and we are not. Al Qaeda is highly imaginative, and we are not." Yet, in his speeches, Bush clings to the notion that the battle against terrorism is going well because, according to his spin, we have been able to eliminate it in Afghanistan and are now destroying the last vestiges of this scourge in Iraq. On his visit to Kabul last month, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld elaborated on this absurdity by declaring bloody, backward Afghanistan as a "model" of progress in the war on terrorism - even as he was admitting that "Iraq is several years behind." Rumsfeld's claim of progress was treated as ridiculous by Afghan security officials interviewed by the BBC following the defense secretary's visit. "We are very worried now," one senior police official told the BBC. "The Taliban and al Qaeda are getting more threatening." Last Sunday, U.S. sources claimed to have targeted Osama's second-in-command with the bombing of a village on the Pakistan side of the border with Afghanistan. But, as is so often the case when applying air power to nonmilitary targets, the corpses left in the debris of a devastated village did not include the intended target. In the aftermath, American flags were once again burning in the region as anti-American protests swept Pakistan. Meanwhile, next door in Afghanistan, a new rash of suicide bombings - 25 in four months, according to the Los Angeles Times - is providing evidence that al Qaeda's old partners in crime, the Taliban, are back with a vengeance. Over the weekend, 20 civilians were killed by a suicide bomber, while a Canadian diplomat was killed in another attack. This month is on pace to be the bloodiest the country has seen since the U.S. invasion. NATO members, with troops operating out of Kabul, are balking at sending more; at least one, Holland, is considering pulling out altogether of a much-hyped occupation that seems to be accomplishing little. "What happened to the new roads and irrigation canals, the jobs we were told about?" village elders plaintively inquired of a BBC correspondent. Indeed, five years of "nation-building" has left Afghanistan a festering wound, with primitive warlords still dominant, an isolated capital with no control of the countryside, no national infrastructure and a once-again booming opium trade the country's only economic bright spot. "Of course we're growing poppy this year," one district chief told the BBC. "The government, the foreigners - they promised to help if we stopped. But where is it?" This occupation is only the latest in centuries of cynical or, at best, ineffective meddling in Afghanistan. From the British to the Soviets to the Republicans, everybody has seen the place as useful to achieve ends that have nothing to do with making it a better place to live. As we once again draw down our annual economic commitment to Afghanistan's rebuilding from $1 billion to $600 million annually, it is clear the Bush team is hoping the country will once again recede from the global stage into unseen anarchy. After our dramatic initial stab into Afghanistan after Sept. 11, the Bush administration has shown no willingness to do the heavy lifting that would be required to make the country once again the functioning nation it was before Cold War games tore it apart. Rather, as with the rest of its policies, a token effort has merely been a cover for conning the American public into believing Bush is effectively pursuing the war on terrorism.
Since most Americans could not find the country on a map, this deeply cynical approach will continue to work -- at least until the next time a gang of marauders trained in the primitive badlands of Afghanistan and Pakistan and funded by our "allies" in Saudi Arabia launch another devastating attack on U.S. soil.
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Bush & The Limits Of Debate By Robert Parry America's "unitary executive" George W. Bush says critics of the Iraq War, who suggest that he lied or had ulterior motives, are "irresponsible," "partisan," hurtful to U.S. troops and thus helpful to the enemy - and should expect to be held accountable. In a Jan. 10 speech to the Veterans of Foreign Wars, Bush marked out the parameters for an acceptable Iraq War debate, excluding those who "claim that we acted in Iraq because of oil, or because of Israel, or because we misled the American people." On the other hand, Bush said it's permissible to "question the way the war is being prosecuted." But that safe zone isn't exactly safe either. People, such as Rep. John Murtha, who favor prompt withdrawal of American troops from Iraq, can expect ugly personal attacks from Bush's surrogates. In a smear reminiscent of Campaign 2004 when Republicans mocked Sen. John Kerry's war wounds, a right-wing news outlet, Cybercast News Service, has publicized accusations that Murtha misrepresented wounds he suffered during combat in Vietnam for which he received two Purple Hearts. Cybercast, formerly the Conservative News Service, says the criticism of Murtha's war record is justified "because the congressman has really put himself in the forefront of the antiwar movement," according to Cybercast editor David Thibault. [Washington Post, Jan. 14, 2006] Cybercast is part of the conservative Media Research Center run by L. Brent Bozell III, the Washington Post reported. Bozell is a longtime right-wing operative in Washington who has been funded by conservative foundations to denounce journalists as "liberal" and pressure them to write stories more to the liking of conservatives. According to Marine records, cited by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Murtha received his Purple Hearts for minor wounds in "hostile" action in 1967 near Da Nang, Vietnam, one a laceration to his right cheek and the other a laceration above his left eye. Cybercast dug up a 1994 interview with Murtha talking about injuries to his arm and knee. Swift Boats The new attacks on Murtha's war record follow the same tactic used against Kerry during Campaign 2004. Kerry won a Silver Star and a Bronze Star for heroism in Vietnam as well as three Purple Hearts. However, pro-Bush groups, such as Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, challenged Kerry's heroism and questioned at least one of his Purple Hearts. GOP operatives at the Republican National Convention highlighted these allegations by handing out band-aids with a Purple Heart printed on them. Republican delegates wore the band-aids on their chins, cheeks and hands. The "Purple Heart band-aids" were arranged by Morton Blackwell, who runs a Virginia training school for Republicans called the Leadership Institute. Blackwell honed his propaganda skills as a special assistant for public liaison in Ronald Reagan's White House in the 1980s. [See Consortiumnews.com's "Reality on the Ballot."] Now, the target is Murtha, who was in the Marine Corps for 38 years and fought in both the Korean and Vietnam wars. The Pennsylvania Democrat has long been considered one of the most pro-military members of Congress. Like Campaign 2004 - when Bush balked at specifically repudiating the smears against Kerry's war record - Bush has issued no clear guidance to his supporters about the propriety of questioning Murtha's bravery. Indeed, conservative activists might reasonably assume they are doing Bush's bidding. In November 2005, when Murtha called for repositioning U.S. troops outside Iraq, While House spokesman Scott McClellan accused the congressman of advocating "surrender to the terrorists" and associated him with "Michael Moore and the extreme liberal wing of the Democratic Party." Bush, who avoided combat in Vietnam by snagging a prized spot in the Texas Air National Guard, later softened the White House tone by calling Murtha "a fine man." Bush also listed disagreements over how the Iraq War is prosecuted as falling within the permissible boundaries of public debate. Nevertheless, Bush has continued slamming people who advocate a U.S. military withdrawal from Iraq as "defeatists." He said they are failing in their "responsibility to our men and women in uniform - who deserve to know that once our politicians vote to send them into harm's way, our support will be with them in good days and in bad days - and we will settle for nothing less than complete victory." Price to Pay In his Jan. 10 speech, Bush also made clear that war critics who continue raising questions outside his parameters can expect to pay a price. "We must remember there is a difference between responsible and irresponsible debate - and it's even more important to conduct this debate responsibly when American troops are risking their lives overseas," Bush said. "The American people know the difference between responsible and irresponsible debate when they see it. ... "In a free society, there's only one check on political speech - and that's the judgment of the people. So I ask all Americans to hold their elected leaders to account, and demand a debate that brings credit to our democracy - not comfort to our adversaries." According to Bush, outside the bounds of responsible debate are questions about whether Iraq's oil supplies and Israel's security interests were factors in Bush's decision to invade Iraq in March 2003. Off the table, too, is whether Bush lied in citing Iraq's supposed weapons of mass destruction and its alleged ties to al-Qaeda terrorists as justifications for war, despite growing evidence that the "intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy," as the chief of Great Britain's MI-6 observed in the so-called "Downing Street Memo" in July 2002. Bush also has made clear that he is asserting his right as the nation's "unitary executive" - a phrase coined by right-wing lawyers who favor nearly unlimited presidential powers - to do whatever he deems necessary as Commander in Chief. Those powers apparently have come to include his right to revise the pre-war history to put himself and his actions in the best possible light. On Jan. 11, in another speech, Bush repeated one of his favorite lies about the Iraq War, that Saddam Hussein brought the war on himself by refusing to let United Nations weapons inspectors search the country. In reality, Hussein opened up his country to U.N. inspections in November 2002 and allowed them to search wherever they wanted for the WMD that even Bush's own inspectors later concluded wasn't there. Yet, speaking to a friendly "town hall" audience in Louisville, Kentucky, Bush told a folksy tale. "I went to the United Nations," he said. "Some of you were probably concerned here in Kentucky that it seemed like the President was spending a little too much time in the United Nations. "But I felt it was important to say to the world that this international body, that we want to be effective, spoke loud and clear not once, but 15 odd times to Saddam Hussein - said, 'disarm, get rid of your weapons, don't be the threat that you are, or face serious consequences.' "That's what the international body said. And my view is, is that in order for the world to be effective, when it says something, it must mean it. We gave the opportunity to Saddam Hussein to open his country up. It was his choice. He chose war, and he got war." Bush's listeners applauded this fictional account of the run-up to war in Iraq - which portrays Bush as some slow-to-anger-but-a-real-mean-dude-when-he-does-get-mad hero. The story also suggests falsely that Bush's invasion was sanctioned by the U.N., rather than in violation of the U.N. Charter. Bush has been presenting this bogus history - virtually without challenge - since July 2003 when the absence of WMD was becoming obvious and an Iraqi insurgency was beginning to kill scores of American soldiers. In his first version of this revisionist history two-and-a-half years ago, Bush said about Hussein, "we gave him a chance to allow the inspectors in, and he wouldn't let them in. And, therefore, after a reasonable request, we decided to remove him from power." When the mainstream U.S. news media failed to object to Bush's deception, he continued to spin out this lie in various forms, including at the Republican National Convention and during the presidential debates. [For more on this longstanding falsehood, see Consortiumnews.com's "President Bush, With the Candlestick..."] Preemptive Politics Bush's threats of political reprisals against those who criticize his war policies also are not new. Ever since 2002, when Bush unveiled the "Bush Doctrine" of "preemptive" wars, targeting nations that represent what he considers a "gathering threat," there has been a domestic component to his aggressive foreign policy. [See Consortiumnews.com's "Bush's Grim Vision."] This domestic "politics of preemption" has a covert side, including surveillance of U.S. anti-war groups, but the largest part is out in the open, using right-wing media and sympathetic columnists to denounce, ridicule and drown out critics. A test run of this propaganda operation occurred in early fall 2002 when Bush was starting a war fever among the American people and former Vice President Al Gore delivered a tough-minded critique of the "Bush Doctrine." "I am deeply concerned that the course of action that we are presently embarking upon with respect to Iraq has the potential to seriously damage our ability to win the war against terrorism and to weaken our ability to lead the world in this new century," Gore said in a speech on Sept. 23, 2002. "To put first things first, I believe that we ought to be focusing our efforts first and foremost against those who attacked us on Sept. 11," Gore said. "Great nations persevere and then prevail. They do not jump from one unfinished task to another. We should remain focused on the war against terrorism." Now - with more than 2,200 Americans soldiers dead in Iraq along with tens of thousands of Iraqis - Gore's comments sound prescient. In early fall 2002, however, Gore's speech received scant media attention, except for denunciations from pro-Bush commentators. Some epithets were hurled by Bush partisans. Republican National Committee spokesman Jim Dyke called Gore a "political hack." [Washington Post, Sept. 24, 2002] Other slurs came from conservative opinion-makers on editorial pages, on talk radio and on television chat shows. "Gore's speech was one no decent politician could have delivered," wrote Washington Post columnist Michael Kelly. "It was dishonest, cheap, low. It was hollow. It was bereft of policy, of solutions, of constructive ideas, very nearly of facts - bereft of anything other than taunts and jibes and embarrassingly obvious lies. It was breathtakingly hypocritical, a naked political assault delivered in tones of moral condescension from a man pretending to be superior to mere politics. It was wretched. It was vile. It was contemptible." [Washington Post, Sept. 25, 2002] "A pudding with no theme but much poison," declared another Post columnist, Charles Krauthammer. "It was a disgrace - a series of cheap shots strung together without logic or coherence." [Washington Post, Sept. 27, 2002] At Salon.com, Andrew Sullivan entitled his piece about Gore's speech "The Opportunist" and characterized Gore as "bitter." While other writers followed Sullivan in depicting Gore's motivation as "opportunism," columnist William Bennett took an opposite tack, saying Gore had committed political "self-immolation" and had banished himself "from the mainstream of public opinion." "Now we have reason to be grateful once again that Al Gore is not the man in the White House, and never will be," Bennett wrote. [WSJ, Sept. 26, 2002] [For more details, see Consortiumnews.com's "Politics of Preemption."] More than three years later, Bush's "politics of preemption" have advanced along with the complementary theory of the "unitary executive," a notion espoused by right-wing jurists who argue that the President has virtually unlimited powers in a time of war. Bush, for instance, cited his "unitary" powers in announcing that he can ignore Sen. John McCain's anti-torture amendment, which was passed and signed into law in December 2005. Bush tacked on a "signing statement," which effectively called the law null and void if Bush wishes it to be. While Bush's supposed power to override laws is certainly not spelled out in the Constitution, he is now filling the U.S. Supreme Court with advocates of the "unitary executive" who may interpret the Constitution to give Bush that authority. Bush's two high-court nominees - John Roberts and Samuel Alito - are supporters of the "unitary executive" as are Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas. [See Consortiumnews.com's "Alito & the Ken Lay Factor."] Bush's status as "unitary executive" also is bolstered by Republican control of the Congress and - perhaps most importantly - by the existence of a powerful conservative media apparatus.
Based on his recent comments about acceptable boundaries for the Iraq War debate, Bush may have concluded, too, that his unfettered authority as "unitary executive" covers setting limits on "responsible" American political discourse.
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 Will The Media Forget Tragedy In The Mines? The sad but safe assumption about the Sago miners is that when their funerals are over, we will forget about them, their mourning families, and the working conditions that still threaten so many like them. We will forget and, with occasional exceptions in the pages of liberal magazines and daily newspapers, we won't be reminded until the next mesmerizing catastrophe shows up on the cable channels. Then the tears will flow again for a few days, and we will all marvel at the courage that sends the miners back underground-and wonder why we do so little to protect them. The answers were painfully obvious back when we watched the last episode of this traditional drama in the summer of 2002. Yet the happy conclusion of the Quecreek accident also ended the brief media preoccupation with the lives and deaths of miners, and almost nobody continued to ask the pertinent questions. Now a dozen men are dead and another remains seriously injured. Nobody knows yet whether their tragic demise could have been averted, but everyone should know that the Sago mine had incurred dozens of serious safety violations, that the Mine Safety and Health Administration has consistently failed to crack down on the operators of unsafe mines, and that the Sago miners lacked the protection of a strong, vigilant union, as did the Quecreek miners before them. Unfortunately the hard truth is that under this government, the scant measures we undertake as a nation to protect miners and other workers in dangerous industries are growing smaller. The budgets of federal regulatory agencies are cut. The officials appointed to run those agencies tend to be former industry executives who display no enthusiasm for enforcing safety regulations. They prefer "voluntary compliance." Under this government, the legal right of workers to organize-so vital in dangerous extraction and manufacturing jobs-is more myth than reality. And in the absence of union pressure, impartial federal regulation is more important than ever. But since the Quecreek incident, which should have served as a warning, the Bush administration has continued to indulge the mining companies by abandoning prior efforts to improve regulation, fining the operators less and less for safety violations, and often failing to collect even those nominal fines. Those are the findings of a recent Knight-Ridder newspapers investigation, which sharply contradicts the "happy news" pronouncements emanating from Washington. Since 2001, the penalties imposed on mine operators have declined precipitously, and less than half of the fines imposed between 2001 and 2003 have been paid. Meanwhile, the number of coal-mine enforcement personnel at MSHA has been cut by almost 10 percent and the President's budget calls for another cut of 6 percent. The number of mine fatalities has remained relatively low during the past few years, but if enforcement continues to decline, then the disaster at Sago may be only the beginning of an ominous trend. The owner of the Sago mine is the International Coal Group (ICG), a new corporation founded by New York businessman Wilbur Ross Jr., to take over distressed and undervalued coal properties. It is now the fifth-largest coal company in the nation. Last year, after ICG bought Sago, the MSHA inspectors found more than 200 safety violations at the mine, including roof support, ventilation and escape-way problems. The agency collected only $24,000 in fines, or about $115 per violation. During the last three months of 2005, including an inspection that took place less than two weeks before the explosion, federal inspectors found 46 safety violations at Sago, including 18 deemed "significant and substantial." The proposed fines for those infractions came to $2,286. When a 62-year-old miner died at another mine owned by ICG last year due to the company's failure to fix a safety violation, the resulting fine was only $400. No wonder Mr. Ross believes he can make a killing in coal. As the billionaire investor boasts, "Coal is the cheapest source of energy for generating electric power." Among the reasons that coal remains so cheap, of course, is that the operators who work for Mr. Ross discourage unionization, don't spend too much on health and safety or environmental protection, and enjoy immunity from the kind of federal enforcement that involves sticks as well as carrots. In the aftermath of the Sago tragedy, Mr. Ross grimly promised to find out what had happened and to prevent such a terrible event from happening again. Whatever his intentions may be, the chances that he will fulfill that pledge are small indeed, unless he and his company are kept under public scrutiny-and unless the government agencies charged with enforcing mine safety are watched closely, too.
Print journalists will do the job, but their impact is minimal compared with television, which must prod us when we begin to forget. Are CNN's Anderson Cooper and the other correspondents who hovered around Sago merely empathetic voyeurs? Quite literally, we shall see.
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Ted Koppel: "Natural Fit" at NPR News and Longtime Booster of Henry Kissinger By Norman Solomon No doubt many people are glad that Ted Koppel will become a regular voice on National Public Radio. He recently ended 25 years with ABC's "Nightline" show amid profuse media accolades. But what kind of journalist goes out of his way to voice fervent admiration for Henry Kissinger? NPR has announced that Koppel will do several commentaries per month on "Morning Edition" and "All Things Considered." The Associated Press reported that "he also will serve as an analyst during breaking news and special events." There's some grim irony in the statement issued by NPR's senior vice president for programming: "Ted and NPR are a natural fit, with curiosity about the world and commitment to getting to the heart of the story. The role of news analyst has been a tradition on NPR newsmagazines and there is no one better qualified to uphold and grow that tradition than Ted." But "the heart of the story" about U.S. foreign policy has often involved deceptions from Washington. And since Koppel became a prominent journalist, he has been a fervent booster of one of the most prodigious and murderous deceivers in U.S. history. "Henry Kissinger is, plain and simply, the best secretary of state we have had in 20, maybe 30 years -- certainly one of the two or three great secretaries of state of our century," Koppel said in an interview (quoted in Columbia Journalism Review, March/April 1989). Koppel added: "I'm proud to be a friend of Henry Kissinger. He is an extraordinary man. This country has lost a lot by not having him in a position of influence and authority." Koppel was heaping praise on someone who served as a key architect of foreign policy throughout the Nixon presidency. Kissinger -- whose record as an inveterate liar was thoroughly documented in Seymour Hersh's 1983 book "The Price of Power: Kissinger in the Nixon White House" -- orchestrated bloody foreign-policy deceptions from Southeast Asia to Chile to East Timor. Kissinger was the smart guy behind the horrendous bombing strategy that killed hundreds of thousands of civilians in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia as he held the diplomatic stage. Kissinger was the smart guy who colluded with Gen. Augusto Pinochet for the September 1973 coup and subsequent years of torture and murder in Chile. And Kissinger was the smart guy who, in his continuing role as secretary of state after Gerald Ford became president, gave Washington's blessing for Indonesian troops to invade and occupy East Timor -- with mass-murderous results. Kissinger was a frequent guest on "Nightline," so reverentially treated by Ted Koppel that in the summer of 1989 the host turned the moderating role over to the extraordinary man so he could direct the panel discussion himself. A few years later, in April 1992, Koppel was telling viewers: "If you want a clear foreign-policy vision, someone who will take you beyond the conventional wisdom of the moment, it's hard to do any better than Henry Kissinger." Koppel's fervent promotion of Kissinger was no anomaly. The longtime ABC newsman amassed a notable record of banging the drum for U.S. foreign policy when it counted the most -- in real time, when a crisis was underway. Asked by Life magazine in 1988 if he'd like to be secretary of state, Koppel responded affirmatively and touted his qualifications: "Part of the job is to sell American foreign policy, not only to Congress but to the American public. I know I could do that." Koppel made the comment while U.S. foreign policy in Central America included direct Reagan administration support for a Contra terrorist army in Nicaragua along with backing for death-squad aligned governments in El Salvador and Guatemala. Meanwhile, his "Nightline" program regularly gave aid and comfort to policymakers in Washington. During the late 1980s, researchers at the media watch group FAIR (where I'm an associate) conducted a 40-month study of "Nightline," 865 programs in all. The two most frequent guests were Kissinger and another former secretary of state, Alexander Haig. On shows about international affairs, U.S. government policymakers and ex-officials dominated the "Nightline" guest list. American critics of foreign policy were almost invisible. But Koppel, the program's anchor and managing editor, didn't see a problem. "We are governed by the president and his cabinet and their people," he fired back. "And they are the ones who are responsible for our foreign policy, and they are the ones I want to talk to." Instead of wide-ranging public discourse, Koppel's show was primarily a conveyor belt for elite opinion at crucial junctures. Later, if he got around to exposing official deception, he was apt to debunk propaganda that he helped to spread in the first place. Back in 1987, Newsweek noted a basic disparity between the image and function of Ted Koppel: "The anchor who makes viewers feel that he is challenging the powers that be on their behalf is in fact the quintessential establishment journalist."
In that light -- considering the overall coverage of Washington's
foreign-policy establishment by NPR News -- Ted Koppel does seem like
a natural fit.
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The New Fascism By William Rivers Pitt The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country. --- Abraham Lincoln
Say "fascism" to anyone you meet, and you will be greeted with the boilerplate response of the blithely overconfident: such a thing cannot happen here. This is the United States of America, land of the free and home of the brave. Ours is a nation of laws, of checks and balances, of righteousness and decency. Our laws and traditions stand as a bulwark against the rise of totalitarian madness. It cannot happen here. Thus we are indoctrinated into the school of our own assumed greatness. "We must disenthrall ourselves," said Abraham Lincoln, and so we must, because it can happen here. It is already happening. All the parroted recitations of grade school civics cannot erase the fact that a new order is rising. Call it "secret fascism" or "smiley-faced fascism." Call it a quiet dictatorship. Call it what you like, but it is here with us in America today, and it is growing. To be sure, there are no coal-scuttle helmets lined in ranks down our broad avenues, no Tonton Macoute savaging dissidents, no Khmer Rouge slaughtering intellectuals and herding citizens from cities to die by the millions on roads littered with skulls. The core strength of our new fascism is that it speaks softly. It does not present itself in such an obvious way that those who subsist on the dogmas of our greatness can point and say there, there it is, I see it. This new fascism is not fed only by lies, though to be sure the lies are there in preposterous abundance. This new fascism is fed by myths, our myths, the myths by which we rock ourselves to sleep. This new fascism is in truth an elemental fascism, reborn today by a confluence of events; the diligent work of the few, in combination with the passivity of the many, have brought forth this new order. The writer Umberto Eco, in a 1995 essay titled "Ur-Fascism," delineated several core elements that have existed in one form or another in every fascist state in history: "Parliamentary democracy is by definition rotten, because it does not represent the voice of the people, which is that of the sublime leader. Doctrine outstrips reason, and science is always suspect. The national identity is provided by the nation's enemies. Argument is tantamount to treason. Perpetually at war, the state must govern with the instruments of fear. Citizens do not act; they play the supporting role of 'the people' in the grand opera that is the state." Take these one at a time. "Parliamentary democracy is by definition rotten, because it does not represent the voice of the people, which is that of the sublime leader." George W. Bush has all but gelded Congress in recent months, attaching so-called "signing statements" to a variety of laws, which state that the president may act beyond the laws whenever he so chooses. The United States, fashioned as a republic, has as its voice the congressional body. This is all but finished. To cement his victory over the parliamentary system, Bush has put forth one Samuel Alito for the Supreme Court, a man who believes in the ultimate power of the one leader over the many. The gelded congress does not appear able to keep this man from the high court, thus rendering the balancing branches of government into a satellite system of the Executive. "Doctrine outstrips reason, and science is always suspect." The supremacy of religious fundamentalism within and without government carries this banner before all others. What is reason in the face of the zealot's faith? Science has become a watered-down vessel for Intelligent Design, and the incontrovertible truths of empirical data are slapped aside. Spencer Tracy, in the film "Inherit the Wind," bellows the warning here: "Fanaticism and ignorance is forever busy, and needs feeding. And soon, your Honor, with banners flying and with drums beating we'll be marching backward, backward, through the glorious ages of that sixteenth century, when bigots burned the man who dared to bring enlightenment and intelligence to the human mind." "The national identity is provided by the nation's enemies." This has been with us for generations now. Our nation defined ourselves through a comparison to the Nazis, to the Imperial Japanese, and then through decades of comparison to Communism. Terrorism has supplanted all of these, hammered into place on a Tuesday in September by the actions of madmen. We are not them, all is justified in the struggle against them, and so we are defined. "Argument is tantamount to treason." All one need do to see this in action is spend some hours with the Fox News channel. Freedom fries. Why do you hate America? You are with us or you are with the terrorists. Watch what you say. "Perpetually at war, the state must govern with the instruments of fear." The manipulation of this population by fear has been ham-fisted, to be sure, but has also been cruelly effective. We do not want the evidence to be a mushroom cloud. Weapons of mass destruction and al Qaeda in Iraq. Nuclear designs in Iran. Plastic sheeting and duct tape. Orange alert. Argument becomes tantamount to treason simply because everyone has been made to feel fear at all times. A frightened populace is easily governed, and governs itself; this lesson was well-learned in the duck-and-cover days of the Cold War. Those lessons have been masterfully applied once again. Today, the citizenry polices itself, and the herd moves as one body. Even the surveillance of innocent citizens by the state is brushed off as a necessary evil. Remember: you are being watched. "Citizens do not act; they play the supporting role of 'the people' in the grand opera that is the state." Once, we lived by the glorious simplicity of the vote. Casting a ballot was the single most patriotic duty a citizen could perform, an affirmation of all we held dear and true. Today, we live in the nation of the vanishing voter. Power has been so far removed from the people by those with money and influence that most see voting as a waste of time. Add to this the growing control of the implements of voting and vote-counting by partisan corporations, and the rule of We the People is left in ashes.
We must disenthrall ourselves from the idea that our institutions, our traditions, the barriers that protect us from absolute and authoritarian powers, cannot be broken down. They are being dismantled a brick at a time. The separation of powers has already been annihilated. It is a whispered fascism, not yet marching down your street or pounding upon your door in the dead of night. But it is here, and it is laying deep roots. We must listen beyond the whispered fascism of today to the shouted fascism of tomorrow. We must look beyond the lies and the myths, beyond the dogmas by which we sleep.
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 Heil Bush, Dear Biznismaen Ross, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your ignoring mine saftey rules which keeps the cost of coal production down and your keeping the miners as slaves, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Republican Corpo-rat Goons," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at the "Fuhrer Bunker" formally 'The White House' on 03-15-2006. We salute you herr Ross, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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AUSTIN -- It takes a Texas Republican to get that fine, hairline reading on the ethical sensitivity scale we all prize so highly. Thus, it comes as no surprise that a couple of six-packs of Texas Republican congressmen have signed up to endorse Rep. Roy Blunt, Tom DeLay's chosen successor, in the House leadership fight. Glad to see they're taking this ethical stuff seriously.
Why else support a man of whom the director of CongressWatch observes, "[His] tenure in Congress has been marked by exchanges of favors between himself and special interests, and a deep embrace of lobbyists. He is an architect of today's sleazy, big-money politics, not the agent of change that Congress so desperately needs right now to regain credibility with the public." Just the man for our delegation.
Texas Republicans are now being led Rep. Joe Barton of Ennis, chair of the critical Energy and Commerce Committee. DeLay sits in on their meetings by speakerphone. Barton, just the man for the job in these ethically sensitive times. He's going to spend next weekend aboard a private train with lobbyists who pay $2,000 for the privilege. After a seven-hour run from Fort Worth to San Antonio, there will be cocktails, an evening tour of the Alamo, dinner and breakfast on Sunday.
The Dallas Morning News reports the invitation reads, "During the ride, we'll have lots of time to talk, play some Texas Hold 'Em, and enjoy some great down home Texas food. This is about as good as it gets."
It's the delicatesse of the invite that I appreciate, and I think the price is right, too -- only $2K for hours of uninterrupted access to the chairman whose committee has jurisdiction over about half of what Congress does -- including oil policy, pro baseball, Medicare and environmental regulation.
Barton's campaign manager told the Morning News, "It's just a normal fund-raiser. You've got to have a fund-raiser if you're going to raise money and have a campaign. Everybody does it."
That's always been one of my least favorite excuses, "Everybody does it." You can't find a mother who will let her 5-year-old get away with that, but politicians often whip it out as though it held moral water.
In this unhappy case it has the advantage of being true: Yup, pretty much everybody does do it. The root of the rot is the way federal (and most state) campaigns are financed. The hoary political saying is, "You got to dance with them what brung you," meaning you vote with the people who paid to get you there. And that would be organized economic special interests, PACs and lobbyists.
Tom DeLay made his pact with the devil when he signed on to expand the Newt Gingrich/Grover Norquist "K Street Project" to turn the entire lobby into an arm of the Republican Party. Members of the lobby were literally called in by Republican leaders to act as auxiliary whips, assigned to recalcitrant members from districts with a special economic vulnerability to a particular special interest.
The corruption of Congress has reached such a noxious level, the country is simply falling down a hole. Tax cuts for the rich! Reckless spending on everyone but those who need it most! Not a grown-up in sight. There is no sense of responsibility. The Republicans' response is to elevate Mr. Blunt, a man who represents zero improvement. Talk about not getting it: Tom DeLay is losing in his own district, 36 percent to 49 percent for "any Democrat." Wouldn't you think Texas congressmen would sit up and take notice of something like that?
I think we can rely upon the Democrats to seize the moment and punt. Their best play, of course, is to take the reform issue and own it, to go long, for the whole reform package every goo-goo group in America has been agitating for years -- starting with public campaign financing for Congress. The package should include changes in House rules, lobby rules -- and even though it is done at the state level, proposals for non-partisan redistricting.
I can almost hear the condescending cynics: "You don't really think you can get the money out of politics, do you?" I guarantee you can do it for several cycles -- and do you know what happens when it starts to creep back in again? You reform again! Perpetual reform, a truly great concept. No human institution is ever going to remain perfect, they have to be watched and adjusted like any other mechanism. Why use that as a defeatist excuse for doing nothing at all?
What matters here is not what the Republicans or the Democrats do -- it's what you do before November. Sit up, join up, stir it up, get online, get in touch, find out who's raising hell and join them. No use waiting on a bunch of wussy politicians.
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Remember when Bill Clinton first ran for president and there was all that talk of a two-for-one deal: elect one Clinton, get the other for free?
Well, Hillary got herself elected in her own right, but yesterday she must have thought that her husband's connection with the African American community, and his status as the "first black President" were transferable gifts.
But it turns out that this connection is not one of those things, like video rental cards, that one is entitled to just because your spouse is a member.
Here's what she said yesterday, speaking at a Martin Luther King Day celebration:
"When you look at the way the House of Representatives has been run, it has been run like a plantation, and you know what I'm talking about."
What? Why would they know what she's talking about? And, if I'm reading the metaphor correctly -- and there aren't many ways to read it -- that would mean that the House Democrats are the slaves. Yikes.
And, of course, the right is spinning this as the most outrageous racial affront since George Wallace stood in that schoolhouse door. Clearly it's not. But just because the right is whipping up the POM (Phony Outrage Machine), it doesn't mean this statement deserves defending.
What it tells us is not about race, but about Hillary's tin ear and her lack of awareness of it. Her "just between you and me tone" was like watching someone who thinks they can sing belting out an off-key song while everyone looks on with clenched smiles.
The difference between Hill and Bill isn't that Bill could get away with it. It's that Bill never would have said it.
... Bruce Beattie ...  |
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If none of us believe in war
Giants sleeping giants winning wars
Killer of giants threatens us all
Mother nature people state your case without it's worth
Killer of giants threatens us all
Killer of giants threatens us all
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Parting Shots...
 Remarks by the President THE PRESIDENT: As you folks out there who waste time reading those newspaper things probably already know, the gossipy elites at the New York Times just can't seem to keep their matzo-ball-chomping traps shut when they find out information that might be of interest to Americans and/or terrorists. It has gotten to the point where the New York Times checking into something this administration needs to do without interference from that terrorist-coddling Constitution thing has become more predictable than Dick Cheney and Lindsay Lohan checking into an emergency room on the same day. Up to their usual shenanigans, on January 7, 2006, those yakkity-yaks in New York saw fit to reveal the findings of a secret Pentagon study that found that as many as 80 percent of the marines who have been killed in Iraq from wounds to the upper body could have survived if they had had extra body armor. Now, what the Pentagon was doing being all sciencey and analyzing stuff related to running a war in the first place is a mystery to me, but the results of any study like that aren't something that folks need to know, particularly over here in the West Wing. As anyone in my administration or family will tell you, I'm not a big believer in folks knowing stuff -- starting with me. Nevertheless, I've tried to be patient with those fact-flaunting troublemakers at the New York Times, but I'm just about at the end of my prop wrangling rope with them. In fact, I'm seriously considering finally letting Dick have his way and taking a posse from the Heritage Foundation up to New York and shutting down that whole nosy enterprise. My Attorney General Alberto "Of Course It's Legal, Boss!" Gonzales assures me that the Executive authority to turn off the power at all of our country's less fawning media outlets was expressly given to me by Congress when some senator from a state whose identity remains classified gave me a "Conserve Energy Now" lapel pin about four or five years ago. Oh, I know what those Constitution-crazy liberals out there say about those unfounded rumors of the press being protected by something somewhere in something called the Constitutional. After all, I listen to their calls. But that's all just ACLU hogwash. I ask you this: if you are guaranteed the right to a "free press," why is that the New York Times hits you up for a dollar each time you get their stinking paper? Bet you liberal smarties never thought about that one before. In any event, I think it is time that we stopped pandering to the intellectual elites' weird fetish for knowledge, which only encourages folks to think that newspapers should contain anything more interesting than sports scores and coupons for your groceries. Because one thing that should never wind up in a newspaper is information that embarrasses this administration (also, coincidentally, known as "breaches of national security"). Not so long ago, those same dreidel-spinning chatterboxes at the Times told you folks out there about our previously super-double-secret domestic spying venture, which is 1000% totally and completely legal (but you are going to have to trust me on that because the laws that make it absolutely legal are so super-triple-secret they can't be on the books and are known only to Dick Cheney). In any event, since all of you all found out that Dick and I are listening to all of your calls, a few of you potty-mouths have cleaned up your act a bit, but terrorists have continued in their willful refusal not to loudly discuss their detailed bombing plans on cell phones while shopping for Jaclyn Smith burkas at Wal-Mart. I also noticed that Maureen Dowd has gotten a whole lot less specific about that thing she does with her tongue for gentleman callers. As if interrupting you folks from your important shopping to tip you off to the fact that America's telephone system is just one big party-line wasn't bad enough, those loose-lipped blabbermouths over there at the New York Times have now revealed that our troops are getting killed, not because of insurgents, but because someone at the Pentagon still hasn't gotten around to signing a purchase order for new armor. In doing so, the Times has told terrorists something that they would never have otherwise guessed: that American soldiers in Iraq are sitting ducks. Now, as I said, I don't know why the Pentagon was navel-gazing about the fantastical, imaginary relationship between how well planned and well equipped a war is and the chances of any of the blue collar boys and girls we ship overseas to fight it ever returning to their families. But it appears that some Pentagon nincompoop has gone and done a report that looks alarmingly close to actual analysis of this war. And if there is one thing I have told all those anal-retentive Chicken Littles over the Department of Defense, it is that so-called "planning" and "analyzing" a war is about as big a waste of time as "budgeting" for it! Those military dunderheads just haven't cottoned on to the fact that the actual results of a war have no bearing whatsoever on its official success. After all, no matter what badly things go, no one in the White House or Pentagon is ever, ever, ever going to say anything negative. Why? Because it is my administration's wartime national policy that every war is super-successful, the completely uncontrollable, unplannable outcome notwithstanding. And to say down-in-the-mouth, defeatist, cut-and-run things about the war in Iraq -- like pointing out that my administration's failure to supply so-called "adequate" armor to our troops was the direct cause of many of their deaths -- well, that kind of negative talk just puts our troops in harms way. So, all you journalists out there: keep a lid on it. Because loose lips sink poll numbers. Watch what you say. And remember: we're listening.
Thank you, and Jesus Bless America. |
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In This Edition
Michael Schwartz explores the, "Precision Killing In Iraq."
Uri Avnery says, "Pity The Orphan."
Mark Morford googles, "Horse Sex Porn Candy Teens!"
Jim Hightower says, "All Hail King George."
W. David Jenkins III concludes, "Sibel Edmonds Is Proof That The "War On Terror" Is A Lie."
Ted Rall follows, "The Right's Attack On Academic Freedom."
Robert Scheer exposes the, "High-Tech Cowards."
Robert Parry reminds us that an, "Alito Filabuster: It Only Takes One."
Joe Conason exclaims, "Republican Leaders Say They're Reformers!"
Norman Solomon reveals, "Other Shoe Dropping On Classified Leaks And Journalists."
William Rivers Pitt comes up with a good idea, "Democrats: Get Up And Walk Out."
Bush mouth piece Scott McClellan wins the coveted "Vidkun Quisling Award!"
Molly Ivins says what we've all been thinking, "I Won't Support Hillary."
Arianna Huffington reports on, "Scottie Watch: Gone McFishing."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department George Carlin has a few words on "Airplanes" but first Uncle Ernie shines a light on, "This Dark Time."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Nate Beeler with additional cartoons from Tom Tomorrow, Micah Wright, Steve Bradenton, Dubyas World.Com, and Old American Century.Org.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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This Dark Time By Ernest Stewart
Bush, rose to power "somewhat dubiously and then lies to the people of this nation, misleads them, misinstructs, then sends off hundreds of thousands of our own boys and girls to a foreign land that has not aggressed against us." "Big darkness soon come." --- Dr. Hunter S Thompson "I'm on a highway to Hell" --- AC/DC
Back on 12-12-2000 when Papa Smirk played his trump card i.e. his puppets on the Extreme Court the "Gang of Five"(tm); I put my normal life on hold and began my fight against the Junta. I'd turned on to their terrible adventures when Papa had old Dementia head hit by Bush's dear old family friend John W. Hinkley, Jr. So when the third Bush coup went down I was already well aware of what it meant. I began by using Hitler and the Nazis as a parable for this new threat to the world, the "Crime Family Bush." After all grand-paters Bush and Walker not only ran Hitler's American bank but kept at it for ten months after Congress had declared war on Germany until someone realized what they were up too and seized all the banks assets. The more I dug into them the more I feared, not only for my country but for everyone in the world. And on everyday since Gore and the Republic were overthrown i.e. from January 20, 2001 onwards, I've learned of a new outrage, a new act of treason or murder and hence I haven't been able to just turn away and get on with my life like so many others have. Nor like some who hide behind phony names and refuse to show their faces with their words I've been up front with who I am and what I stand for. I have no doubt my name and face is entered into various government and corpo-rat data banks and on the round up lists. There is no doubt a cell somewhere with my name on it, cest la guerre! I was talking the other day with Alfred Eaker who stars in the title role as well as directs and who also wrote the screen play for the new motion picture "W" (which is nearing completion in the editing rooms). Alfred confessed to me that he's been getting threatening letters lately over "W" and the film won't be out for another 6 months yet. He warned me to be on the look out too as my names all over it as I wore many hats in the production from actor to writer to associate producer. I assured Alfred that it wasn't really any big thing as I've been getting death threats at least once a month for five years ever since I first published this magazine. I reminded him that we're doing the most dangerous thing that anyone could do to the most powerful people on the planet i.e. were exposing them for the creatures that they are and even worse we're laughing at them! "W" isn't a comedy per say but it has many comedic moments, (some of which I provide) and it is a bit campy and surreal at times as well but only to offset the drama and the real and present danger that the Junta represents. While it's science fiction there is far more truth in it than fiction! If Michael Moore's last two movies upset der Smirk then "W" should send him over the edge. And with a release date in plenty of time for the November elections we hope to do some serious damage to the Rethuglicans and their "Party of No!" "Love yourself, love your neighbors, live in peace!" Northern Exposure I see Bush's puppet and American Gauleiter Stephen Harper has taken the reins over our neighbors to the north and with this victory for fascism all of Canada will soon be goose stepping along with us into WWIII! Welcome aboard the North American Co-Prosperity Sphere, eh! I've always maintained that Canada is America Jr. no matter what their Liberals say and the only real difference between us is that we have nukes and they don't but I wonder how long that will last with this new trend beginning? Yes Bush is our leader but unlike Harper we didn't vote for Bush but you did for Harper. Where is that famous Canadian moral superiority now, eh? I know you're nervous, opening Pandora's box and all, so just relax, drink a few Blues, kill a few Indians, beat the brains out of some baby seals and get ready for those exciting times to come. Bad, Bad Canada! ******************************************** This rant will be the last article in my new book "Notes From The American Underground." A book comprised of all my columns from the last five years in "Issues & Alibis" and other magazines all along the Internet from Canada to Kashmir and from "BartCop" to Budapest.
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We get by with a little help from our friends!
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And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
 Precision Killing In Iraq By Michael Schwartz A little more than a year ago, a group of Johns Hopkins University researchers reported that about 100,000 Iraqi civilians had died as a result of the Iraq war during its first 14 months, with about 60,000 of the deaths directly attributable to military violence by the US and its allies. The study, published in The Lancet, the highly respected British medical journal, applied the same rigorous, scientifically validated methods that the Hopkins researchers had used in estimating that 1.7 million people had died in Congo in 2000. Though the Congo study had won the praise of the Bush and Blair administrations and had become the foundation for UN Security Council and State Department actions, this study was quickly declared invalid by the US government and supporters of the war. This dismissal was hardly surprising, but after a brief flurry of protest, even the anti-war movement (with a number of notable exceptions) has largely ignored the ongoing carnage that the study identified. One reason the Hopkins study did not generate sustained outrage is that the researchers did not explain how the occupation had managed to kill so many people so quickly - about 1,000 each week in the first 14 months of the war. This may reflect our sense that carnage at such elevated levels requires a series of barbaric acts of mass slaughter and/or huge battles that would account for staggering numbers of Iraqis killed. With the exception of the battle of Fallujah, these sorts of high-profile events have simply not occurred in Iraq. Mayhem in Baiji But the Iraq war is a 21st-century war and so the miracle of modern weaponry allows the US military to kill scores of Iraqis (and wound many more) during a routine day's work, made up of small skirmishes triggered by roadside bombs, sniper attacks and US foot patrols. Early this month, the New York Times and the Washington Post reported a relatively small incident (not even worthy of front-page coverage) that illustrated perfectly the capacity of the US military to kill uncounted thousands of Iraqi civilians each year. Here is the Times account of what happened on January 3 in the small town of Baiji, 240 kilometers north of Baghdad, based on interviews with various unidentified "American officials": A pilotless reconnaissance aircraft detected three men planting a roadside bomb about 9pm. The men "dug a hole following the common pattern of roadside bomb emplacement", the military said in a statement. "The individuals were assessed as posing a threat to Iraqi civilians and coalition forces, and the location of the three men was relayed to close air support pilots. The men were tracked from the road site to a building nearby, which was then bombed with 'precision guided munitions'," the military said. The statement did not say whether a roadside bomb was later found at the site. An additional military statement said navy F-14s had "strafed the target with 100 cannon rounds" and dropped one bomb. Crucial to this report is the phrase "precision guided munitions", an affirmation that US forces used technology less likely than older munitions to accidentally hit the wrong target. It is this precision that allows us to glimpse the callous brutality of US military strategy in Iraq. The target was a "building nearby", identified by a drone aircraft as an enemy hiding place. According to witness reports given to the Washington Post, the attack in effect demolished the building, and damaged six surrounding buildings. While in a perfect world, the surrounding buildings would have been undamaged, the reported human casualties in them (two people injured) suggests that, in this case at least, the claims of "precision" were at least fairly accurate. The problem arises with what happened inside the targeted building, a house inhabited by a large Iraqi family. Piecing together the testimony of local residents, the Times reporter concluded that 14 members of the family were in the house at the time of the attack and nine were killed. The Washington Post, which reported 12 killed, offered a chilling description of the scene: The dead included women and children whose bodies were recovered in the nightclothes and blankets in which they had apparently been sleeping. A Washington Post special correspondent watched as the corpses of three women and three boys who appeared to be younger than 10 were removed Tuesday from the house. Because in this case - unlike in so many others in which US air power uses "precisely guided munitions" - there was on-the-spot reporting for a US newspaper, the military command was required to explain these casualties. Without conceding that the deaths actually occurred, Lieutenant-Colonel Barry Johnson, director of the Coalition Press Information Center in Baghdad, commented, "We continue to see terrorists and insurgents using civilians in an attempt to shield themselves." Notice that Johnson (while not admitting that civilians had actually died) did assert US policy: if suspected guerrillas use any building as a refuge, a full-scale attack on that structure is justified, even if the insurgents attempt to use civilians to "shield themselves". These are, in other words, essential US rules of engagement. The attack should be "precise" only in the sense that planes and/or helicopter gunships should seek as best they can to avoid demolishing surrounding structures. Put another way, it is more important to stop the insurgents than protect the innocent. And notice that the military, single-mindedly determined to kill or capture the insurgents, cannot stop to allow for the evacuation of civilians either. Any delay might let the insurgents escape, either disguised as civilians or through windows, back doors, cellars or any of the other obvious escape routes urban guerrillas might take. Any attack must be quickly organized and - if possible - unexpected. The real rules of engagement in Iraq We can gain some perspective on this military strategy by imagining similar rules of engagement for a police force in some large US city. Imagine, for example, a team of criminals in that city fleeing into a nearby apartment building after gunning down a police officer. It would be unthinkable for the police simply to call in airships to demolish the structure, killing any people - helpless hostages, neighbors or even friends of the perpetrators - who were with or near them. In fact, the rules of engagement for the police, even in such a situation of extreme provocation, call for them to "hold their fire" - if necessary allowing the perpetrators to escape - if there is a risk of injuring civilians. And this is a reasonable rule ... because we value the lives of innocent US citizens over our determination to capture a criminal, even a cop-killer. But in Iraqi cities, US values and priorities are quite differently arranged. The contrast derives from three important principles under which the Iraq war is being fought: that the war should be conducted to absolutely minimize the risk to US troops; that guerrilla fighters should not be allowed to escape if there is any way to capture or kill them; and that Iraqi civilians should not be allowed to harbor or encourage the resistance fighters. We are familiar with the first principle, the determination to safeguard American soldiers. It is expressed in the elaborate training and equipment they are given, as well as the continuing effort to make the equipment even more effective in protecting them from attack. (This was most recently expressed in the release of a Pentagon study showing that improved body armor could have saved as many as 300 American lives since the start of the war.) It is also expressed in rules of engagement that call for air strikes such as the one in Baiji. The alternative to such an air attack (aside from allowing the guerrillas to escape) would, of course, be to use a unit of troops to root out the guerrillas. Needless to say, without an effective Iraqi military in place, such an operation would be likely to expose American soldiers to considerable risk. The administration of President George W Bush has long shied away from the high casualty counts that would be an almost guaranteed result of such concentrated, close-quarters urban warfare, casualty counts that would surely have a strong negative effect on support in the United States for its war. (The irony, of course, is that, with air attacks, the US is trading lower American casualties and stronger support domestically for ever-lessening Iraqi support and the ever-greater hostility such attacks bring in their wake.) The second principle also was applied in Baiji. Rather than allow the perpetrators to take refuge in a nearby home and then quietly slip away, the US command decided to take out the house, even though they had no guarantee that it was uninhabited (and every reason to believe the opposite). The paramount goal was to kill or capture the suspected guerrilla fighters, and if this involved the death or injury of multiple Iraqi civilians, the trade-off was clearly considered worth it. That is, annihilating a family of 12 or 14 Iraqis could be justified, if there was a reasonable probability of killing or capturing three individuals who might have been setting a roadside bomb. This is the subtext of Johnson's comment. The third principle behind these attacks is only occasionally expressed by US military and diplomatic personnel, but is nevertheless a foundation of US strategy as applied in Baiji and elsewhere. Though Bush administration officials and top US military officers often, for propaganda purposes, refer to local residents as innocent victims of insurgent intimidation and terrorism, their disregard for the lives of civilians trapped inside such buildings is symptomatic of a very different belief: that most Sunni Iraqis willingly harbor the guerrillas and support their attacks - that they are not unwilling shields for the guerrillas, but are actively shielding them. Moreover, this protection of the guerrillas is seen as a critical obstacle to our military success, requiring drastic punitive action. As one American officer explained to New York Times reporter Dexter Filkins, the willingness to sacrifice local civilians is part of a larger strategy in which US military power is used to "punish not only the guerrillas, but also make clear to ordinary Iraqis the cost of not cooperating". A marine calling in to a radio talk show recently stated the argument more precisely: "You know why those people get killed? It's because they're letting insurgents hide in their house." This is, by the way, the textbook definition of terrorism - attacking a civilian population to get it to withdraw support from the enemy. What this strategic orientation, applied wherever US troops fight the Iraqi resistance, represents is an embrace of terrorism as a principle tactic for subduing Iraq's insurgency. Escalating the war against Iraqi civilians Baiji, a loosely settled village, is not typical of the locations where US air power is regularly used. In Iraq's densely packed cities, where much fighting takes place, buildings usually house several families with other multiple-occupancy dwellings adjacent. Moreover, city battles often involve larger units of guerrillas, who ambush US patrols and then disperse into several nearby dwellings, or snipers shooting from several locations. As a consequence, when US F-14s, helicopter gunships or other types of aircraft arrive, their targets are larger and more dispersed. Liquidating guerrillas can then require the "precise" leveling of several buildings (with "collateral damage"), or even a whole city block. Instead of 100 cannon rounds and one 500-pound (227-kilogram) bomb, such an attack can (and often does) involve several thousand cannon rounds and a combination of 500- and 2,000-pound (907kg) bombs. Needless to say, the casualties in such attacks are likely to be magnitudes greater, though we hardly read about them in the US press, since reporters working for US newspapers are rarely present before, during or after the attack. This has started to change since "Up in the air", a New Yorker piece by Seymour Hersh, garnered much attention for outlining a Bush administration draw-down strategy in which air attacks are to be increasingly relied upon. One particularly vivid recent account by Washington Post reporter Ellen Knickmeyer discussed the impact of air power during the US offensive in western Anbar province last November. Using testimony from medical personnel and local civilians, Knickmeyer reported that 97 civilians were killed in one attack in Husaybah, 40 in another in Qaimone, 18 children (and an unknown number of adults) in Ramadi and uncounted others in numerous other cities and towns. (The US military typically denied knowledge of these casualties.) All of these resulted from the same logic and the same rules of engagement as the Baiji attack, and in most cases the attacks seem to have been chosen in place of mounting ground assaults. In each case, "precision guided munitions" were used, and - for the most part, as far as we can tell - US forces destroyed mainly the targets they intended to hit. In other words, this mayhem was not a matter of dumb munitions, human error, carelessness, or gratuitous brutality. It was policy. These same principles apply to all engagements undertaken by the US military. There are about 100 violent encounters with guerrillas each day, or about 3,000 engagements each month, most of them triggered by IEDs (improvised explosive devices or booby traps), sniper fire, or low-level hit-and-run attacks. (Only a relative handful of these - never more than 100 in a month and recently far fewer - involve suicide bombers). The rules of engagement call for the application of overwhelming force in all these situations. The hiding places of the attackers - houses, commercial shops, even mosques and schools - in essence become automatic targets for attack. For the most part, rifles, tanks and artillery are sufficient to eradicate the enemy, and air power is only called in as a last resort (though with a recent surge in air missions reported, that "last resort" is evidently becoming an ever more ordinary option). Instead of body counts ranging as high as 100 per incident, only a small minority of these daily engagements produce double-digit mortality rates. Nevertheless, the 3,000 small monthly engagements often involve attacking structures with civilians in them, and the lethality of these battles, combined with the havoc and destruction wrought by the air attacks, does add up to possibly thousands and thousands of civilian deaths each year. Hersh's article made public the new Bush administration policy of relying on air power. It involves, in the near future, substituting Iraqi for US foot patrols as often as possible (which means an instant drop in the quality of the soldiering involved); and, since the Iraqi military does not have tanks, artillery or other heavy weaponry, the US plans to compensate both for weaker fighting outfits and lack of on-the-ground firepower by increasing its use of air strikes In other words, in the coming months those 3,000 encounters a month are likely to produce even more victims than the already staggering civilian casualty rates in Iraq. Each incident that previously might have killed a few civilians will now be likely to kill many more. The Washington Post, along with other major US media outlets, has confirmed that a new military strategy is being put in place and implemented. Quoting military sources, the Post reported that the number of US air strikes increased from an average of 25 per month during the summer, to 62 in September, 122 in October and 120 in November. The Sunday Times of London reports that, in the near future, these are expected to increase to at least 150 per month and that the numbers will continue to climb past that threshold. Consider then this gruesome arithmetic: if the US fulfills its expectation of surpassing 150 air attacks per month, and if the average air strike produces the (gruesomely) modest total of 10 fatalities, air power alone could kill well over 20,000 Iraqi civilians in 2006. Add the ongoing (but reduced) mortality due to other military causes on all sides, and the 1,000 civilian deaths per week rate recorded by the Hopkins study could be dwarfed in the coming year.
The new US strategy, billed as a way to de-escalate the war, is actually a
formula for the slaughter of Iraqi civilians. |
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Pity The Orphan By Uri Avnery IT WAS a colorful day in Bil'in. Political flags of many colors were fluttering in the brisk breeze, the vivid election posters and the colorful graffiti on the walls adding their bit. It was the biggest demonstration in the beleaguered village for a long time. This week, the protest against the Fence was interwoven with Palestinian electioneering. I was happily marching along in the wintry sunshine, holding high the Gush Shalom emblem of the flags of Israel and Palestine side by side. We were approaching the line of armed soldiers that was waiting for us, when I suddenly realized that I was surrounded by the green flags of Hamas. Ordinary Israelis would have been flabbergasted. What, the murderous terrorists marching in line with Israeli peace activists? Israelis marching, talking and joking with the potential suicide bombers? Impossible! But it was quite natural. All the Palestinian parties took part in the demonstration, together with the Israeli and international activists. Together they ran away from the clouds of tear gas, broke together through the lines of soldiers, were beaten up together. The green flags of Hamas, the yellow of Fatah, the red of the Democratic Front and the blue-and-white of the Israeli flag on our emblems harmonized, as did the people who carried them. In the end, many of us improvised a kind of protest concert. Standing along the iron security railing, Israelis and Palestinians together, we beat on it rhythmically with stones, producing something like an African tom-tom that could be heard for miles around. The Orthodox settlers in nearby Modiin-Illit must have wondered what it meant. THE PARTICIPATION of all Palestinian parties was in itself an important phenomenon. It was no doubt encouraged by the Palestinian elections, due to take place this coming Wednesday. It was curious to see the same faces on the posters along our route and right next to us in the crowd. But it also showed the importance the Fence has assumed in Palestinian eyes. Years ago, when the construction of the Wall-cum-Fence was just beginning, I went to see Yasser Arafat to suggest a joint struggle against it. I got the impression that the idea that the Wall was a serious danger was quite new to him - the Palestinian establishment had not yet grasped the significance of it. Now it is near the top of the national agenda. This week, on the eve of the elections in which Hamas is expected to gain a significant share of the vote, the picture of Hamas activists marching side by side with Israeli peace activists, was important. Because soon Hamas will enter the Palestinian Parliament and, perhaps, the government, too. CONDOLEEZZA RICE sharply criticized the elections because of the participation of "terrorists", echoing the statement of her new Israeli colleague, Tsipi Livni, who declared that they are not "democratic elections" because of Hamas. What is emerging now is a new pretext for our government to avoid negotiating with the elected Palestinian leadership. The pretext changes frequently, but the purpose remains the same. First there was the assertion that Israel would not negotiate until the new Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, dismantles the "terrorist infrastructure". That was, indeed, an obligation under the Road Map - but so was the obligation, completely ignored by Ariel Sharon, simultaneously to remove the hundred settlements or so that were set up after his coming to power. Then came the claim that the Palestinian Authority was in a state of anarchy. How can one negotiate with anarchy? Now there comes the contention that Israel cannot possibly be expected to negotiate with a Palestinian leadership that includes Hamas, an organization that has carried out many suicide bombings and, at least officially, does not accept the existence of Israel.. The pretexts are manifold, and more can be produced if necessary. (Reminding me of my late friend, Natan Yellin-Mor, former leader of the "Stern Gang" terrorist underground and later peace activist, who said: "I wish God would put in my way as many temptations as I have pretexts for succumbing.") Hamas' presence in the next Palestinian government is not a reason to reject peace negotiations. On the contrary, it is a compelling reason for starting them at long last. It would mean that we negotiate with the entire Palestinian spectrum (excluding only the small Islamic Jihad organization). If Hamas joins the government on the basis of Mahmoud Abbas' peace policy, it is manifestly ripe for negotiations, with or without arms, based on a hudnah (truce). Thirty years ago, when I started secret contacts with the PLO leadership, I was almost the only person in Israel in favor of negotiating with the organization that was at the time officially designated as "terrorist". It took almost 20 years for the Israeli government to come round to my point of view. Now we are starting again from the same point. Why do the Palestinian organizations refuse to give up their arms? Let's not deceive ourselves: for most Palestinians, these arms are a kind of strategic reserve. If negotiations with Israel lead nowhere, the armed struggle will probably be resumed. That by itself is not unheard of. (See: Ireland.) EVEN IF Mahmoud Abbas wanted to disarm Hamas, he would be unable to. His weak position, combined with the weakness of his Fatah movement makes such a measure impossible. This weakness, which also finds its expression in the Fawda ("anarchy"), derives mainly from one source: the sly efforts of Sharon to undermine his position. I have pointed this out more than once: for Sharon, the rise of Abbas constituted a serious danger. Being favored by President Bush as an example of his success in bringing democracy and peace to the Middle East, he threatened the exclusive relationship between the US and Israel, perhaps even opening the way for American pressure on Israel. To prevent this, Sharon denied Abbas even the slightest political concession, such as releasing prisoners (Marwan Barghouti springs to mind), changing the path of the Wall, freezing settlement, coordinating the withdrawal from Gaza with Abbas, etc. This campaign was successful. The authority of Abbas has been significantly weakened.
Now Sharon's successors are using this very weakness as a pretext to reject serious negotiations with him and the next Palestinian government, calling to mind the story of the boy who, having killed both his parents, threw himself upon the mercy of the court: "Have pity on a poor orphan!"
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 Horse Sex Porn Candy Teens! Inside! Fresh Google search terms to confound Dubya and the FBI. Also: Is Bush a fascist? By Mark Morford Attention, all who are reading this column right now, please put down your drink and leap up off the couch and put your pants back on and log in to Google and type the words "hot bunny terrorist fluffer banana" into the comely and world-beloved Google search engine. Do it. Do it now. Oh no wait, make it "Osama butt pancake lube explosives yay." Or better yet, try "homemade nuke porn lollipop kiddie nipple bomb!!!" (Be sure to include extra exclamation points because as we all know, Dubya isn't the brightest of presidents and these will add zing and personality to your entry and make your search terms -- the very ones the Bush administration is right now subpoenaing the Google corporation to gain access to -- really stand out to the FBI and the Department of Justice, which are always in need of a little zing). It shall be a mini-movement. It shall be called "Operation Screw With the DOJ and Make Lynne Cheney Squirm." It shall be a big national gigglefest as we watch George W. Bush's gummint work to force and coerce the search engines of the nation to turn over their massive logs of search terms, all in an effort to see what perverted and criminal-minded people like you are really searching for, and sure you can defend yourself and claim it's pictures of Brangelina or recipes for blood orange/vodka body shots or just what the hell is wrong with Samuel Alito to make him look so wan and malicious, when we all know you're really looking for, of course, massive amounts of porn. And so are your kids. Is it not just the warmest and nicest sensation? Is it not just pleasing to your core to know that your government is right now trying to track your behavior in a whole new and unsettling way, using the vague excuse that they're trying to "protect" children from online porn (an effort, by the way, to reinstate nasty anti-porn laws that were blocked by the Supreme Court two years ago)? Are we now utterly charmed to death that this is the most invasive and appallingly mistrustful administration since Nixon secretly beat himself with nails? Now here you might say, oh please, the feds issuing subpoenas to Google and Yahoo and the rest for access to their search logs is nothing to be overly paranoid about. After all, BushCo is not, at this time, asking for information on individual behaviors. They are not checking the IP address of your home computer or secretly recording your every keystroke as you type or looking through your windows with high-powered telescopes as you look up the hideous "Goetse" phenomenon (Google it, if you dare) or buy a Jesus-shaped dildo or search for a big list of all known slang terms for "penis" for use in your, uh, novel. So far as you know. But it certainly doesn't feel very far off. BushCo's latest move against the citizenry is indeed a new and disturbing salvo, sending a shiver down the spine of civil rights proponents everywhere. Are you concerned? No? Then try this: Simply couple this latest move with BushCo's outright love and defense of torture, along with Dubya's recent enthusiastic declaration that his team of flying monkeys has been secretly wiretapping whomever it wants in this nation for the past four years without any sort of warrant and, well, you've got yourself one hell of a big sticky taste of happy neofascism. What, not enough? Fine. How about how Bush's insane rate of issuing those now-infamous "signing statements," those little firebombs of judicial misprision wherein your mumbling president gets to reserve for himself the right to ignore any law he signs -- yes, any law he desires: anti-torture, surveillance, you name it -- whenever he feels like it, if he deems that law unconstitutional. Screw Congress. Screw the system of law. And screw, well, you. For the record: Ronald Reagan issued 71 signing statements during his unholy term. Bill Clinton issued 105 over the span of eight years. Bush 41 signed off on 146, the previous record. And Dubya? Well, little George has slapped his color-crayon signature on over 500 signing statements so far, reserving his right to disregard the law more times than all former American presidents combined. It is a record. It is a disgusting abuse of power. It is another thing to stack on the pile o' embarrassment for our nation. Shall we see how high we can go before we topple and implode? (Here is the beautiful kicker, the thing to make you shudder and sigh: As this Knight Ridder report illuminates, in 2003 lawmakers attempted to rein in Bush's abuse of signing statements by passing a bill that required the Justice Department to inform Congress whenever BushCo decided to ignore a legislative provision. Bush signed the bill into law -- but then immediately issued a signing statement asserting his right to ignore it. Ah, the nauseating poetry of it all.) It is amusing how little I am hearing in defense of BushCo anymore. The rafts of flaming hate mail I used to receive from the sanctimonious right have subsided to a withered whimper, nothing really to defend anymore, one of the most corrupt and secretive presidencies in American history, more criminals and indictments per square White House foot than a den of drug runners, a decimated economy and a failed war and thousands of soldiers dead and tens of thousands disabled and not a single explanation or apology. No one is writing in anymore to say what a good and noble man Bush is. No one pointing up stats to prove how Dubya and his cronies have brought integrity and honor back to the White House. And never a single voiced raised in meek cry to claim that we are somehow better off than we were six years ago, that there's a new feeling of hope and renewal, the slightest hint that we are improving our ability to take care of our poor and rebuild our bankrupt cities and help heal our mauled international relations. Hell, even the most devout of Bush sycophants are becoming increasingly disturbed by this administration's unchecked power grab, by the new American neofascist mantra that claims that wiretapping is good, and surveillance is good, and torture and secret prisons are very, very good, and Big Brother scouring America's Internet habits is fine and healthy for your family, and ignoring the law whenever you deem it appropriate, a provision that lets you get away with murder, well, in the parlance of Bush himself, that's the goodest of all. So then, as we wait to vote huge numbers of these corrupt cretins out of office this upcoming congressional election, why not make as much noise as possible? Why not start a mini-search revolution, fluster the FBI and give a rash to the DOJ and Lynne Cheney alike? There are worse ways to spend your lunch hour.
Up, off the couch. Log in to Google. Type "Karl Rove eaten by giant homosexual squid." Type "George W. Bush beaten to lifeless pulp by swarm of angry kindergarten children." Enter "Samuel Alito loves his 'Weapons of Ass Destruction IV' DVD." It might not be much, but it sure sends the right kind of message. Don't you agree?
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Well, gosh, says George W., I can declare parts of the Bill of Rights null and void if I want to because I'm the commander-in-chief, don't you know, and that gives me all the authority I need.
Well, gosh-right-back-at-you, George - you're merely a president, not a monarch, and even presidents are not above the law, much less above the Constitution.
At issue is Bush's convoluted claim that he has a perfect right to unleash his national security agency on a secret mission to spy on American citizens. Even though a president can readily get a court order for such surveillance, King George has proclaimed that he don't need no stinking court order: "Do I have the legal authority to do this?" asked the petulant president when confronted. "The answer is, absolutely." He said he'd been told it was OK by his crack legal team of Alberto "See No Evil" Gonzales and Harriet "I Adore You" Miers.
Besides, snapped Bush, those congressional Democrats now carping about his secret domestic surveillance scheme had been fully briefed and had okayed it. But wait, your highness, when lawmakers approved the use of "all necessary and appropriate force" to punish those responsible for 9/11, they were told it was to invade Afghanistan and smoke out Osama bin Laden - not to invade the privacy of U.S. citizens.
Indeed, Tom Daschle, then the senate's Democratic leader, says that the senate specifically rejected Bush's request after 9/11 to let NSA have such war-making powers inside the U.S. Also, of the handful of Democrats on the intelligence committee who later got the briefing that Bush now refers to, all say the information was so restricted that they were unable to evaluate - much less endorse - what he was proposing.
George W. is confused on a basic concept. He's commander-in-chief of the military, not of the United States - and even the top military chief is not allowed to suspend our Bill of Rights.
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There are simply too many dots! I'm not kidding around here. I've been through a carton of marking pens and a case and a half of extra strength Excedrin following the trail from the Sibel Edmonds case to Plame to Libby to the NSA to the Whistleblowers Coalition to Turkey to Hastert to Abramoff to the White House and back again. This is not an exercise equivalent to playing "six degrees of Kevin Bacon" but a monstrous series of lines and dots that would produce a flow chart bigger than Rush Limbaugh's mouth.
Speaking of Limbaugh, his recent slam of Ms. Edmonds and fellow whistleblower, Russell Tice, prompted me to congratulate Sibel the last time we talked. "They must be worried if they're calling out the right wing radio mouths," I told her. However, Rove and Co. may want folks like Rush to shut up about Edmonds because the more people hear about her case, the more trouble it invites for this most corrupt administration. Besides, they've spent the last few years imposing gag orders on Edmonds out of fear of what she knows.
And now, true to their sleazy ways of doing "business as usual" as Edmonds calls it, the Bush Cabal is going to add insult to Edmonds ' injury. They're going to poke her in the eye with "Scooter" Libby's get of jail free card. Allow me to introduce, as well as concentrate on, Judge Reggie Walton.
Walton is the judge who will not only be presiding over the Libby case, but he has also been "randomly assigned" to Edmonds' Federal Tort Claim after having upheld her ridiculous gag order imposed by former attorney general, John Ashcroft. I call the gag order ridiculous because technically Edmonds ' driver's license, birth certificate and any potential job applications she might file can be considered a "state secret" under the provisions set. As I've said many times before, somebody is very worried about what Edmonds wants to talk about.
Very little is known about Walton and it would seem that there are those, including Walton, who would just assume keep it that way. But what little is known should be enough to set off all kinds of bells and whistles, beginning with his long history with the Bush gang.
Eight years after becoming a judge on the D.C. circuit, Walton was introduced to Bush the First's "drug czar", Bill (the Gambler) Bennett, who asked him to be his number two guy eight weeks later. Walton accepted the offer and began racking up frequent flyer miles to spread the word on Bush's war on drugs. Two years after that, he became Bush's senior White House advisor on crime and was then reappointed to the D.C. circuit. After that, things get fuzzy again.
In fact, even the DOJ web site has very little listed about this guy. A press release here, a press release there, but that's about it. I found he did overrule a stay on bear hunting in New Jersey and he also weighed in as far as not ordering the ATFE to recognize sport rocket motors as propellant actuated devices.
One would think that someone with such important connections would have an Internet history or any recorded history a tad more interesting than this. I mean, think about it; this is the guy you want to send the Libby case and Edmonds case to? But the more you look at Walton, the more "interesting" things get. In fact, I had to "drudge" through the wacky right wing sites to find the following "interesting" tid bit.
Some may remember the hoopla over alleged connections between the Oklahoma City bombings and Iraq . Now, without going into the nuts and bolts of this particular story, an Oklahoma City lawyer named Mike Johnston, aided by Larry Klayman of Judicial Watch, filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of victims of the Oklahoma City bombing. They sought to obtain FBI files which they felt had been purposely withheld from defense attorneys in the McVeigh trial.
The suit was dismissed in July of 2002 on a technicality. The presiding judge in the decision was none other than Reggie Walton.
Strangely enough, Judicial Watch recently requested and was granted through the FOIA the financial disclosures of federal judges including Walton from the year 2003. Now, if you go to read Walton's disclosure, you will notice that somebody went wild with one of those black magic markers that have become so popular in DeeCeeVille the last five years or so. In other words, Walton's 2003 financial disclosure record is completely redacted. And I mean everything.
Subsequently, Professor William Weaver, Senior Legal Advisor for the National Security Whistleblowers Coalition (NSWBC) recently filed a request on Walton's redacted background. Sibel Edmonds is the founder and president of the NSWBC.
So to quickly sum up, we have a judge with little background available, with long ties to the Bush's, who someone doesn't want the public to know his financial dealings, who has denied requests for domestic intelligence records (at least once), who has now been mysteriously "randomly assigned" to not only hear Edmonds' FTC case, but is also assigned to a case regarding a senior White House official with whom this judge and the defendant worked with the White House at the same time, albeit in different capacities. Have we flunked the infamous Dan Burton "smell test" yet?
Now, let's do some of those notorious dots, shall we? A small sampling of coincidences (a term which the past actions of this administration prevent me from believing applies to these criminals) suggests how tangled things are lately.
Walton gets "randomly" assigned to Edmonds ' original case regarding the gag order after things get bogged down under the original judge appointed to the case in 2002. Edmonds ' attorneys then file a motion asking the case to be assigned to Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle, who is also the judge for Edmonds ' FOIA case filed in May 2002. Edmonds ' attorneys argue that the cases were related under the D.C. circuit rules, and so they should both be handled by Judge Huvelle. The court grants Edmonds ' attorneys request and yet, two weeks after Huvelle is assigned, Walton is reappointed to her case without any explanation. An interesting side note; Huvelle is also the judge who presided over Jack Abramoff's guilty plea.
From February 2003 to April 2004, Walton repeatedly scheduled and postponed hearings in the Edmonds case without citing any reason. There was no communication from Walton to Edmonds' attorneys from October '03 to April '04 until a lawsuit on behalf of one thousand 9/11 families was filed which requested a deposition from Sibel Edmonds. Only then, does Walton move (at the government's request) to not only quash Edmonds ' subpoena on behalf of the 9/11 families, but also upholds the gag order imposed on her using the State Secrets Privilege. So now let's fast forward to Libby's case.
Edmonds has confirmed that Walton's involvement with her original case along with her FTC case has allowed him to be privy to information regarding many of the same players that also appear in the Plame case, most notably, certain Turkish-American organizations. These would be the same semi-legit organizations that were FBI targets of investigation which Edmonds had discovered were being ignored by fellow intelligence translators from within the FBI!
These would also be the same targets that are alleged to have contributed tens of thousands of dollars to Republican Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert. But as hard as it can be, let's not lose focus here.
As Edmonds has stated, the cast of players she stumbled upon during her time at the FBI and some of the very same people that Valerie Plame was investigating involved the actions of top officials in the government and a lot of illegal activities that include multi-billion-dollar drug-smuggling operations, black-market nuclear sales to terrorists and unsavory regimes. In an August 5th interview, Edmonds said, "You can start from the AIPAC angle. You can start from the Plame case. You can start from my case. They all end up going to the same place, and they revolve around the same nucleus of people."
Sibel Edmonds testified to all of this and more in a closed session with the Philip Zelikow led 9/11 Commission. Obviously, her testimony was considered too controversial as the Commission completely omitted the information from their final report. Now, the Bush administration has again called on the shadowy Judge Walton to insure that the truth regarding Edmonds , Plame, Libby , Iraq , 9/11 and all things Bush never sees the light of day.
Judge Walton demands much more attention than he's been given. The mainstream media is obviously oblivious to the effect he will have on the outcome of both the Edmonds case and Libby's trial. As we have seen, there is far too much at stake to allow any sense of true justice to prevail.
After all these years, there are still far too few Americans who realize that the war on terror is being "selectively waged" as Edmonds so desperately wants the right to prove to everyone. Now we are confronted by an administration that states that spying on Americans is "essential to our safety" and that it allows them to do "everything possible to wage war on those who wish us harm." Sibel Edmonds is proof that they are lying their faces off.
And Judge Walton is the administration's insurance policy which will allow them to maintain "business as usual."
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ANN ARBOR--A Republican group's offer of a hundred bucks for information leading to the identification and conviction of the University of California at Los Angeles' "most radical professors" has all the hallmarks of a cheap publicity stunt: an abrasive young quotemonger, the Nixon-style "Dirty Thirty" enemies list of alleged liberal instructors, and its attempt to compromise students willing to furtively tape their teachers' lectures. The media, for which "at first glance" could equally serve as a motto and epitaph, has treated it as unworthy of serious coverage. Scratch the surface, however, and it becomes clear that the UCLA story is a chilling new front in the right's offensive against the last liberal redoubt in America: academia.
The "Bruin Alumni Association"--not the actual UCLA alumni association, but a one-man shell operation run by one Andrew Jones, Class of 2003, age 24--says it/he merely wants to "restore an atmosphere of respectful political discourse on campus." Linda Chavez, a former official in the Reagan White House, assures: "No one is suggesting that anyone be fired for his or her views." Maybe not yet. But why make a hit list and pay for evidence of ideological incorrectness--unless you plan to use them?
Jones is a former researcher for David Horowitz, a bizarre fringe neoconservative with his own taste for enemies lists. Last year he launched a website smearing Bush Administration critics like Phil Donahue and yours truly by lumping them with Al Qaeda leaders wanted for Islamist terrorism. Horowitz, now operating under the banner "Students for Academic Freedom," has spun himself as a self-appointed campus watchdog arguing that professors with left-wing views should help themselves to a nice big cup of shut-the-hell-up or, better yet, face dismissal. And big-time media outlets that ought to know better, like The New York Times, are taking him seriously.
Last week Horowitz spooked the Pennsylvania Legislature into holding HUAC-esque hearings on the pernicious presence of liberal professors in state colleges and universities. Read into the record was witless testimony by disgruntled conservative students. "This professor always had something negative to say not only about the Bush Administration," wrote a snitch about an English class at Temple University, "but about conservatives in general. She stated on one occasion that it is impossible to be a moral capitalist. She stated that the U.S. does not have the right to say anything about the Taliban's record of oppressing women because the U.S. oppresses women too." Rings true to me. But Horowitz's message was as clear as when it appeared in the original German: Unless you're waving the flag and cheering the president, stay away from politics. Stick to the textbook.
Though twice as many journalists vote Democratic as Republican, that's the lowest number since 1971. America's media, passing off discussions between right-wing extremists and squishy New Republic centrists as genuine debate, has silenced the liberals in its ranks. Leaders of major religious groups, including the traditionally activist Roman Catholic Church, have cozied up to the right. Corporate power, historically controlled by Republicans, has consolidated its hold on all three branches of government, which are dominated by the GOP on the federal level as well as most states.
Institutions of higher education, where the hearts and minds of America's next generation of leaders are formed, has become the equivalent of the medieval city-state: tiny refuges where intellectuals and their students can question such conservative articles of faith as free markets, free trade and American military and corporate hegemony.
The nail that sticks out, says the Japanese proverb, must be pounded down. American conservatives, having pounded their liberal foes into nearly total submission, see the campus culture wars as their chance to finish the job.
"By their own description," The Washington Post reported in March 2005, "72 percent of those teaching at American universities and colleges are liberal and 15 percent are conservative." At the most elite institutions including the Ivy League, the ideological differential was even wider--87 percent were self-identified liberals, 13 percent conservatives. There's a simple reason for that gap: conservatives, by definition, are closed-minded. When in doubt, they favor the status quo. Republicans give government officials, the wealthy and others in power the benefit of the doubt. The small-l liberal tradition in academia, on the other hand, relies on the willingness to set aside preconceived notions and beliefs in the pursuit of truth, regardless of where it may lead them. It places progress for the many over the good of a few elites. The longer they study society's complex problems, academics tend to find that the simplistic prescriptions advocated by conservatives don't work.
There is no such thing as a conservative intellectual. If people like Andrew Jones get their way, there won't be any liberal ones either.
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High-Tech Cowards Trio of search engine giants cave to nosy feds By Robert Scheer In case someone in the Justice Department is reading this, let me hasten to explain why I just clicked on the Victoria's Secret online catalog photo featuring a certain "Very Sexy Lace & Mesh Garter Belt." AOL made me do it. Yes, the very same AOL which, like Yahoo and MSN, but not Google, has readily agreed to let you government snoops scrutinize the search words and results from their online search-engine data archives. If AOL is going to let the federal government know where I've been, they should admit they entrapped me! (Honestly, officer, I heard that perky voice say "you've got mail," and then this ad popped up, and there was this lady in her undergarments, and anyway, it was just research.) OK, for the time being, the Bush administration claims that it won't try to connect my name, or yours, with the massive bits of raw data it is demanding from the companies with the most popular search engines. Apparently, it is seeking evidence to prove that online porn is very popular and easily accessible as part of a last-ditch lawsuit to implement the 1998 Child Online Protection Act blocked by the courts. I'm not sure that proving the popularity of pornography is going to make the case for censoring it, but the point here today is my extreme discomfort with the Justice Department's cozy relationship with online giants such as Microsoft and AOL, who already know way, way too much about how we as individuals use the Internet. Why should I trust the Justice Department any more than I trust the NSA bugging phone calls and scanning e-mails without warrants, or Homeland Security looking for terrorists by scrutinizing bookstore purchases and library checkouts? The bottom line is these guys in the Bush administration are obsessed voyeurs, poking their noses into everyone's business, whether the excuse is squelching pornography or preventing terrorism. They simply do not believe civil liberties and privacy are important. It is an executive branch power trip, and completely anti-democratic. Corporations, of course, are not built to think about such lofty ideas as democracy, however, focusing instead on the bottom line. In the world of high-tech privacy, companies such as AOL are also two-timers, collecting data on users of their services so they can better feed us advertising and other revenue-generating products, even as they try to protect that data from identity thieves. In acquiescing to the unwarranted demand of the Justice Department to pore over the companies' records, AOL, Yahoo and Microsoft are sliding down a slippery slope, unconvincingly claiming the data dump to the feds has no implications for online privacy. Does anybody think they won't cooperate if the government comes back and asks for IP addresses - your computer's unique signature on the Web - for everybody who dared type in questionable searches such as "growing marijuana" and "fertilizer bombs?'' The fact is, until Google made its demur public, these companies didn't even tell us about the deals they were cutting with the feds, and they are still not being forthcoming with what, exactly, they've given up to date. We only have their word that they are protecting our privacy. "This is the government's nose under the search-engine's tent," said Marc Rotenberg of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. "If companies like Google respond to this kind of subpoena ... I don't see why the next subpoena might not say, 'Give us what we asked for the last time - plus a little more.' " Fortunately, Google, the latest high-tech upstart giant, dared to challenge the government's claim of an unbridled right to break into our information-age virtual homes. While avoiding the privacy argument as the others did because individual IP addresses were not requested at this time, Google forthrightly sounded the alarm on government arrogance. "Google is not a party to this lawsuit and (the DOJ's) demand for information overreaches," said a company statement. The subpoena is "overbroad, unduly burdensome, vague and intended to harass," argued a company lawyer. Whether Google's motivation is moral or simply concern about the bottom line, it is a good thing it has the corporate guts to resist an administration that is addicted to overreaching.
As for the guardians of my data over at Time Warner's AOL, I can only hope that when the thought police take their information demands to the next level, that AOL will back up my plea that it was merely a slip of the mouse that hyperlinked me to that Victoria's Secret catalog, and not verboten lust.
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Alito Filabuster: It Only Takes One By Robert Parry With the fate of the U.S. Constitution in the balance, it's hard to believe there's no senator prepared to filibuster Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito, whose theories on the "unitary executive" could spell the end of the American democratic Republic. If confirmed, Alito would join at least three other right-wing justices - John Roberts, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas - who believe that George W. Bush should possess near total control of the U.S. government during the ill-defined War on Terror. If Anthony Kennedy, another Republican, joins them, they would wield a majority. Alito's theory of the "unitary executive" holds that Bush can cite his "plenary" - or unlimited - powers as Commander in Chief to ignore laws he doesn't like, spy on citizens without warrants, imprison citizens without charges, authorize torture, order assassinations, and invade other countries at his own discretion. "Can it be true that any President really has such powers under our Constitution?" asked former Vice President Al Gore in a Jan. 16 speech. "If the answer is 'yes,' then under the theory by which these acts are committed, are there any acts that can on their face be prohibited?" The answer to Gore's final rhetorical question would seem to be no, there is nothing prohibited to Bush. The "unitary executive" can assert authoritarian - even dictatorial - powers for the indefinite future. Under this government envisioned by Alito and Bush, Americans would no longer have freedoms based on the Constitution and the law, but on Bush's tolerance and charity. Americans would, in essence, become Bush's subjects dependent on his good graces, rather than citizens possessing inalienable rights. He would be a modern-day king. Resistance In the face of such an unprecedented power grab, Americans might expect senators from both parties to filibuster Alito and resist Bush's consolidation of power. But Republicans seem more interested in proving their loyalty to Bush, and Democrats so far are signaling only a token fight for fear of suffering political reprisals. A meeting of the Democratic caucus on Jan. 18 to discuss Alito drew only about two dozen senators out of a total of 45. The caucus consensus reportedly was to cast a "strategic" - or a symbolic - vote against Alito so they could say "we-told-you-so" when he makes bad rulings in the future. [See NYT, Jan.19, 2006] But it's unclear why voters would want to reward Democrats for making only a meaningless gesture against Alito, rather than fighting hard to keep him off the court. An extended battle also would give them a chance to make their case about why they see Alito as a threat to the U.S. Constitution. A filibuster could give voters time, too, to learn what Alito and Bush have in mind for the country under the theory of the "unitary executive." If after a tough fight the Democrats lose, they could then say they did their best and the voters would know what was at stake. Losing, however, might not be the end result. A swing in public opinion is certainly possible if even one senator takes the floor to wage an old-fashioned, "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" filibuster in defense of the most fundamental principles of the American democratic experiment. A filibuster could touch a public nerve if it concentrates on protecting the Founding Fathers' framework of checks and balances, the Bill of Rights, and the rule of law - all designed specifically to prevent an abusive Executive from gaining dictatorial powers. Secondarily, the filibuster could explain to the American people the need for courage in the face of danger, especially at a time when some political leaders are exploiting fear to stampede the public into trading freedom for security. Rallying the Nation If an elder statesman, like Robert Byrd, or a younger senator, like Russell Feingold, started speaking with a determination not to leave until Bush withdraws the Alito nomination, the filibuster could be a riveting moment in modern American politics, a last line of defense for the Republic. In effect, the filibustering senators would be saying that the future of democracy is worth an all-out congressional battle - and that Alito's theory of a "unitary executive" is an "extraordinary circumstance" deserving of a filibuster. A filibuster also could force other senators to face up to the threat now emanating from an all-powerful Executive. Democrats would have to decide if they're willing to stand up to the pressure that Bush and his many allies would surely bring down on them. Republicans would have to choose between loyalty to the President and to the nation's founding principles. For some senators, the choice might define how they are remembered in U.S. history. Republican John McCain, whose law against torture was approved in December but was essentially eviscerated when Bush pronounced that it would not be binding on him, would have the opportunity to either demand that the torture ban means something or accept Bush's repudiation of its requirements. Democrats who think they have the makings of a national leader - the likes of John Kerry, Hillary Clinton and Joseph Biden - could either demonstrate a toughness for meaningful political battles or confirm their reputations for ineffectual gestures. The American people also would have a chance to rise to the occasion, showing that they are not the frightened sheep as some critics say, but truly care about democracy as a treasured principle of governance, not just a pleasing word of self-congratulations. An Alito filibuster could be a galvanizing moment for today's generation like the Army-McCarthy hearings were in the 1950s when red-baiting Sen. Joseph McCarthy finally went too far and was recognized as a dangerous demagogue. Dangers On the other hand, there are reasons to suspect that the Senate will recoil from a battle of such constitutional magnitude. Democratic consultants already are saying that the Senate Democrats should finesse the Alito confirmation - letting it proceed without a big fight - and then focus instead on corruption as an issue with more "traction." This advice parallels the party's strategy in 2002 when Democratic consultants urged congressional leaders to give Bush what he wanted in terms of authority to invade Iraq so the debate could be refocused on the Democrats' domestic agenda. That approach turned out to be disastrous, both on Election Day and in the Iraq invasion that followed. Nevertheless, a similar approach was pressed on Democratic presidential nominee Kerry in 2004. The goal was to neutralize the national security issue by citing Kerry's Vietnam War record and then shifting the campaign to domestic issues. So, instead of hammering Bush on his recklessness in the Iraq War, Kerry softened his tone in the days before the election, turned to domestic issues, and failed to nail down a clear victory, allowing Bush to slip back in by claiming the pivotal state of Ohio. The strategists are back to the same thinking now, urging Democratic leaders to withdraw from a battle over Alito and to keep their heads down over what to do in Iraq, so they can supposedly gain some ground on the corruption issue. There is, however, no guarantee that corruption will trump national security in November 2006 anymore than domestic issues did in 2002 and 2004. Even if the Democrats do filibuster, they could still botch it by muddying the waters with appeals about abortion rights. A longstanding Democratic Party tendency is to pander to liberal interest groups even when doing so will hurt the overall cause. As strongly as many people feel about Roe v. Wade, it would detract from what is of even greater importance in the Alito confirmation, that he would help consolidate the precedent of an American strongman Executive with virtually no limits on his powers. A disciplined filibuster focused on protecting the Constitution and the Bill of Rights would have a chance of attracting traditional conservatives as well as moderates and liberals in a cause larger than any political grouping.
Indeed, the filibuster could be the start of a grand coalition built around what many Americans hold as dear as life itself, the principles of a democratic Republic where no man is above the law, where no man is king.
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| Republican Leaders Say They're Reformers! If we are to believe the latest press releases from Capitol Hill, the leaders of Congress aren't a bloated, self-serving clique fattened on largesse from lobbyists, but a lean, idealistic and indefatigable band of reformers. The Speaker of the House and his ambitious colleagues can now think of nothing as important as proposals to restrict the free dinners, golf junkets, stadium boxes and myriad other costly gifts lavished on them by their backers on K Street. Responsible for deficits that would make the most spendthrift liberal blush, these "fiscal conservatives" promise to abolish pork-barrel projects, secret earmarks and all the varied means they currently use to siphon billions from the federal treasury into the pockets of their contributors. Glancing nervously behind them as their old cronies line up in the dock, from Jack Abramoff and Tom DeLay to Duke Cunningham and Bob Ney, and looking nervously ahead to Election Day, the rentable statesmen compete to prove their devotion to the highest ethical standards. Their proclamations of purity display a truly touching faith in the perpetual gullibility of the American voter. In fact, when you consider what they expect us to believe, it's hard not to be insulted. Speaker Dennis Hastert claims that he has been pondering how to rein in crooked legislators and lobbyists, while consulting with his troubled colleagues. In a statement hastily issued within hours after Mr. DeLay resigned as House Majority Leader, Mr. Hastert declared: "Over the past several months, I have spoken with many members about the need for such reforms. I have been encouraged by the breadth and boldness of their ideas. Now is the time for action." Actually, what the Speaker has done over the past several months (and years) is pretty much nothing, except for his assiduous efforts to cover up for Mr. DeLay-who ushered him into the top leadership post in 1999 and was universally regarded as the brains and muscle behind Mr. Hastert. Oblivious to appearances as well as facts, the House Speaker steadfastly defended Mr. DeLay as the evidence of corruption accumulated. He sought to change the rules so that Mr. DeLay could remain as majority leader, even after the inevitable felony indictment. He punished the Republican chairman of the House Ethics Committee for daring to criticize Mr. DeLay's blatant misconduct by removing the unfortunate fellow from his post and replacing him with a pliant loyalist. In short, he served as Mr. DeLay's reliable enabler-and took his own share of proceeds from Mr. Abramoff as well. Immediately after a fund-raiser for the Speaker at the lobbyist's Washington restaurant, Mr. Hastert signed a letter to the Secretary of the Interior on behalf of an Abramoff Indian gaming client. Following the example of the Speaker, the men seeking to succeed Mr. DeLay as House Majority Leader all insist that they, too, are born-again reformers. The leading candidate is Roy Blunt, the Missouri Republican who rose to leadership as majority whip under the DeLay regime. He's a bit gamy to be minted as their fresh new boss, as the Republicans poised to choose him surely understand. What they know, although you may not, is that Mr. Blunt is quite literally wedded to influence peddling: His current wife is a lobbyist. (She used to be his girlfriend, before he demonstrated his unbending morality by leaving his first wife of 31 years to marry her.) One of his sons is a lobbyist, too. Wife and son both work for Altria, the tobacco company once known as Philip Morris, which has poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into Mr. Blunt's political accounts. He returned the favor a few years ago, while in the throes of illicit romance, by sneaking an amendment benefiting the tobacco industry into the bill that created the Department of Homeland Security. So blatant was this maneuver that even Mr. DeLay and Mr. Hastert objected. Electing Mr. Blunt won't put much distance between the House Republicans and the scandals that threaten their power. Mr. Blunt's former chief of staff is a lobbyist, too-of course-who hired Mr. Abramoff as a rainmaker in 2004, after the initial revelations about his swindling of Indian tribes led to his dismissal by his old firm. And Mr. Blunt himself accepted favors from the same crooked defense contractors whose generosity led to the indictment and guilty plea of Mr. Cunningham. So alarming is Mr. Blunt's record that certain conservatives and Republicans are seeking to prevent his promotion. They have come to understand-in many instances, rather belatedly-that the corruption of the House leadership has sullied their movement. Until very recently, most on the right accepted the greasy DeLay machine as the price of Republican power.
With that power imperiled by exposure and prosecution, they demand a restoration of probity and a return to principle. What they will get is a pretense of reform-and they will accept that, too.
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Other Shoe Dropping On Classified Leaks And Journalists By Norman Solomon Ever since the disclosure of Valerie Plame's identity as an undercover CIA operative in July 2003, prominent Democrats have denounced that leak -- often with some kind of rhetoric about the sanctity of classified information. But reverence for keeping such information secret is dangerous. And so is the claim that sometimes the government should put journalists in jail to ferret out leakers. With the vice president's former top aide Lewis Libby under indictment and Karl Rove still in the special counsel's sights, the Bush administration is eager to go on the offensive about classified leaks. Loyal Republicans now claim higher moral ground as they decry the leak of classified information about the National Security Agency's domestic spying that surfaced on the New York Times front page in mid-December. "Thank goodness the Justice Department is investigating to find out who has been endangering our national security by leaking this information so that our enemies now have a greater sense of what our techniques are in going after terrorists," the GOP's Sen. Mitch McConnell said on national television as this year began. He was on message with a bogus assertion. Whoever spilled the beans about the NSA's domestic spying did not endanger U.S. national security any more than Daniel Ellsberg did when he leaked the Pentagon Papers to the press 35 years ago. In both cases, the leaks endangered official mendacity and served the interests of democratic accountability. But the president's defenders want to divert outrage, away from the domestic snooping and toward the leaking that revealed the snooping. So, McConnell declared that "the national security was not endangered" by the Plame leak -- and he added that the probe of the NSA leak is "a much more important investigation and should go forward." Bush loyalists (or is that royalists?) are correct that the NSA leak is of enormous importance, but not for the reasons they claim. In truth, U.S. citizens have a profound right to know about a program that fundamentally jeopardizes civil liberties. But protracted overblown horror at disclosure of Plame's identity has made it easier for the Bush administration to now set off on a witch hunt -- not only against whistleblowers in government but also potentially against journalists. True, the "outing" of Plame was a sordid act of political payback against her husband, a diplomat who had criticized the Bush administration for false claims related to weapons of mass destruction and Iraq. But that doesn't justify poking holes in protection of confidentiality for journalists' sources. Some customary defenders of press freedom were not noticeably bothered by the jailing of New York Times reporter Judith Miller in the Plame leak investigation; some even applauded her incarceration. A factor was animosity that Miller earned due to her prewar record of reporting false claims about Iraqi WMDs as if they were highly credible. But the political precedent set by putting Miller in jail is likely to make it more difficult to protect other journalists, who could be swept up in the investigation of the NSA leak. One person's whistleblower is another's score settler or traitor. And efforts to draw sharp distinctions -- between virtuous and nefarious leaks -- is fraught with subjectivity. The motivations of leakers, while important for journalists and the public to understand, should not determine whether a legal shield for confidentiality remains in place. At an informal Jan. 20 hearing on domestic surveillance, chaired by Rep. John Conyers and attended by eight Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee, one of the most illuminating witnesses was legal scholar Jonathan Turley. He noted that President Bush "already stated quite clearly that he believes he can violate federal law. That, for our system, is the equivalent of a declaration of war on the separation of powers." Turley, a professor of Constitutional law at George Washington University, added: "But one thing I would encourage you to think about as a collateral matter is how important it is for Congress to pass a shield law for journalists. This is a great example of why journalists need to have a federal shield law. The fact that the administration's first act was to pursue the whistleblower and potentially threaten these journalists shows how vital it is for us to have a statutory protection supporting the First Amendment." The White House has launched its own anti-leak bandwagon with a vengeance, Turley explained: "If the administration continues the way it's going, it's going to significantly diminish the ability of journalists to hear from whistleblowers. I'm referring to the fact that this administration has used a waiver that's given to all officials in a particular office -- and they're all asked to sign and to waive confidentiality, so that if you don't, you self-identify; but if you sign it, you're signing something false unless you actually did waive. We're in a very precarious position unless we get a shield law so that these types of abuses can be disclosed." Yes, the Bush administration was in a defensive crouch when investigators put the squeeze on leakers and journalists in the Plame case. But the same administration is now eager to put the squeeze on leakers and journalists in the NSA domestic-spying case. For that matter, even in the Plame battle, the White House has moved to further normalize the idea of legal actions against journalists. On Jan. 20, lawyers for Dick Cheney's ex-assistant Lewis Libby notified a federal court of their intention to issue subpoenas to journalists and news organizations in a quest to obtain documents for Libby's upcoming trial. In the long run, efforts to drag reporters into legal proceedings are apt to let the journalistic profession -- or culpable administration officials -- off the hook. The focus can easily become the merits of a journalist's legal position rather than the substance of the reporting. Judith Miller's credibility as a reporter was sinking in the post-invasion aftermath of her prewar stories that beat the drum about supposed WMDs in Iraq. Since then, Miller has been more successful in the martyr-tinged role of jailed reporter than in the journalistic role of defending her odious reportorial work.
It's very important to assess whether a journalist has been serving
as a watchdog or a flunky for powerful government officials. But
prosecutors and judges are not the ones who should decide. Such
assessments -- and their consequences -- should be journalistic and
political.
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Democrats: Get Up And Walk Out By William Rivers Pitt
MEMO I have a wild and crazy idea. George W. Bush's delivery of the State of the Union address will take place on Tuesday, January 31, a little more than a week from now. It is my strong belief that every single Democrat present in the House chamber for the speech should, at a predetermined moment, stand up and walk out. No yelling. No heated words. Every Democrat should simply stand silently and leave. Crazy, I know. Crazy, and possibly the best idea ever put before a body of Democrats since the New Deal. Understand this, congressional Democrats, and understand it well: you are not dealing merely with a body of political opponents in the GOP. You are dealing with a group of people that want you exterminated politically. The days of walking the halls of the Rayburn Building, sharing a bourbon with a colleague from the other side of the aisle, and hammering out a compromise are as dead as Julius Caesar. Collegiality is out. Mutual respect is out. They want you gone for good. Erased. Destroyed. And you have been far too polite about this. The writing has been on the wall for a while now. Back in 1995, Republican Senator Phil Gramm said, "We're going to keep building the party until we're hunting Democrats with dogs." That was eleven years ago. If you listen close, you can hear the beasts baying in the distance, waiting to slip the leash. Your limp tactics in the face of the assault upon you, your vacillation, your strange hope that maybe the GOP will be nicer tomorrow, has left you all smelling like Alpo. For the love of God, you are being compared to Osama bin Laden all over network television because some within your ranks have had the courage to question the war in Iraq. It hasn't been subtle. Bin Laden, according to the right-wing talking heads, is getting his talking points straight from Howard Dean. These are the out-front spokespeople for the folks running the GOP right now. If you think there is compromise to be had with these people, if you think there is quarter to be given to you, then I have a nice, big red bridge to sell you in San Francisco. I know you believe the Abramoff scandal is going to be your bread and butter in the upcoming midterm elections. I hate to break it to you, but you have already been outflanked. The television nitwits have flooded the airwaves with the meme that this is a "two-party scandal," despite the fact that Abramoff would have sooner lit himself on fire than give money to a Democrat. As you have been collectively incapable of setting the record straight in public, with the exception of a two-minute crunch between Howard Dean and Wolf Blitzer on CNN that left Blitzer spluttering impotently, understand that "this scandal affects both parties" is now commonly accepted fact all across the land. Oh, yeah, P.S., the investigation is being run out of the Department Justice. If this scandal does touch some sixty Republican officeholders, as Abramoff's donation history indicates, do you really think this White House is going to let the investigation get far enough to do real damage? If so, I again need to mention that big red bridge I have for sale. In all likelihood, however, the White House won't even need to derail the Abramoff investigation to save Republicans from their ridiculous greed. Did you see the Washington Post headline from Friday? It read, "Rove: GOP to Use Terror as Campaign Issue." In reality, the headline should have read "GOP to Use Terror as Campaign Tactic." Once again, the Republicans are going to try to win midterm elections by scaring the hell out of the American people. This time, the fear factor will center around Iran and nuclear weapons. The intelligence specialists in the United States, Germany and Israel all agree that Iran is between three and five years away from being able to manufacture nuclear weapons. This, of course, is based on the premise that such manufacture is Iran's goal. Take it as a given that it is, and we have at least three years to use diplomacy, economic pressures and possibly sanctions to keep them from creating these bombs. But "three to five years" isn't going to help the GOP win the midterm elections. They need things to be scary, and they need things to be scary now. The same right-wing groups that ginned up the fantasy that Iraq was laden with weapons of mass destruction, and was an imminent threat, are now at work building up a martial froth about Iran. They did this in time for the midterms last time, and are preparing to do it again. United Press International carried a story last Thursday about a group called the Foundation for Democracy in Iran. This group, according to the UPI story, claims that, "Tehran is planning a nuclear weapons test before the Iranian New Year on March 20, 2006." FDI, according to the story, offered absolutely no proof to back this claim. But that's not three to five years. That's less than ten weeks. Scary stuff, right? Take a closer look, however, and you can see the fingerprints of the architects of our current Iraq boondoggle all over this. The Foundation for Democracy in Iran is run by a man named Kenneth Timmerman. Timmerman is umbilically connected to the godfather of right-wing think tanks, the American Enterprise Institute. It was the American Enterprise Institute that spawned the Project for the New American Century, the think tank that gave us Cheney, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, the original noise about Iraqi WMD, and the idea that a military takeover of the entire Mideast is a bully idea. The same people that terrorized the American people into unnecessary war in Iraq are preparing to do the same with Iran, and all in time for the midterms. One must also note the irony of the suggested date for this Iranian nuclear test. March 20, 2006, for those not paying attention, is the three-year anniversary of our invasion of Iraq. And round and round we go. You've been outflanked, Democrats. Abramoff won't help you, and the noise machine is preparing to terrorize the American people into such a distracted state that anything you say in the next ten months will be lost amid the howling. The midterms are pretty much a done deal, and your continued marginalization will proceed at speed. You can stomp your feet and yell at the wall. You can put your head in your hands and weep. You can sit silently and be simply satisfied that your own job-for-life is secure, thanks to your friendly district back home, and be damned to actually doing anything of substance. In other words, you can continue to do what you've been doing since this outrageous assault on basic American democracy began. Or you can stand up. It takes a spine to stand up. Find yours. Get up and walk out of the State of the Union speech. Turn your backs on the blizzard of lies and empty promises that are sure to pour forth from that podium. Give it exactly what it deserves. Walk outside to the steps of the Capitol Building and hold a Counter-State-of-the-Union. Lay out your plans for a better future. Explain how you will reform the system that spawned Mr. Abramoff. Demand answers and explanations about what is happening in Iraq, what is happening over at the National Security Agency, and why this administration believes itself to be completely above the law. I can even offer a bit of text for your opening statement. "Three years ago during this very speech," your leading spokesperson can say from those steps, "Mr. Bush told us that Iraq was in possession of 26,000 liters of anthrax, 38,000 liters of botulinum toxin, 500 tons - which is one million pounds - of sarin, mustard and VX nerve agent, 30,000 missiles to deliver the stuff, mobile biological weapons labs, al Qaeda connections, and uranium from Niger for use in a robust nuclear weapons program. He said all this three years ago, during this all-important annual address, and all of it was a lie. The American people deserve an explanation." See? It's easy. All it takes is courage. What I am talking about is political theater on a grand scale. No opposition party in American history has ever turned their backs on a President and walked out of a State of the Union address. No opposition party has faced the degree of potential extermination the Democrats face today. The stakes have never been higher. You are dealing with a President who wants to make his Executive powers absolute, and with a Republican party that has been usurped from soup to nuts by extremists that would be cartoonish if they were not so very real. Abramoff won't help you. The fear factor will subsume you. You can sit there and take it, clapping politely as the ram rolls towards you, or you can stand up and make yourselves relevant again. To walk out of the speech would be a huge statement, bold and potentially dangerous. But if you don't do something bold, something grand and unprecedented, something to take back the initiative, you will join the Whigs in the dustbin of history.
Stand up. Walk out. You have a week to get this organized.
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 Scotty explains why spying on Americans is for their own protrection! Heil Bush, Dear Propaganda Ansager McClellan, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your constant lying, spinning, shilling, all with a strait face, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Republican Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at the "Fuhrer Bunker" formally 'The White House' on 03-15-2006. We salute you herr McClellan, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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AUSTIN, Texas -- I'd like to make it clear to the people who run the Democratic Party that I will not support Hillary Clinton for president.
Enough. Enough triangulation, calculation and equivocation. Enough clever straddling, enough not offending anyone This is not a Dick Morris election. Sen. Clinton is apparently incapable of taking a clear stand on the war in Iraq, and that alone is enough to disqualify her. Her failure to speak out on Terri Schiavo, not to mention that gross pandering on flag-burning, are just contemptible little dodges.
The recent death of Gene McCarthy reminded me of a lesson I spent a long, long time unlearning, so now I have to re-learn it. It's about political courage and heroes, and when a country is desperate for leadership. There are times when regular politics will not do, and this is one of those times. There are times a country is so tired of bull that only the truth can provide relief.
If no one in conventional-wisdom politics has the courage to speak up and say what needs to be said, then you go out and find some obscure junior senator from Minnesota with the guts to do it. In 1968, Gene McCarthy was the little boy who said out loud, "Look, the emperor isn't wearing any clothes." Bobby Kennedy -- rough, tough Bobby Kennedy -- didn't do it. Just this quiet man trained by Benedictines who liked to quote poetry.
What kind of courage does it take, for mercy's sake? The majority of the American people (55 percent) think the war in Iraq is a mistake and that we should get out. The majority (65 percent) of the American people want single-payer health care and are willing to pay more taxes to get it. The majority (86 percent) of the American people favor raising the minimum wage. The majority of the American people (60 percent) favor repealing Bush's tax cuts, or at least those that go only to the rich. The majority (66 percent) wants to reduce the deficit not by cutting domestic spending, but by reducing Pentagon spending or raising taxes.
The majority (77 percent) thinks we should do "whatever it takes" to protect the environment. The majority (87 percent) thinks big oil companies are gouging consumers and would support a windfall profits tax. That is the center, you fools. WHO ARE YOU AFRAID OF?
I listen to people like Rahm Emanuel superciliously explaining elementary politics to us clueless naifs outside the Beltway ("First, you have to win elections"). Can't you even read the damn polls?
Here's a prize example by someone named Barry Casselman, who writes, "There is an invisible civil war in the Democratic Party, and it is between those who are attempting to satisfy the defeatist and pacifist left base of the party and those who are attempting to prepare the party for successful elections in 2006 and 2008."
This supposedly pits Howard Dean, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi, emboldened by "a string of bad news from the Middle East ... into calling for premature retreat from Iraq," versus those pragmatic folk like Steny Hoyer, Rahm Emanuel, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden and Joe Lieberman.
Oh come on, people -- get a grip on the concept of leadership. Look at this war -- from the lies that led us into it, to the lies they continue to dump on us daily.
You sit there in Washington so frightened of the big, bad Republican machine you have no idea what people are thinking. I'm telling you right now, Tom DeLay is going to lose in his district. If Democrats in Washington haven't got enough sense to OWN the issue of political reform, I give up on them entirely.
Do it all, go long, go for public campaign financing for Congress. I'm serious as a stroke about this -- that is the only reform that will work, and you know it, as well as everyone else who's ever studied this. Do all the goo-goo stuff everybody has made fun of all these years: embrace redistricting reform, electoral reform, House rules changes, the whole package. Put up, or shut up. Own this issue, or let Jack Abramoff politics continue to run your town.
Bush, Cheney and Co. will continue to play the patriotic bully card just as long as you let them. I've said it before: War brings out the patriotic bullies. In World War I, they went around kicking dachshunds on the grounds that dachshunds were "German dogs." They did not, however, go around kicking German shepherds. The MINUTE someone impugns your patriotism for opposing this war, turn on them like a snarling dog and explain what loving your country really means. That, or you could just piss on them elegantly, as Rep. John Murtha did. Or eviscerate them with wit (look up Mark Twain on the war in the Philippines). Or point out the latest in the endless "string of bad news."
Do not sit there cowering and pretending the only way to win is as Republican-lite. If the Washington-based party can't get up and fight, we'll find someone who can.
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It's been a tough couple of weeks for the Bush-serving McClellan boys -- and those pictures of their boss and Jack Abramoff ain't gonna help matters.
First, Mark, Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, rolled out the president's Medicare prescription drug program -- which, right out of the gate, is being regarded as one of this administration's biggest debacles (and that's saying something!).
And while Mark was busy fending off angry senior citizens who want their drugs, brother Scottie has had his hands full fending off angry reporters who want to learn how well the president knew Abramoff.
Earlier this month, Scottie promised he'd have a "thorough report" on the matter very soon -- a vow the beleaguered press secretary seems to have forgotten. Unfortunately for him, the press hasn't, and last week began hammering him on the subject. See if you can spot the recurring leitmotif in Scottie's responses:
Q Scott, just quickly back to Abramoff. Can you give any more specificity on those meetings, when they were, years, times?
McCLELLAN: No, this is sticking with our past policy. We're not going to engage in a fishing expedition. *** Q Okay, you talked about the Hanukkah receptions. Can you talk about the staff-level meetings and what years those were, or --
McCLELLAN: No --
Q And why would you tell us the Hanukkah --
McCLELLAN: I did a check for you all, to provide you that information. But we're not going to engage in a fishing expedition...
It was more of the same the following day:
Q And going back to the Abramoff investigation, do you have an update for us on any records of phone calls or emails between staff members and Mr. Abramoff, or photos of the President with him?
McCLELLAN: No, as I indicated yesterday, we're not going to engage in some sort of fishing expedition...
And again yesterday:
Q On the Abramoff pictures. You had said last week that if we had something specific, that you would then explain further about the connections between the President and the White House and Mr. Abramoff. Can you talk about the specific circumstances surrounding these pictures, and exactly the range of contacts that Mr. Abramoff had?
McCLELLAN: ...Now in terms of the reports about some of these pictures, as we have previously indicated, the President did not have a personal relationship with Mr. Abramoff. But we also indicated that it should not be surprising that he might have taken some pictures with him at some of the widely attended events that we know both attended. What I indicated previously was, if you've got some specific issue that you need to bring to my attention, fine. But what we're not going to do is engage in a fishing expedition that has nothing to do with the investigation.
And today:
Q But if there was nothing improper about contacts with him, why not open up records about any visits or meetings Mr. Abramoff might have had?
McCLELLAN: Well, I've already talked to you about that information and responded to questions that you have. There's a difference between responding to questions like that and engaging in a fishing expedition that has nothing to do with the investigation.
Alright, Scottie -- we get it. You don't want to go fishing. At least not for explanations. Or maybe your perseverations actually belie an overwhelming unconscious desire to toss the "Bush doesn't know Abramoff" fish story back and head off for a little R&R on a slow boat to nowhere. That's one way out. Or maybe Scottie can score some of the drugs his brother's program is currently keeping out of the hands of the elderly?
... Nate Beeler ...  |
Place your message here!
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Searching each day for the answers,
Caught in the fight for survival,
Shadows of the past,
Into the verbal arena,
Shadows of the past,
Shadows of the past,
Shadows of the past,
Shadows of the past,
Victims of the future.
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Parting Shots...
 Somethin' else we have in common, flying on the airlines, and listening to the airlines announcements. And trying to pretend to ourselves that the language they're using is really English. Doesn't seem like it to me. Whole thing starts when you get to the gate. First announcement, "We would like to begin the boarding process." Extra word, "process", not necessary. Boarding is enough, "We'd like to begin the boarding." Simple! Tells the story... People add extra words when they want things to sound more important than they really are. "Boarding Process" sounds important.... It isn't! It's just a bunch of people getting on an airplane. People like to sound important. Weather men on television talk about shower activity, sounds more important than showers. I even heard one guy on CNN talk about a rain event. Swear to god. He said, "Louisiana is expecting a rain event." I thought HOLY SHIT I hope I can get tickets to that! "Emergency Situation." News people like to say, "Police have responded to an emergency situation." No they haven't....They've responded to an emergency. We KNOW it's a situation... everything is a situation. Anyway as part of this boarding process, they say, "We would like to pre-board." Well what exactly is that, anyway? What does it mean to pre-board? To get on before you get on! That's another complaint of mine, too much use of this prefix pre.... It's all over the language now. pre this, pre that..... place the turkey in a preheated oven.... it's ridiculous... there are only two states an oven can possibly exist in, heated or unheated.... preheated is a meaningless fucking term... that's like pre-recorded, this program was pre-recorded, well of course it was pre-recorded, when else you gonna record it, afterwards? That's the whole purpose of recording, to do it beforehand! Otherwise it doesn't really work does it? Pre-existing, pre-planning, pre-screening, you know what I tell these people? PRE-SUCK MY GENITAL SITUATION! And they seem to understand what I'm talking about.... Anyway, as part of this pre-boarding, they say, "We would like to pre-board those passengers traveling with small children." Well, what about those passengers traveling with large children? Suppose you have a 2-year old with a pituitary disorder. You know a 6 foot infant with an oversized head. The kind of kid you see in the National Enquirer all the time. Actually, with a kid like that, I think you're better off checking him right in with your luggage at the curb, don't you? Well, they like it under there, it's dark, they're used to that. About this time, someone's telling you to get on the plane. "Get on the plane, get on the plane." I say fuck you; I'm getting IN the plane! In the plane! Let Evil Kneivel get ON the plane. I'll be in here with you folks in uniform. There seems to be less wind in here. They might tell you you're on a non-stop flight. Well, I don't think I care for that. No, I insist that my flight stop. Preferably at an airport. It's those sudden unscheduled cornfield and housing development stops, that seem to interrupt the flow of my day . . . Here's one they just made up... "Near Miss". When two planes almost collide, they call it a near miss. IT'S A NEAR HIT! A collision is a near miss. POOOF, look, they nearly missed. YES, BUT NOT QUITE!!! They might tell you you're flight has been delayed because of a change in equipment--BROKEN PLANE! They tell me to put my seat back forward. Well, I don't bend that way. If I could put my seat back forward, I'd be in porno movies. Then they mention carry-on luggage, the first time I heard carry-on, I thought they were going to bring a dead deer on board. I thought what the hell do they need with that. Don't they have those little TV dinners anymore? Then I thought carry-on, carry-on, there's going to be a party. People are going to be carrying on, on the plane. Well, I don't care for that, I like a serious attitude on the plane, especially on the flight deck, which is the latest euphemism for COCKPIT. Can't imagine why they wouldn't want to use a lovely word like COCKPIT, can you? Especially with all those stewardesses going in and out of it all the time. There' one.......There's a word that has changed, stewardess. First it was hostess, then stewardess, now it's flight attendant. You know what I call them--the lady on the plane. Sometimes it's a man on the plane now. That's good, equality, I'm all in favor of that. Sometimes, they actually refer to these people as "uniformed crew members." Uniformed--as opposed to that guy sitting next to you in a Grateful Dead tee-shirt and a fuck you hat, who's working on his ninth little bottle of Kahlua, I might add. As soon as they close the door to the aircraft, that's when they begin the safety lecture. I love the safety lecture. This is my favorite part of the airplane ride. I listen very carefully to the safety lecture, especially that part where they teach us how to use the seatbelts. Imagine this, here we are, a plane full of grown human beings, many of us partially educated, and they're actually taking time out to describe the intricate workings of a belt buckle. "Place the small metal flap into the buckle." Well, I asked for clarification at that point. Over here please, over here, yes, thank you very much. Did I hear you correctly? Did you say place the small metal flap into the buckle or place the buckle over and around the small metal flap? I'm a simple man; I do not possess an engineering degree nor am I mechanically inclined. Sorry to have taken up so much of your time. Please continue with the "wonderful" safety lecture. Seatbelt--high-tech shit. The safety lecture continues. The next thing they do, they tell you to locate your nearest emergency exit. I do this immediately. I locate my nearest emergency exit, and then I plan my route. You have to plan your route--it's not always a straight line, is it? Sometimes, there's a really big fat fuck sitting right in front of you. Well, you know you'll never get over him. I look around for women and children, midgets and dwarves, cripples, war widows, paralyzed veterans, people with broken legs--anybody who looks like they can't move too well. The emotionally disturbed come in very handy at a time like this. You might have to go out of your way to find these people, but you'll get out of the plane a lot goddamn quicker, believe me. I say, let's see, I'll go around the fat fuck, step on the widow's head, push those children out of the way, knock down the paralyzed midget, and get out of the plane where I can help others. I can be of no help to anyone if I'm lying unconscious in the aisle with some big cocksucker standing on my head. I must get out of the plane, go to a nearby farmhouse, have a Dr. Pepper and call the police. The safety lecture continues. "In the unlikely event . ." This is a very suspect phrase, especially coming as it does from an industry that is willing to lie about arrival and departure times. "In the unlikely event of a sudden change in cabin pressure"--ROOF FLIES OFF! " . . An oxygen mask will drop down in front of you. Place the mask over your face and breathe normally." Well, I have no problem with that. I always breathe normally when I'm in a 600 mile an hour uncontrolled vertical dive. I also shit normally. RIGHT IN MY PANTS! They tell you to adjust YOUR oxygen mask before helping your child with his. I did not need to be told that. In fact, I'm probably going to be too busy screaming to help him at all. This will be a good time for him to learn self-reliance. If he can program his fucking VCR, he could goddamn, jolly-well learn to adjust an oxygen mask. Fairly simple thing, just a little rubber band in the back is all it is. Not nearly as complicated as say, for instance, a seatbelt. The safety lecture continues. "In the unlikely event of a water landing . . ." Well, what exactly is a water landing? Am I mistaken, or does this sound somewhat similar to CRASHING INTO THE OCEAN!? ". . . your seat cushion can be used as a floatation device." Well, imagine that, my seat cushion. Just what I need--to float around the North Atlantic for several days, clinging to a pillow full of beer farts...........Thank you, thank you...... The flight continues, a little later on, towards the end, we hear, "The captain has turned on the fasten seatbelt sign." Well, who gives a shit who turned it on? What does that have to do with anything? It's on, isn't it? And who made this man a captain, might I ask? Did I sleep through some sort of armed forces swearing-in ceremony or something? Captain--he's a fucking pilot and let him be happy with that. If those sight-seeing announcements are any mark of his intellect, he's lucky to be working at all. Tell the captain, Air Marshall Carlin says go fuck yourself! The next sentence I hear is full of things that piss me off. "Before leaving the aircraft, please check around your immediate seating area for any personal belongings you might have brought onboard." Well, let's start with immediate seating area--SEAT! It's a goddamn seat! Check around your seat! "For any personal belongings." Well, what other kinds of belongings are there, besides personal--public belongings? Do these people honestly think I might be traveling with a fountain I stole from the park. "You might have brought onboard." Well.......I MIGHT have brought my arrowhead collection--I didn't, so I'm not going to look for it! I am going to look for things I brought onboard, which seems to enhance my likelihood of finding something, wouldn't you say? Tell me to return my seatback and tray table back to their original, upright position. Fine, who's going to return this guy with the Grateful Dead tee-shirt and the fuck you hat to his original upright position. About this time, they tell you you'll be landing shortly. That sound to you like we're gonna miss the runway. Final approach is not very promising either, is it? Final is not a good word to be using on an airplane. Sometimes, the pilot will get on and he'll say, "We'll be on the ground in 15 minutes." Well, that's a little vague, isn't it? Now we're taxiing in, she says, "Welcome to O'Hare International Airport . . ." Well, how can someone who is just arriving herself possibly welcome me to a place she isn't even at yet? Doesn't this violate some fundamental law of physics? We're only on the ground for 4 seconds; she's coming on like the fucking mayor's wife! ". . . where the local time . ." Well, of course it's the local time. What did you think we were expecting--the time in Pango Pango? "Enjoy your stay in Chicago, or wherever your final destination might be." All destinations are final! That's what it means, destiny-final. If you haven't gotten where you're going, you aren't there yet. "The captain has asked . . ." More shit from the bogus captain. You know, for someone who's supposed to be flying an airplane, he's taking a mighty big interest in what I'm doing back here.". . . that you remain seated until he has brought the aircraft to a complete stop. Not a partial stop, cuz' during a partial stop, I partially get up. "Continue to observe the no-smoking sign until well inside the terminal." It's physically impossible to observe the no-smoking sign even if you're standing just outside the door of the airplane, much less well inside the terminal. You can't even see the fucking planes from well inside the terminal. Which brings me to terminal--another unfortunate word to be used in association with air travel. And they use it all over the airport, don't they? Somehow I just can't get hungry at a place called the Terminal Snack bar. But, if you've ever eaten there, you know it IS an appropriate name.
Thank you...... thank you very much... |
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In This Edition
Gore Vidal with a must read, "President Jonah."
Helen Thomas warns, "Bush: 'L'etat, C'est Moi'."
Uri Avnery is having a, "Deja Vu!"
Thom Hartmann returns with, "Alito - It's the Constitution That's At Stake."
Jim Hightower reports, "Wall Street Divies Up The Bonus Booty."
Sheila Samples wonders, "Who Will Tell The People?"
Cindy Sheehan tells, " What Really Happened."
Robert Scheer recalls, "Enron's Political Helpmates."
Robert Parry explores, "Bush & The Bullfight."
Joe Conason concludes, "Picturegate Inspires No Media Outrage."
Norman Solomon covers, "Domestic Lying: The Question That Journalists Don't Ask Bush."
William Rivers Pitt explains, "The State Of The Union."
Bob Schieffer wins the coveted "Vidkun Quisling Award!"
Molly Ivins asks, "Is There Anything These Folks Can't Screw Up?"
Arianna Huffington is, "Blogging The SOTU."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department 'The Onion' reports, "Secretary Of Agriculture Keeps Bragging He's Ninth In Line For The Presidency" but first Uncle Ernie sez, "Fight The Good Fight."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Clay Bennett with additional cartoons from Ward Sutton, Micah Wright, Rex Babin, Bruce Yurgil, Jeff Parker, Rico Dog, Mike Lester, Dubyas World.Com and Internet Weekly.Org.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Fight The Good Fight By Ernest Stewart
Every minute every day Fight the good fight every moment It's your only way Fight The Good Fight --- Triumph
It's that time of the year again when we look back at our humble beginning and re-pledge ourselves for the fight against the Crime Family Bush. When the 12-12-2000 coup d'etat went down I said enough is enough. This was after all the third coup brought to us by that wonderful Crime Family Bush. The two successful coups i.e. JFK's and Gore's and the unsuccessful attempt on Reagan. I was writing a political column called Issues & Alibis for another ezine. As I was the only who wasn't writing fluff I decided to found a magazine that wasn't fluffy and dealt with the truth and what was really goin' down all around us. On the first of February 2001 I began this little enterprise dedicated to restoring the old Republic and over throwing the dictatorship. I was joined by the best and the brightest liberal writers and cartoonists from all over the world.
The first to join us were the writers Robert Parry, Helen Thomas and Greg Palast and the cartoonists Rex Babin and Clay Bennett; whose work is spotlighted this week. They were joined by practically every liberal writer on the planet from Noam Chomsky to Howard Zinn, to Kurt Vonnegut to this weeks lead off writer Gore Vidal; quite a collection of talent for this little ezine is it not? The amazing thing about this fight folks is that every one that I've ever asked has said yes. Yes to donating their current and future art work for free, for the good of the cause. (As does our sponsor Marc Perkel who stepped up when we lost our pre-paid space for the crime of being liberal which is enough to get you thrown off a lot of servers!) Almost magically just in time for this celebration old friends Gore Vidal appeared as did Thom Hartmann; who've been missing from these pages for some time due to other efforts i.e. new books and a Air America radio show. They've both written must read articles with Thom summing up what I've been on about for the last 5 years in his comparison of Bush and Hitler. It is no surprise when Smirky brings out the next horror as his grand daddies Bush and Walker taught the same lessons to Hitler and the Nazis. There goes that pesky "history repeating itself again thingie" that both Thom and I are very cognoscente of.
During the last five years we have seen things go from bad to worse to unbelievable. Many folks are surprised that the Sheeple can't see all of these nightmares right before their eyes and so do nothing while all their rights are steadily taken away and Bush, Cheney, Rove, Rummy and the rest dare us to do something about it! With the spin masters of the American media and the Rethuglican control of Congress they now control all three divisions of government and both parties too! The Crime Family Bush knows there is no one to stop them at home and doesn't fear a world that has forgotten it's history about appeasing monsters from Caesar to Hitler and keeps bending over backwards to kiss Bush's ass. We are truly doomed unless we get up off our fat American asses and "Fight The Good Fight." Nobody else is going to do it, nobody. Not Rambo, nor Steven Sagal or is the US Calvary are coming to our rescue. In fact the new S.S., the National Guard and US Army units will soon be rounding us up for a trip to the new "Happy Camps" where work and a little torture are sure to set us all free at least from this "mortal coil." And as I've said a hundred times in these pages before, "When you're strapped inside a white boxcar with your family on the way to camp it's way too late to do something about it!" At that point in time all that you can do is try to explain your lack of actions and beg forgiveness of your children and grandchildren for not doing something while you still could. Here's a helpful tip for those of you who go, "No matter what they say, stay out of the shower building!"
As I predicted the Demoncrats who could have stood together and stopped Sammy the coathanger, (from the 30 years of mischief that he'll create before Yahweh calls him home to his cosmic bosom are likely to be the worst years this planets ever seen) didn't and have all bent back over and dropped their pants once again. My buddy Bartcop (Who is celebrating his this month!) has been fighting a never ending battle in support of Hillary and for the life of me I have no idea why? I can't see Hillary for many reasons myself, one of which is that no one on the left will vote for her and no one on the right will vote for her either! But for the sake of argument (which we liberals are often prone to do), let's say she's just been pretending to be a fascist just to get a chance to run for President and is really politically left of liberal. Then let's say; we all fall in behind her and vote for her. Again, so what? Another dictator like Smirky in a rare moment of truth, once said everything you need to know on the subject. Do you remember the words of old Joe Stalin? Unka Joe said...
"It is enough that the people know there was an election. The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything!"
With seditious companies like Diebold corporation and their no paper trail voting machines no matter who you voted for, their Rethuglican pals will win the election. They've already thrown parts of the 2002 and 2004 elections. Papa didn't even need his "Gang of Five"(tm) from the Extreme Court to commit treason and sedition again. Now with Alito replacing the seditious Sandra Day O'Connor and Roberts replacing old "Golden Stripes" Bush has a total lock and will have it as long as he wants it! So even if the entire country wants Hillary a convenient Marshall Law decree just before the 2006 or 2008 elections keeps us all goose stepping off to our brave new world America.
I was going to wait to write this until after Bush made his speech but as I can never bring myself to watch him without lobbing a brick at the TV and screaming back at him and thus scarring all the dogs and the neighbors for 4 or 5 houses in all directions I'll just wait and read it the following morning and since everything out of his cake hole will without a doubt be a lie or the truth told for a totally evil reason, what would be the point of tuning it?
Well I had myself tied to the mast and like passing by a road accident where you really don't want to look but you just can't help but stare at it so I watched his speech and I must say I'm glad I did as I came away recharged seeing the heroic Cindy Sheehan being arrested for her lone stand against tyranny, for the crime of being there and daring to disagree with the Fuhrer. There she was standing for all of us, a truly inspiring moment in that sea of bullshit! Read Cindy's story below in her own words, "What Really Happened."
No matter what he said I predict that the Rethuglicans will keep committing treason, they'll keep slaughtering our children, they'll keep stealing everything in site and embarrassing us all over the world: you know doing Rethuglican things, and I also predict that the Demoncracts will let them get away with it and remain on their knees like the good little lap dogs that they've become.
So America it's up to us to take it to the streets and to "Fight The Good Fight!" We'll be right there with you every step of the way until we get our republic back and the evil doers are brought to justice!
Peace!
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W's campy. It's avant-garde and it's just a wee bit SURREAL. It's a salute to 1950's sci-fi, it's as serious as a heart attack and it confirms what we've all wondered about... is W really from outer space? And wouldn't that explain a lot of things, wouldn't it? Find out for yourself who's behind the evil Party of No! It's coming to a theatre near you this summer and a film festival this spring. Just click on the big "W" and tell'em Uncle Ernie sent ya!
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We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
 President Jonah By Gore Vidal While contemplating the ill-starred presidency of G.W. Bush, I looked about for some sort of divine analogy. As usual, when in need of enlightenment, I fell upon the Holy Bible, authorized King James version of 1611; turning by chance to the Book of Jonah, I read that Jonah, who, like Bush, chats with God, had suffered a falling-out with the Almighty and thus became a jinx dogged by luck so bad that a cruise liner, thanks to his presence aboard, was about to sink in a storm at sea. Once the crew had determined that Jonah, a passenger, was the jinx, they threw him overboard and--Lo!--the storm abated. The three days and nights he subsequently spent in the belly of a nauseous whale must have seemed like a serious jinx to the digestion-challenged whale, who extruded him much as the decent opinion of mankind has done to Bush. Originally, God wanted Jonah to give hell to Nineveh, whose people, God noted disdainfully, "cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand," so like the people of Baghdad who cannot fathom what democracy has to do with their destruction by the Cheney-Bush cabal. But the analogy becomes eerily precise when it comes to the hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico at a time when a President is not only incompetent but plainly jinxed by whatever faith he cringes before. Witness the ongoing screw-up of prescription drugs. Who knows what other disasters are in store for us thanks to the curse he is under? As the sailors fed the original Jonah to a whale, thus lifting the storm that was about to drown them, perhaps we the people can persuade President Jonah to retire to his other Eden in Crawford, Texas, taking his jinx with him. We deserve a rest. Plainly, so does he. Look at Nixon's radiant features after his resignation! One can see former President Jonah in his sumptuous library happily catering to faith-based fans with animated scriptures rooted in The Simpsons. Not since the glory days of Watergate and Nixon's Luciferian fall has there been so much written about the dogged deceits and creative criminalities of our rulers. We have also come to a point in this dark age where there is not only no hero in view but no alternative road unblocked. We are trapped terribly in a now that few foresaw and even fewer can define, despite a swarm of books and pamphlets like the vast cloud of locusts that dined on China in that 1930s movie The Good Earth. I have read many of these descriptions of our fallen estate, looking for one that best describes in plain English how we got to this now and where we appear to be headed once our Good Earth has been consumed and only Rapture is left to whisk aloft the Faithful. Meanwhile, the rest of us can learn quite a lot from Dark Ages America: The Final Phase of Empire, by Morris Berman, a professor of sociology at the Catholic University of America in Washington, DC. I must confess that I have a proprietary interest in anyone who refers to the United States as an empire, since I am credited with first putting forward this heretical view in the early 1970s. In fact, so disgusted with me was a book reviewer at Time magazine that as proof of my madness he wrote: "He actually refers to the United States as an empire!" It should be noted that at about the same time Henry Luce, proprietor of Time, was booming on and on about "The American Century." What a difference a word makes! Berman sets his scene briskly in recent history. "We were already in our twilight phase when Ronald Reagan, with all the insight of an ostrich, declared it to be 'morning in America'; twenty-odd years later, under the 'boy emperor' George W. Bush (as Chalmers Johnson refers to him), we have entered the Dark Ages in earnest, pursuing a short-sighted path that can only accelerate our decline. For what we are now seeing are the obvious characteristics of the West after the fall of Rome: the triumph of religion over reason; the atrophy of education and critical thinking; the integration of religion, the state, and the apparatus of torture--a troika that was for Voltaire the central horror of the pre-Enlightenment world; and the political and economic marginalization of our culture.... The British historian Charles Freeman published an extended discussion of the transition that took place during the late Roman empire, the title of which could serve as a capsule summary of our current president: The Closing of the Western Mind. Mr. Bush, God knows, is no Augustine; but Freeman points to the latter as the epitome of a more general process that was underway in the fourth century: namely, 'the gradual subjection of reason to faith and authority.' This is what we are seeing today, and it is a process that no society can undergo and still remain free. Yet it is a process of which administration officials, along with much of the American population, are aggressively proud." In fact, close observers of this odd presidency note that Bush, like his evangelical base, believes he is on a mission from God and that faith trumps empirical evidence. Berman quotes a senior White House adviser who disdains what he calls the "reality-based" community, to which Berman sensibly responds: "If a nation is unable to perceive reality correctly, and persists in operating on the basis of faith-based delusions, its ability to hold its own in the world is pretty much foreclosed." Berman does a brief tour of the American horizon, revealing a cultural Death Valley. In secondary schools where evolution can still be taught, too many teachers are afraid to bring up the subject to their so often unevolved students. "Add to this the pervasive hostility toward science on the part of the current administration (e.g., stem-cell research) and we get a clear picture of the Enlightenment being steadily rolled back. Religion is used to explain terror attacks as part of a cosmic conflict between Good and Evil rather than in terms of political processes.... Manichaeanism rules across the United States. According to a poll taken by Time magazine, 59 percent of Americans believe that John's apocalyptic prophecies in the Book of Revelation will be fulfilled, and nearly all of these believe that the faithful will be taken up into heaven in the 'Rapture.' "Finally, we shouldn't be surprised at the antipathy toward democracy displayed by the Bush administration.... As already noted, fundamentalism and democracy are completely antithetical. The opposite of the Enlightenment, of course, is tribalism, groupthink; and more and more, this is the direction in which the United States is going.... Anthony Lewis, who worked as a columnist for the New York Times for thirty-two years, observes that what has happened in the wake of 9/11 is not just the threatening of the rights of a few detainees, but the undermining of the very foundation of democracy. Detention without trial, denial of access to attorneys, years of interrogation in isolation--these are now standard American practice, and most Americans don't care. Nor did they care about the revelation in July 2004 (reported in Newsweek), that for several months the White House and the Department of Justice had been discussing the feasibility of canceling the upcoming presidential election in the event of a possible terrorist attack." I suspect that the technologically inclined prevailed against that extreme measure on the ground that the newly installed electronic ballot machines could be so calibrated that Bush would win handily no matter what (read Representative John Conyers's report on the rigging of Ohio's vote). Meanwhile, the indoctrination of the people merrily continues. "In a 'State of the First Amendment Survey' conducted by the University of Connecticut in 2003, 34 percent of Americans polled said the First Amendment 'goes too far'; 46 percent said there was too much freedom of the press; 28 percent felt that newspapers should not be able to publish articles without prior approval of the government; 31 percent wanted public protest of a war to be outlawed during that war; and 50 percent thought the government should have the right to infringe on the religious freedom of 'certain religious groups' in the name of the war on terror." It is usual in sad reports like Professor Berman's to stop abruptly the litany of what has gone wrong and then declare, hand on heart, that once the people have been informed of what is happening, the truth will set them free and a quarter-billion candles will be lit and the darkness will flee in the presence of so much spontaneous light. But Berman is much too serious for the easy platitude. Instead he tells us that those who might have struck at least a match can no longer do so because shared information about our situation is meager to nonexistent. Would better schools help? Of course, but, according to that joyous bearer of ill tidings, the New York Times, many school districts are now making sobriety tests a regular feature of the school day: apparently opium derivatives are the opiate of our stoned youth. Meanwhile, millions of adult Americans, presumably undrugged, have no idea who our enemies were in World War II. Many college graduates don't know the difference between an argument and an assertion (did their teachers also fail to solve this knotty question?). A travel agent in Arizona is often asked whether or not it is cheaper to take the train rather than fly to Hawaii. Only 12 percent of Americans own a passport. At the time of the 2004 presidential election 42 percent of voters believed that Saddam Hussein was involved in 9/11. One high school boy, when asked who won the Civil War, replied wearily, "I don't know and I don't care," echoing a busy neocon who confessed proudly: "The American Civil War is as remote to me as the War of the Roses." We are assured daily by advertisers and/or politicians that we are the richest, most envied people on earth and, apparently, that is why so many awful, ill-groomed people want to blow us up. We live in an impermeable bubble without the sort of information that people living in real countries have access to when it comes to their own reality. But we are not actually people in the eyes of the national ownership. We are simply unreliable consumers comprising an overworked, underpaid labor force not in the best of health: The World Health Organization rates our healthcare system (sic--or sick?) as thirty-seventh-best in the world, far behind even Saudi Arabia, role model for the Texans. Our infant mortality rate is satisfyingly high, precluding a First World educational system. Also, it has not gone unremarked even in our usually information-free media that despite the boost to the profits of such companies as Halliburton, Bush's wars of aggression against small countries of no danger to us have left us well and truly broke. Our annual trade deficit is a half-trillion dollars, which means that we don't produce much of anything the world wants except those wan reports on how popular our entertainment is overseas. Unfortunately, the foreign gross of King Kong, the Edsel of that assembly line, is not yet known. It is rumored that Bollywood--the Indian film business--may soon surpass us! Berman writes, "We have lost our edge in science to Europe.... The US economy is being kept afloat by huge foreign loans ($4 billion a day during 2003). What do you think will happen when America's creditors decide to pull the plug, or when OPEC members begin selling oil in euros instead of dollars?... An International Monetary Fund report of 2004 concluded that the United States was 'careening toward insolvency.' " Meanwhile, China, our favorite big-time future enemy, is the number one for worldwide foreign investments, with France, the bte noire of our apish neocons, in second place. Well, we still have Kraft cheese and, of course, the death penalty. Berman makes the case that the Bretton-Woods agreement of 1944 institutionalized a system geared toward full employment and the maintenance of a social safety net for society's less fortunate--the so-called welfare or interventionist state. It did this by establishing fixed but flexible exchange rates among world currencies, which were pegged to the US dollar while the dollar, for its part, was pegged to gold. In a word, Bretton-Woods saved capitalism by making it more human. Nixon abandoned the agreement in 1971, which, according to Berman, started huge amounts of capital moving upward from the poor and the middle class to the rich and superrich. Mr. Berman spares us the happy ending, as, apparently, has history. When the admirable Tiberius (he has had an undeserved bad press), upon becoming emperor, received a message from the Senate in which the conscript fathers assured him that whatever legislation he wanted would be automatically passed by them, he sent back word that this was outrageous. "Suppose the emperor is ill or mad or incompetent?" He returned their message. They sent it again. His response: "How eager you are to be slaves." I often think of that wise emperor when I hear Republican members of Congress extolling the wisdom of Bush. Now that he has been caught illegally wiretapping fellow citizens he has taken to snarling about his powers as "a wartime president," and so, in his own mind, he is above each and every law of the land. Oddly, no one in Congress has pointed out that he may well be a lunatic dreaming that he is another Lincoln, but whatever he is or is not he is no wartime President. There is no war with any other nation...yet. There is no state called terror, an abstract noun like liar. Certainly his illegal unilateral ravaging of Iraq may well seem like a real war for those on both sides unlucky enough to be killed or wounded, but that does not make it a war any more than the appearance of having been elected twice to the presidency does not mean that in due course the people will demand an investigation of those two irregular processes. Although he has done a number of things that under the old republic might have got him impeached, our current system protects him: incumbency-for-life seats have made it possible for a Republican majority in the House not to do its duty and impeach him for his incompetence in handling, say, the natural disaster that befell Louisiana. The founders thought two-year terms for members of the House was as much democracy as we'd ever need. Therefore, there was no great movement to have some sort of recall legislation in the event that a President wasn't up to his job and so had lost the people's confidence between elections. But in time, as Ecclesiastes would say, all things shall come to pass and so, in a kindly way, a majority of the citizens must persuade him that he will be happier back in Crawford pruning Bushes of the leafy sort while the troops not killed or maimed will settle for simply being alive and in one piece. We may be slaves, but we are not unreasonable. One way that a majority of citizens can help open the road back to Crawford is by heeding the call of a group called The World Can't Wait. They believe that the agenda for 2006 must not be set by the Bush gang but by the people taking independent mass political action.
On January 31, the night of Bush's next State of the Union address, they have called for people in large cities and small towns all across the country to join in noisy rallies to make the demand that "Bush Step Down" the message of the day. At 9 PM Eastern Standard Time, just as Bush starts to speak, people can make a joyful noise and figuratively drown out his address. Then on the following Saturday, February 4, converge in front of the White House with the same message: Please step down and take your program with you. |
 Bush: 'L'etat, C'est Moi' We are now learning what President Bush considers to be the limits of his power-nothing. In public appearances this week, Bush defended his program of domestic spying without court approval, citing the inherent war powers of the presidency under the U.S. Constitution. The president points to his status as commander-in-chief and the resolution - approved by Congress three days after the 9/11 attacks - authorizing him to use "all necessary and appropriate force" against the terrorists. It is an obvious overreach of presidential prerogative; thin justification for what amounts to a snooping foray against Americans and others in the U.S. It all smacks of France's Louis XIV's famous dictum: "L'etat, c'est moi"- "I am the state." The administration is on shaky legal ground. Last week, the Justice Department issued a 42-page analysis declaring the president "will exercise all authority available to him, consistent with the Constitution, to protect the people of the United States." The Justice Department brief also contended that some presidential powers are simply "beyond congressional ability to regulate." But the law is the law. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 - which was enacted after in-depth congressional hearings on domestic spying - established a special court to issue warrants for electronic eavesdropping on suspected foreign agents inside the United States. So far, that court has been basically a rubber stamp for government petitions, rarely turning down a request at crisis times. The court permits emergency wiretaps without court approval for up to 72 hours. If court procedures tie law enforcement's hands, Congress is open to fixing it. "I know of no member of Congress, frankly, who, if the administration came and said, 'Here's why we need this capability,' that they wouldn't get it," said Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. But the Bush administration wanted unfettered freedom to spy on who they want, when they want, with no legal constraints whatsoever. The president and his cohorts are engaged in a full court press to justify their dubious legal position. Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee will hold hearings on domestic spying Feb. 6. But if this GOP-run Congress runs true to form, Bush will have clear sailing. In an appearance at Kansas State University earlier this week, President Bush claimed that the post-9/11 congressional resolution provided him with all the justification he needed. "Congress gave me the authority to use necessary force to protect the American people, but it didn't prescribe the tactics," Bush said. "It said, 'Mr. President, you've got the power to protect us, but we're not going to tell you how.'" Bush's stand is all too reminiscent of former President Richard Nixon who said during the unraveling of the Watergate scandal: "If a president does it, it's not illegal." Bush might take note that the Supreme Court and Congress said otherwise, leading to Nixon's resignation from the highest office in the land in 1974. Civil liberties' advocates are pressing lawsuits to challenge domestic spying. But with Supreme Court nominee Samuel A. Alito Jr. expected to win Senate approval within the next week, the Supreme Court is likely to tilt further to the right. So I doubt if President Bush is worried that a civil libertarian challenge to presidential power will survive court scrutiny. The Democrats, silent for too long, are finally stepping up to the plate, with former Vice President Al Gore leading the charge. Gore - who lost out to Bush in the presidential race in 2000 - is loud and clear, standing with the growing number of critics. "A president who breaks the law is a threat to the very structure of our government," Gore said. He called for the appointment of a special counsel to investigate Bush's domestic spying. Gore called the spying "a shameful exercise of power." The administration claims the American people are on its side. White House press secretary Scott McClellan told reporters that recent surveys "overwhelmingly show that the American people want us to do everything within our power to protect them." McClellan skirted around whether that included breaking the law, but contended that Bush was within his presidential power "to do everything he can to prevail in the war on terrorism." But the polls are mixed. A recent AP-Ipsos poll said 56 percent of those polled believed that the Bush administration should seek a warrant before eavesdropping on overseas calls to Americans, or vice versa. A Gallup Poll on Tuesday showed 51 percent of Americans deemed domestic spying without court approval "wrong" and 58 percent backed appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate. The Fourth Amendment in the Bill of Rights speaks of the right of people "to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects against unreasonable searches..."
I wonder what other secret orders Bush has issued to enhance his powers and diminish ours?
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Deja Vu! By Uri Avnery IF ARIEL Sharon had not been in a deep coma, he would have jumped out of his bed for joy. The Hamas victory fulfils his most ardent hopes. For a whole year now, he did everything possible to undermine Mahmoud Abbas. His logic was quite obvious: The Americans wanted him to negotiate with Abbas. Such negotiations would inevitably have lead to a situation that would have compelled him to give up almost all of the West Bank. Sharon had no intention of doing so. He wanted to annex about half of the territory. So he had to get rid of Abbas and his moderate image. During the last year, the situation of the Palestinians got worse from day to day. The actions of the occupation made normal life and commerce impossible. The West Bank settlements were continuously enlarging. The Wall which cuts off about 10% of the West Bank was nearing completion. No important prisoners were released. The aim was to impress on the Palestinians that Abbas is weak ("a chicken without feathers", as Sharon put it), that he cannot achieve anything, that offering peace and observing a cease-fire leads nowhere. The message to the Palestinians was clear: "Israel understands only the language of force." Now the Palestinians have put in power a party that speaks this language. WHY DID Hamas win? Palestinian elections, like German ones, consist of two parts. Half the members of parliament are elected on straight party lists (like in Israel), the other half are elected individually in their districts. This gave Hamas a huge advantage. In the party lists elections, Hamas won with only a slight majority. This would suggest that as far as the general political line is concerned, the majority is not far from Fatah - two states, peace with Israel. Many of the votes given to Hamas had nothing to do with peace, religion and fundamentalism, but with protest. The Palestinian administration, run almost exclusively by Fatah, is tainted with corruption. The "man in the street" felt that the people on top don't care about him. Fatah was also blamed for the terrible situation created by the occupation. Also, the glory of the martyrs and the indomitable fight against the immensely superior Israeli army added to the popularity of Hamas. In the personal-regional elections, the situation of Hamas was even better. Hamas had more creditable candidates, untainted by corruption. Its party machine was far superior, its members far more disciplined. In every district, there were several Fatah candidates competing with each other. After the death of Yasser Arafat, there is no strong leader capable of imposing unity. Marwan Barghouti, who could perhaps have done the job, is held in an Israeli prison - another big Israeli gift for Hamas. PEOPLE WHO believe in conspiracy theories can assert that it is all part of a devious Israeli plan. Some people even believe that Hamas was an Israeli invention right from the beginning. That is, of course, a wild exaggeration. But it is indeed the case that in the years before the first intifada, the Islamic organization was the only Palestinian group that had practically a free run in the occupied territories. The logic went like this: Our enemy is the PLO. The Islamists hate the secular PLO and Yasser Arafat. So we can use them against the PLO. Moreover, while all political institutions were banned, and even Palestinians who worked for peace were arrested for carrying out illegal political activity, no one could control what was happening in the mosques. "As long as they are praying, they are not shooting," was the innocent opinion in the Israeli military government. When the first intifada broke out at the end of 1987, this was proved wrong. Hamas was formed, partly in order to compete with the Islamic Jihad fighters. Within a short time, Hamas became the core of the armed uprising. But for almost a year, the Israeli Security Service did not act against them. Then policy changed and Sheik Ahmed Yassin, the spiritual leader, was arrested. All this happened more through stupidity than design. Now the Israeli government is faced with a Hamas leadership that was democratically elected by the people. WHAT NOW? Well, a strong feeling of deja vu. In the 70s and 80s, the Israeli government declared that it would never ever negotiate with the PLO. They are terrorists. They have a charter that calls for the destruction of Israel. Arafat is a monster, a second Hitler. So, never, never, never --- In the end, after much bloodshed, Israel and the PLO recognized each other and the Oslo agreement was signed. Now we are hearing the same tune again. Terrorists. Murderers. The Hamas charter calls for the destruction of Israel. We shall never never never negotiate with them. All this is very welcome to Sharon's Kadima party, which openly calls for the unilateral annexation of territory ("Fixing the borders of Israel unilaterally"). It will help the Likud and the Labor party hawks whose mantra is "We have no partner for peace", meaning - to hell with peace. Gradually, the tone will change. Both sides, and the Americans, too, will climb down from the tall tree. Hamas will state that it is ready for negotiations and find some religious basis for this. The Israeli government (probably headed by Ehud Olmert) will bow to reality and American pressure. Europe will forget its ridiculous slogans. In the end, everybody will agree that a peace, in which Hamas is a partner, is better than a peace with Fatah alone.
Let's pray that not too much blood is spilled before that point is reached.
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 Alito - It's the Constitution That's At Stake By Thom Hartmann Samuel Alito is a big booster of presidential power. Other "constitutional scholars" have been less sanguine. On April 20, 1795, James Madison, who had just helped shepherd through the Constitution and Bill of Rights, and would become President of the United States in the following decade, wrote: "Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes. And armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few." Reflecting on the ability of a president to use war as an excuse to become a virtual dictator, Madison continued his letter: "In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive [President] is extended. Its influence in dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force of the people. The same malignant aspect in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war...and in the degeneracy of manners and morals, engendered by both. "No nation," our fourth President and the Father of the Constitution concluded, "could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare." Since Madison's warning, "continual warfare" has been used both in fiction and in the real world. In the novel "1984" by George Orwell, the way a seemingly democratic president kept his nation in a continual state of repression was by having a continuous war. Cynics suggest the lesson wasn't lost on Lyndon Johnson or Richard Nixon, who both, they say, extended the Vietnam war so it coincidentally ran over election cycles, knowing that a wartime President's party is more likely to be reelected and has more power than a President in peacetime. And, as George W. Bush told his biographer in 1999: "One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as commander in chief. My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it. If I have a chance to invade, if I had that much capital, I'm not going to waste it. I'm going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and I'm going to have a successful presidency." Similarly, Adolf Hitler used the 1933 burning of the Reichstag (Parliament) building by a deranged Dutchman to declare a "war on terrorism," establish his legitimacy as a leader (even though he hadn't won a majority in the previous election). "You are now witnessing the beginning of a great epoch in history," he proclaimed, standing in front of the burned-out building, surrounded by national media. "This fire," he said, his voice trembling with emotion, "is the beginning." He used the occasion - "a sign from God," he called it - to declare an all-out war on terrorism and its ideological sponsors, a people, he said, who traced their origins to the Middle East and found motivation for their "evil" deeds in their religion. Two weeks later, the first prison for terrorists was built in Oranianberg, holding the first suspected allies of the infamous terrorist. Within four weeks of the terrorist attack, the nation's now-popular leader had pushed through legislation, in the name of combating terrorism and fighting the philosophy he said spawned it, that suspended constitutional guarantees of free speech, privacy, and habeas corpus. Police could now intercept mail and wiretap phones without warrants; suspected terrorists could be imprisoned without specific charges and without access to their lawyers; police could sneak into people's homes without warrants if the cases involved terrorism. To get his patriotic "Decree on the Protection of People and State" passed over the objections of concerned legislators and civil libertarians, he agreed to put a 4-year sunset provision on it: if the national emergency provoked by the terrorist attack on the Reichstag building was over by then, the freedoms and rights would be returned to the people, and the police agencies would be re-restrained. He then expanded his personal security service (the Stosstrupp) into a nationwide police force (the SchutzStaffel), answerable only to him, and thus with virtually unlimited powers of arrest and imprisonment. Now George W. Bush is the most recent "leader" to claim vast and wide powers during time of war, that those powers trump the constitution, and that the war he has started will go on "for generations" to come. To this end, has attached more than one hundred "presidential signing statements" to legislation passed by Congress, with the goal of inflating presidential power and inserting himself into the lawmaking process - a strategy developed in part by Samuel Alito himself. And in the new reauthorization of the PATRIOT Act - a piece of legislation almost certain to eventually come before the Supreme Court - Section 3605 expands the Secret Service (SS) from a Presidential protection detail to a national police force with the power to designate anyplace where people are meeting in the USA as a SENS (Special Event of National Significance). Once a SENS is established - anywhere, anytime, at the sole discretion of the SS (and it's not even necessary that the President or any other Executive Branch member be present) - the SS shall have the power to (quoting the new PATRIOT Act provisions) "carry firearms" and "make arrests without warrant for any offense against the United States committed in their presence, or for any felony cognizable under the laws of the United States if they have reasonable grounds to believe that the person to be arrested has committed or is committing such felony." Samuel Alito not only would support such expansions of Presidential power on the Supreme Court, he was the author and/or principle proponent of several of the devices used today by Bush to secure such power (including the argument that the power of the Presidency is "unitary"). The vote this week about Samuel Alito is not a vote about Republicans versus Democrats. It's a vote about the future of democracy in the United States of America. Do we accept Madison's vision of a nation in search of peace and with personal privacy intact, or do we embrace Sam Alito's vision of questionable elections, concentration camps, spying on citizens to create an atmosphere of fear and uncertainty, repression of women's and minority rights, and war without end?
As our legislators vote, we must carefully note their positions on this issue. Their oath of office is not to the President or even to "protect the people," but to the Constitution. And it is the Constitution - and the future of our democratic republic - that is at stake here.
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You are a Wall Street broker, aren't you? These few financial elites are the lucky devils who have recently been blessed with $21.5 billion in bonuses dispensed by Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, and the other giants that twist our economy to their advantage. Even while the wages of working stiffs did not even keep up with inflation in 2005, these high-flying speculators enjoyed nearly a 50 percent increase in revenues, producing record profits. So they are now splitting the loot. The honcho of Goldman Sachs, for example, pulled in $38 million, the CEO of Lehman Brothers took $14.9 million, and the top dog at Morgan Stanley had to settle for $11.5 million (but, after all, he only worked for six months last year). In fairness, I should note that their good fortunes are trickling down to those below - though certainly not to those as low-down as you and me. But the sellers of multimillion-dollar estates, rare art, luxury imported cars, and private jets are in high cotton as the Wall Streeters rush to spend their bonanza. For example, Gotham Dream Cars in Manhattan will sell you a Lamborghini Gallardo for only $195,000. If you're a younger bonus baby on Wall Street who can't quite afford to buy this exotic vehicle - hey, Dream Cars will let you rent it for $1,350 a day. "It's the perfect way for people to celebrate without going overboard," says the president of Dream Cars. How egalitarian is that? Also, super-luxury Manhattan apartments, starting at $10 million, are said to be a particularly hot market this year. As a broker for such properties puts it: "We love Wall Street bonuses." This is Jim Hightower saying... Remember, Bush & Company say that these financial hucksters who're now divvying up the booty they took from investors in '05 are the very people who should take over our Social Security program. (c) 2006 Jim Hightower's latest book, "If The Gods Had Meant Us To Vote They Would Have Given Us Candidates," is available in a fully revised and updated paperback edition. |
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that free speech is a ruse; The corporations run the country and then they make the news. Is it media or mind control heroic victories or crime? Who will tell the people... that we are living in these times. Who Will Tell The People --- Willie Nelson
George Orwell wrote that people who neither read nor ask questions will ultimately lose all desire to question "Big Brother." What is so frightening as we descend into the new world order fascism is not that we no longer read -- it's that we no longer can read. Researchers estimate as many as 30 million Americans -- many of them college graduates -- cannot read. They're unable to comprehend news stories or even instructions. They said they were "stunned," but could offer no explanation for the steep drop in literacy. I don't know what's more depressing -- that Americans can't read or, after studying the phenomenon, researchers lack the critical skills to discern why. Today, as in Orwell's 1984, the sound and fury of Big Brother's repetitive visual stimuli has apparently crippled our ability to think critically. If it's not on television, it isn't happening. Even then, we can't be sure of what is true until the paid TV "analyst" or pundit with the biggest stash of "Newspeak" talking points wins the debate. When there's no one left to tell the people the truth, Orwell said, "the people will believe what the media tells them they believe." I had almost come to the sad conclusion that Orwell was right when, late one September night in 2004 as I was surfing for something "soothing" on the radio, the door of my mind was unceremoniously bashed in and I was startled by... "I'm pissed off -- and I'm Mike Malloy." Malloy, clean-up guy for Air America Radio (10pm-1am), rode in on the strident vibrations of Pink Floyd's Run Like Hell and, for the next three hours, relentlessly hit both spineless Democrats and Republican "sonszabitches" with the truth about the Bush crime family, pummelled them with the truth about spineless and quivering democrats, bitch-slapped them with the truth about where we're headed if we don't wake up, stand up and speak up... Then, with a friendly and quiet "watch your back," he was gone. I just sat there, grinning. Maybe we aren't doomed to slip-slide into fascist hell after all. By sheer luck, I had stumbled across a guy with the ability to see the truth and the courage to tell the people... Who IS this guy? Mike Malloy is the canary in the political coal mine -- the bane of the Bush administration and of hypocrites of all stripes. He is a liberal gadfly whose light shines so brightly on the truth that even Air America struggles to keep him hidden under its late-night barrel. Far from being a "loose liberal cannon," Malloy has a solid background of writing, reporting, editing and broadcasting. He is a former news writer and editor for both CNN and CNN-international, and a former publisher of Atlanta's Creative Loafing newspaper. But it was in radio broadcasting in the 90's that Malloy literally came into his own. Malloy has been named "One of the Heavy Hundred" three times by Talkers Magazine, an honor given to only the top 100 radio talk show hosts out of more than 4,000, of which all but a handful are right-wing blustering liars like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, et al. Malloy has worked for WSB in Atlanta, WLS in Chicago and the now defunct I.E. America Radio Network. So, some may ask -- if Malloy's so damn good, why did WSB, WLS -- let him go? Why is Air America Radio afraid to stick him in prime time so more people can hear the truth? Because he is so damn good, that's why. Because the truth Malloy tells is raw, straightforward, stripped of all spin -- every word shoved right in the faces of those who have seized power to destroy the democratic safeguards of the U.S. Constitution, to steal elections, to abandon society's most vulnerable, and to slaughter their own citizens as a pretext for war. But even Air America knows that not everybody can handle the truth, especially in prime time. Malloy can be heard each night on Air America affiliate stations, the Internet, and on XM Satellite Radio, Channel 167. Missed programs are available at the White Rose Society website. Each night, Malloy exposes the Bush administration for what it is -- a murderous, evil, lying, fascist regime. Each night, I am amazed that he has somehow managed to slip through enemy lines yet again to shout truth to power. He asks no quarter, and gives none, regardless of the consequences. "I'm like a cork," Malloy says with a laugh, "You can't submerge me. You push me down and I pop up somewhere else. That's a given." He's uncomfortable with praise, and stresses often that he is there neither to educate nor entertain, but to "get together" with sane people in the evening and talk about the insanity. "I'm not arrogant enough to think I can educate you," he said. "I'm not that condescending, not that patronizing. Take what you want from this program and run with it." "Truthseekers" get a fast-moving mixture of music selected by Malloy's producer-wife Kathy Bay, occasional interviews, self-incriminating audio clips straight from the mouths of right-wing rat bastards, raisin brain politicians, simple Scotty McClellan, and President Chuckle Nuts himself. Malloy encourages listeners to call the show, although he warns Republicans they will get bounced if they start slinging Rovian "flying monkey" talking points at him. Most Republican callers, incapable of applying logic to the message, get their butts kicked off the air by the messenger in about five seconds -- seven tops. Like most progressives, Malloy is disillusioned with the state of the Democratic Party, but maintains he will always be a "traditional" Democrat. Republicans accuse him of being nothing but a "Bush basher" or a "left-wing nutcase," but Malloy's late-night "Paul Revere" cry emanating from Air America comes straight from a man who is angrily committed to ousting the criminals who are hell-bent on destroying all that is good and decent not only in this country, but throughout the world. Considering the wounds inflicted on this country in the last five years, Malloy has concluded that the Republican Party is now the American Nazi Party, and most of its members are vile deceivers. "Republicans are liars, cheats, and sneaks; they are deceivers," he said. "They are immoral, and they have no ethical structure whatsoever...If they are Republicans, they are thugs. They have abondoned whatever moral sense they ever had, if any. They support mass murder. They support the destruction of this country." Malloy is not known for pulling punches when addressing the administration or the Bush Crime Family either. "I hate you to the depths of my soul," he said. "I will hate you when I'm dead. I will hate you a million years after I'm dead...My hate will be a star in the firmament that will shine down on your Republican asses forever. That's how deep my hatred is, because of what you're doing to this country." A good way to end the day. Malloy is not alone. His counterparts at Air America are all conversant with history and capable of critical thinking. Like Malloy, they struggle each day to tell the people the truth about what the Bush administration is doing to this country. Scores of books have been written pointing out that Bush has arrogantly placed himself above the law and outside the constraints of the U.S. Constitution. He has bestowed upon himself a god-like superiority to decide who deserves to live or die. And Bush kills with malevolent, inhuman brutishness. Authors sound the alarm that what happened in 1933 in Hitler's Germany and in Orwell's 1984 is descending upon us today because we are losing the will to combat it. The Internet is throbbing with articles on the same subject. The vigilance required to preserve our freedoms is impossible when we're whipped into submission by terror and convinced to give up a few freedoms we never use anyway, such as questioning those who are waging war to protect us. But we are no longer vigilant. That's why Malloy and those like him are so important. Over and over, Malloy tells the people that their continued silence will soon crush all of us into a 1984 world so aptly described by Aristotle as being fit for "only the gods and the beasts." Malloy is a modern-day Tom Paine, who told the people in 1776 that the time had come to break free from oppression. "Even brutes do not devour their young, nor savages make war upon their own families," Paine wrote in Common Sense, his little 47-page pamphlet that ultimately sparked a revolution and gave us our world. But people could read back then... It's time to take that world back. Last week, Malloy began reading to the people, devoting a short six-minute segment of the show's second hour to Orwell's 1984. He will read the book in its entirety, and has completed Chapter 1 and a portion of Chapter 2. For those few chilling minutes each night Malloy transports us to London and into the dreary world of "Big Brother," a world much like Bush is striving for today -- constant surveillance and total obedience. Malloy quietly records the slow, but steady eradication of individuality -- of humanity itself -- through fear. The parallels are obvious. Now, as in 1984, in the words of former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleisher, we must "watch what we say; watch what we do" lest we be found guilty of the heinous offense of "thoughtcrime." Now, as in 1984, Malloy says there are three things we can take to the bank as Bush's "truth." He encourages people to not only watch Bush's speeches for amusement as he mangles the language while stammering and stumbling through one photo Op after another -- but to listen to the words and phrases Bush repeats endlessly. War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength. After we accept that, the rest is easy...
Encountering Malloy may startle you; rock your world. You may even go to bed screaming. But hey -- it's a good way to end the day.
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As most of you have probably heard, I was arrested before the State of the Union address last night.
I am speechless with fury at what happened and with grief over what we have lost in our country.
There have been lies from the police and distortions by the press (shocker). So this is what really happened:
This afternoon at the People's State of the Union Address in DC, where I was joined by Congresspersons Lynn Woolsey and John Conyers, Ann Wright, Malik Rahim and John Cavanagh, Lynn brought me a ticket to the State of the Union address. At that time, I was wearing the shirt that said: 2245 Dead. How many more?
After the PSOTU press conference, I was having second thoughts about going to the SOTU at the Capitol. I didn't feel comfortable going. I knew George Bush would say things that would hurt me and anger me, and I knew that I couldn't disrupt the address because Lynn had given me the ticket, and I didn't want to be disruptive out of respect for her. I, in fact, had given the ticket to John Bruhns, who is in Iraq Veterans Against the War. However, Lynn's office had already called the media, and everyone knew I was going to be there, so I sucked it up and went.
I got the ticket back from John, and I met one of Congresswoman Barbara Lee's staffers in the Longworth Congressional Office building and we went to the Capitol via the underground tunnel. I went through security once, then had to use the rest room and went through security again.
My ticket was in the 5th gallery, front row, fourth seat in. The person who in a few minutes was to arrest me, helped me to my seat.
I had just sat down and I was warm from climbing 3 flights of stairs back up from the bathroom so I unzipped my jacket. I turned to the right to take my left arm out, when the same officer saw my shirt and yelled, "Protester." He then ran over to me, hauled me out of my seat, and roughly (with my hands behind my back) shoved me up the stairs. I said something like "I'm going, do you have to be so rough?" By the way, his name is Mike Weight.
The officer ran with me to the elevators, yelling at everyone to move out of the way. When we got to the elevators, he cuffed me and took me outside to await a squad car. On the way out, someone behind me said, "That's Cindy Sheehan." At which point the officer who arrested me said, "Take these steps slowly." I said, "You didn't care about being careful when you were dragging me up the other steps." He said, "That's because you were protesting." Wow, I got hauled out of the People's House because I was "Protesting."
I was never told that I couldn't wear that shirt into the Congress. I was never asked to take it off or zip my jacket back up. If I had been asked to do any of those things ... I would have, and written about the suppression of my freedom of speech later. I was immediately and roughly (I have the bruises and muscle spasms to prove it) hauled off and arrested for "unlawful conduct."
After I had my personal items inventoried and my fingers printed, a nice Sgt. came in and looked at my shirt and said, "2245, huh? I just got back from there."
I told him that my son died there. That's when the enormity of my loss hit me. I have lost my son. I have lost my First Amendment rights. I have lost the country that I love. Where did America go? I started crying in pain.
What did Casey die for? What did the 2244 other brave young Americans die for? What are tens of thousands of them over there in harm's way for still? For this? I can't even wear a shirt that has the number of troops on it that George Bush and his arrogant and ignorant policies are responsible for killing.
I wore the shirt to make a statement. The press knew I was going to be there, and I thought every once in awhile they would show me, and I would have the shirt on. I did not wear it to be disruptive, or I would have unzipped my jacket during George's speech. If I had any idea what happens to people who wear shirts that make the neocons uncomfortable, that I would be arrested ... maybe I would have, but I didn't.
There have already been many wild stories out there.
I have some lawyers looking into filing a First Amendment lawsuit against the government for what happened tonight. I will file it. It is time to take our freedoms and our country back.
I don't want to live in a country that prohibits any person, whether or not he/she has paid the ultimate price for that country, from wearing, saying, writing, or telephoning any negative statements about the government. That's why I am going to take my freedoms and liberties back. That's why I am not going to let BushCo take anything else away from me ... or you.
I am so appreciative of the couple of hundred of protesters who came to the jail while I was locked up to show their support. We have so much potential for good. There is so much good in so many people.
Four hours and 2 jails after I was arrested, I was let out. Again, I am so upset and sore it is hard to think straight.
Keep up the struggle ... I promise you, I will too. |
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Enron's Political Helpmates By Robert Scheer Finally, after four years of legal maneuvering, the trial of Enron top dogs Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling opens a new window on the outrageous practices of our modern-day robber barons. But it is depressing that the politicians who benefited from Lay's largesse, and who changed the law enabling Enron's chicanery, are going unpunished and even uncriticized. Indeed, the larger crime, in any proper moral dimension of that word, was committed in the rewriting of the law on corporate regulation to permit Enron's very existence as a humongous stock market swindler. There simply would be no Enron story were it not for the deregulation of the energy market ushered in by Republican politicians, as Lay himself acknowledged freely in a 2000 interview when asked to explain the "common thread"? in Enron's business model. "I think the common elements first are that, basically, we are entering markets or in markets that are deregulating or have recently deregulated, and so they have become competitive, moving from monopoly franchise-type businesses to competitive, market-oriented businesses, said Lay." Enron's domination of those deregulated markets was made possible, to a large degree, through the work of the powerful Washington couple, Phil Gramm, then-Republican senator from Texas, and his wife Wendy, then-chair of the Commodities Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). Perhaps predictably, neither Gramm has been charged with any crimes in connection with the Enron scandal, and both are barely mentioned in the two leading books on the scandal by New York Times business writers. But their antics, well documented by the leading public-interest watchdog group Public Citizen, are the key to understanding the Enron debacle. Back in 1993, when Enron was an upstart energy trader and Wendy Gramm occupied the position of chair of the CFTC, she granted the company, the biggest contributor to her husband's political campaigns, a very valuable ruling exempting its trading in futures contracts from federal government regulation. She resigned her position six days later, not surprising given that she was a political appointee and Bill Clinton had just defeated her boss, the first President Bush. Five weeks after her resignation, she was appointed to Enron's board of directors, where she served on the delinquent audit committee until the collapse of the company. There was perfect quid pro quo symmetry to Wendy Gramm's lucrative career: the elder Bush appoints her to a government position where she secures Enron's profit margin; Lay, a close friend and political contributor to Bush, then takes care of her nicely once she leaves her post. Although she holds a Ph.D. in economics and often is cited as an expert on the deregulation policies she so ardently champions, Gramm insists that while serving on the audit committee she was ignorant of the corporation's accounting machinations. Despite her myopia, or because of it, she was rewarded with more than $1 million in compensation. A similar claim of ignorance of Enron's shenanigans is the defense of her husband, who received $260,000 in campaign contributions from Enron before he pushed through legislation exempting companies like Enron from energy trading regulation. "This act, Public Citizen noted, allowed Enron to operate an unregulated power auction - EnronOnline - that quickly gained control over a significant share of California's electricity and natural gas market." The gaming of the California market, documented in grotesque detail in the e-mails of Enron traders, led to stalled elevators, hospitals without power and an enormous debt inflicted on the state's taxpayers. It was only after the uproar over California's rolling blackouts, which Enron helped engineer, that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission finally re-imposed regulatory control - and thereby began the ultimate unraveling of Enron's massive pyramid of fraud. Because the second President Bush effectively stalled a more timely response by the FERC, Enron's demise came too late to prevent California from losing its shirt in its desperate attempt to keep the lights on. The state was forced to hurriedly sign price-gouging long-term energy contracts in order to prevent more damage. And Bush, even at that late date, still attempted to save Enron by reversing the policy of the Clinton administration aimed at closing off foreign-tax shelters of the type favored by the company's duplicitous executives. Bush, who received $1.14 million in campaign contributions from Enron, according to Public Citizen, couldn't understand why the company should not be allowed to have 874 subsidiaries located in offshore tax and bank havens.
As the trial reveals just how fraudulent those offshore Enron operations apparently were, keep in mind that this President Bush was most loath to clear out those refuges of corporate pirates.
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Bush & The Bullfight By Robert Parry Forget the donkey. National Democrats might want to adopt some of the fighting spirit demonstrated by a half-ton bull that disrupted a Mexico City bullfight by jumping into the stands to scatter customers sitting in the highest-priced front-row seats. The bull - named "Pajarito" for "little bird" - startled the well-dressed spectators and injured one before he was stabbed to death by a bullfight participant wielding a sword. BBC News, Jan. 30, 2006 So, Pajarito didn't escape his fate, but he did act with more enlightened self-interest than many national Democrats have shown. Not only did Pajarito fight - rather than simply accept the taunting and a stylized death - but he bypassed the matador, who is really just a glorified butcher in a fancy costume, to go after the wealthy paying customers who make the butchery profitable. The way Congress now works has some parallels to the bullfight, except the Democrats - when confronting George W. Bush - often act like a passive bull that thinks survival depends on cooperating with the matador. There's scarcely a Pajarito to be found. Alito Capitulation A day before Bush's State of the Union Address, Senate Democrats had enough votes against U.S. Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito to sustain a filibuster and thus force Bush to come up with a more moderate candidate. But the Senate Democratic leadership instead stepped aside to let the Republicans win a cloture vote that shut down a filibuster led by Sen. John Kerry, the party's standard-bearer in the last presidential election. Democrats collaborated in this humiliation of Kerry even after Republicans had mocked him as a "Swiss Miss" for urging a filibuster while he was attending an economic conference in Davos, Switzerland. Washington Times, Jan. 28, 2006 Presidential spokesman Scott McClellan had piled on Kerry at a White House press briefing. "I think even for a senator, it takes some pretty serious yodeling to call for a filibuster from a five-star ski resort in the Swiss Alps," McClellan laughed. Kerry and his close ally, Sen. Ted Kennedy, didn't help their cause much either by failing to concentrate on Alito's advocacy for giving the President sweeping authority as a "unitary executive" and his support for the President's "plenary" - or unlimited - powers as Commander in Chief during wartime. [See Consortiumnews.com's "Alito & the Point of No Return." Much as Democrats did during poorly focused Senate Judiciary Committee hearings, Kerry and Kennedy recounted what sounded like a checklist of favorite causes of liberal single-issue groups. The threat that Alito represented to constitutional checks and balances - and thus the liberties of all Americans - often was treated as an after-thought. So, some Democrats who opposed Alito decided that his confirmation didn't measure up to the "extraordinary circumstances" that the Senate's centrist "Gang of 14" - seven Democrats and seven Republicans - said were needed to justify a filibuster of Bush's judicial picks. That meant Kerry could muster only 25 votes, while the Republicans amassed 72 votes for cloture - a dozen more than the 60 needed to shut off debate. Those votes included 19 Democrats freed from party discipline by Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid. On the final confirmation vote, however, Alito was approved by a much smaller margin, 58-42, meaning that he could have been kept off the Supreme Court if all those who considered him a poor choice had backed the filibuster. By contrast, when Republicans were in the minority, they aggressively used the filibuster to get their way. In 1991, for instance, Senate Republicans blocked funding for an investigation into whether George H.W. Bush and other senior Republicans illegally met with radical Iranian mullahs behind President Jimmy Carter's back in 1980. [For details, see Consortiumnews.com's "When Republicans Loved a Filibuster." An Angry Base The Alito capitulation by Senate Democratic leaders has infuriated much of the Democratic base, which recognized the constitutional stakes of putting another supporter of the "unitary executive" on the Supreme Court. But Reid and other top Democrats chose to mount only a symbolic battle. Rank-and-file Democrats have been livid with the Democratic congressional leaders since 2002 when many voted to give Bush authority to invade Iraq, partly as a political gambit to finesse the war issue and then try to pivot the nation's attention back to domestic issues, a ploy that failed miserably. Ever since, the Democratic base has favored a much more critical stance against Bush's Iraq War policies than have most congressional Democrats. That split was on display again on Jan. 31, before Bush's State of the Union speech as anti-war demonstrators protested outside the Capitol while Democratic members of Congress assembled indoors. Before Bush arrived, Capitol police arrested Gold-Star mother Cindy Sheehan when she sat down in the gallery and removed her coat to show a shirt noting the number of American soldiers, including her son, killed in Iraq. Sheehan was dragged from the gallery after a policeman spotted her shirt reading, "2245 Dead. How Many More?" Despite the fuss, most Democratic members of Congress joined in giving Bush standing ovations when he read his applause lines. The Democrats did show some spunk when they put up a mock cheer as Bush mentioned his failed plan to partially privative Social Security - and some sat silently when Republicans cheered Bush's plans for enacting more tax cuts.
Overall, however, the Democrats demonstrated very little of the Pajarito spirit.
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| Picturegate Inspires No Media Outrage The White House possesses several photographs of George W. Bush with Jack Abramoff, the once-powerful Republican fixer who recently pled guilty to bribery and fraud. The snapshots show nothing more than the typical "grip-and-grin" that the President has politely bestowed on thousands of visitors-or so his flacks assure us. Although the pictures are said to be wholly innocent and commonplace, however, the White House refuses to release them to the press. Perhaps that's because the pictures might show that when the President says he "doesn't know" Mr. Abramoff, he isn't being entirely truthful. He and his handlers still hope to confine the Abramoff scandal to the grubby members of Congress who took golf trips, stadium tickets and free meals from the lobbyist. Yet with or without pictorial proof, there is ample evidence of the President's connections to him in the public record. Enough evidence, certainly, to provoke a frenzy of questions, demands and speculations from the Washington press corps. The questions at the daily briefings with Presidential press secretary Scott McClellan sound rather muted-and the official response is an absolute stonewall. Mr. McClellan declines not only to provide the photographs of Mr. Bush with Mr. Abramoff, but any records whatsoever of the lobbyist's visits to the White House. He has admitted only that Mr. Abramoff met with unnamed "staff" on unspecified occasions to discuss unspecified matters. Instead of candor, Mr. McClellan repeats the same opaque phrases every time a reporter asks about Mr. Abramoff's connections with the President and the Bush administration. Asked about the pictures and meetings, he says he won't participate in a "fishing expedition" motivated by "partisan politics." He notes that Mr. Abramoff "is being held to account" by the Justice Department." Like his boss, the press secretary hastens to mention that Mr. Abramoff "contributed to both Democrats and Republicans." And the President-for whom Mr. Abramoff gathered contributions of at least $100,000 in 2004, which is by far the largest amount that the lobbyist collected for any politician of either party-insists that he doesn't know the guy. Now, there was once another scandalous Republican donor whom Mr. Bush professed not to know. Ridiculously, he tried to blame his connections with disgraced Enron chief executive Kenneth ("Kenny Boy") Lay on Ann Richards, the Democrat who preceded him as Governor of Texas. "I got to know Ken Lay when he was the head of the-what they call the Governor's Business Council in Texas," said Mr. Bush back in 2002. "He was a supporter of Ann Richards in my run in 1994. And she had named him the head of the Governor's Business Council. And I decided to leave him in place, just for the sake of continuity. And that's when I first got to know Ken." Actually, he and his family had long known Mr. Lay, who gave triple the amount to Mr. Bush as he did to the incumbent Ms. Richards. But their friendship was retroactively erased-at least in the President's mind-when prosecutors started to investigate the financial chicanery at Enron. So skepticism is warranted when he says he doesn't know Mr. Abramoff. He stops knowing people when they get in trouble. It is obvious that Mr. Abramoff was no stranger to the Bush White House from the very beginning. Well before the President took office, Mr. Abramoff was named to the Bush transition team for the Department of the Interior. He may not have had any discernible qualifications to oversee that department's appointments, but he had clients on tribal reservations and in the Marianas Islands whose businesses were regulated by Interior officials. He has been a friend of Karl Rove, the deputy chief of staff and Presidential political advisor, for more than a quarter-century. His personal assistant soon showed up as the personal assistant to Mr. Rove. His associate David Safavian, since indicted, became the administration's chief procurement officer. He told his friends and clients that he could get into the Bush White House-and get whatever he wanted there. He proved that boast on May 9, 2001, only four months into the first Bush term, when the President met with two Native American tribal leaders represented by Mr. Abramoff. According to a report published in the Texas Observer last June, that meeting was arranged in cooperation with conservative strategist Grover Norquist, another longtime comrade of Mr. Rove. The Texas magazine uncovered documents showing that Mr. Abramoff and Mr. Norquist used their White House access to squeeze money from clients. There are probably photographs of that May 2001 event, and they must be among the photos that the White House is refusing to release.
Eight years ago, the Clinton White House released photos and videos of President Clinton's coffee meetings with campaign donors and potential donors, following angry demands from politicians and the press. How fortunate for Mr. Bush that his scandals and prevarications provoke no such outrage.
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Domestic Lying: The Question That Journalists Don't Ask Bush By Norman Solomon With great fanfare the other day, Oprah Winfrey asked James Frey a question that mainstream journalists refuse to ask George W. Bush: "Why would you lie?" Many pundits and news outlets have chortled at the televised unmasking of Frey as a liar. The reverberations have spanned from schlock media to highbrow outlets. On Friday, the PBS "NewsHour With Jim Lehrer" devoted an entire segment to what happened. The New York Times supplemented its page-one coverage with an editorial that concluded "Ms. Winfrey gave the audience, including us, what it was hoping for: a demand to hear the truth." A key reality of the National Security Agency spying story is: President Bush lied. But routinely missing from media coverage is a demand to hear the truth. More than two years after he started the NSA's domestic spying without warrants, Bush was unequivocal. During a speech in Buffalo on April 20, 2004, he said: "Any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires -- a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so." The next day, Bush went out of his way to reinforce the same lie. "White House briefing records show Bush made similar remarks about the sanctity of court orders for wiretaps in a speech in Hershey, Pa., the day after he spoke in Buffalo." Frey lied about his personal life in a book, and that infuriated Oprah Winfrey. "It is difficult for me to talk to you, because I really feel duped," she said, confronting him in the midst of the Jan. 26 telecast. "I feel duped. But more importantly, I feel that you betrayed millions of readers." Yet the journalists who interview Bush aren't willing to question him in similar terms. The president didn't merely betray millions of readers. He betrayed hundreds of millions of citizens. Bush lied about basic civil liberties in the United States. Instead of relying on euphemisms, the news media should directly confront him with the question: "Why would you lie?" During the "Oprah" show, while lecturing a powerful book-publishing executive who had served as an enabler for the author's mendacity, Winfrey declared: "That needs to change." But what about the powerful news-media executives who keep enabling the president's mendacity? When Frey tried to weasel out of responsibility for concocting a phony story about a root canal without anesthetic, the host interrupted after the words "I've struggled with the idea of it --" "No, the lie of it," Winfrey said. "That's a lie. It's not an idea, James, that's a lie."
But high-profile journalists are unwilling to confront President Bush
on national television with such clarity: "That's a lie. It's not an
idea, George, that's a lie."
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The State Of The Union By William Rivers Pitt
something in me said, go ahead, die, sleep, become them, accept. then something else in me said, no, save the tiniest bit. it needn't be much, just a spark. a spark can set a whole forest on fire. just a spark. save it. --- Charles Bukowski
It shall be quite a thing to see, a show worth watching if only to observe exactly how many lies, distortions, threats, taunts and smirks can be crammed into a single speech. This will be Mr. Bush speaking, after all, and the truth is not in him. It will be in every pertinent sense a mere commercial, a television advertisement from a failing company, a whitewashing of ugly truths by a staggering CEO whose sole desire is to keep the stockholders in line for another quarter. In the interests of truth, the actual state of this union deserves to be displayed for all to see. This is the deal. This is how it is. The Real Economy Since 2000, the number of Americans living in poverty has risen to nearly 37 million. More than 13 million of these are children. More than one in four American families with children make less than $30,000 a year. Look within that number and you will find 46% of African American families with children and 44% of Hispanic families with children fall below this mark. Average annual income for Americans fell once again in 2005. 46 million Americans live without health insurance. The response to this? Vice President Cheney, three days before Christmas, cast the tie-breaking vote on a spending reduction bill that will fall most heavily on the poor, the infirm and the elderly. Funding for health care, child support, and education subsidies for low-income families has been gutted. Medicaid benefits for the poor were cut by $7 billion, and Medicare programs for the elderly were cut by $6.4 billion. Federal student-loan programs were cut by $12.7 billion. On the very same day, the Senate passed legislation that drastically cut funding for the departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education. The Head Start program was hit especially hard: the cuts here eliminate some 25,000 slots for low-income children. All in all, these spending reductions are expected to save $40 billion. Meanwhile, recently-passed tax cuts ravage the budget far more deeply than these drastic budget cuts. Two tax cuts in particular that went into effect on New Year's Day will cost $27 billion, more than half of what the spending reductions are supposed to save. These cuts will cost more than $150 billion over the next ten years. 97% of the money from these cuts will go to households making more than $200,000 a year. Households with incomes under $100,000 will get 0.1% of these cuts. If all of Mr. Bush's tax cuts are stopped or allowed to expire, $750 billion will be added to the federal budget. That is more than enough to pay for the programs that have been eviscerated. It won't happen, not with the priorities of this administration, but that is the simple math of the matter. New Orleans Drowned in a Bathtub The first weeks of September brought to all Americans a devastating tragedy. The city of New Orleans was all but obliterated by Hurricane Katrina when levees meant to hold back the waters failed. The failure of these levees came, in no small part, because of unprecedented budget cuts for the Army Corps of Engineers, which was tasked to keep the levees viable. The tragedy was compounded by the utterly incompetent management of the Federal Emergency Management Agency and its head, Michael Brown, whose experience with disaster management came while he was serving as an attorney for owners of Arabian horses. In the weeks to follow, lavish promises were made by Mr. Bush. "We will do what it takes, we will stay as long as it takes, to help citizens rebuild their communities and their lives," he said on September 15th. Those promises have been broken. We have gone from oaths to revive this cherished city to this: "I want to remind people in that part of the world, $85 billion is a lot," said Bush on January 26th. Hundreds of thousands of Americans remain displaced, many holding on by the skin of their teeth in cramped trailers. Thirty million cubic yards of debris remain uncollected - the Washington Post estimated over the weekend that this was "enough to build a five-sided column more than 50 stories tall over the Pentagon." There is not even a plan in place to begin to attack the problem. The Bush administration has left New Orleans to rot, and the next hurricane season is four months away. Anti-tax crusader Grover Norquist once famously stated that he wanted to shrink the federal government to the size where it could be drowned in a bathtub. As evidenced by the budget cuts and tax giveaways described above, many within this government feel as Norquist does. Thanks to their actions, to the cuts in the Army Corps of Engineers budget, to the nomination of useless cronies like Brown to vital positions of civil defense, to a war in Iraq that has bled the budget further and left Louisiana without sufficient National Guard troops to help the population, it is New Orleans that has been drowned in Norquist's bathtub. A major American city has been shattered, and nothing is done about it. To add insult to injury, the Bush administration utterly refuses to answer any questions on the matter. Senator Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, perhaps the most widely-known Democratic defender of Mr. Bush, is the ranking minority member on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. Even Mr. Lieberman is flabbergasted by the stonewalling of the White House. "My staff believes that DHS (the Department of Homeland Security) has engaged in a conscious strategy of slow-walking our investigation in the hope that we would run out of time to follow the investigation's natural progression to where it leads," Lieberman said last week. "At this point, I cannot disagree. There's been no assertion of executive privilege, just a refusal to answer. I have been told by my staff that almost every question our staff has asked federal agency witnesses regarding conversations with or involvement of the White House has been met with a response that they could not answer on direction of the White House." Mark Folse, a New Orleans native, operates a blog called "Wet Bank Guide." On Monday, Mr. Folse posted a message for Mr. Bush. "I've never lost the deepest allegiance I've ever held: to my city," wrote Folse. "We have always known we were a people different and unique, as divided as we may seem. That sense of identity as a New Orleanian is the powerful bond that draws me on. It is the deep love of country that drives me - of my country, New Orleans and southern Louisiana. It is the irrational emotional attachment to my piece of America that leads men and women to go willingly up Bunker Hill, to follow General Pickett, to volunteer for Iraq." "A life of assured privilege has protected you from having to take these sorts of risks," continued Folse, "to find the strength to get up and go into the maw of uncertainty, to risk and gamble your own and not other peoples' lives or money. You can pledge allegiance or sing the anthem or give a stirring speech as well as any, but you know you have no allegiance except self-interest." "If nothing moves you except your own self-interest," concluded Folse, "then consider this. There are hundreds of thousands of us, scattered throughout most of the United States. We are everywhere you and your party will go to campaign: Arkansas and Atlanta and Austin, Dallas and Detroit and Denver, Los Angeles and Las Vegas, Baltimore and Boston, Chicago and Charlotte. Many will remain there indefinitely, unable to go home, precisely because you have lied to them and betrayed them. We will not let you escape from the net of lies you have woven. Wherever you turn, you will find us, ready to call you out." The situation in New Orleans is a problem that will not go away. Men like Mark Folse will make absolutely sure of that. "Scandal" Is Too Small a Word The Abramoff scandal directly touches some sixty Republican congresspeople, according to campaign finance records that show where the disgraced lobbyist sent his money. Mr. Bush recently promoted the lead investigator in this case, effectively removing him from the investigation. Despite this, the hard look into Mr. Abramoff's dealings continue. Mr. Abramoff's plea deal has a lot of people in Washington suffering from flop-sweat. Patrick Fitzgerald's investigation into the outing of a deep-cover CIA agent by administration officials continues apace, and has already cashiered Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis Libby. According to t r u t h o u t investigative reporter Jason Leopold, Fitzgerald has "spent the past month preparing evidence he will present to a grand jury alleging that White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove knowingly made false statements to FBI and Justice Department investigators and lied under oath while he was being questioned about his role in the leak of covert CIA agent Valerie Plame's identity more than two years ago, according to sources knowledgeable about the probe." "Although there have not been rumblings regarding Fitzgerald's probe into the Plame leak since he met with the grand jury hearing evidence in the case more than a month ago," continued Leopold in his January 10th report, "the sources said that Fitzgerald has been quietly building his case against Rove and has been interviewing witnesses, in some cases for the second and third time, who have provided him with information related to Rove's role in the leak." None of this will be mentioned in the State of the Union speech tonight. The Bush administration continues to stonewall these investigations with all its might - Mr. Bush has denied ever knowing Jack Abramoff, despite the existence of several pictures showing them glad-handing each other in the White House - and the Republican-controlled congress will certainly do nothing to advance the questions being asked. In contrast, a portion of the speech will certainly be dedicated to moralistic sloganeering about values. Remember, as high-flown words about truth and justice are spoken, what the Abramoff and Plame scandals represent: a government run by thieves, stroked by swindlers, and staffed by assassins who sing of defending the nation even as they cast us down into greater danger. And, by the way, the Enron trial started on Monday. The Middle East 2,242 American soldiers have died in Iraq. Tens of thousands more are grievously wounded. Tens and tens of thousands of civilians are dead or maimed. Scores more simmer in rage and pick up weapons to attack American forces. American soldiers wishing to go around the Pentagon to augment their meager armor have been threatened with the revocation of death benefits for their families. A coalition of fundamentalist Shiite groups has taken over the government, the two main parts of which are notorious terrorist organizations with umbilical ties to Iran. Hundreds of billions of dollars have been spent to do this. There is no end in sight. Three years ago, in another State of the Union address, Mr. Bush told the nation that Iraq was in possession of 26,000 liters of anthrax, 38,000 liters of botulinum toxin, 500 tons (which is 1,000,000 pounds) of sarin, mustard and VX nerve agent, 30,000 munitions to deliver these agents, mobile biological weapons labs, al Qaeda connections, and uranium from Niger for use in a robust nuclear weapons program. Mr. Bush will have to work very hard tonight to tell a lie as vast, dramatic and bloody as this. Certainly, Mr. Bush will sing the praises of bringing democracy to the Middle East. It is worthwhile, however, to consider what his concept of democracy has accomplished to date. Six months ago, a radical named Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was elected president of Iran. Thanks to the intense feelings within Iran's populace about the US occupation of Iraq, Ahmadinejad has been able to unify his country behind the establishment of a nuclear program that frightens the rest of the world. Ahmadinejad's election itself owes a great deal to Mr. Bush's policies on Iraq. Last week, the terrorist organization Hamas was overwhelmingly elected by the Palestinian people to run their government, leaving the Fatah party shocked and displaced. While the success of Hamas has much to do with Fatah's corruption and lack of progress on several fronts, the slow radicalization of the general population in the Middle East once again can be laid at the doorstep of Mr. Bush. It has been revealed that Bush's decision to disengage from the peace process between Israel and Palestine several years ago was a disastrous choice. Couple that with the occupation of Iraq and the torture of its citizens, and few can be surprised when the general population in the Middle East turns toward more radical elements. Democracy is a tricky thing. The fact that people in Iraq, Iran and Palestine are afforded the opportunity to vote, instead of suffering the absolute control of a dictatorship, is arguably a good thing in the main. Yet methods matter. When the Iraqi people are given the vote by way of a ravaging war that inflames the passions of the region and enshrines a radical government, democracy becomes its own worst enemy. When that ravaging war empowers a fringe president in Iran, democracy becomes its own worst enemy. Methods matter. Democracy does not exist in a vacuum. When it is forced upon a population at the point of a sword, that population will see the sword as the best viable option to exercise its collective will. Almost immediately, democracy will be used to elect radicals, and those radicals will dispose of democracy at the first opportunity. The radicalization of governments all across the Middle East has made the world substantially more dangerous. Mr. Bush will speak of progress tonight. The only progress being made is toward a general conflagration. On the other hand, Exxon Mobil has posted a $32 billion profit for the last year. This stands as the largest single one-year profit in the entire history of the world. Progress indeed. The Unitary Executive Tapping Your Phone Mr. Bush and friends have been jumping through flaming hoops to justify the blatantly illegal policy of spying on Americans by way of the National Security Agency. Their tortured arguments in favor of this action, and their flat-footed declaration that the policy will continue, makes confetti of the Fourth Amendment. More than that, however, it moves this nation one step closer to having an Executive Branch that supersedes all others in power and scope. Not only will Mr. Bush spy on whomever he pleases, but he will also torture whomever he pleases. Put simply, the constitutionally-required separation of powers, the checks and balances that have maintained the stability of this republic, is being destroyed. This will echo down the corridors of our history long after Mr. Bush has left his office. On Monday afternoon, Senate Democrats failed to muster the necessary 41 votes needed to avoid cloture on the nomination of Samuel Alito. The man will be elevated to the highest court. Beyond the fact that Alito is hostile to a woman's right to choose, hostile to privacy rights in the face of unwarranted police intrusion, and hostile to the poor and disadvantaged, there is the matter of his opinion on the powers of the Executive. In short, he agrees with Mr. Bush. The Reign of Witches The state of this union is not good. We are poorer, frightened, faced with the swelling ranks of enemies our leaders have created, and hell-bent to do away with the most precious aspects of our system of government. We are surveilled, propagandized, intimidated. We empower the radicals and disenfranchise the common good. We are fed swill via the television and thus convinced that what they tell us is what we already believe. We are bought, and we are paid for. The radicals running this country have long desired to destroy the government's ability to govern - they found things like taxes intrusive, which is amusing when one hears them now defending warrantless spying on Americans - and they are well along the path towards success. The budget is destroyed, spent on tax cuts and the Iraq occupation, while millions of Americans suffer the loss of necessary services. The one percent of the one percent is making a killing, and the rest of us are left behind. If there is hope to be found in all this, it is in the words of Thomas Jefferson, written 208 years ago after the passage of the Sedition Act.
"A little patience, and we shall see the reign of witches pass over, their spells dissolve, and the people, recovering their true sight, restore their government to its true principles. It is true that in the meantime we are suffering deeply in spirit, and incurring the horrors of a war and long oppressions of enormous public debt. If the game runs sometimes against us at home we must have patience till luck turns, and then we shall have an opportunity of winning back the principles we have lost, for this is a game where principles are at stake."
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 Heil Bush, Dear Propaganda Ansager Schieffer, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your turning the CBS Evening News into our lap dog and asking der Fuhrer softball questions that were approved from Unka Rove's list, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Media Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at the "Fuhrer Bunker" formally 'The White House' on 03-15-2006. We salute you herr Schieffer, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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Several great minds were asked to help think up interview questions for George W. Bush. I liked, ''Are you the worst president since James Buchanan, or have you never heard of him?''
Sorry about the snarkiness quotient, but is there anything these folks can't screw up - and then refuse to own up to? Iraq is the most difficult to judge because it's so far away. I can find no indication - from hours of electricity available to amount of oil being pumped to number of dead people - that hints at any improvement.
On the other hand, even though I don't think it's my job, I can't prove that pulling out won't make things worse. Judging the good news-bad news volume from Iraq took such an exceptional lurch to ludicrous, it's now difficult to even try to judge it with a straight face.
In matters closer to home, however, it is not that hard to miss total disaster when you see it. The Medicare prescription drug benefit comes to mind. As governmental screw-ups go, it ranks up there with Katrina, which in turn is the latest in a parade of fiascoes inspiring the administration to an impressive level of dishonesty.
Following its usual m.o., the administration's first step on Katrina was to clam up on all the information possible about how the government handled it. Why should a congressional committee have any right to question the Bush administration? Whom do they think they represent?
I couldn't even bring myself to snicker at poor Joe Lieberman, chair of the committee trying to find out what went wrong, as he forlornly announced a ''near total lack of cooperation.'' Despite his record as a Bush toady, Lieberman couldn't get enough information to even start on the problem.
The committee had one interesting item - Bush had claimed that ''no one anticipated'' New Orleans would be leveled. Turns out they not only expected it, but the Department of Homeland Security sent an urgent warning to the White House situation room, saying Katrina will likely leave ''the New Orleans metro area submerged for weeks or months.''
Meanwhile, the White House informed Louisiana reps it would not be supporting legislation for a federally financed reconstruction program for the area, despite Bush's promise to make it the grandest reconstruction since the Marshall Plan.
Looking on the bright side, this may yet turn out to be a good thing, since a new audit of the federally financed reconstruction in Iraq indicates - well, a great deal left to be desired. That would be counting untold billions of dollars wasted, millions left lying around in footlockers and filing cabinets, millions gambled away and - here's a note - three Iraqis who fell to their death in a repaired hospital elevator that had been certified as safe.
I also like the one about the contractor who got $100,000 to refurbish an Olympic-sized swimming pool (clearly a high priority in war-torn Iraq) but only polished the pumps. Well, polished pumps are nice.
Governance in this administration is like Casey Stengel with the early Mets: ''Doesn't anybody here know how to play this game?'' But lest you think I do nothing but pick on the Bushies, let me devote some loving attention to the best Congress money can buy.
Last month, in a closed-door, Republican-only ''conference committee'' meeting, a $22 billion change was inserted at the last minute. The taxpayers were supposed to get $26 billion in relief over 10 years by altering a formula for Medicare reimbursement. But lo, many insurance lobbyists for the HMOs knew about the committee meeting attended only by Republicans, who helpfully lowered the savings estimate of the formula to $4 billion and handed the other $22 billion back to the insurance industry.
We can certainly see how serious the Republicans are about ''reform'' - we can't wait to pay, er, hear more. One sign to look for would be if they stop calling it ''lobby reform'' and call it ''congressional reform'' instead.
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Let's take some of these gems as they come...
17 mentions of "freedom" from the guy obsessed with assaulting it here at home.
Did you notice the president had on a purple tie tonight? Very subtle. He could have come up with a purple finger or maybe covered head-to-toe in purple paint.
We also heard him mention "weapons of mass murder". WMM. That's apparently the new WMD.
The president also brought back that old chestnut, the line item veto. This from a man who has yet to veto a single bill. In over five years in office. I guess the line item veto was this year's voyage to Mars.
One of the most heart-warming moments came when Joe Lieberman kissed W. even longer than he did at last year's speech. A salute to "Brokeback Mountain," I guess.
Twenty mentions of "hope" or "hopeful".. which I guess is a shout out to the 58% of Americans who disapprove of him - and who can look hope for the day when we no longer have to listen to him.
Wow, trying to equate "staying the course" in Iraq with Lincoln fighting slavery, Martin Luther King not stopping in Birmingham or Selma, and American surrendering Europe to Communism. Chutzpah, indeed!
I love that the biggest applause line of the night was an unintentional one, the spontaneous clapping that followed his mention of the fact that Congress hadn't acted on his Social Security plan. Bush looked flustered, unsure how to respond. Sitting next to me was actor (and HuffPost blogger) Paul Hipp who said: "Next time I want a president who can improv!"
I'm pretty sure this was the first State of the Union speech with the words "wood chips" and "switch grass,"...but, of course, even those were surrounded by lies, too.
"So we strive to be a compassionate, decent, hopeful society."
It's the Return of the "C" word. Compassion. Too bad Katrina wasn't spelled C-A-T-R-I-N-A
Lots of talk about isolationism (indeed 5 mentions of either "isolationism", "isolating", or "isolation"). He is clearly afraid that the American DNA is so solidly against imperial adventures that protecting the U.S. homeland first is going to become a huge populist issue if only some Democrat would take it up. He calls it "isolationism", we call it minding our own business and there are millions of us in the red states, too.
"Our economy is healthy, and vigorous, and growing faster than other major industrialized nations."
Don't believe the hype. Yes, the GDP grew 3.5 percent in 2005 (though it was only up 1.1 percent in the last quarter). And, yes, productivity is up. But median wages fell, our trade deficit is over $760 billion (80 percent higher than when you took office), inflation is at 3.4 percent, the highest it's been in half-a-decade, and the gap between the Two Nations is wider than ever. Not exactly figures to crow about.
The President just delivered the biggest lie of the speech, claiming a "clear plan for victory" in Iraq. I think I even saw Hastert do a spit take on that one.
"If we were to leave these vicious attackers alone, they would not leave us alone. They would simply move the battlefield to our own shores."
Ah, yes.. the Flypaper strategy: Fight 'em over there, so we won't have to fight 'em over here. But Osama seems intent on moving the battlefield to our shores whether we're in Iraq or not.
"In this decisive year, you and I will make choices that determine both the future and the character of our country. We will choose to act confidently in pursuing the enemies of freedom - or retreat from our duties in the hope of an easier life."
Whoever asked for an easier life? Just the opposite, we've been waiting to be asked to sacrifice -- to help fight the war on terror, to help break our dependence on foreign oil. But the only thing this president has asked us to do is go shopping and go to Disney World. Of course, he has asked for the sacrifice of the troops who have had to go into battle under prepared and under equipped.
"The only way to protect our people ... the only way to secure the peace ... the only way to control our destiny is by our leadership - so the United States of America will continue to lead."
And by leading, he means doing whatever the hell we want, whenever we want... the scorn of the rest of the world be damned.
"Abroad, our Nation is committed to an historic, long-term goal - we seek the end of tyranny in our world... the future security of America depends on it."
Ah, a return to the soaring rhetoric of his inaugural speech. Rhetoric he conveniently forgets about when dealing with those he wants to do business with like the Chinese government.
... Clay Bennett ...  |
Place your message here!
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Free as a bird,
Home, home and dry,
Whatever happened to
Where did we lose the touch
Free as a bird,
Home, home and dry,
Whatever happened to
Free as a bird.
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Parting Shots...
 WASHINGTON, DC-Beltway insiders report that since his appointment in February 2005, Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns has been preoccupied with the fact that he is ninth in the line of presidential succession. Said Johanns: "It's really something to think that, if the president and the vice-president, the speaker of the house, the president pro tempore of the Senate, the secretary of state, the secretary of the treasury, the secretary of defense, the attorney general, and the secretary of the interior were somehow unable to fulfill their capacities as president, I would have to be the one to take up the mantle." Those close to him say that Johanns never expressed any particular knowledge of or interest in presidential succession prior to his appointment as head of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. "If you've ever wondered what it's like to be nine heartbeats away from the presidency, just ask Mike," Deputy Secretary Chuck Conner said. "He'll tell you." Johanns said he has promised his children that should he become president, he will not allow the press to exploit them or put them in the spotlight. "I used to be intimidated by it a little," Johanns said. "But now that I've had a chance to settle into the post of the presidency nine times removed, I finally feel up to the challenge. God forbid it should ever come to that, but if my country needs me to take the helm of the ship of state, I'm ready." Last Thursday, Johanns testified before the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee On Agriculture, Rural Development, And Related Agencies about the potential dangers of avian flu communicability within the poultry industry. "Alarmingly, bird flu can attack, and possibly kill, people in their prime. If we don't take aggressive preventive steps now, people from all walks of life-even the eight most important people in the executive branch of our government-could be victims." A December visit by officials from Mexico's Agricultural Ministry was marked by Johanns' insistence on distributing number-nine-embossed T-shirts, pencils, and coffee mugs to all assembled. According to Conner, Johanns "kept saying things to them like 'the president didn't make me numero nueve for nothing.'" In recent weeks, Johanns has taken his preoccupation to a new level, formulating contingency plans in the event he is forced to assume control of the presidency. During a four-hour meeting earlier this month, Johann debriefed his staff on possible scenarios, and their corresponding duties. "He rattled off everything from mass assassination to a catastrophic roller coaster disaster," Conner said. "Frankly, I'm worried about his capacity to continue to maintain his position in his current mental state, which is pretty important, because if he should prove unable to fulfill his duties, I as deputy secretary would be next in line to replace him."
Conner added: "Imagine me, Chuck Conner, in charge of the entire Department of Agriculture." |
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Issues & Alibis Vol 6 # 05 (c) 02/03/2006
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In This Edition
Sam Harris lectures, "On The Reality Of Islam."
Uri Avnery takes us to the movies in, "...Shall We Not Revenge?"
Ray McGovern sees the, "Juggernaut Gathering Momentum, Headed For Iran."
Jim Hightower explains why they're, "Firing The Wrong Auto Workers."
Ted Rall watches, "The Nanny Press And The Cartoon Controversy."
Polly Toynbee suggests, "No More Fantasy Diplomacy: Cut A Deal With The Mullahs."
Robert Scheer says Bush wants to, "Take From The Poor, Give To The Military."
Robert Parry uncovers, "Yet Another Bush Lie."
Joe Conason explores, "Bush On Health Care: Anybody Have A Leech?"
Norman Solomon concludes, "The Iran Crisis -- "Diplomacy" As A Launch Pad For Missiles."
Sheila Samples tells the, "Tale Of A Connecticut Donkey."
American Talibaner the Rev. Fred Phelps wins the coveted, "Vidkun Quisling Award!"
Molly Ivins reviews, "Cut-Ups On The Budget Cuts."
Arianna Huffington sums up, "The Murtha Effect: Why Republicans Are Worried."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department 'The Landover Baptist Church' presents it's answer to the Muhammad cartoons, "Baby Jesus Comix" but first Uncle Ernie foretells, "The Coming Of Martial Law: Welcome to the Happy Camps America."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Steve Benson with additional cartoons from Ruben Bolling, Micah Wright, Swamp Rat, Andy Singer, Internet Weekly.Org, Rico Dog, Steve Bradenton, Paul, Jens Julius, Karen Spector, Rasmus Sand Hoyer and Konopacki.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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The Coming Of Martial Law: Welcome to the Happy Camps America By Ernest Stewart
This has been coming for many years. The fascists under Nixon first conceived the Modern Happy Camps for "black militants" whom they feared would rise up and overthrow the order and control that Washington has always held over the people. Now finally all the plans, laws and facilities are in place. All that is needed to begin it is a pretext. Another bad hurricane, another 911 scam, the impeachment of Bush. Another October surprise either coming this October or in 2008 would result in first the rounding up of all Muslims, followed closely by bringing in all the homosexuals, then the radicals/liberals and others of their ilk. My guess is it will happen this October as from all signs we'll be invading another sovereign nation for the two fold purpose of relieving it of all that lovely oil and protecting the murdering thieves in Israel and their huge stockpile of atomic weapons. The end result of this new war will be the kid gloves coming off from our corpo-rat masters and the politicians that they own and control.
Remember that we invented concentration camps, they're as American as apple pie dating back to the 1830's when they were begun by "Old Hickory" who wasn't; like Washington, happy with simply slaughtering the Indians for their lands but in Andy's case there was all that lovely gold the tribes were sitting on in Georgia. Jackson decided like Bush that he was above the law and didn't have to obey the Supreme Court who had ruled in the tribes favor against the corpo-rat goons who smelled a fat profit to be made off of the tribes. In fact in this gargantuan land grab all the tribes currently living east of the Mississippi would have to move west of the Mississippi or face being rounded up and put in our first Concentration Camp that we called Oklahoma!
The modern concentration camp was born under old "honest" Abe who preferred to round up the desenters and starve them slowly to death when he declared war on the south. Happy camps sprang up all over the north not to hold southern soldiers but to hold northern desenters. Like the Catholic Churches infamous witch hunts and trials of the middle ages the same laws were applied to US citizens mostly for committing the crime of being born a Papist or a Jew or a Chinese or even worse an Irishman! Of course their slow deaths and torture were a step above what happened to New Yorkers during the week of draft riots in July of 1863. US Battleships in New York harbor let loose full broadsides into the city killing hundreds and wounding thousands, destroying whole sections of the city. Yes they have ways of making us cooperate! Jawohl?
More famous of course are the Happy Camps built by old Woodrow (I got a woody) Wilson who had them all ready when he declared war in W.W.I. Not to be out done FDR in W.W.II had similar plans for all citizens of Japanese and German ancestry well before the war began when he was planning stratergy with Churchill. I wonder why they didn't round up all the Italians too? Oh yeah; I almost forgot, the Mafia!
So when Nixon had similar ideas the Rethuglicans began to assemble the strategies and laws that led to 911 and the enslavement of America which is now close upon us. In the magazine's "Happy Camp" section we've put together the entire structure of our doom for you to see and thus understand what is going on in front of your eyes. The latest in this is the little-known $385 million contract for the Halliburton subsidiary KBR to build detention facilities for "an emergency influx of immigrants." The same type of code words were used by American traitor Ollie North for his orwellian Rex-84 "readiness exercise" in 1984. This called for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to round up and detain 400,000 imaginary "refugees." Another executive order for continuity of government (COG) had been drafted in 1982 by FEMA head Louis Giuffrida. The order called for "suspension of the Constitution" and the "declaration of Martial law." Now isn't that special?
These are just a few examples of the laws already on the books, that are just a pen stroke away from being implemented. You owe it to yourself and your family and your friends to visit the Happy Camps sites and read and understand all of it. Over 20,000 of you have visited the sites in the last year alone and know what's in store for us, do you?
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We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
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On The Reality Of Islam By Sam Harris In recent days, crowds of thousands have gathered throughout the Muslim world-burning European embassies, issuing threats, and even taking hostages-in protest over 12 cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad that were first published in a Danish newspaper last September. The problem is not merely that the cartoons were mildly derogatory. The furor primarily erupted over the fact that the Prophet had been depicted at all. Muslims consider any physical rendering of Muhammad to be an act of idolatry. And idolatry is punishable by death. Criticism of Muhammad or his teaching-which was also implicit in the cartoons-is considered blasphemy. As it turns out, blasphemy is also punishable by death. So pious Muslims have two reasons to "not accept less than a severing of the heads of those responsible," as was recently elucidated by a preacher at the Al Omari mosque in Gaza. The religious hysteria has not been confined to the "extremists" of the Muslim world. Seventeen Arab governments issued a joint statement of protest, calling for the punishment of those responsible. Pakistan's parliament unanimously condemned the drawings as a "vicious, outrageous and provocative campaign" that has "hurt the faith and feelings of Muslims all over the world." Turkey's prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, while still seeking his nation's entry into the European Union, nevertheless declared that the cartoons were an attack upon the "spiritual values" of Muslims everywhere. The leader of Lebanon's governing Hezbollah faction observed that the whole episode could have been avoided if only the novelist Salman Rushdie had been properly slaughtered for writing "The Satanic Verses." Let us take stock of the moral intuitions now on display in the House of Islam: On Aug. 17, 2005, an Iraqi insurgent helped collect the injured survivors of a car bombing, rushed them to a hospital and then detonated his own bomb, murdering those who were already mortally wounded as well as the doctors and nurses struggling to save their lives. Where were the cries of outrage from the Muslim world? Religious sociopaths kill innocents by the hundreds in the capitols of Europe, blow up the offices of the U.N. and the Red Cross, purposefully annihilate crowds of children gathered to collect candy from U.S. soldiers on the streets of Baghdad, kidnap journalists, behead them, and the videos of their butchery become the most popular form of pornography in the Muslim world, and no one utters a word of protest because these atrocities have been perpetrated "in defense of Islam." But draw a picture of the Prophet, and pious mobs convulse with pious rage. One could hardly ask for a better example of religious dogmatism and its pseudo-morality eclipsing basic, human goodness. It is time we recognized-and obliged the Muslim world to recognize-that "Muslim extremism" is not extreme among Muslims. Mainstream Islam itself represents an extremist rejection of intellectual honesty, gender equality, secular politics and genuine pluralism. The truth about Islam is as politically incorrect as it is terrifying: Islam is all fringe and no center. In Islam, we confront a civilization with an arrested history. It is as though a portal in time has opened, and the Christians of the 14th century are pouring into our world. Islam is the fastest growing religion in Europe. The demographic trends are ominous: Given current birthrates, France could be a majority Muslim country in 25 years, and that is if immigration were to stop tomorrow. Throughout Western Europe, Muslim immigrants show little inclination to acquire the secular and civil values of their host countries, and yet exploit these values to the utmost-demanding tolerance for their backwardness, their misogyny, their anti-Semitism, and the genocidal hatred that is regularly preached in their mosques. Political correctness and fears of racism have rendered many secular Europeans incapable of opposing the terrifying religious commitments of the extremists in their midst. In an effort to appease the lunatic furor arising in the Muslim world in response to the publication of the Danish cartoons, many Western leaders have offered apologies for exercising the very freedoms that are constitutive of civil society in the 21st century. The U.S. and British governments have chastised Denmark and the other countries that published the cartoons for privileging freedom of speech over religious sensitivity. It is not often that one sees the most powerful countries on Earth achieve new depths of weakness, moral exhaustion and geopolitical stupidity with a single gesture. This was appeasement at its most abject. The idea that Islam is a "peaceful religion hijacked by extremists" is a dangerous fantasy-and it is now a particularly dangerous fantasy for Muslims to indulge. It is not at all clear how we should proceed in our dialogue with the Muslim world, but deluding ourselves with euphemisms is not the answer. It now appears to be a truism in foreign policy circles that real reform in the Muslim world cannot be imposed from the outside. But it is important to recognize why this is so-it is so because the Muslim world is utterly deranged by its religious tribalism. In confronting the religious literalism and ignorance of the Muslim world, we must appreciate how terrifyingly isolated Muslims have become in intellectual terms. The problem is especially acute in the Arab world. Consider: According to the United Nations' Arab Human Development Reports, less than 2% of Arabs have access to the Internet. Arabs represent 5% of the world's population and yet produce only 1% of the world's books, most of them religious. In fact, Spain translates more books into Spanish each year than the entire Arab world has translated into Arabic since the ninth century.
Our press should report on the terrifying state of discourse in the Arab press, exposing the degree to which it is a tissue of lies, conspiracy theories and exhortations to recapture the glories of the seventh century. All civilized nations must unite in condemnation of a theology that now threatens to destabilize much of the Earth. Muslim moderates, wherever they are, must be given every tool necessary to win a war of ideas with their coreligionists. Otherwise, we will have to win some very terrible wars in the future. It is time we realized that the endgame for civilization is not political correctness. It is not respect for the abject religious certainties of the mob. It is reason.
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"...Shall We Not Revenge?" By Uri Avnery IF ONE wants to understand what the Palestinians did on election day, one has to see the film "Paradise Now", which has been nominated for an Oscar for the best foreign film, after collecting several prestigious international prizes. It explains better than a million words. Its makers - the screen-writer-cum-director, Hani Abu-As'ad from Nazareth, and the actors, are Palestinians. (Amir Harel, one of the producers, is a Jewish Israeli.) The two main characters, Sa'id and Khaled, are suicide bombers. The film addresses a question that is troubling everyone in Israel, and perhaps throughout the world: Why do they do it? What makes a person get up in the morning and decide to blow himself up in the middle of a crowd of people in Jerusalem or Tel-Aviv? And some of the people also ask: Who are they? What is their background? How did they come to be like that? Today, a long time after it was made, the film also answers another question: Why did the great majority of the Palestinians elect the very group that sent these people to blow themselves up? The film answers these questions. Not with slogans, not with propaganda speeches, nor with an academic report. It does not preach, praise or get mad. It tells a story. The story says everything. And since not many Israelis are going to see it, I permit myself to do what is generally not being done: to tell the story of the film until almost the end. THE OPENING scene creates the atmosphere: Suha, a beautiful young Palestinian woman of good family, brought up in France, approaches a checkpoint, one of the innumerable roadblocks that dot the West Bank landscape. She faces an intimidating soldier, a mustached face under a steel helmet, in a bullet-proof vest. Their eyes meet. He does not talk. He measures her up and down, down and up. He checks her bag, slowly, slowly. His eyes do not leave her eyes. When he finishes, he returns her documents to her - almost. When she tries to take them, he raises his hand. Let her make an effort. In the end, without a word, he orders her with a movement of his head to move on. Just a few minutes - minutes in which total humiliation, mutual fear and hatred flow together. The viewer feels that the woman is on the point of blowing herself up. But nothing happens. She moves on. ...Two young men, in their early 20s, in Nablus, the central town of the northern West Bank. Practically unemployed, like almost all the young men in Nablus. They have no future. No hopes. Not even dreams. They can do nothing to help their destitute families. They live at the bottom, in a mixture of boredom, frustration, despair. Even the cup of tea that a servile but stubborn boy sells them for 20 cents is cold. They are bearded, but not fanatical. Religious like everyone else, no more. They were born under occupation and are living under occupation. Nablus is surrounded on all sides by roadblocks. There is no work. No nothing. Only neglect and depressing poverty. The occupation is the central fact in their lives. Everything begins with the occupation, everything ends with it. ...One of them, Sa'id, meets Suha. Something clicks between them. Just then the two youngsters receive the message: you have been chosen. Tomorrow you will carry out a suicide attack in Tel-Aviv. ...An abandoned building serves as the headquarters of the underground. Final preparations: The beards are shaved off. Their hair is cut. They put on good suits. They get their pictures taken. A short pep talk, without pathos, from the chief, a "wanted person" who is a living legend (still living). The attack is in retaliation for the "targeted killing" of a comrade. The two look silently on while they are fitted with explosive belts. They are warned that these cannot be removed without exploding. A spine-chilling moment: the two see their pictures on the posters that will go up after the deed. ...ON THE way. The fence is cut. On the other side, a military jeep suddenly approaches. Khaled slides back through the breach, Sa'id continues on his way into Israel. He reaches a bus stop, waits, sees a woman playing with her little child. The bus arrives. The woman and the child get in. At the last minute Sa'id hesitates, gestures the driver to move on - without him. ...Among the comrades, panic ensues. Where is Sa'id? Has he deserted? Betrayed them? Run away? They search for him everywhere. Sa'id, still wearing the explosive belt, secretly returns to Nablus, looks for Khaled. He comes upon Suha. While they embrace, Suha says that it's the wrong way, civilians should not be harmed, it won't achieve liberation from the occupation. But Sa'id begs the chief to try him again, to give him a second chance. An important detail comes out: Sa'id's father had been a collaborator and was executed. Sa'id wants to eradicate the terrible stain, the shame that has pursued him from childhood. "He was a good man, but weak," he says. "The Israelis exploited his weakness. It's they who are to blame." ...Finally, the two comrades reach Tel-Aviv. For the youngsters from poor, run-down Nablus, Tel-Aviv looks like something from another world - shining, rich, unattainable. Skyscrapers. Girls in bikinis. People frolicking on the seashore. At the last moment, Khalid falters and tries to convince Sa'id to give up the mission. But Khalid returns to Nablus alone. Sa'id goes on to avenge his father's death. ...Last scene: Sa'id sits in the bus, surrounded by soldiers and civilians. The camera focuses on his eyes. The eyes fill the screen. We are petrified by what is going to happen in a moment... All this recounted in a restrained cinematic language. There are almost no verbal statements. On the face of it, a banal story, even with light moments: Khaled is reciting his farewell message before the video camera, the camera does not work properly, he has to repeat the moving message again and again. Comrades stand around, eating. He looks at them, stops and has to start again. And again. A comic interlude. I STUDIED the faces of the people leaving the Tel-Aviv cinematheque after the performance. They were silent and thoughtful. For the first time in their life they have seen the terrorists who are killing us, who blow themselves up among children, men and women. They see ordinary youngsters, who behave and react as ordinary people. They see the occupation from the other side, the underside. I sat in the dark cinema, and found myself in a situation of total dissonance: we, the intended victims, who could easily have been sitting on that bus, see everything through the eyes of our murderer. A thought strikes us: that force will not help here. If we kill those two, two others will take their place. The fence will hold up some of them, but not all of them. The Security Service, with the help of collaborators, will prevent some of the attacks, but cannot prevent all of them - and the children of the collaborators will come to avenge. When there are people like that, who grow up in these conditions, some of them will always reach their targets. The film does not provide solutions. It does not even pretend to be balanced. It exposes us to the face of a reality that we do not know, from an angle that we are not used to - and tortures us with the tension of conflicting emotion. And perhaps also prompts us to think about a solution that will cause Sa'id and Khaled to turn in a different direction. A solution that will put an end to the humiliation, to the crushing of personal and national dignity, to the destitution and hopelessness. A FEW days later, I saw another film that was nominated for Oscars, the much-praised film of Steven Spielberg, "Munich". As it so happens, I saw it in Germany, not so far from Munich itself. On leaving the cinema, my German host wanted to know what I thought of it. Spontaneously, without thinking, I said what I had felt throughout: "Disgusting!" Only later did I have time to sort out the impressions that I had accumulated during this very long film. What had disgusted me so much? First of all, the Spielberg style, a combination of the highest cinematic technique and the lowest cultural content. It has pretensions to profundity, with new and revealing insights, but basically it is nothing but another American Western, where the good guys slaughter the bad guys and the blood flows like water. Some Jewish politicians protested against the film for equating the "terrorists" with the "avengers". And indeed, in several places in the film the "terrorists" were allowed to declaim some sentences in their defense, about the injustice done to them by the Jews and their right to a homeland. But that is only lip-service, a pretense, in order to give an impression of balance. But in the portrayal of the Munich attack - fragments of which are dispersed throughout the film - the Arabs appear as miserable, ugly, unkempt, cowardly creatures, the very opposite of Avner, the Israeli avenger, who is handsome and decent, brave and well turned-out - in short, the younger brother of Ari Ben Canaan, the superman of "Exodus". The Arabs have no qualms of conscience, but the Israelis have scruples in every interval between murders. They hesitate every time when they blow up / shoot / cut down one of their "targets"- which they do, of course, only after ensuring the safety of the wife and children of the victim. They are not just killers, they are Jewish killers. As an Israeli satirical slogan goes: "Shoot and weep." The presentation of the affair itself is highly manipulative. It withholds from the viewer some very relevant facts. For example: - That the post-mortems showed that nine of the 11 Israeli athletes were killed by the bullets of the pathetically untrained German policemen. (The post-mortem reports are kept secret until this very day, both in Israel and Germany. But a powerful person like Spielberg should know about them.) - That it was Golda Meir and her German colleagues - great heroes, every one of them - who sealed the fate of the hostages, when they rejected the kidnappers' demand to take them to an Arab country, where they would have surely been traded for Palestinian prisoners held in Israel. - That the Palestinians, who were killed in revenge for Munich, had nothing to do with the affair. The Mossad was looking for easy targets and chose PLO diplomats posted to European capitals, who were quite unprotected. But most of all I was repulsed by the Spielbergian vulgarity that runs through the whole film, including explicit sex scenes that are both gratuitous and particularly unaesthetic.
The film contributes nothing to an understanding of the conflict. It is basically a routine gangster film, which Spielberg centered on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in order to garner the longed-for Oscars that have eluded him until now.
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 Juggernaut Gathering Momentum, Headed For Iran By Ray McGovern What President George W. Bush, FOX news, and the Washington Times were saying about Iraq three years ago they are now saying about Iran. After Saturday's vote by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to report Iran's suspicious nuclear activities to the UN Security Council, the president wasted no time in warning, "The world will not permit the Iranian regime to gain nuclear weapons." The next IAEA milestone will be reached on March 6, when its director, Mohamed ElBaradei, makes a formal report to the Security Council regarding what steps Iran needs to take to allay growing suspicions. The Bush administration, however, has already mounted a full-court press to indict and convict the Iranian leaders, and the key question is why. Iran signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty and insists (correctly) that the treaty assures signatories the right to pursue nuclear programs for peaceful use. And when Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice claims, as she did last month, "There is simply no peaceful rationale for the Iranian regime to resume uranium enrichment," she is being, well, disingenuous again. If Dr. Rice has done her homework, she is aware that in 1975 President Gerald Ford's chief of staff Dick Cheney and his defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld bought Iran's argument that it needed a nuclear program to meet future energy requirements. This is what Iranian officials are saying today, and they are supported by energy experts who point out that oil extraction in Iran is already at or near peak and that the country will need alternatives to oil in coming decades. Ironically, Cheney and Rumsfeld were among those persuading the reluctant Ford in 1976 to approve offering Iran a deal for nuclear reprocessing facilities that would have brought at least $6.4 billion for US corporations like Westinghouse and General Electric. The project fell through when the Shah was ousted three years later. It is altogether reasonable to expect that Iran's leaders want to have a nuclear weapons capability as well, and that they plan to use their nuclear program to acquire one. From their perspective, they would be fools not to. Iran is one of three countries earning the "axis-of-evil" sobriquet from President Bush and it has watched what happened to Iraq, which had no nuclear weapons, as well as what did not happen to North Korea, which does have them. And Iran's rival Israel, which has not signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty but somehow escapes widespread opprobrium, has a formidable nuclear arsenal cum delivery systems. Israeli threats to destroy Iranian nuclear facilities simply provide additional incentive to Tehran to bury and harden them against the kind of Israeli air attack that destroyed the Iraqi nuclear facility at Osirak in 1981. Although the US (together with every other UN Security Council member) condemned that attack, Dick Cheney and other senior officials do not disguise their view that it was just what the doctor ordered at the time ... and that the same prescription might take care of Iran. Who Is Threatened by Iranian Nukes? The same country that felt threatened by putative nuclear weapons in the hands of Iraq. With at least 200 nuclear weapons and various modes of delivery at their disposal, the Israelis have a powerful deterrent. They appear determined to put that deterrent into play early to pre-empt any nuclear weapons capability in Iran, rather than have to deal with one after it has been put in place. Israeli leaders seem allergic to the thought that other countries in the region might be able to break its nuclear monopoly and they react neuralgically to proposals for a nuclear-free zone in the Middle East. Bending over backwards to such sensitivities, the US delegation to the IAEA delayed the proceedings for a day in a futile attempt to delete from Sunday's report language calling for such a zone. The final report called for a "Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction." This is the first time a link has been made, however implicitly, between the Iranian and Israeli nuclear programs. The argument that the US is also threatened directly by nuclear weapons in Iranian hands is as far-fetched as was the case before the war in Iraq, when co-opted intelligence analysts were strongly encouraged to stretch their imaginations - to include, for example the specter that Iraqi weapons of mass destruction could be delivered by unpiloted aerial vehicles (UAVs) launched from ships off the US coast. No, I'm not kidding. They even included this in the infamous National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) of October 1, 2002. That canard was held up to ridicule by the US Air Force, which was permitted to take a footnote in the NIE. The scare story nonetheless provided grist for the president's key speech in Cincinnati on October 7, 2002 - three days before Congress voted to authorize war. That was also the speech in which he also warned, "Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot wait for the final proof - the smoking gun - that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud." While Congress was voting for war on October 10, more candid observations came in highly unusual remarks from a source with excellent access to high-level thinking at the White House. Philip Zelikow, at the time a member of the prestigious President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board and confidant of then-national security adviser Condoleezza Rice (and later Executive Director of the 9/11 commission), said this to a crowd at the University of Virginia: Why would Iraq attack America or use nuclear weapons against us? I'll tell you what I think the real threat is and actually has been since 1990 - it's the threat against Israel. And this is the threat that dare not speak its name ... the American government doesn't want to lean too hard on it rhetorically, because it is not a popular sell. More recently, in the case of Iran, President Bush has been unabashed in naming Israel as the most probable target of any Iranian nuclear weapons. He has also created a rhetorical lash-up of the US and Israel, referring three times in the past two weeks to Israel as an "ally" of the US, as if to condition Americans to the notion that the US is required to join Israel in any confrontation with Iran. For example, on February 1 the president told the press, "Israel is a solid ally of the United States; we will rise to Israel's defense if need be." Asked if he meant the US would rise to Israel's defense militarily, Bush replied with a startlingly open-ended commitment, "You bet, we'll defend Israel." In repeatedly labeling Israel our "ally," Bush is following his own corollary to the dictum of Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels that if you repeat something often enough, most people will believe it. In an unusual moment of candor in a discussion of domestic affairs last May, Bush noted: That's the third time I've said that. I'll probably say it three more times. See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda. Why No Treaty? The trouble is that, strictly speaking, allies are not picked by presidential whim - or by smart staffers like the top Bush aide who bragged that he and his colleagues are "history's actors ... creating new realities." Bush's speech writers are acting as though the "new realities" they create can include defense treaties. But unless they've changed the Constitution, in our system nations become allies via treaty; and treaties have to be approved by a two-thirds vote of the Senate. There is no treaty of alliance with Israel. But why? Earlier, I had had the impression that it must be because of US reluctance - despite widespread sympathy for Israel - to get entangled in the complexities of the Middle East and gratuitously antagonize Arab countries. Comparing notes with Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) colleagues with more experience in the Middle East, however, I learned that the Israelis themselves have shown strong resistance to a US-Israel defense treaty - for reasons quite sound from their perspective, and quite instructive from ours. The possibility of a bilateral treaty was broached after the 1973 Yom Kippur war as a way to reduce chances of armed conflict between Israel and its Arab neighbors. But before the US could commit to defending Israel, its boundaries would have had to be defined, and the Israelis wanted no part of that. Moreover, the Israelis feared that a defense pact would curb their freedom of action - as would signing the Non-Proliferation Treaty. They were aware that in a crisis situation, the US would almost certainly discourage them from resorting to their familiar policy of massive - often disproportionate - retaliation against the Arabs. It became quite clear that the Israelis did not want the US to have any say over when they would use force, against whom, and what (US or non-US) equipment might be employed. Aside from all that, the Israelis were, and are, confident that their influence in Washington is such as to ensure US support, no matter what. And, as President Bush's rhetoric demonstrates, they are correct in thinking they can, in effect, have their cake and eat it too - a commitment equivalent to a defense treaty, with no binding undertakings on Israel's part. That is a very volatile admixture. Congress would do well to wake up to its Constitutional prerogatives and responsibilities in this key area - particularly now that the juggernaut to war has begun to roll. Preparing the Public One major task is to convince the public and, as far as possible, our allies that the Iran-nuclear problem is critical. This would be an uphill task, were it not for the success of our domesticated media in suppressing the considered judgment of the US intelligence community that Iran is nowhere near a nuclear weapon. Washington Post reporter Dafna Linzer, to her credit, drew on several inside sources to report on August 2, 2005, that the latest NIE concludes Iran will not be able to produce enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon until "early to mid-next decade," with general consensus among intelligence analysts that 2015 would actually be the earliest. That important information was ignored in other media and quickly dropped off the radar screen. In the Washington of today there is no need to bother with unwelcome intelligence that does not support the case you wish to make. Polls show that hyped-up public statements on the threat from Iran are having some effect, and indiscriminately hawkish pronouncements by usual suspects like senators Joseph Lieberman and John McCain are icing on the cake. Ahmed Chalabi-type Iranian "dissidents" have surfaced to tell us of secret tunnels for nuclear weapons research, and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld keeps reminding the world that Iran is the "world's leading state sponsor of terrorism." Administration spokespeople keep warning of Iranian interference on the Iraqi side of their long mutual border - themes readily replayed in FOX channel news and the Washington Times. This morning's Chicago Tribune editorial put it this way: There will likely be an economic confrontation with Iran, or a military confrontation, or both. Though diplomatic efforts have succeeded in convincing most of the world that this matter is grave, diplomatic efforts are highly unlikely to sway Iran. On Saturday, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist insisted that Congress has the political will to use military force against Iran, if necessary, repeating the mantra " We cannot allow Iran to become a nuclear nation." Even Richard Perle has come out of the woodwork to add a convoluted new wrinkle regarding the lessons of the attack on Iraq. Since one cannot depend on good intelligence, says Perle, it is a matter of "take action now or lose the option of taking action." One of the most influential intellectual authors of the war on Iraq, Perle and his "neo-conservative" colleagues see themselves as men of biblical stature. Just before the attack on Iraq, Perle prophesized: If we just let our vision of the world go forth, and we embrace it entirely and we don't try to piece together clever diplomacy, but just wage a total war ... our children will sing great songs about us years from now.
Those songs have turned out to be funeral dirges for over 2,250 US troops and tens of thousands of Iraqis.
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In December, General Motors said it was eliminating 30,000 of its workers. Delphi, the biggest maker of automobile components, also whacked its workforce last fall, demanding that its 34,000 people on the line workers take a two-thirds cut in their wages. Now, Ford has joined the fun, saying in January that it'll slash 30,000 of its workers.
The CEOs of these auto giants all moaned that it was "painful" for them to fire so many good and loyal blue collar employees, but, gosh, American car makers are losing market share to foreign competitors, they wailed, so these drastic cutbacks are simply essential in order to turn the U.S. industry around. Their collective motto seems to be: "Come On, America - Let's Shrink Our Way To Success!"
But, wait - the industry's problem is not with the blue-collar workers down on the factory floor. Those people are highly-skilled, efficient, and productive. Rather, the problem is with the suits up in the executive suite. They're the ones who're supposed to assess what consumers want and to design quality cars - and these numbskulls are failing miserably at both of these jobs.
While foreign car makers are turning out vehicles that look good, are well-designed, get good mileage, use innovative technology, and are both reliable and longlasting - our top execs keep coming out with poorly-designed, gas-guzzling clunkers. Consumers are snapping up Toyotas, for example, faster than the company can roll them out, because - duh !- Toyota is making cars that people actually want.
This is Jim Hightower saying... Its' America's auto executives who can't compete, not the workers on the line. If they want a real turnaround plan for the industry, they should keep the workers, fire themselves, and bring in new executive teams that have enough old-fashioned, good ol' American, innovative spark to compete.
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LAS VEGAS--Of course it was a provocation. In September, the editor of a right-wing Danish newspaper decided "to test cartoonists to see if they were self-censoring their work, out of fear of violence from Islamic radicals." Though some declined, 12 artists accepted the editor's invitation to make light of the Prophet Mohammed, and submitted work equating Islam with terrorism and the oppression of women, among other things.
Five months later editor Fleming Rose has learned that cartoonists have good reason to watch what they draw. Thousands of demonstrators, furious at the publication's violation of an Islamic stricture banning graphic depictions of the Prophet, marched through the streets of Cairo, Karachi, Istanbul, Teheran and Mehtarlam, Afghanistan, where at least five were killed by police. Gunmen took over the European Union office in Gaza. Mobs burned Danish flags and called for a Muslim boycott of Danish goods. Iran withdrew its ambassador from Copenhagen. Danes were ordered to flee Lebanon after mobs burned the Danish consulates in Damascus and Beirut, where they also trashed a Christian neighborhood. The Danish cartoonists, having been threatened with beheading, are presumably catching up on their Salman Rushdie while they weather the storm.
Adding fuel to the fire, said the Times, were "a group of Denmark's fundamentalist Muslim clerics...[who] took their show on the road" last fall, traveling around the Middle East showing a package that included cartoons that had never actually appeared in any newspaper, "some depicting Mohammed as a pedophile, a pig or engaged in bestiality." Newspapers in France, Germany and elsewhere further fanned the flames by reprinting the Danish drawings.
Being provoked, as I tell myself when I'm sitting next to Sean Hannity, doesn't justify reacting with violence. And as Kuwaiti oil executive Samia al-Duaij pointed out to Time, there are better reasons to torch embassies than over cartoons: "America kills thousands of Muslims, and you lose your head and withdraw ambassadors over a bunch of cartoons printed in a second-rate paper in a Nordic country with a population of five million? That's the true outrage."
"CNN has chosen not to show the [Danish Mohammed] cartoons out of respect for Islam," said the news channel.
"We always weigh the value of the journalistic impact against the impact that publication might have as far as insulting or hurting certain groups," said an editor at The San Francisco Chronicle.
"The cartoons didn't meet our long-held standards for not moving offensive content," said the Associated Press.
Bull----.
If these cowards were worried about offending the faithful, they wouldn't cover or quote such Muslim-bashers as Ann Coulter, Christopher Hitchens or George W. Bush. The truth is, our national nanny media is managed by cowards so terrified by the prospect of their offices being firebombed that they wallow in self-censorship.
The nanny media, even more prudish since 9/11, covers our millions of eyes to protect us from our own icky deeds. In Afghanistan in 2001, while covering a war that had officially killed 12 civilians, I watched a colleague from a major television network collate footage of a B-52 bombing indiscriminately obliterating a civilian neighborhood. "If people saw what bombing looks like here on the ground, " he observed as body parts and burning houses and screaming children filled the screen, "they would demand an end to it. Which is why this will never air on American television." But other countries don't have our nanny media. Europeans and Arabs see the horror wreaked in our name on their airwaves, assume that we see the same imagery and hate us for not giving a damn. America's self-censors make anti-Americanism worse.
Ugly truths come out one way or the other. While the Muslim world was raging over the Danish Mohammed cartoons, Washington Post cartoonist Tom Toles received a chilling letter from the Joints Chief of Staff in reaction to his single-panel rendition of a quadriplegic veteran; if not for the nanny media's slavish refusal to run photos of the real thing, would that abstract image have shocked anyone? While we're at it, using prose to describe graphic images--as editors and anchormen are doing about the Mohammed imagery--makes as much sense as talking about the Rodney King police brutality video. "[Describing the cartoons without showing them] seems a reasonable choice," editorialized The New York Times, a paper whose readers' right to know apparently includes classified surveillance programs--but not cartoons.
While deciding what goes into the paper and the evening news, good journalists ought to be guided by only one consideration: Is it news? If the answer is yes, send it out. Even if it's tasteless as all f---.
Postscript: A European Muslim website has posted a cartoon depicting Anne Frank in bed with Adolf Hitler. "If it is the time to break taboos and cross all the red lines," the site explains, "we certainly do not want to fall behind." It's an idiotic cartoon. Breaking taboos, on the other hand, is something our nanny media ought to try.
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Now the mad mullahs of Iran will soon have nuclear bombs, are we all doomed? Thumbing his nose at the impotent west, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad taunts us: "Our enemies cannot do a damn thing. We do not need you at all. But you are in need of the Iranian nation." And he is absolutely right. A frisson of panic shudders around the globe: he has already threatened to wipe Israel off the face of the Earth. Do something, someone! But what and who? And if there is nothing to be done, what then?
The International Atomic Energy Agency has failed to stop Iran restarting its nuclear programme. The matter has been referred to the UN, with a decision on any possible action in early March. But that may be yet another dismal reminder of UN incapacity. Meanwhile, the Americans are grinding out ritual bellicose statements, Donald Rumsfeld refusing to rule out air strikes. The Israelis warn that Iran will pay "a very heavy price" and Iran replies that if anyone attacks "we will give the enemy a lesson that will be remembered throughout history". Is this the way the world ends?
All this suggests that international diplomacy is not one whit wiser than it ever was. Talking to experts in the field, these appear to be a few key facts: even if the US or Israel strike down the sites where they think Iranian nuclear weapons are being built, that can only delay their development. (How good are we at finding weapons anyway?) If Iran wants weapons above all else, it can get them by around 2010. Unlike Libya, Iran may well put national pride before economic growth, ignoring any harm sanctions can do them. If the world's fourth largest producer sends oil prices through the roof, it can cause near-nuclear damage to the global economy. If this is how the west wants to play it, then Iran seems to hold some strong cards.
History sheds light, but offers few answers. The Anglo-American coup knocking over Mossadegh in 1953 to enthrone the shah was another shining example of how western crusaders for democracy prop up dictators in exchange for oil, afraid of the elections they pretend to champion. That is the paradox of the White House dream of turning Afghanistan and Iraq into "beacons of democracy" to spread their light across the Middle East. Yet - at least at first - democracy was always bound to bring mullahs and religious parties to power in Kabul and Baghdad or the Muslim Brotherhood's rise in Egypt. More theocratic parties are the price of free elections, and the west has to accept it.
American pride is easily bruised, unused to taking such humiliations as the 1979 embassy-hostage crisis that lasted 444 shaming days and the Iran-backed Beirut embassy attack that slaughtered 241 marines. On its side, Iran will never forgive the US for backing Iraq in the bloody eight-year Iran-Iraq war. So the two countries have barely attempted to speak in all these years: admirable EU attempts at peacemaking could not bridge that historic bile. Without the US at the table, a deal was impossible.
On the face of it, Iran has every reason to feel insecure. While America occupies two of Iran's neighbours and Israel's nuclear weapons point at Tehran, paranoia seems as justified as it is dangerous. Yet Iran knows its strength. The Iraq adventure has exposed the painful limits to force, and America can no longer make a credible threat of invasion: it has forfeited the power to frighten.
What's more, Iran is the true winner of that war. They only had to sit tight and smile as the west delivered on a golden plate all the influence Iran had always sought in the Middle East. The US and its allies will soon be gone from Afghanistan and Iraq, leaving Iranian-backed Shias dominant in both countries, their influence well spread across Syria, a chunk of Saudi Arabia and other countries for decades to come. Historic Iranian ambitions have been fulfilled without firing a shot while the US is reduced to fist-shaking. How foolish was that?
If Iran is determined, no one can stop it becoming a nuclear power, alongside Israel, Pakistan and India. The crazed dictator of North Korea shows the way: nuclear weapons make nations unassailable. Why on earth would Iran not want them too?
It is much odder that Britain demands them. What for? Protection against whom? John Reid has said Trident will be replaced - and now Gordon Brown has said he too would renew our nuclear weapons, despite the 20bn price tag and a lack of anyone to point them at. If we can seriously consider such expensive folly in pursuit of strutting our stuff and punching above our weight to buy a UN security council seat, we can hardly pretend outrage at Iran's ambitions.
But fantasy diplomacy is taking a grip. The pretence is that the world united can deflect Tehran: there is still a small chance that Russia's offer to strike a deal could work. But the experts expect an aggressive stand-off, with a risk of futile air attacks. Even if no blood is spilt, the west may find itself in a cold jihad with a God-driven, nuclear-armed adversary, and no solution in sight. Nothing suggests that sanctions and fiery words will make the more moderate forces in Iran overthrow their mullahs and choose westernisation: under external pressure in this clash of civilisations, history suggests they will close ranks. Meanwhile, oil-hungry nations will do dirty backdoor deals: oil tends to trump UN resolutions.
Fantasy diplomacy is ready to fight all the way to stop the mullahs getting the bomb. Reality suggests there is a difficult choice: if you cannot win, give up at once to minimise the damage. Get off the high horse and start to negotiate terms on which Iran can be allowed to enrich uranium. It amounts to turning a blind eye to their weapons potential while striking a deal that saves their face, affords them some dignity and entices them economically into becoming a more stable force.
It takes some swallowing, but what if there is no alternative? Either they have nuclear weapons and we are at cold war, or else they have nuclear weapons and we have an uneasy kind of peace. But that decision has to be made before UN sanctions ratchet up the rhetoric to no-turning-back resistance.
It may be beyond the ability of this White House to climb down, but the US should remember Aesop's fable The Sun and the Wind: when they competed to get a man's coat off, the full force of a cold blast only made him hold on to it tighter, but the warmth of the sun made him take it off by himself. So far US diplomacy over Iran echoes Louis XVIII's court: they seem to have forgotten nothing and learned nothing.
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Take From The Poor, Give To The Military By Robert Scheer Where would the Bush administration be without terrorism? Like the Cold War before it, the "war on terror" is a conveniently sweeping rationale for all manner of irrational governance, such as the outrageous $2.77-trillion budget the president proposed to Congress on Monday. Without terrorism, how could Bush justify to fiscal conservatives the whopping budget deficits that he has ballooned via his tax cuts for the wealthy that he now seeks to make permanent? Without terrorism, how could he convince government corruption watchdogs that the huge increases in military and homeland security - 7% and 8%, respectively - aren't simply payback to the defense contractors who so heavily support the Republicans every election cycle? Without terrorism, how could the president get away with blindly dumping $120 billion more into the war in Afghanistan and the bungled occupation of Iraq that the Bush administration had once promised would be financed by Iraqi oil sales? In order to pay for the money pit that is Iraq, the Bush budget demands draconian cuts in 141 domestic programs, led by a $36-billion cut in Medicare spending for the elderly over the next five years. This from a president reelected after promising to expand rather than curtail healthcare services to seniors. Many of the other proposed cuts are equally obscene, such as the termination of $1 billion in child-care funds over five years, and the complete elimination of the Commodity Supplemental Food Program that provides food assistance to low-income seniors, needy pregnant women and children. These attacks on the social safety net for the most vulnerable members of our society are not only patently unfair, in light of Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy, but the simultaneous blank check for the Pentagon cannot be honestly justified by the fight against terrorism. And although the president insists that it is unpatriotic to question his strategies in fighting terrorism, let me risk his opprobrium, and that of the pseudo-conservative bully boys that shill for him in the media, by doing just that. To begin with, we must remember that this "war" was launched against an enemy, still mostly at large, who on Sept. 11 accomplished phenomenal destruction and suffering with armaments no fiercer or costlier than some box-cutters. Their key weapon, in fact, was suicidal fanaticism. Yet, rather than sensibly investing in aggressive global detective work, collaborating with our European allies, engaging meaningfully with an independent and skeptical Arab world, and working to protect vulnerable U.S. sites such as nuclear power plants, our leaders decided to turn logic on its head and make ignorance about the enemy into a virtue, slash civil liberties and recklessly invade a major Muslim country that had no connection to the attacks. In other words, our response to Sept. 11 has been almost completely military in nature, granting the Defense Department an excuse to increase spending by 48% in just four years. Yet, despite all this spending, and the loss of life that has accompanied it, our standing in the Muslim world has been in free fall since we invaded Iraq, we have never captured or killed Osama bin Laden or his top strongman, we don't know how to "fix" Iraq or Afghanistan, and we have greatly strengthened the hand of our rivals in Iran. We don't even know, as the Sept. 11 commission report revealed, much of anything about the 15 Saudi hijackers and their four leaders from other parts of the Arab world who committed the Sept. 11 attacks. We do know, however, that they weren't from Iraq, weren't funded by Iraq and weren't trained by or in Iraq; nevertheless, the huge elephant in the Bush budget is the war and occupation of Iraq, now approaching its third anniversary, not the effort to dismantle Al Qaeda. "Since 2001, the administration ... liberated nearly 50 million people in Iraq and Afghanistan," boasts the Bush budget document. Ah, but if they have been liberated, then why the need for an additional $50-billion emergency "bridge funding" in 2007, itself coming on the heels of a supplementary $70-billion budget request last week? The answer provided by the report is that Iraq is far from being stabilized and that in Afghanistan "enemy activity has increased over the past year."
Unfortunately, the Democratic leadership in Congress is still unwilling to challenge the necessity of "winning" the war in Iraq and, as a result, its complaints about cutting needed domestic programs are framed exclusively as an argument against making Bush's tax cuts permanent. It is a losing argument, because it leaves Bush as both the big spender and the big tax-cutter once again, posturing as the savior of the taxpayer when he is in fact quite the opposite for all but the wealthiest Americans.
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Yet Another Bush Lie By Robert Parry George W. Bush has assured Americans that they can relax about his warrantless wiretapping because the program is reviewed by lots of lawyers and intelligence professionals. What he doesn't say is that officials who object too much find themselves isolated, ridiculed and pushed out of their jobs. For instance, when Deputy Attorney General James Comey refused to recertify the spying program in March 2004 - while Attorney General John Ashcroft was in the hospital - Bush gave Comey a derisive nickname, as "Cuomey" or "Cuomo" after New York's former liberal Democratic Gov. Mario Cuomo, Newsweek has reported. Similarly, a high-ranking intelligence official who questioned the wiretapping program told the Washington Post that his objections soon made him an unwanted outsider. He encountered awkward silences when he attended meetings where the eavesdropping rules were discussed. "I became aware at some point of things I was not being told about," the intelligence official said. [Washington Post, Feb. 5, 2006] Another outcast from the Bush administration's clique of insiders was Assistant Attorney General Jack Goldsmith, who reportedly led an internal rebellion of Justice Department lawyers who protested Bush's assertion of nearly unlimited presidential powers for the duration of the War on Terror. "Demanding that the White House stop using what they saw as farfetched rationales for riding rough-shod over the law and the Constitution, Goldsmith and the others fought to bring government spying and interrogation methods within the law," Newsweek wrote. "They did so at their peril; ostracized, some were denied promotions, while others left for more comfortable climes in private law firms and academia." White House Nerves Goldsmith - a Republican conservative but not a believer in the absolutist Presidency - started getting on the White House's nerves in fall 2003 after taking over the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel (OLC). First, Goldsmith argued that Iraqi prisoners were protected by the Geneva Conventions and couldn't be subjected to coercion. Then, Goldsmith challenged a legal memo that had supported Bush's right to authorize torture. Vice President Dick Cheney's chief counsel David Addington addressed Goldsmith with dripping sarcasm, accusing him of undermining the powers of the President, Newsweek reported in its Feb. 6, 2006, edition. "Now that you've withdrawn legal opinions that the President of the United States has been relying on," Addington reportedly told Goldsmith, "I need you to go through all of OLC's opinions (relating to the War on Terror) and let me know which ones you still stand by." Goldsmith's opposition to Bush's program for warrantless wiretapping of Americans brought the tensions to a head. He drew support from Comey, who refused to sign a recertification of the wiretap program in March 2004 when he was filling in for ailing Attorney General Ashcroft. White House chief of staff Andrew Card and Bush's counsel Alberto Gonzales rushed to visit Ashcroft, who was hospitalized for gallbladder surgery. Faced with Comey's objections - and the resistance from Goldsmith - Ashcroft also balked at continuing the wiretap program, which was temporarily suspended while a compromise was reached on more safeguards. [NYT, Jan. 1, 2006] The battle over the warrantless wiretaps reportedly earned Comey the derisive nickname from Bush as "Cuomey" or just "Cuomo," a strong insult from Republicans who deem the former New York governor to be both excessively liberal and famously indecisive. Comey - previously a well-respected Republican lawyer who was credited with prosecuting key terrorism cases including the Khobar Towers bombing which killed 19 U.S. servicemen in 1996 - had been deputy attorney general since December 2003. Plame Case But by 2004, Comey already was wearing out his welcome with the White House. He also was responsible for picking Patrick Fitzgerald to be special prosecutor to investigate who leaked the identity of a covert CIA officer after her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, criticized Bush's misuse of intelligence on Iraq. In 2003, when Ashcroft was still handling the investigation, Bush had expressed confidence that the leakers would never be identified. But Ashcroft stepped aside because of conflicts of interest and his deputy, Comey, selected U.S. Attorney Fitzgerald. By mid-2004, Fitzgerald was proving himself to be a dogged investigator as he zeroed in on Cheney's chief of staff Lewis Libby and Bush's political adviser Karl Rove as two officials suspected of exposing CIA officer Valerie Plame. Demanding testimony from prominent journalists, such as New York Times correspondent Judith Miller, Fitzgerald was too high profile for the White House to easily remove. But the days of Comey - Fitzgerald's chief ally - were numbered. After the "torture memo" leaked to the Washington Post in June 2004, Comey and Goldsmith threw down the gauntlet again, leading the fight to repudiate the memo and pressing for a revised version that deleted the most controversial elements, again angering the White House, according to Newsweek. Facing withering criticism from White House hardliners, Goldsmith was the first big name to go. In summer 2004, a battered and exhausted Goldsmith quit the Justice Department to become a professor at Harvard Law School. Comey's Departure A year later, Comey followed Goldsmith out of the department, going into private law practice. On Aug. 15, 2005, in his farewell speech, Comey urged his colleagues to defend the integrity and honesty of the department. "I expect that you will appreciate and protect an amazing gift you have received as an employee of the Department of Justice," Comey said. "It is a gift you may not notice until the first time you stand up and identify yourself as an employee of the Department of Justice and say something - whether in a courtroom, a conference room or a cocktail party - and find that total strangers believe what you say next. "That gift - the gift that makes possible so much of the good we accomplish - is a reservoir of trust and credibility, a reservoir built for us, and filled for us, by those who went before - most of whom we never knew. They were people who made sacrifices and kept promises to build that reservoir of trust. "Our obligation - as the recipients of that great gift - is to protect that reservoir, to pass it to those who follow, those who may never know us, as full as we got it. The problem with reservoirs is that it takes tremendous time and effort to fill them, but one hole in a dam can drain them. "The protection of that reservoir requires vigilance, an unerring commitment to truth, and a recognition that the actions of one may affect the priceless gift that benefits all. I have tried my absolute best - in matters big and small - to protect that reservoir and inspire others to protect it." Bush first tried to replace Comey with Timothy Flanigan, a former deputy White House counsel who had become general counsel of Tyco International. But Flanigan's nomination foundered over questions about his dealings with corrupt Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff and Flanigan's role in developing White House interrogation policies. 'Torture Memo' In 2002, as deputy to then-White House counsel Gonzales, Flanigan joined other right-wing lawyers in advocating legal strategies for protecting administration officials implicated in abuse of detainees. An Aug. 1, 2002, memo - prepared by hardliners in the Justice Department and signed by Jay Bybee, then-chief of the Office of Legal Counsel - defined torture so narrowly that interrogators would have wide latitude in abusing prisoners to extract information. The memo also sought to give Bush authority to order outright torture of detainees. This "torture memo" argued that U.S. government operatives should be spared prosecution for torture if they had Bush's approval. Flanigan sat in on at least one meeting during which lawyers discussed various torture techniques, including telling detainees that they would be buried alive and subjecting them to "waterboarding" which involves tying a person to a board and using water to simulate drowning. Flanigan and Addington reportedly tried to shepherd this policy through the government by limiting the opportunities for critical comments. As Newsweek reported, Flanigan and Addington "came up with a solution: cut virtually everyone else out." During questioning by the Senate Judiciary Committee on his nomination to replace Comey, Flanigan declined to say whether he voiced support for the "torture memo" in its original version, although he did say he supported a revised - less sweeping - version in December 2004. Flanigan also told the committee that he saw ambiguities in setting limits on the abuse of detainees, saying that he did "not believe that the term 'inhumane' is susceptible to succinct definition." As the fight over his nomination grew more contentious, Flanigan asked Bush to withdraw his name on Oct. 6, 2005. [Washington Post, Oct. 8, 2005] With Flanigan's nomination in flames, the acting deputy to now-Attorney General Gonzales became Paul McNulty, who also has a strong pedigree as a hardline Republican legal operative, a Bush loyalist and a member of Gonzales's inner circle. McNulty was chief counsel to the Republican-run House Judiciary Committee when it pressed for impeachment of Democratic President Bill Clinton in 1998. McNulty also headed Bush's Justice Department transition team after Election 2000. [NYT, Oct. 21, 2005] Plame Probe Since Gonzales - like Ashcroft - has recused himself on the Plame leak investigation, McNulty also has inherited the job of overseeing Fitzgerald. In that position, the deputy attorney general can apply subtle pressure on the special prosecutor through the allotment of staff and other bureaucratic means. The notion of constraining the work of a special prosecutor by gaining control of his oversight is not unprecedented. After Iran-Contra special prosecutor Lawrence Walsh broke through a long-running White House cover-up of that scandal in 1991, Republican Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist engineered a behind-the-scenes coup against the senior judge overseeing Walsh. In 1992, Rehnquist ousted moderate Republican Judge George MacKinnon as chief of the three-judge panel that picked and oversaw independent counsels. MacKinnon had staunchly backed Walsh, another old-time Republican jurist, as he peeled back the secrets of the complex Iran-Contra schemes, which threatened George H.W. Bush's reelection. At that key moment, Rehnquist replaced MacKinnon with Judge David Sentelle, one of President Ronald Reagan's conservative judicial appointees and a protg of Sen. Jesse Helms, then one of the most right-wing Republicans in the U.S. Congress. Earlier, as a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, Sentelle had teamed with another Republican judge, Laurence Silberman, to overturn the felony convictions of Oliver North in 1990. Sentelle also provided one of the two votes in 1991 to throw out the convictions of North's boss, National Security Adviser John Poindexter. Faced with these obstructions, Walsh had come to view the Reagan-Bush loyalists on the U.S. Court of Appeals as "a powerful band of Republican appointees [who] waited like the strategic reserves of an embattled army." Sentelle, who had named his daughter Reagan after the President, was one of those "strategic reserves." A dozen years later, George W. Bush executed a similar maneuver, replacing a relatively non-partisan Republican (Comey) with two candidates who are considered more politically reliable - or some might say pliable (Flanigan and McNulty). With Comey gone, Fitzgerald still pressed ahead with his investigation of the White House leak of Plame's identity, but he had lost the strong institutional support that Comey had provided. On Oct. 28, 2005, Fitzgerald indicted Libby for lying to investigators and obstructing justice, but the special prosecutor backed off from his expected indictment of Rove, who had become Bush's deputy chief of staff. (Significantly, Libby was replaced as Cheney's chief of staff by David Addington, who had helped formulate the White House policy on torture.) On Feb. 6, 2006 - with few Americans knowing or understanding the significance of this history - Gonzales testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee, avoiding any details about the internal disputes on the legality of Bush's warrantless wiretaps. Gonzales simply told the senators that the administration's reading of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 let Bush bypass its seemingly clear language requiring warrants from a special secret court for wiretaps of communications originating in the United States. Even Republican senators Arlen Specter and Lindsey Graham objected to the administration's strained interpretation of the law. But Bush, in effect, is buying time while he builds federal judicial majorities in favor of his vision of an all-powerful presidency. Bush took a big step in that direction with the confirmation of Justice Samuel Alito, an architect of the so-called "unitary executive" theory. The U.S. Supreme Court now has at least four of nine justices who favor granting the President virtually unlimited powers as Commander in Chief.
In the meantime, Bush is relying on shrewd bureaucratic maneuvers - neutralizing and removing skeptics - in order to fend off harassing actions by Democrats and other Americans, including traditional Republican lawyers, who oppose Bush's extraordinary assertions of power.
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| Bush On Health Care: Anybody Have A Leech? Having established his credibility by improving Medicare and strengthening Social Security, George W. Bush is moving on to address America's health-insurance crisis. Still guided by the deep social and economic insights that brought us those earlier triumphs, he is promoting the same panacea he applies to almost every domestic problem: tax cuts favoring the wealthy. Although he once flattered himself as "the reformer with results," Mr. Bush seems unfazed by the dismal results he has achieved to date. Last year at this time, he announced that privatizing Social Security- or establishing "personal accounts," the pollster-approved phrase he prefers-would become the highest domestic priority of his second term. And he looked forward to the bright dawn of his Medicare prescription-drug plan, a central legislative priority of his first term. Today we know how those two bold initiatives have worked out. Americans rejected his Social Security privatization scheme by an overwhelming margin, and they are refusing to participate in his impossibly complicated, ridiculously overpriced and patently useless prescription-drug plan. Mission accomplished, eh? No wonder the President believes he is ready to tackle even bigger problems. The American health-care system certainly requires reform, with its unsustainable costs and unsatisfactory performance. Indeed, the awful defects of that system harm not only the uninsured and underserved, but even threaten the national economy, driving major corporations and millions of individual families toward bankruptcy. Unfortunately the President's "medical savings accounts," like his Social Security and Medicare schemes, are more likely to aggravate than to resolve those problems. By attracting younger and healthier insurance clients away from the "risk pools" of employer plans, the accounts will undermine the solvency of traditional insurance. The chief beneficiaries will be those who can take advantage of yet another tax shelter. Most Americans will get nothing, and many could lose their insurance if these tax breaks encourage employers to cut off insurance benefits. The President's plan risks precisely such perverse incentives by luring away the healthiest workers and forcing employer plans to pay higher premiums to serve older and sicker workers. Proponents of medical-savings accounts promise that they will provide "choice" to medical "consumers," as if buying health care were as simple and straightforward as purchasing groceries. People will make the best choices for themselves and budget their health purchases prudently. That will supposedly create competition, reduce spending and eventually lower costs. Similar assumptions lay behind the Social Security privatization and Medicare prescription-drug programs-but as it turns out, the world doesn't work as simply as the President and his ideological advisors would have us believe. The elderly (and their adult children) struggling to make sense of the Bush drug plan have learned that there can be such a thing as too much choice. They have no idea which plan will provide needed medications while saving money. They have no capacity to negotiate with drug companies to lower prices. They have no time for all of this nonsense. The Presidential fumbling over health care is opening up the most important opportunity for true reform since the debacle of the Clinton initiative. What Democrats should explain this time is that we can achieve quality universal coverage, cut the economic costs of the present system and reduce the burden on industry with a single-payer plan. Instead of cutting the Medicaid benefits provided to poor children, as the Republicans propose to do in the current federal budget, we could ensure that no American child will ever be deprived of care again. Instead of wasting $700 billion a year on extraneous expenses, we could capture those dollars to provide insurance to every family and individual. Instead of encouraging the most unhealthy behavior by consumers and the most inefficient behavior by providers, we could promote preventive care and best practices. The best way to drive down costs is not to impose greater costs on workers and families whose real wages have been falling for years. And forcing people to forgo clinic appointments to save money, as the medical-accounts model will do, will only discourage prevention and lead to more disease, more suffering and more waste. Bigger savings can be found in the bloated administrative budgets of private insurance companies and health-maintenance organizations, and in the extortionate prices charged by pharmaceutical companies. Skeptics should ponder the following statistic: Private health insurers spend as much as 30 percent of their budgets on administration, compared with the 2 percent spent by Medicare. Conventional wisdom dictates that universal single-payer health care is politically impossible. The special interests that profit exorbitantly from the current system are just too powerful. That perception is accurate, of course, but only if nobody has the courage and wit to mobilize the anger of dissatisfied voters. Those voters are waiting to hear a brave Democrat-perhaps a potential candidate for President-utter three words that remain taboo in conservative Washington.
Medicare for all.
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The Iran Crisis -- "Diplomacy" As A Launch Pad For Missiles By Norman Solomon The current flurry of Western diplomacy will probably turn out to be groundwork for launching missiles at Iran. Air attacks on targets in Iran are very likely. Yet many antiwar Americans seem eager to believe that won't happen. Illusion #1: With the U.S. military bogged down in Iraq, the Pentagon is in no position to take on Iran. But what's on the horizon is not an invasion -- it's a major air assault, which the American military can easily inflict on Iranian sites. (And if the task falls to the Israeli military, it is also well-equipped to bomb Iran.) Illusion #2: The Bush administration is in so much political trouble at home -- for reasons including its lies about Iraqi WMDs -- that it wouldn't risk an uproar from an attack on Iran. But the White House has been gradually preparing the domestic political ground for bombing Iran. As the Wall Street Journal reported on Feb. 3, "in recent polls a surprisingly large number of Americans say they would support U.S. military strikes to stop Tehran from getting the bomb." Above those words, the Journal's headline -- "U.S. Chooses Diplomacy on Iran's Nuclear Program" -- trumpeted the Bush administration's game plan. It's a time-honored scam: When you're moving toward aggressive military action, emphasize diplomacy. Donald Rumsfeld proclaimed at a conference in Munich on Feb. 4 that -- to put a stop to Iran's nuclear program -- the world should work for a "diplomatic solution." Yet the next day, the German daily newspaper Handelsblatt reports, Rumsfeld said in an interview: "All options including the military one are on the table." Top U.S. officials, inspired by the royal "W," aren't hesitating to speak for the world. Condoleezza Rice said: "The world will not stand by if Iran continues on the path to a nuclear weapons capability." Meanwhile, Rumsfeld declared: "The Iranian regime is today the world's leading state sponsor of terrorism. The world does not want, and must work together to prevent, a nuclear Iran." Translation: First we'll be diplomatic, then we can bomb. Illusion #3: The U.S. won't attack Iran because that would infuriate the millions of Iran-allied Shiites in Iraq, greatly damaging the U.S. war effort there. But projecting rationality onto the Bush administration makes little sense at this point. The people running U.S. foreign policy have their own priorities, and avoiding carnage is not one of them. Non-proliferation doesn't rank very high either, judging from Washington's cozy relationships with the nuclear-weapons powers of Israel, India and Pakistan. Unlike Iran, none of those countries are signatories to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Only Iran has been allowing inspections of its nuclear facilities -- and it is Iran that the savants in Washington are now, in effect, threatening to bomb. With sugar-plum visions of Iran's massive oil and natural-gas reserves dancing in their heads, the Washington neo-cons evidently harbor some farfetched hopes of bringing about the overthrow of the Iranian regime. But in the real world, an attack on Iran would strengthen its most extreme factions and fortify whatever interest it has in developing nuclear arms. "The U.S. will not solve the nuclear problem by threatening military strikes or by dragging Iran before the U.N. Security Council," Iran's 2003 Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi wrote in the Jan. 19 edition of the Los Angeles Times, in an oped piece co-authored by Muhammad Sahimi, a professor of chemical engineering at the University of Southern California. "Although a vast majority of Iranians despise the country's hard-liners and wish for their downfall, they also support its nuclear program because it has become a source of pride for an old nation with a glorious history." The essay added: "A military attack would only inflame nationalist sentiments. Iran is not Iraq. Given Iranians' fierce nationalism and the Shiites' tradition of martyrdom, any military move would provoke a response that would engulf the entire region, resulting in countless deaths and a ruined economy not only for the region but for the world. Imposing U.N. sanctions on Iran would also be counterproductive, prompting Tehran to leave the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and its 'additional protocol.' Is the world ready to live with such prospects?" While calling for international pressure against Iran's serious violations of human rights, Ebadi and Sahimi said that "Iran is at least six to 10 years away from a nuclear bomb, by most estimates. The crisis is not even a crisis. There is ample time for political reform before Iran ever develops the bomb." On Feb. 3, the Iranian Student News Agency quoted Iran's former president Muhammad Khatami, who urged the Iranian government to offer assurances that the country's nuclear program is only for generating electricity. "It is necessary to act wisely and with tolerance so that our right to nuclear energy will not be abolished," he said. Though he failed to develop much political traction for reform during his eight years as president, Khatami was a moderating force against human-rights abuses. His demagogic successor, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is a menace to human rights and peace. But it's by no means clear that Ahmadinejad can count on long-term support from the nation's ruling clerics. The man he defeated in the presidential runoff last summer, former president Hashemi Rafsanjani, wields significant power as head of the government's Expediency Council. Though he has a well-earned reputation as a corrupt opportunist, Rafsanjani is now a beacon of enlightenment compared to Ahmadinejad. In early January, a pair of Iran scholars -- Dariush Zahedi and Ali Ezzatyar, based at the University of California in Berkeley -- wrote an LA Times piece making this point: "Contrary to popular belief, the traditional conservative clerical establishment is apprehensive about the possibility of violence inside and outside Iran. It generally opposes an aggressive foreign policy and, having some intimate ties with Iran's dependent capitalist class, is appalled at the rapid slide of the economy since Ahmadinejad's inauguration. The value of Tehran's stock market has plunged $10 billion, the nation's vibrant real estate market has withered and capital outflows are increasing." And the scholars added pointedly: "The history of U.S.-Iran relations shows that the more Washington chastises Tehran for its nuclear ambitions, the more it plays into the hands of the radicals by riling up fear and nationalist sentiment."
Right now, the presidents of Iran and the United States are thriving
on the belligerency of the other. From all indications, a military
assault on Iran would boost Ahmadinejad's power at home. And it's a
good bet that the U.S. government will do him this enormous favor.
Unless we can prevent it.
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 Tale Of A Connecticut Donkey By Sheila Samples
Jim Bob came out of the feed store, threw his purchases into the back of the wagon and climbed up beside his wife. He picked up the reins, shook them and called out to the donkey -- "Giddy-up Joe! Come on, Joe, let's go!"
But Joe just stood there, oblivious to Jim Bob's pleading, his tongue-clickings, even to the lash of the reins on his rump. Jim Bob sighed, picked up the baseball bat, climbed down, walked around in front of Joe and, with a mighty swing, smashed him right between his long ears with the bat. Jim Bob hopped back into the wagon, grabbed the reins and, with a single, "Go, Joe!" the donkey headed off at a brisk trot.
Jim Bob's wife was horrified. "Why did you hit Joe in the head with that bat?" she asked.
Jim Bob grinned, "Sometimes ol' Joe forgets who's the boss here," he said. "When that happens, you just gotta get his attention..."
That was back in the day -- but little has changed since then. Donkeys are still stubborn. Especially on the political scene, where most are completely oblivious to what's going on around them. It's easy for some to forget who's the boss when they're free to gallop through the halls of power -- trot around with the big boys...
Unless you happen to be a Connecticut donkey.
Democrats in that very blue, anti-war state are unhappy with their three-term senator, Joe Lieberman, for his stubborn, rabid support of President Bush and his bloody, illegal war. They pleaded with Joe to recognize that the war on Iraq was planned long before 9-11, that there were no weapons of mass destruction in that pitiful, unarmed country, and that thousands of US citizens and tens of thousands of Iraqi men, women and children are being blown to pieces, maimed, and poisoned with depleted uranium -- all because of a lie.
But Joe refused to move. He responded by penning an op-ed in the Nov. 29, 2005 Wall Street Journal entitled " Our Troops Must Stay." In that piece, Lieberman "catapaulted the propaganda" that Iraq was experiencing a great deal of progress, underscored by "continuing security and growing prosperity." The Shiite south, he said, "remains largely free of terrorism, receives much more electric power and other public services than it did under Saddam, and is experiencing greater economic activity." And Lieberman said even the Sunni triangle -- Baghdad on the East, Tikrit to the North, and Ramadi to the West, where most American troops are slaughtered, is showing progress...
Warming to his subject, Lieberman wrote, "None of these remarkable changes in Iraq would have happened if Coalition Forces, lead (sic) by the U.S., had not overthrown Saddam Hussein ...The question is whether the American people and enough of their representatives in Congress from both parties understand this."
Lieberman then chided war naysayers on both sides of the aisle with, "I am disappointed by Democrats who are more focused on how President Bush took America into the war in Iraq almost three years ago, and Republicans who are more worried about whether the war will bring them down in next November's elections, than they are concerned about how we continue the progress in Iraq in the months and years ahead."
Lieberman underscored his stance in December by hitting the talk-show circuit to wrap himself in the flag and scold his anti-war constituents -- "It is time for Democrats who distrust President Bush to acknowledge ... that in matters of war we undermine presidential credibility at our nation's peril."
But Connecticut yankees are hard to fool. They know civil war is raging throughout Iraq. They know we are there under false pretenses. They know in November, while Lieberman was polishing his commentary, 88 American servicemen were killed. In December - 67, January - 65, and 15 in the first seven days of February - for a total of 235. They know there was never any reason for even one of the nearly 2,300 U.S. servicemen and women to die. They know a lie is not good enough reason to destroy an entire generation of Americans -- nor to remain silent to keep from embarrassing the man who sent them to their deaths.
In January, Democrats in Manchester attempted to get Lieberman's attention by overwhelmingly passing a resolution opposing his "unconditional support of President Bush." The measure stated that Lieberman was not acting in the best interest of the American public or the Democratic Party by supporting Bush in the handling of the Iraqi conflict.
Dorothy Brindamour, one of the many Democrats to speak out, said, "I think it is one thing to be an independent thinker. It's another thing to be a Democratic senator who is acting as a lobbyist for King George and his chancellor, Cheney."
Lieberman responded by trotting to the annual State of the Union speech on Jan. 31 and, when Bush defiantly claimed that the only exit plan from Iraq was "victory" in his noble war on terror, Lieberman was the lone Democrat to rise with the Republicans and give Bush a cheering, standing ovation.
Four days later, Windsor Democrats joined their Manchester counterparts and, with a mighty swing, bashed Lieberman right between the ears with a Vote of No Confidence "for embracing Bush's position on the war, including denying that the United States wrongly entered the war and that it was not accomplishing the objectives set out by the president."
Windsor Democratic town Chairman Tim Fitzgerald admitted the resolution was a "practical way" to get Lieberman's attention, but added he was "not delusional that this is going to change his fundamental way of thinking."
According to the Los Angeles Times, Lieberman's approval ratings in Connecticut are at a weak 52%, which puts him in a shaky political position, and sharks are beginning to circle for the upcoming August primary -- something the Democrats don't need right now. To make matters worse, Keith Crane, from Branford, not only created a "Dump Joe" Internet site, but shows up at meetings with fists full of anti-Lieberman buttons and bumper stickers.
What Lieberman's constituents don't understand is that his stubborn defense of the Iraq war in all probability goes much deeper than mere support of Bush's war on terror. Rising numbers of innocents sent to early graves in an unending war is the price that Lieberman and others within the U.S. government -- willingly or unwillingly -- are committed to pay in order to keep Israel safe from madmen such as Iranian President Mahmooud Ahmadinejad who has openly called for Israel to be "wiped off the map."
Lieberman, like so many of his congressional peers, has sworn to do whatever it takes to protect Israel, and all appear to be blinded by ideology. Therefore, they are condemned to show up for work morning after morning in a chamber that reeks of blood.
U.S. politicians have removed their fingers from the pulse of the nation. They have forgotten who's the boss. Face it -- if you're an elected political animal who refuses to move, refuses to pay attention; refuses to pull the state wagon -- you could likely find yourself "put out to pasture" in the next election.
Especially if you're a Connecticut donkey.
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 Heil Bush, Dear Taufer Hochwerden Phelps, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your turning up at servicemen's funerals telling the grieving paernts their son or daughter was killed by god because they were gay, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Religous Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at the "Fuhrer Bunker" formally 'The White House' on 03-15-2006. We salute you herr Phelps, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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AUSTIN, Texas -- I like to think that Republicans are having fun. They're such cards. What a wheeze, what a jape. Talking about energy independence in the State of the Union Address! President Bush said, "America is addicted to oil" and we will "break this addiction." Oh what a good trick to see if anyone thought he actually meant it!
I'm not going to embarrass the perennial suckers who fell for it by identifying them, but I assure you they include some well-known names in journalism. Boy, I bet they feel like fools, having written those optimistic columns pointing to how Bush had made a fine proposal -- cut oil imports from the Middle East by 75 percent by 2025 -- and people should take it seriously and stop dissing him.
Of course, the next day the administration trotted out Energy Secretary Sam Bodman and Alan Hubbard, director of the president's National Economic Council, to assure us the president didn't mean it. Bodman explained, "That was purely an example." A 'for instance.' Like, we could set a goal like that. Actually, we could do that without breaking a sweat: set fuel efficiency standards at 40 miles per gallon in 10 years (hybrids already get higher mileage now), and you save 2.5 million barrels a day, just what we import now from the Mideast.
According to Knight Ridder, "Asked why the president used the words 'the Middle East' when he didn't really mean them, one administration official said Bush wanted to dramatize the issue in a way that 'every American sitting out there listening to the speech understands.' The official spoke only on condition of anonymity because he feared that his remarks might get him into trouble."
Aw. Let's see, Bush lied so "every American sitting out there listening to the speech understands." It's our fault. We're so dumb, if he doesn't lie, we don't get it. Of course, those sophisticates who pay attention to stuff like the budget, where they decide how to spend the money, were already aware that the $150 million (a truly pitiful amount by Washington standards) Bush promised would go to making biofuels more competitive is $50 million less than what was in last year's budget for that purpose.
But, you are not to assume that Bush has given up on the Dick Cheney plan to drill our way to energy independence just because he didn't mention it in his speech. Last month, the Department of Interior released a plan that will open 590,000 acres in Alaska's Western Arctic Reserve for drilling. The land has been protected for decades.
The head of the Natural Resources Defense Council's Alaska Project, Chuck Clusen, said: "Scientists, sportsmen and conservation groups all agree we should protect the last 13 percent of the most sensitive habitat in the Western Arctic's Northeast area. Eighty-seven percent was already open. The Bureau of Land Management decided to hand all of it over to the oil companies. ... We can drill every last acre of wilderness, and it won't make us any more secure. We only have 3 percent of the world's oil, and the Middle East has 66 percent. Do the math. We can't drill our way to energy independence."
What a good joke.
And this guy Boehner, John Boehner, the new Republican majority leader, elected because of Tom DeLay's unfortunate indictment, what a gagster this guy is, what a zany madcap. He ran as a reform candidate! Har, har, har, har! This is a guy who's up to his neck in the K Street Project, in which conservative lobbyists and politicians walk hand-in-hand. Boehner has such a highly developed sense of ethics, he once distributed checks from the tobacco lobby on the floor of the House of Representatives.
But now that he's been elected, it's time to get serious, and Boehner has already backed away from Speaker Dennis Hastert's proposal to actually ban (gasp!) gifts and trips from lobbyists. Boehner figures it's enough just to report them. That'll take care of everything.
I tell you, this bunch of cut-ups just keeps the fun coming. Just a few weeks ago, the House of Representatives cut $16 billion from Medicaid over 10 years, which means states will increase co-payments on poor people and drop preventive care -- which will cost more in the long run, but what the hey. They also cut $12.7 billion in student aid and loan programs over five years, because who needs that? And cut another $1.5 billion in child support enforcement in the next year, which is positively brilliant and will result in a drop of at least $8.4 billion in child support collected over the next 10 years. Oh, and a measly cut of $577 million in foster care over five years, making it harder to take care of neglected and abused children, who probably did something to deserve it in the first place.
Now here's a little howler: Bush proposes cutting $36 billion from Medicare over the next five years only ... wait for it ... he's not cutting the money, he's saving it! A $36 billion Medicare savings. That's so clever.
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For further evidence of why Democrats should be falling in behind Jack Murtha and making him the point man for nationalizing the '06 elections, look no further than the editorial page of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.
After steadfastly deriding Murtha's call for immediately withdrawal, the conservative daily, fast on the heels of Murtha's Jan. 15th appearance on "60 Minutes," did an abrupt 180 and offered a ringing endorsement of his plan.
What makes this so significant is not the Tribune-Review's reach (circulation 102,000) but its provenance. It's part of a seven-paper chain that is published -- and controlled -- by Richard Mellon Scaife, the arch-conservative icon who has donated so much money to conservative causes and institutions that the Washington Post dubbed him the "Funding Father of the Right."
Besides infamously backing the American Spectator's smear-Clinton Arkansas Project, Scaife has given hundreds of millions of dollars to a who's who of right-leaning groups including the Heritage Foundation, the American Enterprise Institute, Judicial Watch, the Federalist Society, Paul Weyrich's Free Congress Foundation, David Horowitz's Center for the Study of Popular Culture, Brent Bozell's Media Research Center, and many others. He's also part owner of NewsMax.
Since Murtha's emergence as a critic of the war, Scaife's flagship paper has been critical of his stance, mirroring the White House talking point that withdrawal will only " embolden America's terrorist enemies."
"We respect Mr. Murtha," the Tribune-Review editorialized on December 7. " We think his call for immediate withdrawal is wrong. And now we think he'd better start measuring his words."
On December 14th, on the eve of Iraq's parliamentary elections, the paper, echoing President Bush, wrote, " Defeatism is not a strategy but a millstone around the necks of brave Americans and Iraqis fighting for freedom. We do not accept cut-and-run."
Then came Murtha's appearance on "60 Minutes," in which he powerfully made the case that Iraq is not now a war against terror (if it ever was one) but has become a civil war -- a civil war that our presence is only exacerbating.
Two days later, the Tribune-Review abruptly changed course. " We didn't agree with Jack Murtha in November when he called for an immediate withdrawal of United States forces from Iraq. The timing wasn't right. But times have changed... This is not retreat. This is not cut-and-run. This is a recognition of the reality in Iraq -- one that has evolved into an Iraqi problem that only the Iraqis now can solve."
Murtha's ability to coalesce concerns conservatives are already having and move the needle on Iraq is one of the reasons the White House is so worried and trying to define opposition to the war as "isolationism." If Murtha can peel off a die-hard conservative like Scaife, how many hundreds of thousands -- millions? -- of Republicans are on the verge of abandoning the president on his signature initiative?
Karl Rove, who has a PhD in the ways of the conservative mind, knows that a distrust of imperial adventures, nation building, and a blank check approach to government are deeply engrained in it. The claim that bringing democracy to Iraq -- and keeping our troops there to ensure it -- is crucial to our national security is becoming a harder and harder sell.
Richard Mellon Scaife is no longer buying it. How long before others of his ilk follow suit and it becomes increasingly difficult to portray a demand for troop withdrawal as a left-wing, peacenik, unpatriotic position?
The big question remains: Will the Democrats finally recognize the significance of the Murtha Effect and put his message front and center?
P.S. The Republican Majority Leader of the New York Senate, Joseph Bruno, came out against the war late last week: "get the troops out of there."
P.P.S. Contrast the Murtha Effect with the conventional wisdom that the Murtha call for withdrawal backfired on Democrats.
... Steve Benson ...  |
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I still remember it was autumn and the moon was shining
I walked up back to speak to this southern funky school teacher
Go! Get out of Denver, baby, go, go
Well, all red lights were flashing and the sirens were screaming screaming
The rain was driving but the Caddy kept on burning rubber
He said, Go! Get out of Denver, baby, go, go
Scat................... go, go
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Parting Shots...
 Baby Jesus Cartoons and Comix are available exclusively to Landover Baptist Church Members True Christian(tm) children love Baby Jesus Cartoons! What better way to demonstrate the importance of God's word than in the form of a comic strip? Join Baby Jesus, Daddy God, and their flying sidekick, The Holy Ghost on a fun filled adventure through the Holy Bible! See the sample cartoons below to view the timeless truths of scripture paraphrased so even an unsaved moron could understand them!
 "1 Corinthians 6:9"
(c) 2006 The Landover Baptist Church |
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Issues & Alibis Vol 6 # 06 (c) 02/10/2006
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In This Edition
Senator Russ Feingold orates, "I Strongly Oppose Patriot Act Deal."
Uri Avnery reveals the racism that is, "The Secret Of Kadima."
Sam Harris gives his, "Response To Reader Comments And Criticism."
Jim Hightower listens as, "President Pinocchio Speaks To The Nation."
Bill Maher reports, "Anti-Muslim Cartoons Are A Riot."
Eric Alterman explains why, "Lies About Blowjobs, Bad. Wars? Not So Much."
Robert Scheer says, "Dream On, Condi."
Robert Parry explains why I'm an independent in, "Democratic Leaders 'Betray' Hackett."
Joe Conason reminds us that, "Bush's Tough Oil Talk Lasted About 24 Hours."
Norman Solomon follows, "Cheney's Dodge: Taking Responsibility."
William Rivers Pitt compares, "The Wack-Pack."
Ann Coulter wins the coveted, "Vidkun Quisling Award!"
Molly Ivins watches as, "Cheney Shoots A Texas Liberal."
Arianna Huffington listens as, "Cheney Talks, The Coverup Continues."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department 'The Whitehouse.Org' presents "Ask the Whitehouse: Ann Coulter" but first Uncle Ernie sez oh look out now, "Cheney's Got A Gun."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Justin Bilicki with additional cartoons from Tom Tomorrow, Micah Wright, Pablo On Politics, Studio Bendib, Steve Greenberg, Fuller, Starr Buzz.Com, The Hollywood Liberal.Com and ZB.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Cheney's Got A Gun By Ernest Stewart
Cheney's got a gun The whole worlds come undone Now everybody is on the run! With apologies to Aerosmith's --- Janie's Got A Gun
 A normal person might think the president of vice attempted a little murder as most people can tell the difference between a full grown man and a tiny quail but then again when you look back at the disaster that the Junta has brought not only to America but to the world this is pretty much par for the course. Not since little Dick went duck hunting with Tony (light-fingers) Scalia to make sure that the Gang of Five(tm) knew how to rule on certain cases before it, has the vice-fuhrer made such a faux pax. I guess that this is all the work of Karl (little Caesar) Rove who is desperate to keep the world from looking behind the curtain as we ratchet up for yet another oil war. It has that certain je ne sais quoi, that certain odor of the Crime Family Bush does it not? Or perhaps it was simply that old dead eye just drank his lunch? Which would explain his Chappaquiddick like disappearance until he could blow a straight result! I guess if Dickie hadn't been to busy in school (getting all those deferments) to go and risk his worthless ass in the Nam we'd have won the war? Funny all these macho dudes chickened out when they had the opportunity but they have no problems sending our kids off to slaughter other kids and be slaughtered themselves. As a lot of young folks have found out in Iraq there are worse things than being killed. I've always thought that before some dumb kid can enlist in the service they should be made to watch the motion picture, "Johnny Got His Gun" and listen to Metallica's One which is our song of the week in the "To End On A Happy Note" department below. I see where they're still spinning Bush's SOTU speech. Apparently every single word, sentence and paragraph was a lie, well DUH! And yet everyone of those lies was met with a standing ovation from the crooks and thieves of the House and Senate; everyone of which knew better. I wonder America how much longer are you going to put up with these monsters? We have the best House and Senate that money can buy and almost none of them are working for the people. Not a single one isn't guilty of taking bribes from the corpo-rats. What will it take I wonder before the Matrixed Sheeple finally see the light? My guess is when American cities start sprouting mushroom clouds above them and our new death camps open for the general public! After all you rolled over and went back to sleep after witnessing, treason, sedition, mass murder, war crimes, torture, the destruction of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, the theft of trillions of dollars, the illegal immoral war, not to mention 911 and the 3000 American dead that they caused to happen. Some say the correct figures on American war dead now tops 9,000 and wounded nearly 30,000 not the 2300 or so dead and 15,000 wounded that they'll cop to; all so our corpo-rat masters can rule the world. How much more America, how much more must happen before you're ready to face the truth? Before you scream out your window, "I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore! ********************************************
We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
 I Strongly Oppose Patriot Act Deal By Senator Russ Feingold Statement of US Senator Russ Feingold as prepared for delivery from the Senate floor, February 15, 2006. Mr. President, it will come as no surprise that I'd like to talk about the Patriot Act today. I strongly oppose proceeding to consideration of S. 2271, which is legislation introduced by some of my friends and colleagues to implement the deal on the Patriot Act that was struck with the White House last week. Some may argue that there's no harm in passing a bill that could charitably be described as trivial. But protecting the rights of law-abiding Americans is not trivial. And passage of S. 2271 is the first step toward passage of the flawed Patriot Act conference report. I will oppose both measures and I am prepared to explain at length my reasons for doing so. While I greatly respect the Senators who negotiated this deal, I am gravely disappointed in the outcome. The White House would agree to only a few minor changes to the same Patriot Act conference report that could not get through the Senate back in December. These changes do not address the major problems with the Patriot Act that a bipartisan coalition has been trying to fix for the past several years. They are, quite frankly a fig leaf to allow those who were fighting hard to improve the Act to now step down, claim victory, and move on. What a hollow victory that would be, and what a complete reversal of the strong bipartisan consensus that we saw in this body just a couple months ago. What we are seeing is quite simply a capitulation to the intransigent and misleading rhetoric of a White House that sees any effort to protect civil liberties as a sign of weakness. Protecting American values is not weakness, Mr. President. Standing on principle is not weakness. And committing to fighting terrorism aggressively without compromising the rights and freedoms this country was founded upon - that's not weakness either. We've come too far and fought too hard to agree to reauthorize the Patriot Act without fixing any of the major problems with the Act. A few insignificant, face-savings changes just don't cut it. I cannot support this deal, and I strongly oppose proceeding to legislation that will implement it. I understand the pressure that my colleagues have been under on this issue, and I appreciate all the hard work that they have done on the Patriot Act. It has been very gratifying to work on a bipartisan basis on this issue. It is unfortunate that the White House is so obviously trying to make this into a partisan issue, because it sees some political advantage to doing so. Whether the White House likes it or not, this will continue to be an issue where both Democrats and Republicans have concerns, and we will continue to work together for changes to the law. I am sure of that. But I will also continue to strongly oppose any reauthorization of the Patriot Act that does not protect the rights and freedoms of law-abiding Americans with no connection to terrorism. This deal does not meet that standard - it doesn't even come close. I urge my colleagues to oppose it, and therefore I ask that they oppose proceeding to this legislation. I wanted to take some time today to lay out the background and the context for this ongoing debate over the Patriot Act, a debate that will not end with the reauthorization of the sixteen provisions that are now set to expire on March 10. And I would like to discuss my concerns about this reauthorization deal with some specificity. Mr. President, because I was the only Senator to vote against the Patriot Act in 2001, I want to be very clear from the start. I am not opposed to reauthorization of the Patriot Act. I supported the bipartisan, compromise reauthorization bill that the Senate passed last July without a single Senator objecting. I believe that bill should become law. The Senate reauthorization bill is not a perfect bill, but it is a good bill. If that were the bill we had considered back in December or the bill we were considering today, I would speak in support of it. In fact, we could have completed the process of reauthorizing the Patriot Act months ago if the House had taken up the bill that the Senate approved without any objections. I also want to respond to those who argue that people who are continuing to call for a better reauthorization package want to let the Patriot Act expire. That is nonsense. Not a single member of this body is calling for any provision of the Patriot Act to expire. There are any number of ways that we can reauthorize the Act while amending its most problematic provisions and I am not prepared to support reauthorization without adequate reforms. Let me also be clear about how this process fell apart at the end of last year and how we ended up having to extend the Patriot Act temporarily past the end of 2005. In December this body, in one of its prouder moments in recent years, refused to let through a badly flawed conference report. A bipartisan group of Senators stood together and demanded further changes. We made very clear what we were asking for. We laid out five issues that needed to be addressed to get our support. Let me read some excerpts from a letter that we sent explaining our concerns: The draft conference report would allow the government to obtain sensitive personal information on a mere showing of relevance. This would allow government fishing expeditions. As business groups like the US Chamber of Commerce have argued, the government should be required to convince a judge that the records they are seeking have some connection to a suspected terrorist or spy. The draft conference report does not permit the recipient of a Section 215 order to challenge its automatic, permanent gag order. Courts have held that similar restrictions violate the First Amendment. The recipient of a Section 215 order is entitled to meaningful judicial review of the gag order. The draft conference report does not provide meaningful judicial review of an NSL's gag order. It requires the court to accept as conclusive the government's assertion that a gag order should not be lifted, unless the court determines the government is acting in bad faith. The recipients of NSLs are entitled to meaningful judicial review of a gag order. The draft conference report does not sunset the NSL authority. In light of recent revelations about possible abuses of NSLs, the NSL provision should sunset in no more than four years so that Congress will have an opportunity to review the use of this power. The draft conference report requires the government to notify the target of a "sneak and peek" search no earlier than 30 days after the search, rather than within seven days, as the Senate bill provides and as pre-Patriot Act judicial decisions required. The conference report should include a presumption that notice will be provided within a significantly shorter period in order to better protect Fourth Amendment rights. The availability of additional 90-day extensions means that a shorter initial time frame should not be a hardship on the government. That is from a letter that we sent late last year. Now, you might ask, in this newly announced deal on the Patriot Act, have any of these five problems been solved? The answer is "No." Not a single one. Only one of these issues has been even partially addressed by this deal. The White House applied immense pressure and pulled out its usual scare tactics, and succeeded in convincing people to accept a deal that makes only a tiny substantive improvement to the bill that was rejected in December. This is simply not acceptable. I want to explain in detail my biggest concerns with the conference report, as modified by S. 2271, the legislation that the majority leader is seeking to take up. But first I want to clear up one frequent misconception. I have never advocated repeal of any portion of the Patriot Act. In fact, as I have said repeatedly over the past four years, I supported most of that bill. There are many good provisions in that bill. As my colleagues know, the Patriot Act did a lot more than expand our surveillance laws. Among other things, it set up a national network to prevent and detect electronic crimes, like the sabotage of the nation's financial sector; it established a counterterrorism fund to help Justice Department offices disabled in terrorist attacks keep operating; and it changed the money laundering laws to make them more useful in disrupting the financing of terrorist organizations. One section even condemned discrimination against Arab and Muslim Americans. Even some of the Act's surveillance sections were reasonable. One provision authorized the FBI to expedite the hiring of translators. Another added terrorism and computer crimes to the list of crimes for which criminal wiretap orders could be sought. And some provisions helped to bring down what has been termed "the wall" that had built up between intelligence and law enforcement agencies. Whenever we start debating the Patriot Act, we hear a lot of people saying that we must reauthorize the Patriot Act in order to ensure that the wall does not go back up. So let me make this clear. I supported the information sharing provisions of the Patriot Act. One of the key lessons we learned in the wake of September 11 was that our intelligence and law enforcement agencies were not sharing information with each other, even where the statutes permitted it. Unfortunately, the wall was not so much a legal problem as it was a problem of culture. The report of the 9/11 Commission made that clear. And I'm sorry to report that we have not made as much progress as we should have in bringing down those very significant cultural barriers to information sharing among our agencies. The 9/11 Commission report card that was issued toward the end of last year gave the government a "D" for information sharing because our agencies' cultures have not changed enough. As the statement issued by Chairman Kean and Vice Chairman Hamilton explained, "You can change the law, you can change the technology, but you still need to change the culture. You still need to motivate institutions and individuals to share information." And so far, our government has not met this challenge. Talking about the importance of information sharing, as Administration officials and other supporters of the conference report have done repeatedly, is part of a pattern that started several years ago. Rather than engage in a true debate on the controversial parts of the Patriot Act, as some in this body have done - to their credit - during this reauthorization process, many proponents of the Patriot Act just point to non-controversial provisions of the Patriot Act and talk about how important they are. They say this bill must be passed because it reauthorizes those non-controversial provisions. That does not advance the debate, it just muddies the waters. We don't have to accept bad provisions to make sure the good provisions become law. Mr. President, today I do want to advance the debate. I want to spend some time explaining my specific concerns with the conference report and the deal that was struck to make a few minor changes to it. It is very unfortunate that the whole Congress could not come together as the Senate did around the Senate's bipartisan, compromise reauthorization bill. Back in July, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted unanimously in favor of a reauthorization bill that made meaningful changes to the most controversial provisions of the Patriot Act to protect the rights and freedoms of innocent Americans. Shortly thereafter, that bill passed the full Senate by unanimous consent. It was not easy for me to support that Senate bill, which fell short of the improvements contained in the bipartisan SAFE Act. But at the end of the day, the Senate bill contained meaningful changes to some of the most problematic provisions of the Patriot Act - provisions that I have been trying to fix since October 2001 - and I decided to support it. I made it very clear at the time, however, that I viewed that bill as the end point of negotiations, not the beginning. In fact, I specifically warned my colleagues "that the conference process must not be allowed to dilute the safeguards in this bill." Mr. President, I meant it, but it appears that people either weren't listening or weren't taking me seriously. This conference report as slightly modified by this deal, unfortunately, does not contain many important reforms to the Patriot Act that we passed here in the Senate. So I cannot support it. And I will fight it. I want to remind my colleagues of the serious problems with the Patriot Act that we have been discussing for several years. Let me start with Section 215, the so-called "library" provision, which has received so much public attention. I remember when the former Attorney General of the United States called the librarians who were expressing disagreement with this provision "hysterical." What a revelation it was when the Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, the Senator from Pennsylvania, opened his questioning of the current Attorney General during his confirmation hearing by expressing concern about this provision of the Patriot Act. He got the Attorney General to concede that yes, in fact, this provision probably went a bit too far and could be improved and clarified. That was an extraordinary moment. It was a moment that was very slow in coming, and long overdue. And I give credit to the Senator from Pennsylvania because it allowed us to start having a real debate on the Patriot Act. But credit also has to go to the American people who stood up, despite the dismissive and derisive comments of government officials, and said with loud voices - the Patriot Act needs to be changed. These voices came from the left and the right, from big cities and small towns all across the country. So far, more than 400 state and local government bodies have passed resolutions calling for revisions to the Patriot Act. I plan to read some of those resolutions on the floor during this debate. There are a lot of them. And nearly every one mentions Section 215. Section 215 is at the center of this debate over the Patriot Act. It is also one of the provisions that I tried unsuccessfully to amend here on this floor in October 2001. So it makes sense to start my discussion of the specific problems I have with the conference report with the infamous "library" provision. Section 215 of the Patriot Act allows the government to obtain secret court orders in domestic intelligence investigations to get all kinds of business records about people, including not just library records, but also medical records and various other types of business records. The Patriot Act allowed the government to obtain these records as long as they were "sought for" a terrorism investigation. That's a very low standard. It didn't require that the records concern someone who was suspected of being a terrorist or spy, or even suspected of being connected to a terrorist or spy. It didn't require any demonstration of how the records would be useful in the investigation. Under Section 215, if the government simply said it wanted records for a terrorism investigation the secret FISA court was required to issue the order - period. To make matters worse, recipients of these orders are also subject to an automatic gag order. They cannot tell anyone that they have been asked for records. Now some in the Administration, and even in this body, took the position that people shouldn't be able to criticize these provisions until they could come up with a specific example of "abuse." The Attorney General has repeatedly made that same argument, and he did so again in December in an op-ed in the Washington Post when he dismissed concerns about the Patriot Act by saying that "[t]here have been no verified civil liberties abuses in the four years of the act's existence." First of all, that has always struck me as a strange argument since 215 orders are issued by a secret court and people who receive them are prohibited by law from discussing them. In other words, the law is designed so that it's almost impossible to know if abuses have occurred. But even more importantly, the claim about lack of abuses just isn't credible given what we now know about how this Administration views the surveillance laws that this body writes. We now know that for the past four-plus years, the government has been wiretapping the international communications of Americans inside the United States, without obtaining the wiretap orders required by statute. You want to talk about abuses? I can't imagine a more shocking example of an abuse of power, than to violate the law by eavesdropping on American citizens without first getting a court order based on some evidence that they are possibly criminals, terrorists or spies. So I don't want to hear again from the Attorney General or anyone on this floor that this government has shown it can be trusted to use the power we give it with restraint and care. The government should not have the kind of broad, intrusive powers in Section 215 - not this government, not any government. And the American people shouldn't have to live with a poorly drafted provision that clearly allows for the records of innocent Americans to be searched and just hope that the government uses it with restraint. A government of laws doesn't require its citizens to rely on the good will and good faith of those who have these powers - especially when adequate safeguards can be written into the laws without compromising their usefulness as a law enforcement tool. After lengthy and difficult negotiations, the Judiciary Committee came up with language that achieved that goal. It would require the government to convince a judge that a person has some connection to terrorism or espionage before obtaining their sensitive records. And when I say some connection, that's what I mean. The Senate bill's standard is the following: (1) that the records pertain to a terrorist or spy; (2) that the records pertain to an individual in contact with or known to a suspected terrorist or spy; or (3) that the records are relevant to the activities of a suspected terrorist or spy. That's the three prong test in the Senate bill and I think it is more than adequate to give law enforcement the power it needs to conduct investigations, while also protecting the rights of innocent Americans. It would not limit the types of records that the government could obtain, and it does not go as far to protect law-abiding Americans as I might prefer, but it would make sure the government cannot go on fishing expeditions into the records of innocent people. The Senate bill also would give recipients of a 215 order an explicit, meaningful right to challenge those orders and the accompanying gag orders in court. These provisions passed the Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously after tough negotiations late into the night. As anyone familiar with the Judiciary Committee knows, that's no easy feat. The conference report did away with this delicate compromise. First, and most importantly, it does not contain the critical modification to the standard for Section 215 orders. The Senate bill permits the government to obtain business records only if it can satisfy one or more prongs of the three prong test. This is a broad standard with a lot of flexibility. But it retains the core protection that the government cannot go after someone who has no connection whatsoever to a terrorist or spy or their activities. The conference report replaces the three prong test with a simple relevance standard. It then provides a presumption of relevance if the government meets one of the three prongs. It is silly to argue that this is adequate protection against a fishing expedition. The only actual requirement in the conference report is that the government show that those records are relevant to an authorized intelligence investigation. Relevance is a very broad standard that could arguably justify the collection of all kinds of information about law-abiding Americans. The three prongs now are just examples of how the government can satisfy the relevance standard. That is not simply a loophole or an exception that swallows the rule. The exception is the rule. I'll try to make this as straightforward as I can. The Senate bill requires the government to satisfy one of three tests. Each test requires some connection between the records and a suspected terrorist or spy. The conference report says that the government only is required to satisfy a new, fourth test, which is relevance, and which does not require a connection between the records and a suspect. The other three tests no longer provide any protections at all. This issue was perhaps the most significant reason that I and others objected to the conference report. So how was this issue addressed by the White House deal to get the support of some Senators? It wasn't. Not one change was made on the standard for obtaining Section 215 orders. That is a grave disappointment. The White House refused to make any changes at all. Not only would it not accept the Senate version of Section 215, which no member of this body objected to back in July, it wouldn't make any change in the conference report on this issue at all. Another significant problem with the conference report that was rejected back in December was that it does not authorize judicial review of the gag order that comes with a Section 215 order. While some have argued that the review by the FISA court of a government application for a Section 215 order is equivalent to judicial review of the accompanying gag order, that is simply inaccurate. The statute does not give the FISA court any latitude to make an individualized decision about whether to impose a gag order when it issues a Section 215 order. It is required by statute to include a gag order in every Section 215 order. That means the gag order is automatic and permanent in every case. This is a serious deficiency, one that very likely violates the First Amendment. In litigation challenging a similar permanent, automatic gag rule in a National Security Letter statute, two courts have found First Amendment violations because there is no individualized evaluation of the need for secrecy. I have those decisions here. Perhaps I'll have a chance to read them during this debate. Now, this question of judicial review of the Section 215 gag order is one issue that actually is addressed by the White House deal. Addressed, but not solved. Far from it. Under the deal, there is judicial review of Section 215 gag orders, but it can only take place after a year has passed and can only be successful if the recipient of the Section 215 order proves that that government has acted in bad faith. As many of us have argued in the context of National Security Letters, that is a virtually impossible standard to meet. We need meaningful judicial review of these gag orders, not just the illusion of it. I do want to acknowledge one change made by the White House deal that I think is an improvement over the conference report. The conference report clarifies that recipients of both Section 215 orders and National Security Letters - which I will talk about in detail in a moment - can consult an attorney. But it also includes a provision that appears to require the recipients of these letters to notify the FBI if they consult with an attorney and to identify the attorney to the FBI. Obviously, this could have a significant chilling effect on the right to counsel. The deal struck with the White House makes clear that recipients of Section 215 orders and National Security Letters would not have to tell the FBI if they consult with an attorney. That is an improvement over the conference report, but unfortunately it is only one relatively minor change. Mr. President, let me turn next to a very closely related provision that has finally been getting the attention it deserves: National Security Letters, or NSLs, an authority that was expanded by Sections 358 and 505 of the Patriot Act. This NSL issue has flown under the radar for years, even though many of us have been trying to bring more public attention to it. I'm gratified that we are finally talking about NSLs, in large part due to a lengthy Washington Post story published last year on the use of these authorities. What are NSLs, and why are they such a concern? Let me spend a little time on this because it really is important. National Security Letters are issued by the FBI to businesses to obtain certain types of records. So they are similar to Section 215 orders, but with one very critical difference. The government does not need to get any court approval whatsoever to issue them. It doesn't have to go to the FISA court and make even the most minimal showing. It simply issues the order signed by the Special Agent in Charge of a Field Office or some other FBI headquarters official. NSLs can only be used to obtain certain categories of business records, while Section 215 orders can be used to obtain "any tangible thing." But even the categories reachable by an NSL are quite broad. NSLs can be used to obtain three types of business records: subscriber and transactional information related to Internet and phone usage; credit reports; and financial records, a category that has been expanded to include records from all kinds of everyday businesses like jewelers, car dealers, travel agents and even casinos. Just as with Section 215, the Patriot Act expanded the NSL authorities to allow the government to use them to obtain records of people who are not suspected of being, or even of being connected to, terrorists or spies. The government need only certify that the documents are either sought for or relevant to an authorized intelligence investigation, a far-reaching standard that could be used to obtain all kinds of records about innocent Americans. And just as with Section 215, the recipient is subject to an automatic, permanent gag rule. The conference report does little to fix the problems with the National Security Letter authorities. In fact, it could be argued that it makes the law worse. Let me explain why. First, the conference report does nothing to fix the standard for issuing an NSL. It leaves in place the breathtakingly broad relevance standard. Now, some have analogized NSLs to grand jury subpoenas, which are issued by grand juries in criminal investigations to obtain records that are relevant to the crime they are investigating. So, the argument goes, what is the big deal if NSLs are also issued under a relevance standard for intelligence investigations? Two critical differences make that analogy break down very quickly. First of all, the key question is: Relevant to what? In criminal cases, grand juries are investigating specific crimes, the scope of which is explicitly defined in the criminal code. Although the grand jury is quite powerful, the scope of its investigation is limited by the particular crime it is investigating. In sharp contrast, intelligence investigations are, by definition, extremely broad. When you are gathering information in an intelligence investigation, anything could potentially be relevant. Suppose the government believes a suspected terrorist visited Los Angeles in the last year or so. It might then want to obtain and keep the records of everyone who has stayed in every hotel in LA, or booked a trip to LA through a travel agent, over the past couple years, and it could argue strongly that that information is relevant to a terrorism investigation because it would be useful to run all those names through the terrorist watch list. Now, I don't have any reason to believe that such broad use of NSLs is happening. But the point is that when you are talking about intelligence investigations, "relevance" is a very different concept than in criminal investigations. It is certainly conceivable that NSLs could be used for that kind of broad dragnet in an intelligence investigation. Nothing in current law prevents it. The nature of criminal investigations and intelligence investigations is different, and let's not forget that. Second, the recipients of grand jury subpoenas are not subject to the automatic secrecy that NSL recipients are. We should not underestimate the power of allowing public disclosure when the government overreaches. In 2004, federal officials withdrew a grand jury subpoena issued to Drake University for a list of participants in an antiwar protest because of public revelations about the demand. That could not have happened if the request had been under Section 215 or for records available via the NSL authorities. Unfortunately, there are many other reasons why the conference report does so little good on NSLs. Let's talk next about judicial review. The conference report creates the illusion of judicial review for NSLs, both for the letters themselves and for the accompanying gag rule, but if you look at the details, it is drafted in a way that makes that review virtually meaningless. With regard to the NSLs themselves, the conference report permits recipients to consult their lawyer and seek judicial review, but it also allows the government to keep all of its submissions secret and not share them with the challenger, regardless of whether there are national security interests at stake. So you can challenge the order, but you have no way of knowing what the government is telling the court in response to your challenge. The parties could be arguing about something as garden variety as attorney-client privilege, with no national security issues, and the government would have the ability to keep its submission secret. That is a serious departure from our usual adversarial process, and it is very disturbing. The other significant problem with the judicial review provisions is the standard for getting the gag rule overturned. In order to prevail, the recipient has to prove that any certification by the government that disclosure would harm national security or impair diplomatic relations was made in bad faith. This is a standard of review that is virtually impossible to meet. So what we have is the illusion of judicial review. When you look behind the words in the statute, you realize it's just a mirage. Does the White House deal address these problems? It does not. In fact, as I have already discussed, it expands that same very troubling standard of review to judicial review of Section 215 gag orders. The modifications to the conference report agreed to by the White House do contain one other purported change to one of the NSL statutes. This modification states that the FBI cannot issue an NSL for transactional and subscriber information about telephone and Internet usage to a library unless the library is offering "electronic communication services" as defined in the statute. But that just restates the existing requirements of the NSL statute, which currently applies only to entities - libraries or otherwise - that provide "electronic communication services." So that provision has no real legal effect whatsoever. Perhaps that explains why the American Library Association issued a statement calling this provision a "fig leaf" and expressing disappointment that so many Senators have agreed to this deal. I also want to take a moment to address, again, an argument that has been made about the NSL provisions of the conference report. It has been argued that many of the complaints I have about the NSL provisions of the conference report apply equally to the NSL provisions of the Senate bill. And because I supported the Senate bill, by some convoluted theory my complaints are therefore invalid and I should support the conference report. Mr. President, that just makes no sense. The NSL section of the Senate bill was one of the worst sections of the bill. I didn't like it then, and I don't like it now. But in the context of the larger package of reforms that were in the Senate bill, including the important changes to Section 215 that I talked about earlier and the new time limit on "sneak and peek" search warrants that I will talk about in a moment, I was able to accept that NSL section even though I would have preferred additional reforms. Now, the argument has been made that after supporting a compromise package for its good parts, I am supposed to accept a conference report that has the bad parts of the package even though the good parts have been stripped out. That is just nonsense, and every member of this chamber who has ever agreed to a compromise - and I must assume that includes every single one of us - knows it. The other point I want to emphasize here is that the Senate bill was passed before the Post reported about the use of NSLs and the difficulties that the gag rule poses for businesses that feel they are being unfairly burdened by them. At the very least, I would think that a sunset of the NSL authorities would be justified to ensure that Congress has the opportunity to take a close look at such a broad power. But the conferees and the White House refused to make that change. Nor would they budge at all on the absurdly difficult standard of review, the so-called conclusive presumption; in fact, the White House insisted on repeating it in the context of judicial review of Section 215 gag orders. This points out a real problem I have with the White House deal. In our letter in December, my colleagues and I, Democratic and Republican, complained about the unfair standard for judicial review of the gag order in connection to NSLs. So how can the supporters of this deal argue that applying that same standard to challenges to the gag rule for Section 215 orders is an improvement? A standard that was unacceptable in December has somehow miraculously been transformed into a meaningful concession. That is just spin Mr. President. It doesn't pass the laugh test. I suspect, Mr. President, that the NSL power is something that the Administration is zealously guarding because it is one area where there is almost no judicial involvement or oversight. It is the last refuge for those who want virtually unlimited government power in intelligence investigations. And that is why the Congress should be very concerned, and very insistent on making the reasonable changes we have suggested. Mr. President, I next want to address "sneak and peek" searches. This is another area where the conference report departs from the Senate's compromise language, another area where the White House deal makes no changes whatsoever, and another reason that I must oppose the conference report. When we debated the Patriot Act in December, the senior Senator from Pennsylvania made what seems on the surface to be an appealing argument. He said that the Senate bill requires notice of a sneak and peek search within 7 days of the search, and the House said 180 days. The conference compromised on 30 days. "That's a good result," he says. "They came down 150 days, we went up only 23. What's wrong with that?" Let me take a little time to put this issue in context and explain why this isn't just a numbers game - an important constitutional right is at stake. One of the most fundamental protections in the Bill of Rights is the Fourth Amendment's guarantee that all citizens have the right to "be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects" against "unreasonable searches and seizures." The idea that the government cannot enter our homes improperly is a bedrock principle for Americans, and rightly so. The Fourth Amendment has a rich history and includes in its ambit some very important requirements for searches. One is the requirement that a search be conducted pursuant to a warrant. The Constitution specifically requires that a warrant for a search be issued only where there is probable cause and that the warrant specifically describe the place to be searched and the persons or things to be seized. Why does the Constitution require that particular description? Well, for one thing, that description becomes a limit on what can be searched or what can be seized. If the magistrate approves a warrant to search someone's home and the police show up at the person's business, that search is not valid. If the warrant authorizes a search at a particular address, and the police take it next door, they have no right to enter that house. But of course, there is no opportunity to point out that the warrant is inadequate unless that warrant is handed to someone at the premises. If there is no one present to receive the warrant, and the search must be carried out immediately, most warrants require that they be left behind at the premises that were searched. Notice of the search is part of the standard Fourth Amendment protection. It's what gives meaning, or maybe we should say "teeth," to the Constitution's requirement of a warrant and a particular description of the place to be searched and the persons or items to be seized. Over the years, the courts have had to deal with government claims that the circumstances of a particular investigation require a search without notifying the target prior to carrying out the search. In some cases, giving notice would compromise the success of the search by leading to the flight of the suspect or the destruction of evidence. The two leading cases on so-called surreptitious entry, or what have come to be known as "sneak and peek" searches, came to very similar conclusions. Notice of criminal search warrants could be delayed, but not omitted entirely. Both the Second Circuit in US v. Villegas and the Ninth Circuit in US v. Freitas held that a sneak and peek warrant must provide that notice of the search will be given within seven days, unless extended by the court. Listen to what the Freitas court said about such searches: We take this position because surreptitious searches and seizures of intangibles strike at the very heart of the interests protected by the Fourth Amendment. The mere thought of strangers walking through and visually examining the center of our privacy interest, our home, arouses our passion for freedom as does nothing else. That passion, the true source of the Fourth Amendment, demands that surreptitious entries be closely circumscribed. So when defenders of the Patriot Act say that sneak and peek searches were commonly approved by courts prior to the Patriot Act, they are partially correct. Some courts permitted secret searches in very limited circumstances, but they also recognized the need for prompt notice after the search unless a reason to continue to delay notice was demonstrated. And they specifically said that notice had to occur within seven days. Section 213 of the Patriot Act didn't get this part of the balance right. It allowed notice to be delayed for any reasonable length of time. Information provided by the Administration about the use of this provision indicates that delays of months at a time are now becoming commonplace. Those are hardly the kind of delays that the courts had been allowing prior to the Patriot Act. The sneak and peek power in the Patriot Act caused concern right from the start. And not just because of the lack of a time-limited notice requirement. The Patriot Act also broadened the justifications that the government could give in order to obtain a sneak and peek warrant. It included what came to be known as the "catch-all" provision, which allows the government to avoid giving notice of a search if it would "seriously jeopardize an investigation." Some think that that justification in some ways swallows the requirement of notice since most investigators would prefer not to give notice of a search and can easily argue that giving notice will hurt the investigation. Critics of the sneak and peek provision worked to fix both of the problems when they introduced the SAFE Act. First, in that bill, we tightened the standard for justifying a sneak and peek search to a limited set of circumstances - when advance notice would endanger life or property, or result in flight from prosecution, the intimidation of witnesses, or the destruction of evidence. Second, we required notice within seven days, with an unlimited number of 21-day extensions if approved by the court. The Senate bill was a compromise. It kept the catch-all provision as a justification for obtaining a sneak and peek warrant. Those of us who were concerned about that provision agreed to accept it in return for getting the seven-day notice requirement. And we accepted unlimited extensions of up to 90 days at a time. The key thing was prompt notice after the fact, or a court order that continuing to delay notice was justified. So that's the background to the numbers game that the Senator from Pennsylvania and other supporters of the conference report point to. They want credit for walking the House back from its outrageous position of 180 days, but they refuse to recognize that the sneak and peek provision still has the catch-all justification, and unlimited 90-day extensions. And here is the crucial question that they refuse to answer. What possible rationale is there for not requiring the government to go back to a court within seven days and demonstrate a need for continued secrecy? Why insist that the government get thirty days free without getting an extension? Could it be that they think that the courts usually won't agree that continued secrecy is needed after the search is conducted, so they won't get the 90-day extension? If they have to go back to a court at some point, why not go back after seven days rather than 30? From the point of view of the government, I don't see the big deal. But from the point of view of someone whose house has been secretly searched, there is a big difference between one week and a month. Suppose, for example, that the government actually searched the wrong house - as I mentioned, that's one of the reasons that notice is a Fourth Amendment requirement. The innocent owner of the place that had been searched might suspect that someone had broken in, might be living in fear that someone has a key or some other way to enter. Should we make that person wait a month to get an explanation rather than a week? Presumably, if the search revealed nothing, and especially if the government realized the mistake and does not intend to apply for an extension, it will be no hardship, other than embarrassment, for notice to be given within seven days. So Mr. President, that is why I'm not persuaded by the numbers game. The Senate bill was already a compromise on this very controversial provision. And there is no good reason not to adopt the Senate's provision. I have pointed this out repeatedly, and no one has ever come forward and explained why the government can't come back to the court within seven days of executing the search. Instead, they let the House get away with a negotiating tactic - by starting with 180 days, they can argue that 30 days is a big concession. But it wasn't. Let me put it to you this way: If the House had passed a provision that allowed for notice to be delayed for 1,000 days, would anyone be boasting about a compromise that requires notice within 100 days, more than three months? Would that be a persuasive argument? I don't think so. The House provision of 180 days was arguably worse than current law, which required notice "within a reasonable time," because it creates a presumption that delaying notice for 180 days, six months, is reasonable. It was a bargaining ploy. The Senate version was what the courts had required prior to the Patriot Act. And it was itself a compromise because it leaves in place the catch-all provision for justifying the warrant in the first place. That is why I believe the conference report on the sneak and peek provision is inadequate and must be opposed. And the fact that this so-called deal with the White House does not address this issue is yet another reason why I see no reason why I, or anyone, should change their position on this. Let me make one final point about sneak and peek warrants. Don't be fooled for a minute into believing that this power is needed to investigate terrorism or espionage. It's not. Section 213 is a criminal provision that applies in whatever kinds of criminal investigations the government has undertaken. In fact, most sneak and peek warrants are issued for drug investigations. So why do I say that they aren't needed in terrorism investigations? Because FISA also can apply to those investigations. And FISA search warrants are always executed in secret, and never require notice. If you really don't want to give notice of a search in a terrorism investigation, you can get a FISA warrant. So any argument that limiting the sneak and peek power as we have proposed will interfere with sensitive terrorism investigations is a red herring. Mr. President, I have spoken at some length about the provisions of this conference report that trouble me, and the ways in which the deal struck with the White House does not address those problems with the conference report. But to be fair, I should mention one aspect of the conference report that was better than a draft that circulated prior to the final signing of that report. The conference report includes four-year sunsets on three of the most controversial provisions: roving wiretaps, the so-called "library" provision, and the "lone wolf" provision of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Previously, the sunsets on these provisions were at seven years, and it is certainly an improvement to have reduced that number so that Congress can take another look at those provisions sooner. I also want to acknowledge that the conference report creates new reporting requirements for some Patriot Act powers, including new reporting on roving wiretaps, Section 215, "sneak and peek" search warrants, and National Security Letters. There are also new requirements that the Inspector General of the Department of Justice conduct audits of the government's use of National Security Letters and Section 215. In addition, the conference report includes some other useful oversight provisions relating to FISA. It requires that Congress be informed about the FISA Court's rules and procedures and about the use of emergency authorities under FISA, and gives the Senate Judiciary Committee access to certain FISA reporting that currently only goes to the Intelligence Committee. I'm also glad to see that it requires the Department of Justice to report to us on its data mining activities. But, Mr. President, adding sunsets and new reporting and oversight requirements only gets you so far. The conference report, as it would be modified by S. 2271, remains deeply flawed. I appreciate sunsets and reporting, and I know that the senior Senator from Pennsylvania worked hard to ensure they were included, but these improvements are not enough. Sunsetting bad law in another four years is not good enough. Simply requiring reporting on the government's use of these overly expansive tools does not ensure that they won't be abused. We must make substantive changes to the law, not just improve oversight. This is our chance, and we cannot let it pass by. Mr. President, trust of government cannot be demanded, or asserted, or assumed; it must be earned. And this Administration has not earned our trust. It has fought reasonable safeguards for constitutional freedoms every step of the way. It has resisted congressional oversight and often misled the public about its use of the Patriot Act. We know now that it has even authorized illegal wiretaps and is making misleading legal arguments to try to justify them. We sunsetted 16 provisions of the original Patriot Act precisely so we could revisit them and make necessary changes - to make improvements based on the experience of four years with the Act, and with the careful deliberation and debate that, quite frankly, was missing four years ago. Well, Mr. President, this process of reauthorization has certainly generated debate, but if we pass the conference report, even with the few White House modifications, we will have wasted a lot of time and missed our opportunity to finally get it right. The American people will not be happy with us for missing that chance. They will not accept our explanation that we decided to wait another four years before really addressing their concerns. It appears that is now an inevitable outcome. But I am prepared to keep fighting for as long as it takes to get this right. For now, I urge my colleagues to oppose the motion to proceed to this legislation to implement the White House deal. We can do better than these minor cosmetic changes.
I yield the floor. |
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The Secret Of Kadima By Uri Avnery ONLY AN earthquake can still prevent an overwhelming victory for Kadima in the coming elections. But don't rule it out. In this election campaign, four earthquakes have already struck. First: the Labor Party elected a Morocco-born left-wing leader. Second: Ariel Sharon split the Likud and created the Kadima party. Third: Sharon was felled by a massive stroke and left the political stage. Fourth: Hamas won a decisive victory in the Palestinian elections. After four such stunning upheavals, what is to stop a fifth? But, truly, at the moment it is difficult even to imagine an event that could possibly undermine the dominant position of Kadima in the election campaign. IT LOOKS like magic. What is it about Kadima that gives it such a fantastic lead? At first it was believed that after the initial enthusiasm, it would shrink to normal proportions. The forecasts (mine, too) said that in the end, a picture of three more-or-less equal fingers would emerge, with the Likud, Kadima and Labor getting around 25 seats each. According to the polls, this is not the way things are going. Next, it was said that the massive figure of Ariel Sharon was keeping Kadima at the top. After the Gaza disengagement, and especially after the melodramatic TV shows of the evacuation of the settlements, his popularity had reached dizzy heights. So, when he sank into a coma, it was expected that his party's fortunes would sink, too, perhaps after a few days of emotional commiseration. After all, who the hell is this Ehud Olmert? Nothing but an unpopular, second-rate political hack! A party under his leadership is bound to decline. But this has not happened, either. On the contrary, it seems that the Sharon-party does not need Sharon. And the unpopular Olmert rose overnight to an astonishing popularity. (That, by the way, has happened before. After the sudden death of Prime Minister Levy Eshkol in 1969, he was succeeded by Golda Meir, at the time a very unpopular party politician. On becoming Prime Minister, her popularity rating rose practically overnight from 3 (three) percent to 80 (eighty!) A few days ago, something even stranger happened: Olmert lost several popularity points, while those of Kadima actually rose. It seems that they would rise even with Caligula's horse in charge. At the moment, 48 days before the election, the following distribution of seats in the next Knesset is predicted by the polls: 40-45 for Kadima, around 20 for Labor, around 17 for the Likud. The rest of the 120, some 40 seats, will be shared out among 9 or 10 smaller parties. If this picture is confirmed at the ballot box, Olmert will be able to form a coalition at his whim. There are many possibilities: with the Likud and the rightist parties, with Labor and the leftist parties, with both Labor and the Likud, with the right and the religious parties, with the left and the religious parties. There are at least a dozen different possibilities. SO WHAT is the magic quality that protects Kadima from all harm and makes it almost invincible? So what made Kadima jump from nothing to 40, and retain this commanding position in spite of all blows of fortune - the disappearance of Sharon, the breakthrough of Hamas, the televised attack by police horses on the settlers of Amona on live television, the assaults from left and right? Well, it has successfully attracted a mix of politicians from right and left that seem to complement each other. Tsakhi Hanegbi, a right-wing hooligan turned "statesman" complements the world-famous, supremely unsuccessful Shimon Peres. Tsipi Livni, a right-winger from birth with a decent, rational faade complements Haim Ramon, a left-winger from birth with a history of political adventurism. But Kadima is an entity that stands above its constituent personalities: it represents exactly what most Israelis feel at this point in time. It provides a focus for the Israeli consensus of the beginning of 2006 - and that is the main point. This consensus says: - The huge gap between rich and poor is very regrettable indeed, but not so important. Amir Peretz has failed to make this the central issue. -. The majority wants an end to the conflict and detests the settlements. The Hamas breakthrough in Palestine has not caused panic to break out. That's why Binyamin Netanyahu's campaign has not taken off. - The public does not trust the Arabs and does not want to have anything to do with them. This is what attracts it to the central idea of Kadima: that one can achieve peace "unilaterally". Clearly, "unilateral peace" is a contradiction in terms. Olmert's most popular promise - the winning formula, it seems - is "let's fix the permanent borders of Israel unilaterally". That is, of course, utter nonsense. Neither the Palestinians and the Arab world, nor the US and the family of nations will recognize a border that is fixed without agreement. It will not bring peace, but a continuation of the conflict for generations to come. That's what logic says. But in elections, logic takes second place to emotions. Olmert's promise to "separate from the Palestinians" is only a more elegant rendering of the vulgar phrase "get the Palestinians out of our sight" - and that is the popular thing at this moment. Olmert states fairly where the permanent border that is to be fixed unilaterally, will run. The principle is: a Jewish state as large as possible with as few Arabs as possible. He intends to annex the "settlement blocs", Greater Jerusalem, unspecified "security zones" and the Jordan valley. Among the settlement blocs he mentions Ariel, Modi'in Illit, Ma'aleh Adumim and Etzion. Miraculously, that exactly matches the Wall-cum-Fence that is now being constructed (confirming what we have asserted all the time: that the path of the fence was not shaped by security considerations, but by the annexation map.) Olmert's map is, of course, the same as that of Sharon. He only states it openly and in detail. It annexes 58% of the West Bank. What it leaves to the Palestinians (altogether, 11% of pre-1948 Palestine) is chopped up into isolated enclaves, cut off from the world. Yossi Beilin, the originator of the "settlement bloc" idea, has already announced that his left-wing Meretz party wishes to join the future Olmert coalition. Labor does not announce this openly, but that is clearly its hope. They will surely argue with Olmert about the final location of the border, but they do accept his general approach.
Once upon a time, a jocular remark made the rounds in America: "What I hate most is racists and niggers." Now the average Israeli wants "Peace without Arabs". Kadima's "unilateral" approach reflects this position precisely - and that's the secret of its success.
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Response To Reader Comments And Criticism By Sam Harris While "An Atheist Manifesto" received considerable support from readers of Truthdig, a variety of criticisms surfaced in the reader commentary. I summarize and respond to some of these below: 1. Just because you haven't seen God doesn't mean He doesn't exist. Atheism, therefore, is as much an act of faith as theism is. Bertrand Russell demolished this fallacy nearly a century ago with his famous teapot argument. As his response appears to me to be perfect, I simply offer it here: Many orthodox people speak as though it were the business of sceptics to disprove received dogmas rather than of dogmatists to prove them. This is, of course, a mistake. If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time. If a valid retort to Russell has ever seen the light of day, I'm not aware of it. As I tried to make clear in my essay, the atheist is not in the business of making claims on insufficient evidence, he merely resists such claims whenever they appear on the lips of the faithful. I don't think it can be pointed out too often that the faithful do this as well. Every Christian knows what it is like to find the claims of Muslims-that the Holy Koran is the perfect word of God, that Muhammad flew to heaven on a winged horse, etc.-to be utterly incredible. Everyone who is not a Mormon knows at a glance that Mormonism is bogus. And everyone of every religious denomination knows what it is like not to believe in Zeus. Everyone has rejected an infinite number of spurious claims about God. The atheist rejects infinity plus one. 2. You will never get rid of religion, so criticizing it is just a waste of time. I would be the first to admit that the prospects for eradicating religious dogmatism in our world do not seem good. Still, the same could have been said about efforts to abolish slavery at the beginning of the 19th century. Anyone who spoke about eradicating slavery in the United States around 1810 surely appeared to be wasting his time, and wasting it dangerously. The analogy is not perfect, but it is suggestive. If we ever do transcend our religious bewilderment, we will look back upon this period in human history with absolute astonishment. How could it have been possible for people to believe such things in the 21st century? How could it be that they allowed their world to become so dangerously fragmented by empty notions about God and Paradise? The answers to these questions are as embarrassing as those that sent the last slave ship sailing to America as late as 1859 (the same year that Darwin published "The Origin of Species"). 3. Religion is our only source of morality. Without it, we would be plunged into a secular moral chaos. This concern is so widespread that I have responded to it at some length. A version of this response will soon be published in the magazine Free Inquiry (www.secularhumanism.org) as "The Myth of Secular Moral Chaos." One cannot criticize religious dogmatism for long without encountering the following claim, advanced as though it were a self-evident fact of nature: there is no secular basis for morality. Raping and killing children can only be really wrong, the thinking goes, if there is a God who says it is. Otherwise, right and wrong would be mere matters of social construction, and any society will be at liberty to decide that raping and killing children is actually a wholesome form of family fun. In the absence of God, John Wayne Gacy would be a better person than Albert Schweitzer, if only more people agreed with him. It is simply amazing how widespread this fear of secular moral chaos is, given how many misconceptions about morality and human nature are required to set it whirling in a person's brain. There is undoubtedly much to be said against the spurious linkage between faith and morality, but the following three points should suffice. If a book like the bible were the only reliable blueprint for human decency that we have, it would be impossible (both practically and logically) to criticize it in moral terms. But it is extraordinarily easy to criticize the morality one finds in bible, as most of it is simply odious and incompatible with a civil society. The notion that the bible is a perfect guide to morality is really quite amazing, given the contents of the book. Human sacrifice, genocide, slaveholding, and misogyny are consistently celebrated. Of course, God's counsel to parents is refreshingly straightforward: whenever children get out of line, we should beat them with a rod (Proverbs 13: 24, 20:30, and 23:13-14). If they are shameless enough to talk back to us, we should kill them (Exodus 21:15, Leviticus 20:9, Deuteronomy 21:18-21, Mark.7:9-13 and Matthew 15:4-7). We must also stone people to death for heresy, adultery, homosexuality, working on the Sabbath, worshipping graven images, practicing sorcery, and for a wide variety of other imaginary crimes. Most Christians imagine that Jesus did away with all this barbarism and delivered a doctrine of pure love and toleration. He didn't (Matthew 5:18-19, Luke 16:17, 2 Timothy 3:16, 2 Peter 20-21, John 7:19). Anyone who believes that Jesus only taught the Golden Rule and love of one's neighbor should go back and read the New Testament. And pay particular attention to the morality that will be on display if he ever returns to Earth trailing clouds of glory (e.g. 2 Thessalonians 1:7-9, 2:8; Hebrews 10:28-29; 2 Peter 3:7; and all of Revelation). It is not an accident that St. Thomas Aquinas thought heretics should be killed and that St. Augustine thought they should be tortured. (Ask yourself, what are the chances that these good doctors of the Church hadn't read the New Testament closely enough to discover the error of their ways?) As a source of objective morality, the bible is one of the worst books we have. It might have been the very worst, in fact, if we didn't also happen to have the Koran. It is important to point out that we decide what is good in the Good Book. We read the Golden and Rule and judge it to be a brilliant distillation of many of our ethical impulses; we read that a woman found not to be a virgin on her wedding night should be stoned to death, and we (if we are civilized) decide that this is the most vile lunacy imaginable. Our own ethical intuitions are, therefore, primary. So the choice before us is simple: we can either have a 21st century conversation about ethics-availing ourselves of all the arguments and scientific insights that have accumulated in the last 2,000 years of human discourse-or we can confine ourselves to a first century conversation as it is preserved in the bible. If religion were necessary for morality, there should some evidence that atheists are less moral than believers. But evidence for this is in short supply, and there is much evidence to the contrary. People of faith regularly allege that atheism is responsible for some of the most appalling crimes of the 20th century. Are atheists really less moral than believers? While it is true that the regimes of Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot were irreligious to varying degrees, they were not especially rational. In fact, their public pronouncements were little more than litanies of delusion--delusions about race, economics, national identity, the march of history or the moral dangers of intellectualism. In many respects, religion was directly culpable even here. Consider the Holocaust: the anti-Semitism that built the Nazi crematoria brick by brick was a direct inheritance from medieval Christianity. For centuries, Christian Europeans had viewed the Jews as the worst species of heretics and attributed every societal ill to their continued presence among the faithful. While the hatred of Jews in Germany expressed itself in a predominately secular way, its roots were undoubtedly religious-and the explicitly religious demonization of the Jews of Europe continued throughout the period. (The Vatican itself perpetuated the blood libel in its newspapers as late as 1914.) Auschwitz, the gulag and the killing fields are not examples of what happens when people become too critical of unjustified beliefs; to the contrary, these horrors testify to the dangers of not thinking critically enough about specific secular ideologies. Needless to say, a rational argument against religious faith is not an argument for the blind embrace of atheism as a dogma. The problem that the atheist exposes is none other than the problem of dogma itself--of which every religion has more than its fair share. I know of no society in recorded history that ever suffered because its people became too reasonable. According the United Nations' Human Development Report (2005), the most atheistic societies--countries like Norway, Iceland, Australia, Canada, Sweden, Switzerland, Belgium, Japan, the Netherlands, Denmark and the United Kingdom-are actually the healthiest, as indicated by measures of life expectancy, adult literacy, per capita income, educational attainment, gender equality, homicide rate and infant mortality. Conversely, the 50 nations now ranked lowest by the U.N. in terms of human development are unwaveringly religious. Of course, correlational data of this sort do not resolve questions of causality-belief in God may lead to societal dysfunction; societal dysfunction may foster a belief in God; each factor may enable the other; or both may spring from some deeper source of mischief. Leaving aside the issue of cause and effect, these facts prove that atheism is perfectly compatible with the basic aspirations of a civil society; they also prove, conclusively, that religious faith does nothing to ensure a society's health. If religion really provided the only conceivable, objective basis for morality, it should be impossible to posit a non-theistic, objective basis for morality. But it is not impossible; it is rather easy. Clearly, we can think of objective sources of moral order that do not require the existence of a law-giving God. In "The End of Faith," I argued that questions of morality are really questions about happiness and suffering. If there are objectively better and worse ways to live so as to maximize happiness in this world, these would be objective moral truths worth knowing. Whether we will ever be in a position to discover these truths and agree about them cannot be known in advance (and this is the case for all questions of scientific fact). But if there are psychophysical laws that underwrite human well-being-and why wouldn't there be?-then these laws are potentially discoverable. Knowledge of these laws would provide an enduring basis for an objective morality. In the meantime, everything about human experience suggests that love is better than hate for the purposes of living happily in this world. This is an objective claim about the human mind, the dynamics of social relations, and the moral order of our world. While we do not have anything like a final, scientific approach to maximizing human happiness, it seems safe to say that raping and killing children will not be one of its primary constituents.
One of the greatest challenges facing civilization in the 21st century is for human beings to learn to speak about their deepest personal concerns--about ethics, spiritual experience and the inevitability of human suffering--in ways that are not flagrantly irrational. Nothing stands in the way of this project more than the respect we accord religious faith. Incompatible religious doctrines have balkanized our world into separate moral communities, and these divisions have become a continuous source of human conflict. The idea that there is a necessary link between religious faith and morality is one of the principal myths keeping religion in good standing among otherwise reasonable men and women. And yet, it is a myth that is easily dispelled.
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Gosh, so much muck to rake, so little time. I speak, of course, about George W's recent "State of the Union" pontifications. What a mess of lies! His headline-grabber was that America is "addicted to oil" and that he'll cut U.S. reliance on Middle-East oil by 75 percent over the next 20 years. Wow! That's a huge change, right? Wrong. Bush didn't mention that our imports from the Mid-East constitute a mere 11 percent of America's oil use. Also, the next day, his own energy secretary rushed out to say of Bush's 75-percent pledge: "He didn't mean it literally." The promise to cut Mid-East imports "was purely an example," he said. Oh. Then there was George's proud economic boast that "America has created 4.6 million new jobs" during his tenure. Well... yeah... but America has also lost 2.6 million jobs under Bush, leaving a pathetic record of job creation. Plus, Bush's new jobs pay so poorly that hourly workers are not even keeping up with inflation. Of course, a Bush speech would not be complete without another Iraq lie. This time, he gloated about his success in "shutting off terrorist infiltration" into Iraq. Well... not exactly. In fact, just before George's speech, a top Republican wailed that the Iraqi border is "extremely porous" and that a poor job was being done to stop infiltration by terrorists. The Bush lies just kept flowing: He bragged about reducing federal spending, for example,when in fact he's raised it about 30 percent, and he patted himself on the back about his response to Hurricane Katrina, yet the next day the General Accounting office blasted his administration and Bush himself for their failed response. This is Jim Hightower saying... This guy will go down in history as President Pinnoccio! |
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I have to admit: part of me is glad we're seeing the cartoon riots. They serve as a great reminder of what we're up against. Plus, sometimes it's just nice to see angry Muslims burning someone else's flag for a change. And all this over a cartoon. Wait until they find out one of the Teletubbies is gay.
These riots really do remind us that, in some ways, this really is a clash of civilizations. One photo in particular caught my eye, one of a dark-skinned man holding a sign that read, "Freedom: Go to hell!"? Then I realized it was Alberto Gonzalez.
But my real problem with the administration is that once the riots started they didn't even back the Danes, one of the few countries to actually join Bush's "Coalition of the Willing." They didn't back the West. They didn't stand up for our traditions of free speech. For all the talk about how tough Bush is and how much he believes in our way of democracy all the courage they could muster up was to say, "Anti-Muslim images are as unacceptable as anti-Semitic images, as anti-Christian images or any other religious belief." Well, I'm sorry, but that's just chickenshit. And that goes for Bill Clinton's statement as well.
Can you image Ronald Reagan giving some mealy-mouthed statement like that? He would have said, "Sorry. We believe in free speech, and that includes the freedom to critique your religion. Deal with it." Except it would have been written by Peggy Noonan and included glowing prose about crosses and flags and the human heart and made us all puke.
Plus, the idea that anti-Semitic and anti-Christian images are "unacceptable" isn't even true. Same goes for anti-Muslim images, or my personal favorite, anti-Scientologist. Anti-religious images can be offensive, repugnant, amusing, illuminating, ridiculous, a slap-happy good time, or even funded by the NEA. But they're never "unacceptable". This is the West. We accept. And the last time I checked, our way works better.
New Rule: "It turns out there's never a good time to take off three months and get drunk. Why is it why when I go on hiatus all the important stories break?" |
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At a recent conference on the Clinton Administration at Hofstra University, ex-press secretary Jake Siewart made a point that had previously eluded me: It was during the early days of Clinton's presidency that the democratization of instant information made the insider press corps obsolete. To retain their importance and self-regard, these journalists had to invent a new function for themselves, and they did: interpreting, not reporting, the news. But instead of doing the hard work of researching the historical, economic, sociological and political contexts of a given story and then finding a way to explain these in lay terms, they preferred to rely on what came most easily to them: cocktail party gossip, green room small talk, semiofficial leaks and unconfirmed rumor, almost always offered up as if the source had no interest in pushing a point of view.
It soon became clear that the insider press corps had developed a set of values almost completely antithetical to those of the majority of the American people. This disjunction is frequently misinterpreted--often deliberately--as one of snooty liberal elitists versus God-fearing, Darwin-disbelieving, upright common folk. It's almost impossible to find reliable evidence for this characterization, either in what the press corps believes or what the public does. Ironically, the media elite are attacking themselves when they embrace this myth, which is purposely stoked by the far right, as I've demonstrated ad nauseam.
A true dichotomy between the public and the elite media can be found, on the other hand, on the subject of presidential lying. Excluding George Washington and perhaps Jimmy Carter, just about all Presidents have found it necessary to lie to the American people. And with those two exceptions, and possibly a few others, many have also found it necessary--or at least desirable--to fool around with women other than their wives. For reasons of culture and history, the mainstream media decided that both of these longstanding traditions had to end with Bill Clinton.
When Bill Clinton lied about a few blowjobs, the Washington press corps treated his actions as a threat to the Republic. As John Harris observes in his history of the period, The Survivor, on the night Clinton offered his prime-time, post-testimony national apology, network commentary was overwhelmingly negative. Calls for Clinton to resign reigned on pundit television and on the op-ed pages throughout the ordeal--often couched in terms of doing so "for the children." But Clinton pollster Mark Penn would soon find, Harris explains, that "a clear majority of viewers thought Clinton's remarks were fine.... It was only hard-core Republicans and political 'elites'--the kind of people quoted by the networks--who were dissatisfied with the speech." This would prove, Harris observes, "a vivid example of the dichotomy in public opinion that had existed all year." Indeed, Clinton's approval rating hovered between the mid-sixties and the low seventies through the entire ordeal.
Oddly, given the many obvious and quite consequential differences between a blowjob and a botched war effort, the Washington press corps appears to have reached a consensus that the former is a far more serious matter. Pundit "dean" David Broder, who whined that Clinton "trashed the place, and it's not his place," has declared himself uninterested in the question of whether Bush & Co. deceived Congress and the nation into its ruinous Iraq adventure. "This whole debate about whether there was just a mistake or misrepresentation or so on is, I think, from the public point of view largely irrelevant," Broder explained to his chum Tim Russert on NBC's Meet the Press. "The public's moved past that." Shortly thereafter Gloria Borger of U.S. News & World Report wondered why the topic was even being raised: "Ah, 'misleading.' Didn't we live through that argument already? In fact, wasn't that in the Democratic talking points in the 2004 election? Are we still arguing over who lied or did not lie about WMD?" she complained. It's shocking enough that pundits had less interest in Bush's prewar lies than, say, Oprah had in James Frey's rehab program, but it's more so that they can't be bothered to care now that the lies have been exposed. The explosive revelations in the Downing Street memo got relatively scant coverage, as did recent revelations of documents demonstrating that the phony story about the yellowcake uranium Iraq allegedly bought from Niger had been discreditedlong before Bush made his false pronouncements on the subject.
Underlying this attitude may be a simple matter of personal pique. While the punditocracy, much like a scorned lover, resented Clinton, it cannot shake its affection for Bush, no matter how much contempt he showers on their collective heads. As Chris Matthews proclaimed, "Everybody sort of likes the President, except for the real whack-jobs." Today the percentage of Americans who say they actually "like" Bush, according to a New York Times/CBS Poll, is 37 percent. That figure is consistent with Harris Interactive polls reported around Thanksgiving, just before the above statements were made, showing that about 64 percent of Americans believe the Bush Administration "generally misleads the American public on current issues to achieve its own ends...while fewer than a third of Americans believe the information provided by the Administration is generally accurate."
But the insider press corps cannot connect Bush's war lies to his unpopularity, because it has so much difficulty acknowledging either one. Nor have its members--so many of whom, not just Judy Miller, helped lay the groundwork for this Administration's criminal deception by parroting its lies and propaganda--seen fit to take responsibility for their role. Even today, Bush remains a far more respected and admired figure among insiders than Clinton, much less Al Gore, Ted Kennedy or any of our leaders who sought to save us from the Iraq catastrophe.
Clinton's 1998 State of the Union address was the most progressive of any President's in two decades, but it mattered little because, it turned out, he'd lied about his sex life. Eight years later Bush's State of the Union address will matter much more, because, after all, he only lies about everything.
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Dream On, Condi By Robert Scheer Condoleezza Rice is someone I knew to be a very bright scholar when we were both fellows in Stanford University's arms-control seminar. Yes, we differed on occasion, but I never had cause to doubt her ability to reason. Now, I do. Confronted by ABC's George Stephanopoulos with the news that fiery Moqtada al-Sadr, whose Mahdi militia has twice engaged in fierce armed conflict with U.S. troops since the 2003 invasion, was the kingmaker in the selection of Iraq's next prime minister, Rice replied sanguinely, "Iraq is a complex place, there's a lot of voices." But as Stephanopoulos pointed out, the voice in question has been raised to offer military support to Rice's nemeses, Syria and Iran. In Syria, al-Sadr pledged to fight in "the defense against our common enemies," the United States, Britain and Israel. Visiting Tehran, he offered the support of Iraqi fighters in the event of an attack by the United States over the issue of Iran's nuclear program, stating unequivocally, "If neighboring Islamic countries, including Iran, become the targets of attacks, we will support them." There is no way to soft-pedal it: The astounding rise of an anti-American firebrand like al-Sadr is an indicator of how wide and complete a political defeat pro-Western forces have suffered in Iraq. Written off by most Western observers as nothing more than a rabble-rousing irritant in the first months of the U.S. occupation, al-Sadr has more than survived his confrontation with the world's only superpower: His faction was the big winner in the recent elections, now entrenched as the largest single force in the dominant Shiite coalition. So it is that the political support of a young radical, who not so long ago was considered a wanted outlaw by the occupiers, has now determined the selection of Iraq's new leader. Not that the new Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari - the leader of the Dawa Party - is much better. He has even closer ties to the fundamentalists in Iran who provided him with a safe haven during his years of opposition to Saddam Hussein. He only looks moderate next to Sadr. Rice should recall that al-Jaafari pointedly refused to shake her hand when she visited Baghdad, because she is a woman. Even worse, the theocratic model for what is in store for this nation where women previously enjoyed a greater degree of freedom than in most of the Arab world has already been created in the Shiite-controlled region around Basra in the south: The veil is now de rigueur, armed religious enforcers patrol the streets and exercising free speech can earn one a de facto death sentence. With Shiites violently extending their grip on power under the cover of electoral democracy, the Sunni rebellion is only likely to escalate. Chaos rather than order is what the future holds for Iraq. That is why Yuval Diskin, the head of Shin Bet, Israel's domestic security agency, warned recently that his country might come to regret its decision to support the Iraq invasion. "I'm not sure we won't miss Saddam (Hussein)," Diskin said in a speech to students at the Eli settlement that was secretly recorded and broadcast last week on Israeli TV. "When you dismantle a system in which there is a despot who controls his people by force, you have chaos." Bush's ex-Secretary of State Colin Powell made the same point when he reportedly warned Bush and his Cabinet of the so-called Pottery Barn Principle: If you break it, you own it. Unfortunately, it is not just Iraq that America is breaking, but the power and influence of the Islamic world's secular nationalists - like Hussein - in their decades long power struggle with ultra-religious forces. From Hamas' victory in the Palestinian Authority to the resurgence of the theocrats in Tehran to the Talibanization of Southern Iraq, anti-Western religious extremists are in the ascendancy. No wonder the commander of British troops in the Shiite dominated Basra area sounds defeated: "It becomes more and more difficult for ourselves to be here. You almost move from being part of the solution to being part of the problem."
Rice might contemplate those words of warning before she prattles on about the bright new day aborning in Iraq. Last June, when Stephanopoulos asked Rice if she agreed with Vice President Dick Cheney's claim that the insurgency is in its "last throes," Rice replied in the affirmative citing the "elections again in December that will bring about a permanent government." Unstoppable in her myopic optimism, she now blithely ignores the results of that election and predicts "an Iraq that is a tolerant Iraq, an Iraq that will fight terrorism." In your dreams, Condi.
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Democratic Leaders 'Betray' Hackett By Robert Parry The ultimate goal in politics should be to do both what's right and what's smart, what's honorable and what works with voters. In the American context, that could be telling a hard truth instead of pandering or standing for principle at a time of fear - and thus inspiring the public. In recent years, however, what's right and what's smart have rarely made joint appearances on the stage of U.S. politics. The Republicans have built their national dominance - controlling the White House, Congress, the courts and much of the news media - by doing what's politically smart but rarely what's right for a healthy democracy. For instance, White House political adviser Karl Rove has exploited the Sept. 11 terror attacks to marginalize the Democrats as people unconcerned about the security of the American people. Those tactics may be terribly wrong - because they divide the nation - but they certainly work. The Democrats are even more galling. They seem zeroed in on both doing what's wrong and what's stupid. The latest example is the party leadership's "success" in driving Iraq War veteran Paul Hackett out of the Ohio Senate race apparently because he speaks his mind too much and takes the fight directly to the Republicans. Instead, Democratic Senate leaders, hoping to win in Ohio by default because of Republican disarray, opted for an establishment Democrat, Sherrod Brown, a seven-term congressman who has raised $2.37 million, tenfold more money than outsider Hackett. But by settling on a business-as-usual strategy, Democratic leaders offended the idealism - and fighting spirit - of their base and may have ultimately hurt their chances for victory in November, a lose-lose strategy that has become all too familiar for Democrats. Iraq Veteran Hackett, who returned from Iraq angry at George W. Bush for risking the lives of U.S. soldiers over the hyped threat from Saddam Hussein, ran a strong but losing race in 2005 for a House seat in an overwhelmingly Republican district in southern Ohio. That performance made Hackett immensely popular with rank-and-file Democrats and prompted Democratic leaders to encourage him to undertake an uphill fight to unseat Republican Sen. Mike DeWine. Over the past several months, however, the Ohio Republican Party has suffered a series of damaging scandals, making DeWine an endangered incumbent. Meanwhile, Hackett has offended Republicans - and some non-Republicans - by talking bluntly. Earlier this year, Hackett came under criticism for saying that the Republican Party had been hijacked by religious extremists who "aren't a whole lot different than Osama bin Laden." Instead of apologizing, Hackett declared, "I said it. I meant it. I stand behind it." Suddenly, the state and national Democratic leaders were changing their calculations, favoring a more traditional and experienced Democrat, someone like Rep. Brown, a longtime fixture in Ohio politics. So, according to Hackett, for the past two weeks, party leaders, including Senators Harry Reid and Charles Schumer, have urged him to drop out and run instead for a House seat, an option that Hackett had previously forsworn. While agreeing to withdraw from the Senate contest on Feb. 13, Hackett said he would not go back on his word to other Democrats about not running for the House seat. "This is an extremely disappointing decision that I feel has been forced on me," Hackett said. "For me, this is a second betrayal. First, my government misused and mismanaged the military in Iraq, and now my own party is afraid to support candidates like me." [NYT, Feb. 14, 2006] The Hackett fiasco upset rank-and-file Democrats trying to recruit Iraq War veterans to challenge Republicans. "Now is a time for Democrats to be courting, not blocking, veterans who want to run," complained Mike Lyon, executive director for the Band of Brothers, a group urging veterans to run as Democrats. Lose-Lose The Democratic base also is fuming. It has long despised the consultant-driven Democratic hierarchy in Washington, which is seen as putting political machinations ahead of principle - and still managing to lose. Many of these Democrats blame this cozy community of Washington pollsters, strategists and ad consultants for the "triangulation" strategies that have failed to give the Democrats control of Congress since 1994. This timidity also has been blamed for Bush taking the White House in 2000 and 2004. For instance, during Campaign 2004, national Democratic operatives were so spooked by Republican charges that the Democratic convention would become a "Bush hate-fest" that the organizers started censoring critical comments about Bush out of many speeches. The convention's keynote address, delivered by then-Senate hopeful Barack Obama, didn't even mention Bush's name or give any reason for ousting him. The mild-mannered convention ended up giving Democratic nominee John Kerry a zero bounce. By contrast, the Republicans held a convention that bashed Kerry at every opportunity - with GOP operatives even passing out "Purple Heart" band-aids to mock Kerry's Vietnam War wounds. Disgruntled Democratic Sen. Zell Miller excoriated Kerry in the Republican keynote address - and Bush opened up a double-digit advantage. Bush's lead eroded only after he stumbled through the first two presidential debates. Kerry, with his strong debate performances, took the momentum and appeared headed for victory. But his consultants again intervened, urging caution and convincing Kerry to pull his punches in the third debate. In that pivotal last debate, Kerry once more looked like the indecisive figure who had failed to impress the voters over the summer. Down the campaign stretch, Kerry seemed to be coasting, rather than driving for a clear-cut win. He gave Bush a chance to regain his political balance and pull almost even. On Election Day, amid widespread complaints of voting irregularities, Bush wrested the White House again from the Democrats. Though Kerry had vowed to make sure every vote was counted, he listened to his advisers who urged him to concede the day after the election, dooming hopes for a meaningful recount in the pivotal state of Ohio. New Divisions The divisions between the Democratic base and the Democratic leadership have widened again in 2006 as Senate Democrats fought only a half-hearted battle against Bush's Supreme Court nomination of Samuel Alito. The base saw Alito's radical theories of the "unitary executive" as tipping the court balance toward a majority in favor of an all-powerful President and thus endangering civil liberties and the Founders' concept of checks and balances. But the Democratic leadership feared the political fallout of an all-out fight to block Alito's confirmation. Though the Democrats had enough anti-Alito votes (42) to sustain a filibuster, Senate Minority Leader Reid refused to invoke party discipline and 19 Democrats joined with the Republicans in closing off debate, thus ensuring Alito's confirmation. Many in the Democratic base were livid. Now, the rank-and-file Democrats see the party hierarchy adopting the same old "safe" strategies that have failed to restore the party to the majority. Ahead in the latest opinion polls and counting on the Republicans to self-destruct, congressional Democrats are seeking out establishment Democrats who can raise big bucks and avoid controversy. Political analyst Jennifer Duffy told the New York Times that Hackett's bluntness - while loved by the Democratic base - made the Democratic leaders nervous. "Hackett is seen by many as a straight talker, and he became an icon of the liberal bloggers because he says exactly what they have wished they would hear from a politician," Duffy said. "On the other hand, the Senate is still an exclusive club, and the party expects a certain level of decorum that Hackett has not always shown." But many rank-and-file Democrats see something besides decorum at stake. Some conclude that the national Democratic leaders are addicted to losing, content as long as the party holds some seats and the consultants get shares of the campaign ad buys. Some angry Democrats compare the party's performance to an exhibition basketball game between the razzle-dazzle Harlem Globetrotters and the slow-footed Washington Generals. While the Globetrotters (or Republicans) need an opponent in order to have a game, the Generals (or Democrats) aren't supposed to win. The Generals stand around looking befuddled as the Globetrotters make fancy passes and dribble behind their backs and between their legs. It wouldn't do for the Generals to start jumping into the passing lanes and stuffing shots into the faces of the Globetrotter stars. The problem for the Democratic leaders is that the Democratic base has grown tired of watching these exhibition games with their predictable outcomes. Many grassroots Democrats actually believe the Bush administration has put the fate of the democratic Republic in jeopardy and that decisive action is needed.
To them, it's not a game anymore. They don't want politics as usual. They want the Democratic Party to compete to win. They want leaders who understand that they can do what's right and what's smart.
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| Bush's Tough Oil Talk Lasted About 24 Hours Only moments after the damning phrase left his lips, the President's flacks and factotums were assuring anyone who had listened to his State of the Union address that he meant nothing when he declared that America is "addicted to oil." His words meant nothing, they said, when he vowed to break that addiction with new sources of energy. He wasn't even talking about foreign oil, they added, when he mentioned our problems with foreign oil. The next day, newspapers reported sharp cuts in the budget of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, where scientists seek to improve the efficiency of ethanol and other new sources of fuel promoted by the President in his speech. So perhaps his aides were right, and his remarks on this issue are subject to the usual discount. That's too bad, because Mr. Bush's sermon about American oil dependency contained a higher quotient of truth than his typical utterances. He rightly pointed out that, as a society, we need to reduce the use of imported oil while intensifying research into cleaner sources of fuel. We must change our ways not only for the geopolitical and economic reasons he discussed, but because, despite his skepticism, we cannot risk the catastrophic climate change that may ensue if the world continues to burn fossil fuels promiscuously. We have to change because our country is the most wasteful abuser of energy on this little planet, and because developing countries will soon burden the environment with their own carbon overload. Where the President went wrong was in refusing to mention conservation-the most efficient means to reduce our waste of fuel-and his resistance to imposing significant fuel-economy improvements immediately. But then Mr. Bush is a lifetime captive of the oil-industrial complex. His personal and political fortunes have always depended on the generosity of oil investors and energy firms. (Remember Harken?) He could hardly be expected to attack their interests so directly. Besides, their faithful servants surround him. His chief of staff, Andrew Card, formerly served as a Washington lobbyist for the automobile companies, where his greatest legacy was preserving the right of his employers to keep manufacturing gas-guzzling vehicles. His Vice President, Dick Cheney-a former oilman and convener of the secret energy task force-has consistently denigrated any attempt to curb the national appetite for oil. Yet even if the President was serious about financing future technologies and reducing oil imports, it's fair to ask why he and his fellow conservatives have taken so long to understand these national imperatives-and why they wasted so many years mocking liberals and environmentalists for seeking to implement them. Only recently have Republicans of the Bush ilk displayed any interest at all in reducing our oil addiction. (More often they are seen holding hands with Saudi royals.) For as long as anyone can remember, the American right has insisted that we can solve all our energy problems with more drilling and mining. Melting ice caps, mercury in our children and despoiled wilderness were the symbols of our "progress." Meanwhile, the environmental movement and its progressive allies have demanded conservation, fuel-economy standards, and accelerated research into solar and alternative sources for more than three decades. Those demands culminated in an historic speech by Jimmy Carter, a President of character and independence. Three months into his Presidency, Mr. Carter warned that America had reached the peak of domestic oil production-and that the continued doubling of oil consumption would no longer be sustainable. "We must not be selfish or timid if we hope to have a decent world for our children and grandchildren," he said. "We simply must balance our demand for energy with our rapidly shrinking resources. By acting now, we can control our future instead of letting the future control us." As Thom Hartmann, author of The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight, has pointed out, the Carter address "established the strategic petroleum reserve, birthed the modern solar power industry, led to the insulation of millions of American homes, and established America's first national energy policy." If not for the courageous Carter, we would be still worse off today. During the years that followed, federal incentives and high energy prices induced serious conservation efforts throughout the industrialized world. Much more could have been done since 1977, both in conservation and alternative-energy research. But the electoral defeat of Mr. Carter in 1980-ironically, due to the machinations of the same Iranian mullahs who threaten to cut off Western oil supplies today-put an end to his campaign. When Ronald Reagan and George Bush took over the White House for the following decade, they again placed oil interests in charge and abandoned the Carter initiatives.
As we finally face the bloody price of our profligacy, everyone wants clean power and energy security. How much more attainable those goals would be now if we had listened to the liberals then.
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Cheney's Dodge: Taking Responsibility By Norman Solomon When Dick Cheney surfaced on Feb. 15 long enough for an interview with Fox News eminence Brit Hume -- an event that CNN's Jack Cafferty promptly likened to "Bonnie interviewing Clyde" -- the vice presidential spin emerged from a timeworn bag of political tricks. Cheney took responsibility. Whatever that means. The New York Times website swiftly made its top headline "Cheney Takes Full Responsibility for Shooting Hunter." Just before Fox News Channel aired interview segments at length, the summary from anchor Hume told viewers that Cheney had accepted "full responsibility for the incident." Hours later, the Washington Post's front-page story led this way: "Vice President Cheney accepted full responsibility yesterday..." Ironically -- while news outlets kept using the phrase "full responsibility" -- the transcript of the interview posted on FoxNews.com shows that Cheney never used any form of the word "responsibility." Whatever their exact words, the politicians who can't avoid acknowledging culpability are often the beneficiaries of excessive media plaudits for supposedly owning up to what they've done wrong. But those politicians rarely do more than just what the spin doctor ordered. It's not brave or even forthright for an official to express the contrition that seems advisable from a public-relations standpoint. When a convicted defendant voices remorse just before sentencing, the statement is often viewed as little more than a ploy dictated by circumstance. But when a politician ostensibly "takes responsibility" in the court of public opinion, much of the media coverage attaches great significance to an essentially hollow statement that is a transparent effort to extinguish a scandal-fueled firestorm. In almost every instance when a politician "takes responsibility" with great fanfare, there's no penalty attached to the proclamation. Across the terrain of political media, the I-take-responsibility maneuver is the equivalent of a hit-and-run driver offering an over-the-shoulder yell of "Sorry about that" while speeding away from a grisly scene. On July 30, 2003 -- several months after the occupation of Iraq began -- President Bush held a news conference while U.S. forces continued to search in vain for weapons of mass destruction. High up in a front-page story, the New York Times reported that Bush "took responsibility for the first time for an assertion in his State of the Union address about Iraq's nuclear weapons program that turned out to be based on questionable intelligence." Bush told reporters: "I take personal responsibility for everything I say, of course. I also take responsibility for making decisions on war and peace. And I analyzed a thorough body of intelligence, good, solid, sound intelligence that led me to come to the conclusion that it was necessary to remove Saddam Hussein from power." In that instance, as in so many others, the president's declaration about taking responsibility was nothing more than hot air for inflated rhetoric -- a dodge to divert attention from indefensible actions and evident deceptions. Last year, on Sept. 13 at the White House, the president said: "Katrina exposed serious problems in our response capability at all levels of government, and to the extent that the federal government didn't fully do its job right, I take responsibility." Policies during the five months since then have compounded the administration's deadly negligence in response to Hurricane Katrina, underscoring the diversionary significance of the I-take-responsibility scam. When Brit Hume and Dick Cheney did their Fox trot, they were performing the kind of spectacle we've seen many times on television. Network correspondents and powerful politicians know the boundaries and the steps. Their footwork may look simple, but it's fancy and well-practiced. Contrary to pretense, the probing journalist doesn't probe too much, and the forthcoming politician merely hunkers down with a new twist.
And so it goes: Whether the media uproar has to do with a quail hunt,
or lethal negligence in connection with a hurricane, or chronic
deception for a war, top officials may finally opt to "take
responsibility." But that's nothing more than a propaganda technique
for those who view lying as an essential means of governance.
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The Wack-Pack By William Rivers Pitt The bar I spend my time in enjoys the patronage of quite a cast of characters. My friends and I refer to this crew as the Wack-Pack. On any given night you might see The Eater, Moleman, Mumbles, Shiny, Suspicious Facial Hair Guy, Earth Pig and The Crotch-Grabber, among others, bellied up before a beer. There is always a buzz when one of the Pack walks in; it's a fair bet that, soon enough, something strange will transpire. As odd as these folks are, they are straight-up sane and normal compared to the goofballs, idiots, freaks and out-and-out maniacs who are staffing the current administration in Washington. I'll take Earth Pig any day over Dick Cheney, who actually blasted a hunting partner in the face with a shotgun down in Texas this weekend. For the record, the last Vice President to shoot someone was Aaron Burr, who put Alexander Hamilton in the ground with a pistol shot in 1804. This gives a whole new meaning to the idea that the Bush administration is quite literally The Gang That Couldn't Shoot Straight. James Brady, who took a bullet to the back of the head during the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan, and who went on to found the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, released a statement regarding Cheney's prowess with a shotgun on Sunday: "Now I understand why Dick Cheney keeps asking me to go hunting with him. I had a friend once who accidentally shot pellets into his dog - and I thought he was an idiot." His wife, Sarah Brady, piled on by saying, "I've thought Cheney was scary for a long time. Now I know I was right to be nervous." I guess the NRA is going to have to change its rap. Guns don't kill people. Vice Presidents do. Though, to be fair, the fellow who was shot survived the incident. Harry Whittington, who took the buckshot, should be thankful that Mr. Cheney is in such profoundly ill health. Apparently, Dick Cheney goes hunting these days with a full complement of medical professionals. "After the accident," reported the New York Times, "Mr. Cheney's medical attendants helped Mr. Whittington, treating his wounds and covering him in blankets so he would not go into shock." Now that's huntin'. Another famous member of the Washington Wack-Pack is Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. Gonzales, testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee regarding warrantless wiretapping of American citizens authorized by Mr. Bush, said, "President Washington, President Lincoln, President Wilson, President Roosevelt have all authorized electronic surveillance on a far broader scale." Really. George Washington authorized electronic surveillance on a far broader scale than what the National Security Agency is capable of today. How did he do this in an age when the whale-oil lamp was the height of technology? Did he use the old two-cans-and-some-string wiretap trick? Perhaps he was able to bug the Hessians using Ben Franklin's kite and key. Mumbles and Moleman have said some pretty bizarre things at my bar, but Alberto blew them both out of the water with this one. George Washington, of course, justified the magical electronic surveillance of Americans by leaning on the broad powers of the Unitary Executive ... except he wasn't president yet ... and there were no Americans yet ... and, oh yeah, the electron wasn't discovered until 1897. Whatever to all that. If the president does it, it can't be illegal ... or impossible, for that matter. Perhaps the wackiest of the Washington Wack-Pack is Defense Secretary Don Rumsfeld, who actually had the gall last week to suggest that weapons of mass destruction were going to be found in Iraq. He said this in front of the National Press Club, no less. "I don't know what we'll find in the months and years ahead," said Rumsfeld. "It could be anything." Right. It could be anything, except peace or an exit strategy or democracy or freedom. The 26,000 liters of anthrax, the 38,000 liters of botulinum toxin, the 500 tons which is one million pounds of sarin, mustard and VX nerve agent, the 30,000 munitions to deliver the stuff, the mobile biological weapons labs, the al Qaeda connections to 9/11 and the uranium from Niger for use in Iraq's robust nuclear weapons program that Mr. Bush told us about in his January 2003 State of the Union address are definitely still out there ... but somehow, tens of thousands of American soldiers over there, the intelligence professionals over there, the contractors and the Iraqi police have managed not to find any of it in the 1,061 days since the invasion was first undertaken. Only The Eater could equal this mouthful from Mr. Rumsfeld. It's funny, but it isn't funny. This is the Wack-Pack that cherry-picked intelligence data to justify a decision to invade Iraq that had already been made, according to former CIA agent Paul Pillar, who was the national intelligence officer for the Near East and South Asia from 2000 to 2005. Four more American soldiers were killed yesterday by a roadside bomb, bringing the death toll to 2,267. The wounded number in the tens of thousands, and the numbers of Iraqi civilians killed and maimed have become, simply, obscene. This is the Wack-Pack that basically stood back and allowed the city of New Orleans to be destroyed. Michael Brown, the now-disgraced former head of FEMA, testified last week that he alerted senior White House officials, including chief of staff Andy Card, that the levees had broken on the Monday it happened. The Bush White House, however, claims they didn't hear about it until the next day. Mr. Bush was too busy strumming a guitar and making erstwhile campaign appearances to be bothered with something as piddling as the loss of a major American city. This is the Wack-Pack that authorized the exposure of a deep-cover CIA agent in order to cover their backsides and eliminate a critic of the war. Lewis Libby has testified to a grand jury that he was authorized by his superiors to expose the name of Valerie Plame in June and July of 2003. This was done after her husband, Ambassador Joseph Wilson, shredded the administration's "uranium from Niger" war rationale in the editorial pages of the New York Times. Libby served as Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, so when he refers to being authorized to leak Plame's name by his "superiors," you can bet he is talking about none other than Ol' Shotgun Dick himself.
It's funny, but it isn't funny. Not really. Not at all.
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 Heil Bush, Dear Propaganda Ansanger Coulter, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your constant shilling for the Junta and telling that incrediby funny joke about John Paul Stevens, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Media Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at the "Fuhrer Bunker" formally 'The White House' on 03-15-2006. We salute you herr Coulter, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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Of course the jokes are flying all over Texas-what's the fine for shooting a lawyer?-and so forth. Dick-Cheney-shooting-Harry-Whittington is fraught, as they say, with irony. It's not as though the ground in Texas is littered with liberal Republicans. I think the vice president winged the only one we've got.
Not that I accuse Harry Whittington of being an actual liberal-only by Texas Republican standards, and that sets the bar about the height of a matchbook. Nevertheless, Whittington is seriously civilized, particularly on the issues of crime, punishment and prisons. He served on both the Texas Board of Corrections and on the bonding authority that builds prisons. As he has often said, prisons do not curb crime, they are hothouses for crime: "Prisons are to crime what greenhouses are to plants."
In the day, whenever there was an especially bad case of new-ignoramus-in-the-legislature-a "lock 'em all up and throw away the key" type-the senior members used to send the prison-happy, tuff-on-crime neophyte to see Harry Whittington, a Republican after all, for a little basic education on the cost of prisons.
When Whittington was the chairman of Texas Public Finance Authority, he had a devastating set of numbers on the demand for more, more, more prison beds. As Whittington was wont to point out, the only thing prisons are good for is segregating violent people from the rest of society, and most of them belong in psychiatric hospitals to begin with. The severity of sentences has no effect on crime.
Texas still keeps the nonviolent, the retarded, senior citizens, etc. locked up for ridiculous periods-all at taxpayer expense. If we could ever get to where we spend as much per pupil on education as we do per prisoner, this state would take off like a rocket. In 2003, we spend nearly $15,000 per prisoner, while average per-pupil spending was just over $8,000.
I am not trying to make a big deal out of a simple hunting accident for partisan purposes-just thought it was a good chance to pay tribute to old Harry, a thoroughly decent man. However, I was offended by the never-our-fault White House spin team. Cheney adviser Mary Matalin said of her boss, "He was not careless or incautious [and did not] violate of any of the [rules]. He didn't do anything he wasn't supposed to do." Of course he did, Ms. Matalin, he shot Harry Whittington.
Which brings us to one of the many paradoxes of the Bush administration, which claims to be creating "the responsibility society." It's hard to think of a crowd less likely to take responsibility for anything they have done or not done than this bunch. They're certainly good at preaching responsibility to others-and blaming other people for everything that goes wrong on their watch.
Of course the Cheney shooting was an accident.
But is it an accident if your home and your life are destroyed by the flood following a hurricane? Especially if the flood was caused by failed levees, a government responsibility?
Is it an accident if you are born with a clubfoot and your parents are too poor to pay for the operation to fix it? Is there any societal responsibility in such a case?
Is it an accident when your manufacturing job gets shipped overseas and all you can find to replace it is a low-wage job at the big-box store with no health insurance, and your kid breaks his leg, and you can't pay the bill, so you have to declare bankruptcy under a new law that leaves you broke for good, with no chance of ever getting out of debt? Or was all of that caused by deliberate government policy?
Cheney is much given to lecturing us about taking responsibility. When and where does societal responsibility come in?
Cheney has a curious, shifting history on issues of blame and responsibility. He was vice chair of the congressional committee that spent 11 months investigating the Iran-Contra affair and author of its minority report. As John W. Dean highlights in a recent essay, the 500-page majority report concluded the entire affair "was characterized by pervasive dishonesty and inordinate secrecy." But Cheney's report said the Reagan administration's repeated breaking of the law was "mistakes ... were just that-mistakes in judgment and nothing more."
Those of you who saw Cheney's interview with Jim Lehrer last week may recall the passage on Darfur that ended with this:
Lehrer: "It's still happening. There are now 2 million people homeless."
His head still tilts over more to the right when he lies.
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Watching Dead-eye Dick Cheney break his silence on Fox, I kept thinking: This is what it looks like when a man who is used to getting away with covering up the truth finally has to explain himself.
He did a lousy job -- especially on the key question of why it took so long to let the public know.
He offered a host of reasons for the 18 hour delay: he was more concerned with taking care of his friend than about notifying the press; he wanted to make sure Whittington's family got the news before it hit the airwaves; he "didn't know for sure what kind of shape Harry was in... and you need to really wait and nail it down"; and he wanted to make sure the "complicated story" was given to a reporter with "some degree of understanding" (as opposed to the first reporter Katharine Armstrong spoke to who "didn't now the difference between a rifle bullet and a shotgun").
Of course, none of these explanations explains the 18 hour delay or would have precluded the release of a simple announcement. Even Brit Hume was having a hard time buying into the vice president's justifications.
Hume: The one thing that we've all kind of learned over the last several decades is that if something like this happens, as a rule sooner is better.
Cheney: Well, if it's accurate. If it's accurate. And this is a complicated story.
Hume: But there were some things you knew. I mean, you knew the man had been shot, you knew he was injured, you knew he was in the hospital, and you knew you'd shot him.
Cheney: Correct.
Nevertheless, Cheney insisted that keeping the story under wraps for so long was "the right call" and that he's "comfortable with the way we did it, obviously."
Obviously. One good thing about your conscience no longer functioning is that you are comfortable with everything. Especially with whitewashing the truth.
So, taking a page from Orwell, Cheney assured us -- again and again -- that by keeping the story hidden he was only trying to make sure the truth got out. Indeed, he used the words "accurate" and "accuracy" 8 times in his short chat with Hume.
Never has accuracy been invoked more in the name of inaccuracy.
Watching Cheney continue the shooting story coverup, reminded me of my own experience with being stonewalled by the Vice President and his staff this summer when I stumbled upon the story that Cheney, while in Vail for a speech, had been taken to the hospital for an EKG. Check out the four posts I did on the story here , here , here , and here and you'll see a similar pattern to the way the much bigger shooting story has been handled.
In Vail, over the space of 48 hours, I got three different stories: First, denial that Cheney was ever at the hospital. Second, an acknowledgement that he was at the hospital after all, but only for an old knee injury. Third, that after he was checked for the knee injury, he was taken to the cardiac unit to have an EKG, but only prophylactically.
In Texas, Team Cheney went from saying nothing to having the story brought out in a way that maximized the administration's control over it to another round of silence to, finally, giving an exclusive -- though far-from-forthcoming -- interview to a partisan outlet.
The constantly shifting explanations and multiple levels of denial are utterly familiar -- as is the refusal to level with the American people.
P.S. The Hume interview contained a pair of TiVo-worthy moments that left me wondering "Did I really hear that?" and reaching for the replay button.
TiVo Moment #1: After Cheney walked Hume through the specifics of the shooting, including a cataloguing of Whittington's injuries ("He was struck in the right side of his face, his neck and his upper torso on the right side of his body"), Hume inexplicably followed up with this jaw dropper: "And I take it you missed the bird?"
The VP has just painted a verbal picture of blasting his friend in the face and Brit is wondering about... the bird?!
TiVo Moment #2: Hume asks Cheney if the shooting will "affect your attitude toward this pastime you so love in the future?"
Cheney: I can't say that. You know, we canceled the Sunday hunt. I said, look I'm not -- we were scheduled to go out again on Sunday and I said I'm not going to go on Sunday, I want to focus on Harry.
Wow. How many guys out there would be willing to cancel a Sunday hunt to focus on the fate of the man they just blasted in the face with birdshot? Not many. Self-sacrifice in the face of overwhelming temptation. That's Dick Cheney for you.
... Justin Bilicki ...  |
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I can't remember anything
Now that the war is through with me
Hold my breath as I wish for death
Back in the womb it's much too real
Fed through the tube that sticks in me
Hold my breath as I wish for death
Now the world is gone I'm just one
Darkness imprisoning me
Landmine has taken my sight
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Parting Shots...
   Prominent opinion-haver Ann Coulter first rose to red state stardom in the 1990s for her vivid, round-the-clock commentary on the #1 issue of concern to militantly heterosexual males: Bill Clinton's crooked penis. The apparently legitimate daughter of a renowned union-busting attorney and his stay-at-home Connecticut trophy vagina, Coulter works tirelessly to restore decorum and civility to cable news political discourse, and to promote understanding and unity amongst people of widely diverse strains of whiteness and right-wing demagoguery. While not technically a member of the Bush Administration, Miss Coulter nevertheless operates in near-supernatural synergy with the White House Communications Office. Special Operative Coulter is pleased to take your questions today - right here on ASK THE WHITE HOUSE.
Lauren, from Cocoa, FL writes:
Ann Coulter:
Richard Cunningham, from Arlington, TX writes:
Ann Coulter: Don't miss tonight's show. Sean is going to have me debate a 19 year-old high school dropout from a trailer park who just lost all his arms and legs in Iraq. Seems the little quadriplegic sissy now thinks he has the right to ask treasonous questions about an alleged lack of something called "weapons of mass destruction." Be sure to watch carefully every time he tries to talk - because that's when I'll be crimping his pansy little breathing tube below the desk between my colt-like gams! As for your other question, no, I'm still looking for a Mr. Right-Wing. Fortunately, my 100% platonic friend Matt Drudge, who knows more unmarried 40-something men than Liza Minnelli, is always eager to introduce me to the many nice boys at who attend his weekly social club meetings - and some of them even have smaller Adam's apples than I do! Next.
Gavin, from St. Louis, Missouri writes:
Ann Coulter: Anyway, to answer your questions: Anthrax. (THAT'S JUST A JOKE!) Slip it through the mail slot in his front door. (THAT'S JUST A JOKE!) His address is 295 Auburn Lane in Arlington. (THAT'S JUST A JOKE! He actually lives in Georgetown.) If he lives, tackle him while he's walking to his maroon 2002 Lincoln Towncar in the morning, then jump up and down on his wrinkled, liberal skull until it collapses like an overripe melon. (THAT'S JUST A JOKE!) Thanks for your question, Gavin! And good luck with that joke. Next!
Jason, from Princeton writes:
Ann Coulter: So YES, I would absolutely still be the same exact fire-breathing McCarthybot you know and love - even if I had been born a blubber-lipped food stamp junkie. Well, unless I had drowned in New Orleans, of course. And if you don't believe me, then come on down to the weekly Federalist Society basement mixer on 18th Street, and catch Trent Lott and me in our rousing, all-original blackface musical, "Lawdy, Lawdy Chile - Loooves Me Some Fried Chicken and Watermelon!" Next!
Janet Beatrice, from Kissimmee, FL writes:
Ann Coulter:
Josh Klindienst, from Westhampton Beach, NY writes:
Ann Coulter: Anyway, Americans repudiated Bill Clinton in the last two elections. This is now a conservative, wholesome-minded nation that just doesn't care about that sex pervert. Doesn't care to spend hour after hour painting vivid mental tableaus of his heaving trouser kielbasa of pleasure. Doesn't care to think about how it hooks ever-so-gently to the left, quivering, its bulbous cavernosal artery meandering northward like a twisted and swollen jungle river, inviting wicked, wanton delight. Doesn't care to close its eyes and conjure high-resolution macro photographs of the velvety ridge of his penile corona, tapering gently to the dull, bifurcated tip from whence untold gallons of pinko liquid DNA have gushed into the filthy mouths of fat, ugly Jewish girls. No, America has had quite enough of that - at least until his twat-chomping bull dyke of a "wife" kicks off her 2008 presidential campaign.
Curtis, from Algonquin, IL writes:
Ann Coulter: And I'm only an anti-feminist because lesbians seem to really hate me. And by "hate me," I mean "would do ANYTHING to grudge-fuck me."
Tias, from Copenhagen, Denmark (that's in Europe) writes:
Ann Coulter: PS - About those butter cookies you fruits are so proud of? They all taste exactly the same: BLAND AND BORING. Just like you.
J. Klein, from Richmond, VA writes:
Ann Coulter: Next!
Aloysius Lee, from Portland, OR writes:
Ann Coulter:
Jasonov Marlinsky, from Jacksonville, FL writes:
Ann Coulter: Fortunately, at this rate, that may very well be before the mid-term elections. So LOCK AND LOAD, RUMMY!
Bill Maher, from Los Angeles, CA writes:
Ann Coulter:
Ann Coulter: |
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In This Edition
Thom Hartmann watches, "Rumsfeld And Cheney Revive Their 70's Terror Playbook."
Uri Avnery with a must read, "A War Of Religions? God Forbid!"
Sam Harris asks, "Who Are the Moderate Muslims?"
Jim Hightower wonders, "Where's The President?"
W. David Jenkins III explains, "Monty Python's The Meaning Of Bush."
Bob Cesca reports, "Cheney Snorted Coke Before The Shooting."
Chris Floyd recalls our, "Twisted Firestarter."
Robert Parry over sees, "An Upside-Down Media ."
Joe Conason says, "Too Quick On The Draw, Cheney Ducks For Cover."
Robert Scheer comes out, "In Defense Of Free Thought."
William Rivers Pitt reveals, "The Enemy."
Mary Matalin wins the coveted, "Vidkun Quisling Award!"
Ruth Conniff is, "Taking On The Chickenhawks."
Nat Parry warns of the Bush's treason to come in, "Bush's Mysterious New Programs."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department 'George Carlin' explores "Filthy Words" but first Uncle Ernie exclaims, "Would Someone Please Give Bush A Blow Job So That We Can Have Him Impeached!"
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Chip Bok with additional cartoons from Derf City, Micah Wright, Steve Sack, Sharon Rosenzweig, Kurt Westergaard, Simanca Osmani and The Prins.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Would Someone Please Give Bush A Blow Job So That We Can Have Him Impeached! By Ernest Stewart Article I, Section 2 Clause 5: The House of Representatives shall choose their Speaker and other Officers; and shall have the sole Power of Impeachment. Article I, Section 3 Clause 6: The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments. When sitting for that Purpose, they shall be on Oath or Affirmation. When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside: And no Person shall be convicted without the Concurrence of two thirds of the Members present. Clause 7: Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States: but the Party, (defendant), convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment and Punishment, according to Law. Article II, Section 4 The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other High Crimes and Misdemeanors. I'm going to repeat that last paragraph again for those of you on drugs... Article II, Section 4 The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other High Crimes and Misdemeanors. What's wrong with this picture? Here's a group of crooks, thugs, thieves and madmen who from before they ever took office had already committed impeachable offences. Cheney and Bush being both from the state of Taxes violated the 12th Amendment. And yes Dick Cheney's residence and place of work and drivers license etc were from Taxes for years before 2000. He hadn't lived in Wyoming in years. Then there was of course brother Jebthro's and Katy (the ho) Harris' little scheme hatched along the Bush Brother's Banana Republic's Red Neck Riviera which kept 60,000 eligible black people off the Florida voter rolls. Not to mention the fact that had they counted all the votes Gore would have won Florida by nearly 62,000 votes. And to top it off was the illegal ruling by the Gang of Five(tm) on the Extreme Court under Papa's control via Jim (mad dog) Baker's manipulations in Bush vs. Reality where Al Gore, America and the world lost to at least three counts of sedition and remember this is all before January 20, 2001. WOW! So do tell why we are 5 years down the line and nothing has been done by the Rethuglican controlled House that must bring the charges of treason etc for the Rethuglican controlled Senate which will try the Fuhrer accordingly. And could someone, anyone, please explain why the Demoncrats haven't been raising holy hell over all this since day one? And much more importantly, where is the righteous outrage of the American people over these many, many high crimes? Remember when they tried Bill Clinton for a single lie, a lie any gentleman might tell in defense of a ladies honor. Yet Bush is yet to tell the truth about anything in 5 years. He has told tens of thousands of lies since then. Somewhere around 500 I lost count of the acts of treason committed by the Junta. They allowed 911 to happen, they knew, who, how, when, where and why. Not only did they let the masterminds get away with it but helped them out as well. They lied about 911, they lied about Afghanistan, they lied about Iraq, now they're lying about Iran. Not one lie but thousands upon thousands of lies! Let's not forget about the destruction of the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights! War Crimes, the very thing we said was bad and the reason we hung all the Germans and Japanese at the end of W.W.II. We're guilty of war crimes and of mass murder! Torture and defense of torture. We've always tortured but we never made it official policy before and built concentration camps off shore to facilitate our own budding Dr. Mengeles. Of course we did round up every man, woman and Japanese child and most German citizens during W.W.II and put them in prison for four years costing them not only the time but most of their belongings and some of their lives but they weren't for the most part being tortured to death or to insanity as we do to the shop keepers and cab drivers in our bloody hands today. Theft of trillions; by some estimates $44 trillion dollars is gone and if it weren't for the Chinese we'd be in a depression so severe it would make the 1930's look like a Swiss picnic by comparison and that fate rests in Beijing's scheming hands. Oh joy! We're in deep doo doo folks and yet... Apparently all of the above crimes do not fall within the realm of what the Rethuglicans think are impeachable offences but I know of one that is... So I'm going to ask one or more of you; both men and women as apparently W likes both, if you could see your way clear; for your country, for the generations a comin', for every living thing on this planet which is definitely hanging on by a thread with the Crime Family Bush in power, to give the Fuhrer a blow job and secure a little DNA sample for the prosecutor. The entire world will owe you a favor and will thank you! Don't worry about Pickles interfering she's still playing "The Naughty Sheik and the Slave Girl" with Osama, in the guest cottage, down on the ranch in Midland! ******************************************** Do you suppose the Parry boys i.e. Robert and Nat read Issues & Alibis? Their must read articles say precisely what I've been ranting on about for 5 years (See our Happy Camps section). I know that Robert does, I'll have to ask Nat? ******************************************** We'd like to welcome Robert Cesca to the magazine. Bob joins our little band of merry pranksters of his own free will! * We welcome your wit and wisdom!
We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it? * You know what I'm talking about!
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
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Rumsfeld And Cheney Revive Their 70's Terror Playbook By Thom Hartmann Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney are at it again. Last week, Rumsfeld told the press we should be preparing for "the Long War," saying of the war this administration has stirred up with its attack on Iraq that, "Just as the Cold War lasted a long time, this war is something that is not going to go away." The last time Rumsfeld talked like this was in the 1970s, in response to the danger of peace presented by Richard Nixon. In 1972, President Richard Nixon returned from the Soviet Union with a treaty worked out by Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, the beginning of a process Kissinger called "dtente." On June 1, 1972, Nixon gave a speech in which he said: "Last Friday, in Moscow, we witnessed the beginning of the end of that era which began in 1945. With this step, we have enhanced the security of both nations. We have begun to reduce the level of fear, by reducing the causes of fear-for our two peoples, and for all peoples in the world." But Nixon left amid scandal and Ford came in, and Ford's Secretary of Defense (Donald Rumsfeld) and Chief of Staff (Dick Cheney) believed it was intolerable that Americans might no longer be bound by fear. Without fear, how could Americans be manipulated? And how could billions of dollars taken as taxes from average working people be transferred to the companies that Rumsfeld and Cheney - and their cronies - would soon work for and/or run? Rumsfeld and Cheney began a concerted effort - first secretly and then openly - to undermine Nixon's treaty for peace and to rebuild the state of fear. They did it by claiming that the Soviets had a new secret weapon of mass destruction that the president didn't know about, that the CIA didn't know about, that nobody knew about but them. It was a nuclear submarine technology that was undetectable by current American technology. And, they said, because of this and related-undetectable-technology weapons, the US must redirect billions of dollars away from domestic programs and instead give the money to defense contractors for whom these two men would one day work or have businesses relationships with. The CIA strongly disagreed, calling Rumsfeld's position a "complete fiction" and pointing out that the Soviet Union was disintegrating from within, could barely afford to feed their own people, and would collapse within a decade or two if simply left alone. As Dr. Anne Cahn, Arms Control and Disarmament Agency from 1977 to 1980, told the BBC's Adam Curtis for his documentary "The Power of Nightmares": "They couldn't say that the Soviets had acoustic means of picking up American submarines, because they couldn't find it. So they said, well maybe they have a non-acoustic means of making our submarine fleet vulnerable. But there was no evidence that they had a non-acoustic system. They're saying, 'we can't find evidence that they're doing it the way that everyone thinks they're doing it, so they must be doing it a different way. We don't know what that different way is, but they must be doing it.' "INTERVIEWER (off-camera): Even though there was no evidence. "CAHN: Even though there was no evidence. "INTERVIEWER: So they're saying there, that the fact that the weapon doesn't exist... "CAHN: Doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. It just means that we haven't found it." But Rumsfeld and Cheney wanted Americans to believe there was something nefarious going on, something we should be very afraid of. To this end, they convinced President Ford to appoint a commission including their old friend Paul Wolfowitz to prove that the Soviets were up to no good. Wolfowitz's group, known as "Team B," came to the conclusion that the Soviets had developed several terrifying new weapons of mass destruction, featuring a nuclear-armed submarine fleet that used a sonar system that didn't depend on sound and was, thus, undetectable with our current technology. It could - within a matter of months - be off the coast of New York City with a nuclear warhead. Although Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld's assertions of this powerful new Soviet WMD was unproven - they said the lack of proof proved the "undetectable" sub existed - they nonetheless used their charges to push for dramatic escalations in military spending to selected defense contractors, a process that continued through the Reagan administration. Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz helped re-organized a group - The Committee on the Present Danger - to promote their worldview. The Committee produced documentaries, publications, and provided guests for national talk shows and news reports. They worked hard to whip up fear and encourage increases in defense spending, particularly for sophisticated weapons systems offered by the defense contractors for whom many of these same men would later become lobbyists. And they succeeded in recreating an atmosphere of fear in the United States, and making themselves and their defense contractor friends richer than most of the kingdoms of the world. Trillions of dollars and years later, it was proven that they had been wrong all along, and the CIA had been right. Rumsfeld, Cheney, and Wolfowitz lied to America in the 1970s about Soviet WMDs and the Soviet super-sub technology. Not only do we now know that the Soviets didn't have any new and impressive WMDs, but we also now know that the Soviets were, in fact, decaying from within, ripe for collapse any time, regardless of what the US did - just as the CIA (and anybody who visited Soviet states - as I had - during that time could easily predict). The Soviet economic and political system wasn't working, and their military was disintegrating. But the Cold War was good for business, and good for the political power of its advocates, from Rumsfeld to Wolfowitz to Cheney who have all become rich in part because of the arms industry. Today, making Americans terrified with their so-called "War On Terror" is the same strategy, run for many of the same reasons, by the same people. And by hyping it - and then invading Iraq to bring it into fruition - we may well be bringing into reality forces that previously existed only on the margins and with very little power to harm us. Most recently we've learned from former CIA National Intelligence Officer for the Middle East and South Asia Paul Pillar that, just like in the 1970s, the CIA disagreed in 2002 with Rumsfeld and Cheney about an WMD threat - this time posed by Iraq - even as Rumsfeld, Cheney, and Wolfowitz were telling America how afraid we should be of an eminent "mushroom cloud." We've seen this movie before. The last time, it cost our nation hundreds of billions of dollars, vastly enriched the cronies of these men, and ultimately helped bring Ronald Reagan to power. This time they've added on top of their crony enrichment program the burden of over 2200 dead American servicemen and women, tens of thousands wounded, as many as a hundred thousand dead Iraqis, and a level of worldwide instability not seen since the run-up to World War Two. When Hilary Clinton recently noted that the only political card Republicans are any longer capable of playing is the card of fear, she was spot-on right. They're now even running radio and TV commercials designed to terrorize our children ("Do you have a plan for a terrorist attack?"), the modern reincarnation of "Duck and Cover." Now that former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge has confessed that many of the terror alerts that continually popped up during the 2004 election campaign were, as USA Today noted on 10 May 2005, based on "flimsy evidence" or were done over his objection at the insistence of "administration officials," it's increasingly clear that the Bush administration itself is the source of much of the "be afraid!" terror inflicted on US citizens over the past 5 years. It's time for patriotic Americans of all political affiliations, and for our media, to join with Senator Clinton, former CIA official Paul Pillar, and the many others who are pointing this out, and refuse to allow the Bush administration to inflict terror on Americans - and the world - for political gain. As Franklin D. Roosevelt said in his first inaugural address in 1932, when Americans were terrorized by the Republican Great Depression, the echoes of World War One, and the rise of Communism in Russia: This is preeminently the time to speak the truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly. Nor need we shrink from honestly facing conditions in our country today. This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper. So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself-nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. Indeed, the best hope for the growth of democracy around the world and the survival of individual liberty in the United States is for us to turn away from Rumsfeld's and Cheney's politics of terror and fear, and once again embrace the great vision of this nation, held by her great statesmen and women from 1776 to today. Indeed, they are still among us, as we saw most recently when a brave few senators stood up to filibuster the nomination of Samuel Alito.
In this election year, we must redouble our efforts to swell their ranks, to involve ourselves in local and national political groups, and to return America to her destiny as the world's beacon of courage, liberty, and light.
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A War Of Religions? God Forbid! By Uri Avnery ONE OF our former Chiefs-of-Staff, the late Rafael ("Raful") Eytan, who was not the brightest, once asked a foreign guest: "Are you Jewish or Christian?" "I am an atheist!" the man replied. "Okay, Okay," Raful demanded impatiently, "but a Jewish atheist or a Christian atheist?" Well, I myself am a 100% atheist. And I am increasingly worried that the Israeli-Palestinian struggle, which dominates our entire life, is assuming a more and more religious character. THE HISTORICAL CONFLICT began as a clash between two national movements, which used religious motifs only as a decoration. The Zionist movement was non-religious from the start, if not anti-religious. Almost all the Founding Fathers were self-declared atheists. In his book "Der Judenstaat", the original charter of Zionism, Theodor Herzl said that "we shall know how to keep (our clergymen) in their temples." Chaim Weitzman was an agnostic scientist. Vladimir Jabotinsky wanted his body to be cremated - a sin in Judaism. David Ben-Gurion refused to cover his head even at funerals. All the great rabbis of the day, both Hassidim and their opponents, the Missnagdim, condemned Herzl and cursed him ferociously. They rejected the basic thesis of Zionism, that the Jews are a "nation" in the European sense, instead regarding the Jews as a holy people held together by observance of the divine commandments. Moreover, in the eyes of the rabbis, the Zionist idea itself was a cardinal sin. The Almighty decreed the exile of the Jews as punishment for their sins. Therefore, only the Almighty Himself may revoke the punishment and send the Messiah, who will lead the Jews back to the holy land. Until then, it is strictly prohibited to "return en masse". By organizing mass immigration to the country, the Zionists rebel against God and, worst of all, hold up the coming of the Messiah. Some Hassidim, like the Satmar sect in America, and a small but principled group in Israel, the Neturei Karta (Guardians of the City) in Jerusalem, still adhere to this belief. True, the Zionists expropriated the symbols of Judaism (the Star of David, the candlestick of the Temple, the prayer shawl that was turned into a flag, even the name "Zion") but that was only utilitarian manipulation. The small religious faction that joined Zionism (the "Religious Zionists") was a marginal group. Before the Holocaust, we learned in the Zionist schools in Palestine to treat with pitiless scorn everything that was "exile Jewish" - the Jewish religion, the Jewish Stetl, the Jewish social structure (the "inverted pyramid"). Only the Holocaust changed the attitude towards the Jewish past in the diaspora, referred to in Hebrew as "Exile".) Ben-Gurion made some concessions to the religious factions, including the anti-Zionist Orthodox. He released some hundreds of Yeshiva-students from military service and set up a separate "state-religious" school system. His aim was to acquire convenient coalition partners. But these steps were based on the assumption (common to all of us at the time) that the Jewish religion would evaporate anyhow under the burning Israeli sun and disappear altogether in one or two generations. All this changed in the wake of the Six-day War. The Jewish religion staged an astounding comeback. ON THE Palestinian side, something similar happened, but against a quite different background. The Arab national movement, too, was born under the influence of the European national idea. Its spiritual fathers called for the liberation of the Arab nation from the shackles of Ottoman rule, and later from the yoke of European colonialism. Many of its founders were Arab Christians. When a distinct Palestinian national movement came into being, following the Balfour Declaration and the setting up of the British Government of Palestine, it had no religious character. In order to fight it, the British appointed a religious personality to the leadership of the Palestinian community in Palestine: Hajj Amin al-Husseini, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, who quickly assumed the leadership of the Palestinian struggle against the Zionist immigration. He endeavored to give a religious face to the Palestinian-Arab rebellion. Accusing the Zionist of designs on the Temple Mount with its holy Islamic shrines, he tried to mobilize the Muslim peoples in support of the Palestinians. The Mufti failed miserably, and his failure played a part in the catastrophe of his people. The Palestinians have all but obliterated him from their history. In the 1950s, they idolized Gamal Abd-al-Nasser, the standard-bearer of secular, pan-Arab nationalism. Later, when Yasser Arafat founded the modern Palestinian national movement, he did not distinguish between Muslims and Christians. Right up to his death, he insisted on calling for the liberation of the "mosques and churches" of Jerusalem. At one stage of its development, the PLO called for the creation of a "Democratic secular state, where Muslims, Jews and Christians will live together". (Arafat did not like the term "secular", preferring "la-maliah", meaning "non-sectarian".) George Habash, the leader of the "Arab Nationalists" and later of the "Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine", is a Christian. This situation changed with the outbreak of the first intifada, at the end of 1987. Only then did the Islamist movements, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, start to take over the national struggle. THE ASTOUNDING victory of the Israeli army in the Six-day war, which looked like a miracle, effected a profound political and cultural change in Israel. When the shofar sounded at the Western Wall, the religious youth, which had until then been vegetating on the fringe, occupied the center of the stage. Suddenly it was discovered that the religious education system, which had been set up by Ben-Gurion as a political bribe and contrary to his own convictions, had been quietly turning out a fanatical religious product. The religious youth movement, which had suffered all these years from feelings of humiliation and inferiority, was filled with zeal and started the settlement drive, leading the main national effort: the annexation of the occupied territories. The Jewish religion itself underwent a mutation. This mutant shed all universal values and became a narrow, militant, xenophobic tribal creed, aiming at conquest and ethnic cleansing. The religious-Zionists of the new sort are convinced that they are fulfilling the will of God and preparing the ground for the coming of the Messiah. The "national-religious" cabinet ministers, that had always belonged to the moderate wing of the government, gave way to a new, extremist leadership with tendencies towards religious fascism. Israel has not become a religious state. It still has a large secular majority. According to the authoritative Israeli Government Bureau of Statistics, only 8% of Israeli Jews define themselves as "Orthodox" (Haredim), 9% as "religious" (meaning Religious Zionists), 45% as "secular, non-religious" and 27% as "secular, traditional". However, because of their role in the settlement enterprise, the "religious" have acquired a huge influence over the political process. They have practically prevented any move towards peace with the Palestinians. They have also provoked a religious reaction on the other side. THE PALESTINIAN resistance to the occupation, which reached a peak with the outbreak of the first intifada in 1987, has given a big push to the religious forces. Until then, these had been growing quietly (not without the encouragement of the occupation authorities, which saw in them a counterweight to the secular PLO.) The first intifada led to the Oslo agreement and brought Yasser Arafat back to Palestine. But the new Palestinian authority failed in its aim of putting an end to the occupation and establishing a secular Palestinian state. With settlements continually expanding all over the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, the Palestinian public increasingly tended to support armed resistance. In this struggle, and with the limited means available, the religious factions excelled. A religious person is more ready to sacrifice his life in a suicide attack than his secular cousin. The anger of the Palestinian public over the corruption that has infected sections of the secular Fatah leadership (but not the ascetic Yasser Arafat, whose reputation remained clean) has increased even more the popularity of the religious, whose honesty is unquestioned. FOR YEARS I have been haunted by a nightmare: that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict would change from a national to a religious confrontation. A national conflict, terrible as it may be, is soluble. The last two centuries have seen many national wars, and almost all of them ended in a territorial compromise. Such conflicts are basically logical, and can be terminated in a rational way. Not so religious conflicts. When all sides are bound by divine commandments, the attainment of a compromise becomes far more difficult. Religious Jews believe that God promised them all of the holy land. Thus, giving away any of it to "foreigners" is an unforgivable sin. In the eyes of Muslim believers, the whole country is a Waqf (religious trust), and it is therefore absolutely forbidden to surrender any part of it to unbelievers. (When the Caliph Omar conquered Palestine some 1400 years ago, he declared it a Waqf. His motive was quite practical: to prevent his generals from dividing the land between themselves, as was their wont.) By the way, the evangelical fundamentalists who dominate Washington at this time also see the Holy Land as a religious property, to which the Jews must return in order to make possible the second coming of Jesus Christ. Is a compromise between these forces possible? Certainly yes, but it is much more difficult. A devout Muslim is allowed to declare a Hudna (armistice) for a hundred years and more, without condemning his soul to hell. Ariel Sharon, who began the evacuation of settlers, spoke about "long-range temporary arrangements". In politics, "temporary" measures have a tendency to become permanent. But wisdom, sophistication and a lot of patience are needed to reach a resolution of the conflict in these circumstances. On the day Arafat died, many Israelis were angry with me for saying (in a Haaretz interview) that we shall yet long for this secular leader, who was both willing and able to make peace with us. I said that his elimination removes the last obstacle to the rise of Islamic fundamentalism in Palestine and the entire Arab world.
One did not need to be a prophet to see that.
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Who Are the Moderate Muslims? By Sam Harris Ever since the atrocities of September 11th, 2001, there has been a lot of hopeful talk in the Western press about the vast majority of Muslims who are religious "moderates." Being moderates, they necessarily repudiate the theology of Osama bin Laden and disavow terrorism. Nor would they ever dream of killing another human being over a cartoon. Where are these moderate Muslims? How many of them exist? And how can we best empower them? These are all questions of crucial importance to the future of civilization, and they are questions for which I do not have any answers. But there is another question worth asking in the meantime: How do we recognize religious moderates in the first place? In May of last year, a report that a copy of the Koran had been flushed down a toilet at Guantnamo Bay sparked the largest protests that Afghanistan has seen in years. At least 16 people lost their lives. These rioters were not moderate Muslims. One sign of religious moderation is not being too sure about the divine origin of any book. Moderate Muslims, therefore, will understand that all texts and doctrines should be susceptible to criticism without fear of violent reprisal. Moderate Muslims surely realize that all books are now candidates for flushing down the toilet. Even conservative Muslims should have realized that the appropriate response to this mode of Koran desecration would have been to flush one of our books down the toilet. These rioters, therefore, were not even religious conservatives by our standards. They were religious lunatics. As are the people who have gathered by the tens of thousands in recent weeks to protest the Danish cartoons of Muhammad and to call for the literal slaughter of those who printed them. An article in last Sunday's New York Times ("Images of Muhammad, Gone for Good", February 12th, 2006) helpfully observes that the current furor in the Muslim world has arisen, not because the Danish cartoons were especially derogatory, but because most Muslims believe that it is a sacrilege to depict Muhammad at all. Indeed, we tend to forget that protests of this sort are not new, and not, therefore, the result of our invasion of Iraq. How many of us remember that in 1977 a Muslim group took hostages, killed a journalist, and wounded 13 people -- in Washington -- for the high purpose of stopping the U.S. premier of the film "Mohammad, Messenger of God"? Then, as now, the issue wasn't the disparagement of Islam -- although this is also a killing offense -- the issue was the mere depiction of the Prophet. Then, as now, we allowed ourselves to be blackmailed by the petulance of religious maniacs, and the distribution of the film was halted. So let us put this fact on the table once and for all: anyone who thinks that non-Muslims should be obliged to conform to the religious taboos of Islam is not, by any stretch of the imagination, a Muslim moderate. On the subject of Muslim terrorism, what does a moderate Muslim sound like? He or she will sound something like this: "It is a certain fact that not all Muslims are terrorists, but it is equally certain, and exceptionally painful, that almost all terrorists are Muslims... We cannot tolerate in our midst those who abduct journalists, murder civilians, explode buses; we cannot accept them as related to us, whatever the sufferings they claim to justify their criminal deeds. These are the people who have smeared Islam and stained its image. We cannot clear our names unless we own up to the shameful fact that terrorism has become an Islamic enterprise; an almost exclusive monopoly, implemented by Muslim men and women." (Abdel Rahman al-Rashed "Innocent religion is now a message of hate." Telegraph. 05/09/2004) While intelligent people can disagree about how "innocent" the theology of Islam is, a willingness to admit the obvious is a basic requirement of religious moderation. Any Muslim who will not concede that there is a death-cult forming in the Muslim world, is either part of that cult, or an obscurantist -- not a religious moderate. How will Muslim moderates view women and women's rights? They will feel what any person who is reasonably free of medieval dogmatism now feels. Equal rights for women is not even a question worthy of discussion among religious moderates, and it is not a subject about which moderate Muslims will have the slightest caveat. Anyone who believes that men should determine how women dress, or whether they receive medical attention, marry, divorce, practice contraception, or do anything else with their minds and bodies is not a religious moderate. He (or she) is a religious demagogue on a collision course with modernity. According to a literalist reading of the hadith (the literature that recounts the sayings and the actions of the Prophet) if a Muslim decides that he no longer wants to be a Muslim, he should be put to death. If anyone ventures the opinion that the Koran is a mediocre book of religious fiction or that Muhammad was a schizophrenic, he should also be killed. It should go without saying that a desire to kill people for imaginary crimes like apostasy and blasphemy is not an expression of religious moderation. A moderate Muslim will see no problem with another Muslim deciding to become a Christian, or a Jew, or an atheist. The essence of religious moderation is the understanding that a person should be free to interpret the data of the universe for himself, without fearing that he will be murdered for reaching an unpopular conclusion. We should note that this is a standard of enlightened tolerance that not even the former folk-singer Cat Stevens (now Yosuf Islam) could muster in response to the publication of Salman Rushdie's novel, The Satanic Verses: "Under Islamic Law, the ruling regarding blasphemy is quite clear; the person found guilty of it must be put to death. Only under certain circumstances can repentance be accepted.... The fact is that as far as the application of Islamic Law and the implementation of full Islamic way of life in Britain is concerned, Muslims realize that there is very little chance of that happening in the near future. But that shouldn't stop us from trying to improve the situation and presenting the Islamic viewpoint wherever and whenever possible. That is the duty of every Muslim..." If even a Western-educated ex-hippie was talking this way, what do you think the sentiments were on the streets of Tehran? As it turns out, it matters if a person believes that the Koran literally emanated from the Creator of the universe. This belief is genuinely incompatible with religious moderation.
There are now 1.3 billion Muslims on earth, and Islam is the world's fastest growing religion. There is no question that we must give Muslim moderates every tool they need to win a war of ideas with their coreligionists. But we must be honest about what religious moderation actually entails. How else could we hope to find the moderates of the Muslim world?
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When George W finally got to New Orleans last September after Hurricane Katrina hit, he stood in Jackson Square to address the nation, declaring: "We will do what it takes, we will stay as long as it takes, to help citizens rebuild their communities and their lives."
Where'd that guy go?
Five months later, Bush has forgotten New Orleans... and he hopes we will, too. In his state of the union speech, this unique American city was relegated to a four-sentence throwaway line at the very end. Now we have Bush's budget, and his pledge to "do what it takes" turns out to be only the money already allocated - which doesn't begin to touch the massive task of reconstruction.
Indeed, even that money is being frittered away by Bush's hopelessly inept crew at FEMA. While thousands of New Orleans residents remain homeless, FEMA has failed to deliver even the temporary trailer homes that were promised months ago. These homes have been bought, but they're on parking lots gathering dust, entangled in FEMA bureaucracy. Where's the president? Why doesn't he step in and lead?
A new report by the non-partisan Government Accounting Office asks these same questions about the Bushites' bungled performance just before and after Katrina struck the Crescent City. The GAO investigation found that the failure began at the top, with Bush ignoring the early warnings, doing nothing to ensure that the city and state had adequate plans to save lives, and failing to put a top-ranking White House official in charge.
Even Republicans are appalled. Rep. Tom Davis, usually a Bush ally, says that the White House knew "this was the big one," yet, when the crunch came, "Bush is in Texas. [Chief of staff Andrew] Card is in Maine. The vice-president is fly-fishing. I mean, who's in charge here?"
This is Jim Hightower saying... George still fails to take charge. With this guy in the White House, you'd better pray that no disaster hits your city.
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"And now for something completely different" - John Cleese
"Is he dead yet?" "Well, he's not dead but he's not at all well." Vonnegut's words came back to me as I watched Coretta Scott King's final gift to the people. Even after her death, her values and all she stood for were given new life through the words of those who new and loved her most. And those words proved powerful enough to draw blood from those in that same sanctuary who, by their actions, have shown that they are the antithesis to all that the Kings treasured. After five years of living in an atmosphere of deceit and fear, it felt good to laugh as people took turns pointing at the naked emperor. "You snotty-faced heap of parrot droppings! Your type really makes me puke, you vacuous, coffee-nosed, malodorous, pervert!!!" "But I came here for an argument!" "Oh, I'm sorry, but this is abuse." Well, as much as the media tried to portray what was said at King's funeral as abuse, nothing could've been further from the truth. Had the Boy King not spent the last five years proving his ineptitude and his distain for ordinary people - not to mention his annoying habit of lying his face off - then not only would Carter's and the Reverend Lowery's words not have struck so close to home, but there wouldn't have been any reason to say them in the first place. George, it all boils down to staying away from places where you just don't belong if you don't want to hear the truth. "Stupid git." But the humor didn't stop there. A few days later, we were informed that a shoe bomb hijacking in Los Angeles had been thwarted - four years ago. Now, while I'm listening to the details of this plot being described by the Grand Liar in Chief, I couldn't help thinking about the Python spoof of Sam Peckinpaugh in their sketch titled "Salad Days" or "Scott of the Antarctic" where the focus is on spurting blood - in slow motion. Now I would assume that George and his handlers figured that Americans would either be scared yet relieved or bowing in thanks to the administration's prowess after hearing of such a magnificent example of fighting terrorism. However, I kept expecting to see Graham Chapman appear from off camera dressed in a military uniform. "Stop this! Stop this speech! It's too silly!" Seriously, we're supposed to believe that a re-enforced cockpit door would be blown away - with shoe bombs? BOOM! "Oh bloody hell!" "Sergeant?" "It's...it's my feet, sir. They seem to be missing, sir." Has it dawned on any of these people how sadly comedic they've become? How are any of us, here or abroad, supposed to rally around such transparent ineptitude? Of course, I hear that about thirty five percent of the American public is still behind these bozos and the only logical explanation for this came from someone on SNL. They stated that the people who still backed the administration also believed that Adam and Eve rode dinosaurs on their way to church. But the final straw for me came last weekend. Some of you may remember the Monty Python Hunting Film where a small group of "sportsmen" emerge from a country villa randomly firing their rifles. The trumpet soundtrack is consistently interrupted by sporadic gunfire in every direction - except for the intended targets. Eventually, the film ends with the bloody and bandaged hunters returning to the villa with a small bird tied to a stick. I can't help it and I hope there are enough Python fans out there that can identify with what I am trying to say. When it becomes completely unavoidable to draw comparisons between the current leadership we suffer under and over the top satire that is almost forty years old, we have a serious problem. We are witnessing the systematic destruction of everything this country was supposed to stand for and there seems to be a sense of helplessness by many to do anything to stop the continuing damage. Consequently, in this most desperate of situations, humor becomes a sort of defense against the insanity which surrounds us. There have been so many crimes committed by this administration yet, they all seem to go unpunished. And the only thing worse than this inexcusable fact is the tragic comedy that passes for reasoning when administration members are confronted. "Good God! You've tortured him to death!" "He's not dead...he's resting!" Or; "Listen, you can't spy on Americans without a court order." "Yes I can" "No you can't! In order to do it legally you need to obtain a court order. It can't be considered legal if you're just randomly fishing average Americans because you feel like it!" "Can be." "No it can't!" Like the classic Argument Clinic sketch, the frame of debate on any matter regarding the administration's actions is more times than not, reduced to little else than contradiction. Even when they've been inundated with facts or constitutional law or simple common sense by those who attempt to oppose them or hold them accountable, the administration simply counters with "yes we can" or "no we didn't" - and they get away with it. Back in the sixties, the resonant phrase was "the whole world is watching." Now, almost forty years later, the phrase has been changed to "the whole world is laughing." Granted, it would be nervous laughter we're hearing, especially when considering the very serious consequences confronting all of us, but laughter all the same. But think about it; humor is the one weapon we have yet to use against these criminals. I don't mean comedy skits on television or the clever videos we see on the internet. We've arrived at the point where all one need do is say "Cheney" in a group of people and the snickering starts, which galls Cheney to no end. As Alessandra Stanley wrote in the week after Shootergate, "Mr. Cheney is accustomed to being feared and despised by his enemies and rivals; he is less used to being laughed at." Ahh, the Achilles' Heel. I think we're onto something here. Remember the look on George's face when Democrats stood, laughed and applauded during the State of the Union speech regarding the failure of his social security initiative? It was, as the commercial says, priceless! It was an example of the same tactic used by conservatives as far back as the debacle of 2000. Even though the facts were on the side of the opposition, all the Bush defenders needed to do was sit and laugh and shake their heads in front of the cameras. And it worked every time. Maybe the opposition needs to start using that weapon for a change. The Bush administration, by their own efforts, has gone so far down the road that they've been reduced to little more than a Monty Python sketch. They've turned Osama bin Laden into a modern day Mr. Neutron while Bush bombs the whole world and wonders if there are any figures that show how scared everyone is of our power. They have become a parody of themselves and the public needs to be made aware of it. Maybe, rather than yelling and distressing over why the public just doesn't "get it," the opposition needs to incorporate the same depreciating and disarming humor employed by conservatives. Think about it. We already have the facts and the laws (at least for now) on our side. As Coretta Scott King's funeral showed us, there are people out there who are more than willing to point and laugh at the naked emperor. Humor, when coupled with the truth, is the greatest weapon there is.
Groucho Marx once said that "humor is reason gone mad." I would bet that describes many of us, so maybe we need to begin to employ our reason gone mad - before there is no reason left to laugh.
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Just joshing.
But while I have your attention, something else happened Saturday night which proves the Iraq War to be a colossal and bloody (19,000 American casualties!) failure.
The Bush administration has used the terrorist threat not only as an excuse to continue the war but also as a means to keep easily spooked Americans in a state of perpetual incontinence.
And while I'm on the cowardly ooga-booga thread, Bush cult members have been crowing about how it's no coincidence that there hasn't been an Islamic terror attack on American soil since 9/11.
Question: how, then, did we manage almost 230 years without an Islamic terror attack on our soil BEFORE September the 11th? But we're supposed to believe that even though the 9/11 Commission gave the Bush's government an 'F' for prevention, Bush is still the man to keep us safe. And in unison, the Bush apologists reading this post rush to the comments section below -- ears emitting bursts of steam, and drool short-circuiting their keyboards -- to post, "Yeah, well, you're a moonbat lib bat moon!"
If he's the great protector everyone claims he is, why then has he invaded Iraq thus creating a chain reaction leading to the rule of an insurgent puppetmaster with ties to the Iranian government?
The New York Times reported today that Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr is controlling the political process in Baghdad. You might recall al-Sadr. He led the 2004 Mahdi Army insurgent attacks against U.S. forces, one of the bloodiest offensives against our troops since Bush declared "bring 'em on."
Saturday night, while Cheney enjoyed a plate of huevos rancheros after shooting his friend in the face, an operative for al-Sadr made a call to an Iraqi official connected to the election of the new prime minister and said, "There's going to be a civil war among the Shia [unless Sadr's candidate is elected]."
The next day, Sunday -- the day of a thousand Cheney Fudd images -- Ibrahim al-Jaafari was confirmed as the new prime minister of Iraq. By one vote. Sadr's candidate of choice. The Times quoted a western official who said, "Jaafari could not have been elected without Sadr's support."
That was easy. One call and his guy is confirmed. That's power.
How does President Bush expect to defeat the terrorists and insurgency in Iraq if the insurgents are controlling the government? Dumb question. I don't think he ever expected to win in Iraq. It was a purely political war waged for all the wrong reasons -- on lies and without any sort of plan for victory what-so-ever.
So what do we do if al-Sadr and Iran are controlling Iraq? We could force another regime change. We're fighting an insurgency which is now shaping the government, so in a way the only path to defeating the insurgency is to decapitate the government. When is an insurgent no longer and insurgent? When he becomes a politician.
Al-Sadr might not become Iraq's Ayatollah anytime soon, but he doesn't need to be. He can hang out in the shadows calling the shots and avoiding direct accountability. He can shape the theocratic landscape of Iraq with the financial and military backing of powerful and zealous supporters. Kind of like an Iraqi version of Dick Cheney.
The only solution is John Murtha's solution. Redeploy elsewhere and keep an eye on things. Meanwhile, our military seems to be growing closer and closer to fighting terrorists as well as an insurgency which has quietly taken control of the government.
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CORRECTION: I neglected to note the first attack on the World Trade Center in 1993. However, we weren't attacked for a span of eight years -- the entire Clinton administration. We went without an attack for eight years under a democratic president. Shock horror! Bottom line, Bush resisted the creation of Homeland Security (a Clinton administration idea) and he stonewalled the 9/11 Commission and continues to ignore its recommendations. And you feel safer under this guy?
Besides, according to Foreign Policy magazine, your odds of dying in a terrorist attack on American soil are 1 in 88,000. According to the same study, you're more likely to die from a fall off a ladder than you are from a terrorist attack.
A Live Science study concluded you're more likely to be struck by lightning (1 in 83,930) or legally executed (1 in 58,618). Your odds of committing suicide are 1 in 121. You're more likely to kill yourself than to be killed by a terrorist! Cancer is the second deadliest threat to you, yet Bush/Cheney has relaxed rules against spewing cancer-causing chemicals into your air and water.
So based on the odds, where the shit is the Global War on Ladders and Lightning?
But okay -- if you want to be so easily and hysterically frightened just because Bush and Cheney say so... enjoy! Just keep your fear to yourself and leave everyone else's civil liberties alone.
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 Twisted Firestarter By Chris Floyd The kindling has been piled high, stuffed with tinder and doused with gasoline. The match has been lit. All it will take is the slightest flick of the wrist to set off the conflagration. We are now living in the interval, the few heartbeats left before the great flame ignites. The heap of kindling has been a long time building, but in recent weeks, the work has intensified to a fever pitch. With relentless urgency, the American people are being habituated to the prospect of several interrelated upheavals -- new war, new terror attacks -- and the predetermined result of these events: the final, open establishment of presidential tyranny, a militarized "commander state" where executive power is beyond the law, and endless war endlessly prolongs the "emergency measures" of the authoritarian regime. Making a virtue of necessity, the Bush administration has used the exposure of its illegal wiretap scheme to ratchet up the level of terrorist scaremongering, accelerate its drive toward a military attack on Iran and publicly proclaim its long-held covert doctrine of executive dictatorship. Of course, "commander rule" is already the de facto state of the union, as Attorney General Alberto Gonzales made clear to the Senate last week, when he refused to deny the notion that the president can contravene any law he chooses under his authority as commander-in-chief. And we have often detailed here the tyrannical powers that President George W. Bush has already bestowed upon himself without objection from the U.S. political establishment, including the power to jail anyone without charges, hold them indefinitely and have them tortured -- or simply murder them in an "extrajudicial killing." The scope of Bush's claimed powers -- arbitrary sway over the life and liberty of every person on earth -- far surpasses that of the most megalomaniacal Roman emperor or totalitarian dictator. But a militarist state must have war: to justify its draconian rule (and those $550 billion "defense" budgets), to find new fields for dominion and swag, and to seal with blood its illegitimate compact with the people, seeking to make them complicit in its crimes, which are committed in their name, for their "security." We see the latter clearly with the transgression in Iraq, where even mainstream opponents of the illegal war can be heard to cry: "Oh, it's all so dreadful, but we've gone too far to turn back now, sacrificed too many lives; we've got to see it through." This is, of course, just a pale echo of militarists' own position, that dazed and hollow moral nullity induced by greed and murder, best expressed by the ancient Scottish "Commander-in-Chief," Macbeth: "I am in blood stepp'd in so far that, should I wade no more, returning were as tedious as go o'er." Fortunately for the militarists, Bush has promised war in abundance. Just this month, the Pentagon released its new strategy, heralding the newly dubbed "Long War" against terrorism, where U.S. forces will be deployed, openly and covertly, "in dozens of countries simultaneously" for decades to come. The plan is designed to "ensure that no foreign power can dictate the terms of regional or global security" -- except, of course, for the dictatorial foreign power emanating from the Potomac. This is the constitution of the new commander state: the eternal "emergency," fomenting endless bloodshed, strife, atrocity -- and reprisals, the terrorist blowback that is the essential lubricant for the war machine. And a new terror strike on the "homeland" is inevitable. The ground for this attack has been carefully prepared -- whether wittingly or unwittingly is irrelevant now. For whatever the Bush faction's intentions, their actual policies have demonstrably and indisputably stoked the fires of Islamic extremism to new heights of virulence. Meanwhile, their manifest incompetence and callous disregard for the well-being of ordinary Americans -- vividly displayed in the deadly bungling of the Katrina disaster and its corruption-riddled aftermath -- have left American soil virtually undefended against any genuinely serious terrorist attack, i.e. one not carried out by half-wits telegraphing their punches over tapped phones. For years, a vast infrastructure of authoritarian rule has been constructed behind the facade of ordinary political life -- such as the series of "special authorities" signed by Bush and Pentagon warlord Donald Rumsfeld giving the military absolute power over the nation "in the event of a declared or perceived emergency," The Washington Post reports. This dovetails with such open measures as the Patriot Act and the creation of Northcom, the first military command aimed at the "homeland," which last fall conducted the massive "Granite Shadow" exercise, practicing "domestic military operations" with "unique rules of engagement regarding the use of lethal force," the Post reports. *[These measures - and many others like them - are the fruit of long cultivation by the Bush Faction. In 1981, then Vice President George H.W. Bush and Colonel Oliver North spearheaded the creation of "a secret government, hidden in hardened bunkers, capable of waging war and controlling the civilian populace" without any input from Congress or the courts, as we reported in the Moscow Times and Counterpunch two years ago. See Deep Cover: Hidey Holes for the American Elite.]* This infrastructure is part of the context, the granite shadow looming behind many recent events, such as last month's $385 million open-ended contract awarded to Halliburton to build large-scale "detention and deportation" centers around the country, as Pacific News reports. It looms behind the "excitement" expressed by weapons-makers over Bush's plans to build new atomic bombs on a production-line basis, the Oakland Tribune reports, including "low yield" nukes for use in attacks on non-nuclear nations. It looms over Rumsfeld's frenzied push to build a new arsenal of "first-strike" intercontinental and space-based weapons to attack enemies -- or perceived enemies -- with "no warning," as the Pentagon declared this month, UPI reports. You can even see it in the Air Force's decision last week to allow top brass to press their politicized pseudo-Christianity on young cadets without restraint, as Reuters reports -- more of the sinister melding of militarism and religious extremism that characterizes the Bushist philosophy. And of course, the granite shadow overhangs the entire campaign to foment war fever against Iran, a grim replay of the "Attack Iraq" propaganda, complete with exaggerated threats, manipulated intelligence supplied by dubious exiles, lies about "pursuing diplomacy" while finalizing battle plans, as The Sunday Telegraph reports -- and a complete disregard of the murderous quagmire that will ensue, including the rapid proliferation of nuclear weapons worldwide as countries scramble to protect themselves from the "first-strike" triggermen of the Bush faction.
More war, more terror, more authoritarian rule: The fire next time is almost here. |
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An Upside-Down Media By Robert Parry The gravest indictment of the American news media is that George W. Bush has gutted the U.S. Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the Geneva Conventions and the United Nations Charter - yet this extraordinary story does not lead the nation's newspapers and the evening news every day. Nor does the press corps tie Bush's remarkable abrogation of both U.S. and international law together in any coherent way for the American people. At best, disparate elements of Bush's authoritarian powers are dealt with individually as if they are not part of some larger, more frightening whole. What's even odder is that the facts of this historic power grab are no longer in serious dispute. The Bush administration virtually spelled out its grandiose vision of Bush's powers during the debates over such issues as Jose Padilla's detention, Samuel Alito's Supreme Court nomination and the disclosure of warrantless wiretaps. For instance, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has defended the wiretapping program in part by citing the inherent powers of the President to override laws during war time, an argument that the administration also has applied to detentions without trial, abuse of prisoners, launching foreign military operations and committing extra-judicial assassinations. All Bush has to do, it seems, is deem someone an "enemy combatant" or an "affiliate" of some terrorist group and that person's life and liberty are delivered into Bush's hands, without any impartial evaluation of the evidence. Unique Authority But what makes Bush's assertion of authority uniquely dangerous in U.S. history is that his claim of "plenary" - or unlimited - powers as the Commander in Chief are not made in the short-term context of a national crisis or a war with a definable end. Rather these presidential powers have been asserted during what administration officials are calling the Long War against terrorism, a conflict that could well last for decades and quite possibly forever. Instead of the Long War, it could really become the Endless War. In other words, the American system of government as the world has known it for two-plus centuries - with its "unalienable rights" and its "checks and balances" - has effectively come to an end. Yet this earth-shaking development is barely a news story in the United States. Even when prominent Democrats and some Republicans draw troubling conclusions about Bush's megalomania, the major news media barely mentions the protests. For instance, Sen. Russ Feingold observed in a Feb. 7 speech to the Senate about Bush's warrantless surveillance, "this administration reacts to anyone who questions this illegal program by saying that those of us who demand the truth and stand up for our rights and freedoms have a pre-9/11 view of the world. In fact, the President has a pre-1776 view of the world." But Feingold's declaration, implicitly comparing Bush to King George III, got far more attention on Internet blogs than in the mainstream news media. Another of the few political leaders who has sounded the alarm is former Vice President Al Gore, who addressed the issue of presidential power in a largely ignored speech on Jan. 16, the holiday honoring Martin Luther King Jr. "An Executive who arrogates to himself the power to ignore the legitimate legislative directives of the Congress or to act free of the check of the judiciary becomes the central threat that the Founders sought to nullify in the Constitution - an all-powerful Executive too reminiscent of the King from whom they had broken free," Gore said. "As the Executive acts outside its constitutionally prescribed role and is able to control access to information that would expose its actions, it becomes increasingly difficult for the other branches to police it. Once that ability is lost, democracy itself is threatened and we become a government of men and not laws." [See Consortiumnews.com's "End of Unalienable Rights."] Info War The Bush administration's obsession with controlling the flow of information also carries a foreboding sense of doom to anyone who believes in a vibrant democracy. It now appears that Bush's concept of a terrorist "affiliate" is sliding inexorably toward covering people who present facts that undermine Bush's "information warfare" goals. On Feb. 17, in a speech to the Council on Foreign Relations, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld declared that the battle over information will be a decisive front in the War on Terror and juxtaposed "the enemy" and "news informers" as part of the problem. "We are fighting a battle where the survival of our free way of life is at stake and the center of gravity of that struggle is not simply on the battlefield overseas; it's a test of wills, and it will be won or lost with our publics, and with the publics of other nations," Rumsfeld said. "We'll need to do all we can to attract supporters to our efforts and to correct the lies that are being told, which so damage our country, and which are repeated and repeated and repeated. ... "Let there be no doubt, the longer it takes to put a strategic communication framework into place, the more we can be certain that the vacuum will be filled by the enemy and by news informers that most assuredly will not paint an accurate picture of what is actually taking place." Already, Bush's allies in the right-wing news media have taken to accusing "news informers" and other critics of Bush's policies of "aiding and abetting" the enemy and of committing "treason." At times, the White House has coordinated these right-wing media attacks with government leaks to target critics, such as the disclosure of CIA officer Valerie Plame's identity after her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, challenged Bush's case for war in Iraq. Throwing Down the Gauntlet So, in big ways and small, the Bush administration has thrown down the gauntlet to Americans who want to protect individual liberties and preserve the democratic Republic envisioned by the Founding Fathers. But a major obstacle to any unified resistance to Bush's authoritarian model is the failure of the news media to explain these historic developments to the public. More often, the big newspapers and networks have bowed to the administration's news management. The New York Times, the Washington Post and other key U.S. news outlets only grudgingly admitted that they let the country down before the Iraq War by swallowing Bush administration claims on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. But little has really changed in the past three years, either in the media's structure or in the pecking order of elite columnists. With only a few exceptions, the commentators who bungled Iraq's WMD have survived and are still shaping - or misshaping - public opinion. Indeed, most elite columnists are still acting as if all is normal - that it's not so strange that Bush is saying that he or his successors can do whatever they want to anyone in the world for the duration of the so-called Long War. Even after the WMD debacle, most of these editorial writers and commentators continued to behave as Bush's cheerleaders, for instance, praising his Second Inaugural Address on Jan. 20, 2005, for its endless invocation of the words "freedom" and "liberty." The pundits also have kept spotting glimmers of hope in the Middle East, even as the U.S. position has grown grimmer and grimmer. A year ago, these commentators were hailing Bush for unleashing the cleansing winds of democracy across the Middle East. But the pundits missed the fact that many of those regional developments were unrelated to Bush's invasion of Iraq. They also didn't catch the possibility that elections might not bring the blessings of peace and moderation that Bush promised. Like many of his U.S. press colleagues, New York Times foreign policy columnist Thomas L. Friedman pronounced himself "unreservedly happy" about the Iraqi election of Jan. 30, 2005, adding: "you should be, too." But there was always a dark potential to the pleasing images of Iraqis voting with stained fingers. Rather than pointing toward an exit for the United States from Iraq, the election actually was a way for the Shiite majority to consolidate its sectarian control of Iraq, further isolating and alienating the rival Sunni minority. However, this sobering possibility was banished mostly to the Internet and other fringes of American media. At Consortiumnews.com, we wrote that "if the Sunni-based insurgency doesn't give up in the months ahead, American soldiers could find themselves enmeshed in a long and brutal civil war helping the Shiite majority crush the resistance of the Sunni minority. The Sunnis, who have long dominated Iraq, find themselves in a tight corner and may see little choice but to fight on." [See "Sinking in Deeper."] But the big media was busy waving its pom-poms. 'Tipping Points' After those Iraqi elections and several other regional developments, Friedman was perceiving historical "tipping points" that foreshadowed "incredible," positive changes in the Middle East. [NYT, Feb. 27, 2005] To Friedman, this expected transformation of the Arab world would also be a personal vindication for his endorsement of the bloody Iraq War, which has now killed nearly 2,300 U.S. soldiers and tens of thousands of Iraqis. "The last couple of years have not been easy for anyone, myself included, who hoped that the Iraq war would produce a decent, democratizing outcome," Friedman wrote. [NYT, March 3, 2005] A lead editorial in the New York Times struck a similar tone, crediting Bush for supposedly inspiring democratic changes in Lebanon and Palestine, not to mention Egypt and Saudi Arabia. "The Bush administration is entitled to claim a healthy share of the credit for many of these advances," the editorial said. [NYT, March 1, 2005] Over at the Washington Post's Op-Ed page, there was similar applause for Bush and the neoconservative vision of imposing "democracy" on Arab nations by force. "Could it be that the neocons were right and that the invasion of Iraq, the toppling of Hussein and the holding of elections will trigger a political chain reaction throughout the Arab world?" marveled Post columnist Richard Cohen. [Washington Post, March 1, 2005] Another influential Post columnist, David Ignatius, also was swept up in the excitement. "The old system (in the Middle East) that had looked so stable is ripping apart, with each beam pulling another down as it falls," Ignatius wrote. Crediting the U.S. invasion of Iraq for the "sudden stress" that started the collapse, Ignatius wrote, "It's hard not to feel giddy, watching the dominoes fall." Ignatius hailed what he called "the Middle East's glorious catastrophe" and urged the United States to do what it could to accelerate the process. "We are careening around the curve of history, and it's useful to remember a basic rule for navigating slippery roads: Once you're in the curve, you can't hit the brakes. The only way for America to keep this car on the road is to keep its foot on the accelerator," Ignatius wrote. [Washington Post, March 2, 2005] (It's not clear where this Post columnist went to driving school, but few instructors would tell their pupils, who find themselves sliding into an icy curve, to step on the gas.) Another Washington Post columnist, neoconservative Charles Krauthammer, sounded like a modern-day Trotsky and Robespierre, urging an escalation of Bush's radical strategies. "Revolutions do not stand still," Krauthammer wrote. "They either move forward or die." [Washington Post, March 4, 2005] This conventional wisdom of Bush bringing democratic enlightenment to the Arab world also permeated the news pages. "A powerful confluence of events in the Middle East in recent weeks has infused President Bush's drive to spread democracy with a burst of momentum, according to supporters and critics alike," reported the Washington Post in an awestruck page-one article. [March 8, 2005] Failed Promise Just a year later, however, it is clear how off-the-mark these columns were. Many of the developments - viewed by the pundits as interrelated and inspired by the Iraq War - were actually reactions to distinct local conditions. The Lebanese protests against Syrian occupation were not influenced by Bush's invasion of Iraq or his "freedom" Inaugural Address, but rather by growing impatience with the longtime Syrian presence. Those tensions were brought to a head by the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and suspicions of Syrian complicity. A year ago, a brief revival of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks was sparked by the death of Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat and the desire of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to leave behind a more positive legacy. [See Consortiumnews.com's "Neocon Amorality" or "Bush's Neocons Unbridled." Another giant hole in the conventional wisdom was that elections - which would likely reflect the angry mood of Muslims at this time - could well take the region in the opposite direction, toward greater religious fundamentalism and extremism. Contrary to Bush's happy rhetoric about how "history has proven that democracies yield the peace," the reality can be the opposite. Historically, voters in democratic societies often have responded to fear, hate, religious fervor or some other irrational stimuli in supporting political demagogues who provoke unnecessary wars. Historians can trace this pattern from Ancient Athens to the war fever that Bush released in the United States in 2002 before invading Iraq. While democracies have many admirable qualities, moderation and peacefulness are not always among them. Anyone with a sense of history and an awareness of the animosities in the Islamic world should not have been surprised that some recent elections served to exacerbate sectarian tensions and bring religious fundamentalists to power. In Iraq, elections indeed did solidify the power of the Shiite majority over the Sunnis. The pro-Iranian Shiite parties and their Kurdish allies also have consolidated their control of the nation's oil riches, leaving the Sunnis without either political power or oil wealth - and thus creating new incentives for them to fight on. The year-ago optimism about Palestine also proved to be misplaced. Not only have prospects for peace talks foundered, but a stroke removed Sharon from power and a new crisis has emerged after Islamic militants in Hamas defeated the more secular Fatah movement in a Palestinian election. Now, rather than hailing those blessings of democracy, Israel and the United States are considering ways to isolate, bankrupt and destroy the elected Hamas government. Blind Media So, instead of democracy ushering in a new era of peace and moderation in the Middle East, the opposite appears to be occurring. By pushing for elections while simultaneously stirring up Islamic fury over Iraq and other issues, Bush is opening the door to more violence, more extremism and more anti-Americanism. All of these possibilities were logical outgrowths of what was occurring a year ago. Indeed, it should have been obvious to U.S. analysts that elections represented a huge risk amid Muslim animosity over the Iraq occupation, the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, and long-term U.S. support for Israel and corrupt Arab leaders. But many leading U.S. columnists were caught off-guard by these developments, much as they were duped by Bush's claims about Iraq's WMD. Yet these error-prone columnists haven't been fired or replaced. Now, the danger is the media's failure to react to Bush's unprecedented assertion of power inside the United States. Just as the nation's elite editorial pages misunderstood the reality in the Middle East, most columnists are missing the extraordinary transformation now underway toward a system of American authoritarianism.
The pundits would rather bathe in the feel-good rhetoric about Bush spreading freedom and democracy around the world than face the harsh reality of Bush eradicating constitutional safeguards at home.
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| Too Quick On The Draw, Cheney Ducks For Cover For the unfortunate victim of Dick Cheney's quail-shooting misadventure, the experience of being blasted with birdshot and almost killed was all too real. For those of us lucky enough to be out of range, however, that incident may serve as a metaphor for the Vice President's troubled tenure. Withholding word of the shooting accident for as long as possible was, of course, all too typical of Mr. Cheney's attitude toward the press. His preoccupation with secrecy and his contempt for the public right to information has been plain from the beginning, when he fought to hide the names of the oil executives who wrote the White House energy bill. (He still refuses to reveal their names and affiliations.) In this case, he apparently decided to "privatize" the release of the embarrassing news by encouraging his hostess to leak it to a local newspaper in Corpus Christi, Tex., instead of informing the White House press office. Unorthodox to the point of weirdness, that choice may yet have been an innocent mistake made in the midst of panic. But given the Vice President's record of self-serving concealment of facts, such efforts to manage information inevitably look like attempts to cover up. He had ample reason to delay press attention to the accident on the Armstrong ranch, again for reasons that echo a larger theme. According to news reports, he failed to obtain the stamp required to shoot "upland birds" on his hunting license. So he was engaged in an illegal activity when he pumped a round of birdshot, which can be quite lethal, into the face and torso of Austin attorney Henry Whittington. While persons who commit this violation of Texas law can be subject to substantial fines and revocation of their hunting license, the Vice President was let off with a warning. Observing this darkly comical interlude, it is impossible not to wonder how such news would be treated if it had occurred during one of John Kerry's hunting trips during the last Presidential campaign. What if Mr. Kerry had fired his shotgun into the hide of a fellow hunter instead of hitting the birds overhead? What if he had then withheld the news from the reporters covering him, and let his host tell the local paper instead? And what if the privileged, wealthy Senator had neglected to get the proper license, and been let off with a warning? How loudly would the cable commentators have shrieked? In short, Mr. Kerry would have been held responsible in the most humiliating fashion. He would have been mocked and scorned. Yet so far, Mr. Cheney has not taken public responsibility for this accident. All we have heard are the encomiums and excuses proffered by the lady lobbyist who hosted him and the wealthy Republican contributor whom the President appointed as our ambassador to Switzerland. They have assured us that the Vice President is a great hunter, a stickler for safety and a dead shot. They have suggested that the fault lies with Mr. Whittington. Whatever fawning tales his friends may tell, it seems clear enough that Mr. Cheney's hunting skills are less than advertised and that he is not as careful as he ought to be. He shot before he knew where he was aiming, and the consequences of his actions were rather different than he anticipated. This is the Dick Cheney that Americans have come to know in office: an arrogant man with an undeserved reputation for competence, whose inclination to fire at will can be quite dangerous to those around him. The suffering of poor Mr. Whittington-and the embarrassment of Mr. Cheney-may not be completely in vain. For as James Carville has noted, this accident provided a timely distraction from more concrete and important examples of the incompetence that plagues the Bush-Cheney administration. The more coverage that is devoted to the shooting, the less attention will be paid to the latest disasters at home and abroad. In our own country, the details of the federal government's failure to respond to Hurricane Katrina continue to emerge. The latest report prepared by Republican members of Congress lambastes the President for the disaster's aftermath. In Iraq, the results of shooting first and asking questions later are once more on display. The post-election power struggle in the Iraqi Parliament has empowered the most extreme Islamists in the Shiite community, notably Muqtada al-Sadr, whose renewed influence can only please the Iranian mullahs. How this advances American interests or the rise of democracy in the region has yet to be explained. In the courts, the facts are emerging about White House manipulation of intelligence to promote a foolish war. The National Journal has reported testimony by Mr. Cheney's indicted former chief of staff, Lewis (Scooter) Libby, which strongly suggests that the Vice President misused classified material for partisan advantage.
Let us hope that Mr. Whittington recovers more swiftly and fully than Mr. Cheney's reputation ever will.
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In Defense Of Free Thought By Robert Scheer And this gives me pleasure. My conscience decrees, This right I must treasure. My thoughts will not cater To duke or dictator, No man can deny - Die gedanken sind frei. --- German 16th-century peasant song --- (revived as a protest anthem against the Nazi regime)
To be sure, Nazi propaganda is an extremely sensitive issue in Hitler's birth country, which for the most part endorsed the madman's vision of the Third Reich. But the repression of the free marketplace of ideas is an endorsement of tyranny rather than its repudiation. And it is not just Austria and Germany itself that have banned the views of Holocaust deniers: Eight other European states have joined in. Muslim fundamentalists outraged by the cartoons that have appeared widely in the European media thus have the right to question the conflicting standards of what is considered worthy of censorship. The muted response of the Western media to the Irving decision is difficult to fathom. Not much has been reported on this case, and what has appeared often assumes that this severe limit to free speech is obviously justified. For example, a BBC report over the weekend concluded with this ominous paragraph: "In a letter to the BBC from his prison cell, Mr. Irving said some of his views on the gas chambers had changed - but he also expressed opinions which would be challenged by mainstream historians." Since when has it been accepted as a crime to challenge mainstream historians, even when, as in this case, the challenge is without foundation? Should a deeply wrongheaded view, even one motivated by vile malice as Irving's critics claim motivates him, lead to incarceration? The case made for criminalizing speech in the West is usually based on the concept that it is not OK to yell fire in a crowded theater - or incite violence. The argument for jailing Irving is that denying the Holocaust is equivalent to stoking the fires of anti-Semitic violence. "Holocaust denial is anti-Semitism dressed up as intellectual debate. It should be regarded as such and treated as such," stated the head of the UK's Holocaust Educational Trust, by way of defending the Austrian verdict. But by that standard, the artists who drew the cartoons depicting Muhammad should also be arrested, as well as their editors and publishers. Critics of the Danish newspaper that commissioned the Muhammad cartoons claim that its editorial slant is anti-Muslim and that it was attempting a deliberate provocation. So should the paper's editors be prosecuted? After all, people have died protesting these inflammatory comics. Will Austria and the other nations that ban anti-Semitic books now ban expressions judged by Muslims to be unacceptably hostile to their religion? Unfortunately, they may do just that out of political opportunism, given the rioting and trade boycotts that followed the publication of those cartoons. But they would once again be wrong. Speech that is not felt by some powerful group to be loathsome is hardly in need of protection. The value of an absolutist opposition to the censorship of speech, as enshrined in the U.S. Constitution's First Amendment, is that it holds out the prospect that the right to speak will be honored even when the content of those utterances is not. What is disturbing in both the Irving and Muhammad cartoon situations is the stuttering hesitancy of many who claim to be committed to free speech to speak out in opposition to those - be they Muslim clerics or Austrian judges - who seek to limit the free expression of individuals expressing views they detest.
In both instances, the world has been presented with a teaching moment, in which the argument for free thought - that die gedanken sind frei ("thoughts are free") that the Nazis and every other absolutist dictatorship have excelled in crushing - was not advanced by those who know better. As a result, a world sorely in need of a crash course in the efficacy of free debate received nothing of the sort. Instead, the lesson has been that the suppression of ideas is valid, as long as the suppressors are convinced that they are in the right.
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The Enemy By William Rivers Pitt They called it "Cyber Storm," and it was a war-game exercise run last week by the Department of Homeland Security. The war game had nothing to do with testing the security of our shipping ports, borders, infrastructure or airports. "Cyber Storm" was testing the government's ability to withstand an onslaught of information and protest from bloggers and online activists. "Participants confirmed," wrote the Associated Press, that "parts of the worldwide simulation challenged government officials and industry executives to respond to deliberate misinformation campaigns and activist calls by Internet bloggers, online diarists whose "Web logs" include political rantings and musings about current events." Say what? Online expressions of political opinion are so dangerous that the Department of Homeland Security must war-game scenarios to deal with them? Bloggers are potential terrorists now? Bloggers are the enemy? Last week, as far as DHS was concerned, they were. We hear a great deal about enemies these days. Don't criticize the war, or you'll embolden the enemy. The enemy is clever and cruel. Stick with the White House and we'll defeat the enemy. Since the Bush administration no longer likes to mention the name Osama bin "Stayin' Alive" Laden in public, lest everyone remember a dramatic promise long broken, any specific definition of an enemy changes with the moment. Sometimes, the enemy is in Iraq, and we fight them over there so we don't have to fight them over here. Sometimes, the enemy is in Iran, allegedly toiling with all its collective might to manufacture nuclear weapons. Sometimes, the enemy is in Palestine, where Hamas used George W. Bush's exported democracy to take over the government. Sometimes, the enemy is an American face on a television offering criticism of the White House. Last week, the enemy was a blogger making a political expression. The enemy is never in Saudi Arabia, though that nation is the very birthing bed of international terrorism. The enemy is never in Israel, though that nation's far-right leadership has been a good deal of the impetus behind the Bush administration's calamitous push into Iraq. The enemy is never in China, even when they smack our planes out of the sky, because they own a substantial portion of our debt. The enemy is never in Pakistan, though that nation's fundamentalist wing allies itself with the Taliban, and though they actually do possess nuclear weapons. The enemy is occasionally mentioned as being in North Korea, but not often, because we want no part of that fight. For a time, the enemy was in the United Arab Emirates. Two of the hijackers of the September 11 aircraft were citizens of the United Arab Emirates, and the funding behind those attacks was wired through the UAE's banking system. Republican and Democratic Senators believe the UAE has been used as a conduit for the proliferation of nuclear technology. That was then, however. A company named Dubai Ports World intends to spend $6.8 billion to gain control of the management of shipping ports in New York and New Jersey, as well as in Baltimore, Philadelphia, New Orleans and Miami. Dubai Ports World is foreign-owned, but is backed financially by the government of the United Arab Emirates. In other words, a nation suspected of being a significant player in the September 11 attacks is being allowed to take control of our borders. For the record, US ports handle an estimated two billion tons of cargo annually, with only 5% of that cargo undergoing inspection. The deal has already been granted regulatory clearance by the White House. We hear a great deal about enemies, both real and contrived. Let us ponder, for a moment, the existence of another enemy so insidious that it operates fully in daylight but beyond control. This enemy seeks to destroy the rule of constitutional law in the United States. This enemy seeks to destroy the seed-corn defense against tyranny in this nation, the separation of powers. This enemy gathers more and more power to itself to achieve these goals, and uses fear and division to do so. This enemy will lie with impunity, stonewall endlessly and ruin anyone who might disrupt its plans. This enemy stood by and did nothing while a major American city was devoured by the ocean. When New Orleans was drowned, many voices were raised in panicked unison that the White House must do something, and do something now. A conference call was held between key members of the Department of Homeland Security and other administration officials on August 29th, the day the catastrophe began for real. Investigators are seeking the transcript of this call, but administration officials claim the transcript has somehow disappeared. There are many transcripts of calls before and after this one, but the five-hour call on August 29th, the specific call investigators want to see, simply cannot be found. This enemy deliberately reached out and destroyed the career of a deep-cover CIA agent named Valerie Plame, because her husband dared to criticize the White House about its "uranium from Niger" lie regarding Iraq. Plame, among other things, worked clandestinely to track any person, group or nation that would give weapons of mass destruction to terrorists; in other words, Plame worked to track the individuals this White House never fails to label as the enemy. Her work was derailed and her network destroyed because this White House did not want any discussion of the fact that no weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq, despite miles of claims that the stuff was there. TruthOut correspondent Jason Leopold reported this week that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is refusing to turn over incriminating emails to special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, emails that allegedly indicate the involvement of Vice President Dick Cheney and other high-ranking administration officials in the unmasking of Agent Plame. "The emails Gonzales is said to be withholding contained references to Valerie Plame Wilson's identity and CIA status and developments related to the inability to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq," reported Leopold. "Moreover, according to sources, the emails contained suggestions by the officials on how the White House should respond to what it believed were increasingly destructive comments [Plame's husband] Joseph Wilson had been making about the administration's pre-war Iraq intelligence." I. Lewis Libby, chief of staff to Vice President Cheney, was recently indicted by Fitzgerald for lying under oath during the investigation into this matter. Recently, Libby stated that he was authorized by his superiors to expose the classified name of Valerie Plame. Given his position, Libby's main superior is none other than Cheney himself. Cheney recently claimed that he is authorized by an Executive Order to declassify any information he pleases. "I have certainly advocated declassification. I have participated in declassification decisions," said Cheney this week. "There's an executive order that specifies who has classification authority, and obviously it focuses first and foremost on the president, but also includes the vice president." This is a new trend for the White House: rendering an illegal act legal retroactively by fiat. The trend manifested itself in another area of illegal activity by the White House, the warrantless wiretapping of thousands of American citizens by the National Security Agency, in defiance of the black-letter law contained within the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978. For several weeks now, Congress has been threatening to hold hearings on the matter. Bush advisor Karl Rove worked feverishly behind the scenes to keep such hearings from taking place, and has succeeded. Rather than investigate the matter, Congress will instead rewrite the FISA law, thus rendering retroactively legal White House activities that blatantly broke the law. We hear a great deal about enemies these days, and many of them are quite real and quite perilous. It is difficult to imagine a more perilous enemy, however, than the one operating out of Washington today. This enemy would set itself on high, beyond control or censure, and create of itself that permanent faction James Madison so earnestly warned us of. This enemy deletes or hides evidence of its calumny, or simply alters existing laws that would otherwise derail its plans. This enemy destroys lives out of hand, lives by the tens of thousands, and reaps a pretty profit in the process. The difference between the enemies we hear about and the one in Washington is simple and deadly: only the enemy in Washington can annihilate the constitutional government we have enjoyed for more than two centuries. The idea that is America cannot be terminated by terrorists or rogue states. Were the nation entire to be somehow obliterated, the idea that is America would endure. Only its keepers can kill it completely. They are well on their way. "As nightfall does not come at once," wrote Justice William O. Douglas, "neither does oppression. In both instances, there's a twilight where everything remains seemingly unchanged, and it is in such twilight that we all must be aware of change in the air, however slight, lest we become victims of the darkness."
We must deal with the enemy within the halls of our government, the enemy whose power to destroy far outstrips any enemy beyond our borders. In doing so, we save that which is unique in the world. In doing so, we deal a death blow to all other enemies. In doing so, we save ourselves from that darkness.
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 Heil Bush, Dear Propaganda Ansanger Matalin, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your constant shilling for the Junta and leading the cover-up of the Cheney fiasco, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Media Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at the "Fuhrer Bunker" formally 'The White House' on 03-15-2006. We salute you frau Matalin, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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Will the dozens of Democratic vets running for office from coast to coast reverse the Republican revolution and help take back Congress? Or will they be Swift Boated and shot down by the Republican chickenhawks who managed to defeat John Kerry, Max Cleland, and John McCain by impugning their patriotism and military service?
The Democrats are excited about candidates who can neutralize their Republican opponents' tougher image. But, as a New York Times Week in Review piece pointed out Sunday, "After John Kerry's loss in 2004, some Democratic strategists have given up on the idea that a candidate's military experience alone would level the playing field on the issue of national security."
If the Dems are going to retake the House, they need more than a bunch of military uniforms, Representative Rahm Emmanuel, Democrat of Illinois (who is in charge of the Democrats' House races in 2006) rightly points out in the Times piece. Actually, one thing they need is the opposite of Emmanuel's tentative Republican-light position on Iraq.
Military veterans who speak out strongly against this Administration's wasteful, dishonest, and incompetent war-making policies have the potential to galvanize voters. Witness the excitement stirred up by Representative John Murtha's demand that U.S. troops be withdrawn from their sitting-duck position in Iraq. Murtha's critique of the war let loose an explosion of agreement from a public that has been way ahead of the Democratic Party on this issue for a while.
Or, to take a contrary example, remember the failed Kerry campaign, in which the trappings of military service and patriotism became a hollow shell for a politician who waffled on his record of opposition to the war in Vietnam and supported--with many qualifications and qualms--the war in Iraq. The Republicans zeroed in on Kerry's ambivalent record.
The appearance that his campaign was trying to hide something bothered voters. The Kerry campaign wanted to trade on the candidate's war record by suppressing his opposition to the war in which he served. Instead, had Kerry had the guts and foresight to vote against the Iraq war, he would have been able to take the moral high ground against an opponent who dodged service in Vietnam and later sent thousands of Americans to die in an equally ill-fated mission.
It IS possible for Democratic veterans to gain a special edge in the upcoming election. Opposition to the war in Iraq is at 55 percent in the polls. Even voters who chose Bush in the last election are troubled by this President's complicated relationship to the truth, and his cavalier attitude about the safety of U.S. troops. This year's candidates can point to cuts in veteran's benefits, and lack of proper protective gear, and an overall lack of planning in the war, as evidence of the Republicans' negligence.
In a February 9 Pew poll, 50 percent of registered voters said they were planning to vote for Democrats this year, while only 41 percent said they were planning to vote Republican. The time is right for a strong opposition to drive home the message that Americans--including American troops--deserve a better government.
The flood of evidence that the Republicans have bungled Iraq, botched Katrina relief, and used the sacrifice and suffering of American victims of terrorism--at home, on 9/11, and abroad, in Iraq--to hoard power for themselves, makes this a ripe political moment.
Even an event like last week's ridiculous Cheney hunting accident is revealing, prompting Senator Chuck Hagel, Republican of Nebraska, to remark that had the Vice President been in the military, he might have learned something about gun safety. Like Murtha, with his reference to Cheney's five draft deferments, Hagel was speaking to a public that understands the sacrifice gap between the troops and the Administration that got us into the mess in Iraq.
Democrats are missing a "golden opportunity," pollster John Zogby recently commented, pointing out that opposition to the party in power is at a peak. Yet the Democrats don't seem to be able to catch the wave.
Two years ago, the Democrats tried putting on a uniform, and they learned that it wasn't enough. This year, they've got a lot more uniforms running. What they need is for the political courage of the party leadership to match the battlefield courage of the candidates.
The lesson for this year's veteran candidates: shoot straight, and draw a sharp contrast with an Administration that doesn't.
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Not that George W. Bush needs much encouragement, but Sen. Lindsey Graham suggested to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales a new target for the administration's domestic operations -- Fifth Columnists, supposedly disloyal Americans who sympathize and collaborate with the enemy.
"The administration has not only the right, but the duty, in my opinion, to pursue Fifth Column movements," Graham, R-S.C., told Gonzales during Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on Feb. 6.
"I stand by this President's ability, inherent to being Commander in Chief, to find out about Fifth Column movements, and I don't think you need a warrant to do that," Graham added, volunteering to work with the administration to draft guidelines for how best to neutralize this alleged threat.
"Senator," a smiling Gonzales responded, "the President already said we'd be happy to listen to your ideas."
In less paranoid times, Graham's comments might be viewed by many Americans as a Republican trying to have it both ways - ingratiating himself to an administration of his own party while seeking some credit from Washington centrists for suggesting Congress should have at least a tiny say in how Bush runs the War on Terror.
But recent developments suggest that the Bush administration may already be contemplating what to do with Americans who are deemed insufficiently loyal or who disseminate information that may be considered helpful to the enemy.
Top U.S. officials have cited the need to challenge news that undercuts Bush's actions as a key front in defeating the terrorists, who are aided by "news informers" in the words of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. [For details, see Consortiumnews.com "Upside-Down Media" or below.]
Detention Centers
Plus, there was that curious development in January when the Army Corps of Engineers awarded Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root a $385 million contract to construct detention centers somewhere in the United States, to deal with "an emergency influx of immigrants into the U.S., or to support the rapid development of new programs," KBR said. [Market Watch, Jan. 26, 2006]
Later, the New York Times reported that "KBR would build the centers for the Homeland Security Department for an unexpected influx of immigrants, to house people in the event of a natural disaster or for new programs that require additional detention space." [Feb. 4, 2006]
Like most news stories on the KBR contract, the Times focused on concerns about Halliburton's reputation for bilking U.S. taxpayers by overcharging for sub-par services.
"It's hard to believe that the administration has decided to entrust Halliburton with even more taxpayer dollars," remarked Rep. Henry Waxman, D-California.
Less attention centered on the phrase "rapid development of new programs" and what kind of programs would require a major expansion of detention centers, each capable of holding 5,000 people. Jamie Zuieback, a spokeswoman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, declined to elaborate on what these "new programs" might be.
Only a few independent journalists, such as Peter Dale Scott and Maureen Farrell, have pursued what the Bush administration might actually be thinking.
Scott speculated that the "detention centers could be used to detain American citizens if the Bush administration were to declare martial law." He recalled that during the Reagan administration, National Security Council aide Oliver North organized Rex-84 "readiness exercise," which contemplated the Federal Emergency Management Agency rounding up and detaining 400,000 "refugees," in the event of "uncontrolled population movements" over the Mexican border into the United States.
Farrell pointed out that because "another terror attack is all but certain, it seems far more likely that the centers would be used for post-911-type detentions of immigrants rather than a sudden deluge" of immigrants flooding across the border.
Vietnam-era whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg said, "Almost certainly this is preparation for a roundup after the next 9/11 for Mid-Easterners, Muslims and possibly dissenters. They've already done this on a smaller scale, with the 'special registration' detentions of immigrant men from Muslim countries, and with Guantanamo."
Labor Camps
There also was another little-noticed item posted at the U.S. Army Web site, about the Pentagon's Civilian Inmate Labor Program. This program "provides Army policy and guidance for establishing civilian inmate labor programs and civilian prison camps on Army installations."
The Army document, first drafted in 1997, underwent a "rapid action revision" on Jan. 14, 2005. The revision provides a "template for developing agreements" between the Army and corrections facilities for the use of civilian inmate labor on Army installations.
On its face, the Army's labor program refers to inmates housed in federal, state and local jails. The Army also cites various federal laws that govern the use of civilian labor and provide for the establishment of prison camps in the United States, including a federal statute that authorizes the Attorney General to "establish, equip, and maintain camps upon sites selected by him" and "make available ... the services of United States prisoners" to various government departments, including the Department of Defense.
Though the timing of the document's posting - within the past few weeks -may just be a coincidence, the reference to a "rapid action revision" and the KBR contract's contemplation of "rapid development of new programs" has raised eyebrows about why this sudden need for urgency.
These developments also are drawing more attention now because of earlier Bush administration policies to involve the Pentagon in "counter-terrorism" operations inside the United States.
Pentagon Surveillance
Despite the Posse Comitatus Act's prohibitions against U.S. military personnel engaging in domestic law enforcement, the Pentagon has expanded its operations beyond previous boundaries, such as its role in domestic surveillance activities.
The Washington Post has reported that since the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, the Defense Department has been creating new agencies that gather and analyze intelligence within the United States. [Washington Post, Nov. 27, 2005]
The White House also is moving to expand the power of the Pentagon's Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA), created three years ago to consolidate counterintelligence operations. The White House proposal would transform CIFA into an office that has authority to investigate crimes such as treason, terrorist sabotage or economic espionage.
The Pentagon also has pushed legislation in Congress that would create an intelligence exception to the Privacy Act, allowing the FBI and others to share information about U.S. citizens with the Pentagon, CIA and other intelligence agencies. But some in the Pentagon don't seem to think that new laws are even necessary.
In a 2001 Defense Department memo that surfaced in January 2005, the U.S. Army's top intelligence officer wrote, "Contrary to popular belief, there is no absolute ban on [military] intelligence components collecting U.S. person information."
Drawing a distinction between "collecting" information and "receiving" information on U.S. citizens, the memo argued that "MI [military intelligence] may receive information from anyone, anytime." [See CQ.com, Jan. 31, 2005]
This receipt of information presumably would include data from the National Security Agency, which has been engaging in surveillance of U.S. citizens without court-approved warrants in apparent violation of the Foreign Intelligence Security Act. Bush approved the program of warrantless wiretaps shortly after 9/11.
There also may be an even more extensive surveillance program. Former NSA employee Russell D. Tice told a congressional committee on Feb. 14 that such a top-secret surveillance program existed, but he said he couldn't discuss the details without breaking classification laws.
Tice added that the "special access" surveillance program may be violating the constitutional rights of millions of Americans. [UPI, Feb. 14, 2006]
With this expanded surveillance, the government's list of terrorist suspects is rapidly swelling.
The Washington Post reported on Feb. 15 that the National Counterterrorism Center's central repository now holds the names of 325,000 terrorist suspects, a four-fold increase since the fall of 2003.
Asked whether the names in the repository were collected through the NSA's domestic surveillance program, an NCTC official told the Post, "Our database includes names of known and suspected international terrorists provided by all intelligence community organizations, including NSA."
Homeland Defense
As the administration scoops up more and more names, members of Congress also have questioned the elasticity of Bush's definitions for words like terrorist "affiliates," used to justify wiretapping Americans allegedly in contact with such people or entities.
During the Senate Judiciary Committee's hearing on the wiretap program, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-California, complained that the House and Senate Intelligence Committees "have not been briefed on the scope and nature of the program."
Feinstein added that, therefore, the committees "have not been able to explore what is a link or an affiliate to al-Qaeda or what minimization procedures (for purging the names of innocent people) are in place."
The combination of the Bush administration's expansive reading of its own power and its insistence on extraordinary secrecy has raised the alarm of civil libertarians when contemplating how far the Pentagon might go in involving itself in domestic matters.
A Defense Department document, entitled the "Strategy for Homeland Defense and Civil Support," has set out a military strategy against terrorism that envisions an "active, layered defense" both inside and outside U.S. territory. In the document, the Pentagon pledges to "transform U.S. military forces to execute homeland defense missions in the ... U.S. homeland."
The Pentagon strategy paper calls for increased military reconnaissance and surveillance to "defeat potential challengers before they threaten the United States." The plan "maximizes threat awareness and seizes the initiative from those who would harm us."
But there are concerns over how the Pentagon judges "threats" and who falls under the category "those who would harm us." A Pentagon official said the Counterintelligence Field Activity's TALON program has amassed files on antiwar protesters.
In December 2005, NBC News revealed the existence of a secret 400-page Pentagon document listing 1,500 "suspicious incidents" over a 10-month period, including dozens of small antiwar demonstrations that were classified as a "threat."
The Defense Department also might be moving toward legitimizing the use of propaganda domestically, as part of its overall war strategy.
A secret Pentagon "Information Operations Roadmap," approved by Rumsfeld in October 2003, calls for "full spectrum" information operations and notes that "information intended for foreign audiences, including public diplomacy and PSYOP, increasingly is consumed by our domestic audience and vice-versa."
"PSYOPS messages will often be replayed by the news media for much larger audiences, including the American public," the document states. The Pentagon argues, however, that "the distinction between foreign and domestic audiences becomes more a question of USG [U.S. government] intent rather than information dissemination practices."
It calls for "boundaries" between information operations abroad and the news media at home, but does not outline any corresponding limits on PSYOP campaigns.
Similar to the distinction the Pentagon draws between "collecting" and "receiving" intelligence on U.S. citizens, the Information Operations Roadmap argues that as long as the American public is not intentionally "targeted," any PSYOP propaganda consumed by the American public is acceptable.
The Pentagon plan also includes a strategy for taking over the Internet and controlling the flow of information, viewing the Web as a potential military adversary. The "roadmap" speaks of "fighting the net," and implies that the Internet is the equivalent of "an enemy weapons system."
In a speech on Feb. 17 to the Council on Foreign Relations, Rumsfeld elaborated on the administration's perception that the battle over information would be a crucial front in the War on Terror, or as Rumsfeld calls it, the Long War.
"Let there be no doubt, the longer it takes to put a strategic communication framework into place, the more we can be certain that the vacuum will be filled by the enemy and by news informers that most assuredly will not paint an accurate picture of what is actually taking place," Rumsfeld said.
The Department of Homeland Security also has demonstrated a tendency to deploy military operatives to deal with domestic crises.
In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, the department dispatched "heavily armed paramilitary mercenaries from the Blackwater private security firm, infamous for their work in Iraq, (and had them) openly patrolling the streets of New Orleans," reported journalists Jeremy Scahill and Daniela Crespo on Sept. 10, 2005.
Noting the reputation of the Blackwater mercenaries as "some of the most feared professional killers in the world," Scahill and Crespo said Blackwater's presence in New Orleans "raises alarming questions about why the government would allow men trained to kill with impunity in places like Iraq and Afghanistan to operate here."
U.S. Battlefield
In the view of some civil libertarians, a form of martial law already exists in the United States and has been in place since shortly after the 9/11 attacks when Bush issued Military Order No. 1 which empowered him to detain any non-citizen as an international terrorist or enemy combatant.
"The President decided that he was no longer running the country as a civilian President," wrote civil rights attorney Michael Ratner in the book Guantanamo: What the World Should Know. "He issued a military order giving himself the power to run the country as a general."
For any American citizen suspected of collaborating with terrorists, Bush also revealed what's in store. In May 2002, the FBI arrested U.S. citizen Jose Padilla in Chicago on suspicion that he might be an al-Qaeda operative planning an attack.
Rather than bring criminal charges, Bush designated Padilla an "enemy combatant" and had him imprisoned indefinitely without benefit of due process. After three years, the administration finally brought charges against Padilla, in order to avoid a Supreme Court showdown the White House might have lost.
But since the Court was not able to rule on the Padilla case, the administration's arguments have not been formally repudiated. Indeed, despite filing charges against Padilla, the White House still asserts the right to detain U.S. citizens without charges as enemy combatants.
This claimed authority is based on the assertion that the United States is at war and the American homeland is part of the battlefield.
"In the war against terrorists of global reach, as the Nation learned all too well on Sept. 11, 2001, the territory of the United States is part of the battlefield," Bush's lawyers argued in briefs to the federal courts. [Washington Post, July 19, 2005]
Given Bush's now open assertions that he is using his "plenary" - or unlimited - powers as Commander in Chief for the duration of the indefinite War on Terror, Americans can no longer trust that their constitutional rights protect them from government actions.
As former Vice President Al Gore asked after recounting a litany of sweeping powers that Bush has asserted to fight the War on Terror, "Can it be true that any President really has such powers under our Constitution? If the answer is 'yes,' then under the theory by which these acts are committed, are there any acts that can on their face be prohibited?"
In such extraordinary circumstances, the American people might legitimately ask exactly what the Bush administration means by the "rapid development of new programs," which might require the construction of a new network of detention camps. ... Chip Bok ...  |
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There's many a strange impulse out on the plains of West Texas;
Well I believe in my soul that inside every man there's a feminine,
Cowboys are frequently secretly fond of each other
Ten men for each woman was the rule way back when on the prairie,
Cowboys are frequently secretly fond of each other
Well there's always somebody who says what the others just whisper,
Cowboys are frequently secretly fond of each other
There's many a cowboy who keeps quiet about things he's done.
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Parting Shots...
 By George Carlin The following is a verbatim transcript of "Filthy Words" (the George Carlin monologue at issue in the Supreme Court case of FCC v. Pacifica Foundation) prepared by the Federal Communications Commission: Aruba-du, ruba-tu, ruba-tu. I was thinking about the curse words and the swear words, the cuss words and the words that you can't say, that you're not supposed to say all the time, ['cause] words or people into words want to hear your words. Some guys like to record your words and sell them back to you if they can, (laughter) listen in on the telephone, write down what words you say. A guy who used to be in Washington knew that his phone was tapped, used to answer, Fuck Hoover, yes, go ahead. (laughter) Okay, I was thinking one night about the words you couldn't say on the public, ah, airwaves, um, the ones you definitely wouldn't say, ever, [']cause I heard a lady say bitch one night on television, and it was cool like she was talking about, you know, ah, well, the bitch is the first one to notice that in the litter Johnny right (murmur) Right. And, uh, bastard you can say, and hell and damn so I have to figure out which ones you couldn't and ever and it came down to seven but the list is open to amendment, and in fact, has been changed, uh, by now, ha, a lot of people pointed things out to me, and I noticed some myself. The original seven words were, shit, piss, fuck, cunt, cocksucker, motherfucker, and tits. Those are the ones that will curve your spine, grow hair on your hands and (laughter) maybe, even bring us, God help us, peace without honor (laughter) um, and a bourbon. (laughter) And now the first thing that we noticed was that word fuck was really repeated in there because the word motherfucker is a compound word and it's another form of the word fuck. (laughter) You want to be a purist it doesn't really -- it can't be on the list of basic words. Also, cocksucker is a compound word and neither half of that is really dirty. The word -- the half sucker that's merely suggestive (laughter) and the word cock is a half-way dirty word, 50% dirty -- dirty half the time, depending on what you mean by it. (laughter) Uh, remember when you first heard it, like in 6th grade, you used to giggle. And the cock crowed three times, heh (laughter) the cock -- three times. It's in the Bible, cock in the Bible. (laughter) And the first time you heard about a cock-fight, remember -- What? Huh? naw. It ain't that, are you stupid? man. (laughter, clapping) It's chickens, you know, (laughter) Then you have the four letter words from the old Anglo-Saxon fame. Uh, shit and fuck. The word shit, uh, is an interesting kind of word in that the middle class has never really accepted it and approved it. They use it like, crazy but it's not really okay. It's still a rude, dirty, old kind of gushy word. (laughter) They don't like that, but they say it, like, they say it like, a lady now in a middle-class home, you'll hear most of the time she says it as an expletive, you know, it's out of her mouth before she knows. She says, Oh shit oh shit, (laughter) oh shit. If she drops something, Oh, the shit hurt the broccoli. Shit. Thank you. (footsteps fading away) (papers ruffling) Read it! (from audience) Shit! (laughter) I won the Grammy, man, for the comedy album. Isn't that groovy? (clapping, whistling) (murmur) That's true. Thank you. Thank you man. Yeah. (murmur) (continuous clapping) Thank you man. Thank you. Thank you very much, man. Thank, no, (end of continuous clapping) for that and for the Grammy, man, [']cause (laughter) that's based on people liking it man, yeh, that's ah, that's okay man. (laughter) Let's let that go, man. I got my Grammy. I can let my hair hang down now, shit. (laughter) Ha! So! Now the word shit is okay for the man. At work you can say it like crazy. Mostly figuratively, Get that shit out of here, will ya? I don't want to see that shit anymore. I can't cut that shit, buddy. I've had that shit up to here. I think you're full of shit myself. (laughter) He don't know shit from Shinola. (laughter) you know that? (laughter) Always wondered how the Shinola people feel about that? (laughter) Hi, I'm the new man from Shinola. (laughter) Hi, how are ya? Nice to see ya. (laughter) How are ya? (laughter) Boy, I don't know whether to shit or wind my watch. (laughter) Guess, I'll shit on my watch. (laughter) Oh, the shit is going to hit de fan. (laughter) Built like a brick shit-house. (laughter) Up, he's up shit's creek. (laughter) He's had it. (laughter) He hit me, I'm sorry. (laughter) Hot shit, holy shit, tough shit, eat shit, (laughter) shit-eating grin. Uh, whoever thought of that was ill. (murmur laughter) He had a shit-eating grin! He had a what? (laughter) Shit on a stick. (laughter) Shit in a handbag. I always like that. He ain't worth shit in a handbag. (laughter) Shitty. He acted real shitty. (laughter) You know what I mean? (laughter) I got the money back, but a real shitty attitude. Heh, he had a shit-fit. (laughter) Wow! Shit-fit. Whew! Glad I wasn't there. (murmur, laughter) All the animals -- Bull shit, horse shit, cow shit, rat shit, bat shit. (laughter) First time I heard bat shit, I really came apart. A guy in Oklahoma, Boggs, said it, man. Aw! Bat shit. (laughter) Vera reminded me of that last night, ah. (murmur) Snake shit, slicker than owl shit. (laughter) Get your shit together. Shit or get off the pot. (laughter) I got a shit-load full of them. (laughter) I got a shit-pot full, all right. Shit-head, shit-heel, shit in your heart, shit for brains, (laughter) shit-face, heh (laughter) I always try to think how that could have originated; the first guy that said that. Somebody got drunk and fell in some shit, you know. (laughter) Hey, I'm shit-face. (laughter) Shitface, today. (laughter) Anyway, enough of that shit. (laughter) The big one, the word fuck that's the one that hangs them up the most. [']Cause in a lot of cases that's the very act that hangs them up the most. So, it's natural that the word would, uh, have the same effect. It's a great word, fuck, nice word, easy word, cute word, kind of. Easy word to say. One syllable, short u. (laughter) Fuck. (Murmur) You know, it's easy. Starts with a nice soft sound fuh ends with a kuh. Right? (laughter) A little something for everyone. Fuck (laughter) Good word. Kind of a proud word, too. Who are you? I am FUCK. (laughter) FUCK OF THE MOUNTAIN. (laughter) Tune in again next week to FUCK OF THE MOUNTAIN. (laughter) It's an interesting word too, [']cause it's got a double kind of a life -- personality -- dual, you know, whatever the right phrase is. It leads a double life, the word fuck. First of all, it means, sometimes, most of the time, fuck. What does it mean? It means to make love. Right? We're going to make love, yeh, we're going to fuck, yeh, we're going to fuck, yeh, we're going to make love. (laughter) we're really going to fuck, yeah, we're going to make love. Right? And it also means the beginning of life, it's the act that begins life, so there's the word hanging around with words like love, and life, and yet on the other hand, it's also a word that we really use to hurt each other with, man. It's a heavy. It's one that you have toward the end of the argument. (laughter) Right? (laughter) You finally can't make out. Oh, fuck you man. I said, fuck you. (laughter, murmur) Stupid fuck. (laughter) Fuck you and everybody that looks like you. (laughter) man. It would be nice to change the movies that we already have and substitute the word fuck for the word kill, wherever we could, and some of those movie cliches would change a little bit. Madfuckers still on the loose. Stop me before I fuck again. Fuck the ump, fuck the ump, fuck the ump, fuck the ump, fuck the ump. Easy on the clutch Bill, you'll fuck that engine again. (laughter) The other shit one was, I don't give a shit. Like it's worth something, you know? (laughter) I don't give a shit. Hey, well, I don't take no shit, (laughter) you know what I mean? You know why I don't take no shit? (laughter) [']Cause I don't give a shit. (laughter) If I give a shit, I would have to pack shit. (laughter) But I don't pack no shit cause I don't give a shit. (laughter) You wouldn't shit me, would you? (laughter) That's a joke when you're a kid with a worm looking out the bird's ass. You wouldn't shit me, would you? (laughter) It's an eight-year-old joke but a good one. (laughter) The additions to the list. I found three more words that had to be put on the list of words you could never say on television, and they were fart, turd and twat, those three. (laughter) Fart, we talked about, it's harmless It's like tits, it's a cutie word, no problem. Turd, you can't say but who wants to, you know? (laughter) The subject never comes up on the panel so I'm not worried about that one. Now the word twat is an interesting word. Twat! Yeh, right in the twat. (laughter) Twat is an interesting word because it's the only one I know of, the only slang word applying to the, a part of the sexual anatomy that doesn't have another meaning to it. Like, ah, snatch, box and pussy all have other meanings, man. Even in a Walt Disney movie, you can say, We're going to snatch that pussy and put him in a box and bring him on the airplane. (murmur, laughter) Everybody loves it. The twat stands alone, man, as it should. And two-way words. Ah, ass is okay providing you're riding into town on a religious feast day. (laughter) You can't say, up your ass. (laughter) You can say, stuff it! (murmur) There are certain things you can say its weird but you can just come so close. Before I cut, I, uh, want to, ah, thank you for listening to my words, man, fellow, uh space travelers. Thank you man for tonight and thank you also.
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In This Edition
Arundhati Roy says, "Bush In India: Just Not Welcome."
Uri Avnery gives a speech at, "An Extraordinary Conference."
Sheila Samples examines, "The World That Dick Built."
Jim Hightower calculates, "The Price Of Cheney's Quail Hunt."
Frank Scott wonders, "Whose Freedom?"
Robert Scheer watches, "Dubai: Great Theater."
Chris Floyd explores, "The Pentagon Archipelago."
Robert Parry explains, "The U.S. Disconnect On Bush Abuses."
Joe Conason reports, "Bush Puts Port Safety In Some Dubious Hands."
Norm Solomom follows, "Mahatma Bush."
William Rivers Pitt tosses around, "The Boomerang."
South Dakota governor Mike Rounds wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award!'
Molly Ivins asks, "What About Port Security?"
Arianna Huffington uncovers, "The Full Disclosure Tucker Carlson Isn't Making."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department the fabulous Betty Bowers returns with advice in "What Would Betty Do" but first Uncle Ernie reveals, "The Triumph Of The Stepford Wives."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Dwayne Booth with additional cartoons from Ward Sutton, Whitehouse.Org, Micah Wright, MoPaul, Lisa Casey, Ted Rall, Buck Fush.Com, Steve Bradenton, Internet Weekly.Org, Mike Luckovich, Stuart Carlson and Tom Stiglich.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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The Triumph Of The Stepford Wives By Ernest Stewart
Shake, Rattle And Roll --- Big Joe Turner
You remember Dr. Coathanger, don't ya ladies? He's coming back thanks to the good folks in the South Dakota legislature and their fearless leader Governor Mike Hitler oops Mike Rounds. Although the law as written is against existing federal laws they're going to implement it anyway, well actually they're going to fight it through the courts all the way to the Extreme Court which has been recently packed, you'll remember with John (the enforcer) Roberts and Sammy (the coathanger) Alito who will judge whether a woman owns her reproductive parts or whether she'll be returning to second class status? She'll have to consult with a Politician or Mythologist and obey whatever they decree. How do you think Johnny, Sammy, Fat Tony, Tony Light-fingers and Hot-lips Clarence are going to vote ladies? Hmmm? Did I mention that certain Rethuglican billionaires are giving millions to the state to pay for the fight to the Extremes where at least 5 activist judges are standing by to endorse it? And ladies, South Dakota is just the tip of the iceberg, standing in the wings with their own little pieces of similar slavery are the states of Missouri, Indiana, Kentucky, Oklahoma, West Virginia, Georgia and Tennessee just to name the ones that have current similar bills. Funny how they are all Red States, eh? Funny thing that. Did I mention there is no choice even if you are raped or in cases of incest. Isn't that special? Aren't Rethuglicans some wonderful, caring folks, with a "kinder, gentler machine gun hand?" Did I mention that the rapist could have parental rights as well? Did I mention that? On a similar note, I see where the FBI says that three quarters of the churches and such that are now taking over government duties such as welfare etc. are in violation of the law. Many have been caught proselytizing or was it prostituting, I get those two confused or mayhaps they have taken that government money and used it to buy Jesus a new water slide or a new Bentley for the Rev. Say that Jesus is Lord and get a baloney sandwich starving person, go ahead, say it, Amen! According to the law they should; amongst other things, loose their tax exempt status. Yeah that's going to happen! Can you see Bush going toe to toe with the Panzer Pope or the American Taliban, can you? And since the Panzer Pope and American Taliban are the main backers of an abortion ban it will be to their tender mercies you gals will be subjected and subjugated. How do you like them so far? Are you ready yet to get out and raise a lot of hell to keep your rights or have you all been turned into the Stepford Wives? Are you ready to return to being the "little women" again? Do you think that this will be the last step in the destruction of your civil rights or perhaps just the beginning? Are the breeding centers all that far off from here? Are they really? What are you waiting for ladies? What?
I wrote governor Mikie this letter... Congratulations Governor Hitler er Rounds, Speaking for the publisher, the board of directors and the editors and staff of Issues & Alibis magazine we're proud to present you (in our 03-03-06 edition) The Vidkun Quisling Award for treason for signing the bill that makes ladies reproductive parts not their own but the properties of the state and various mythology's ( I bet the Panzer Pope and the American Taliban are cuming right now); effectively making them slaves to you Nazi bastards. What's next my little goose stepper, whopping slaves and sellin' cotton? We will also be starting a boycott; the first of thousands to come, of South Dakota and everything you make. Here's to hearing about the ladies in South Dakota rounding you fascist traitors up for a little tarring and feathering before the ride out of the country on a rail! You're real scum Mikie! Heil Bush,
Your liberal, blue state pal,
You might like to write Mikie and let him know your feelings? If so go to:
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We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
 Bush In India: Just Not Welcome By Arundhati Roy On his triumphalist tour of India and Pakistan, where he hopes to wave imperiously at people he considers potential subjects, President Bush has an itinerary that's getting curiouser and curiouser. For Bush's March 2 pit stop in New Delhi, the Indian government tried very hard to have him address our parliament. A not inconsequential number of MPs threatened to heckle him, so Plan One was hastily shelved. Plan Two was to have Bush address the masses from the ramparts of the magnificent Red Fort, where the Indian prime minister traditionally delivers his Independence Day address. But the Red Fort, surrounded as it is by the predominantly Muslim population of Old Delhi, was considered a security nightmare. So now we're into Plan Three: President George Bush speaks from Purana Qila, the Old Fort. Ironic, isn't it, that the only safe public space for a man who has recently been so enthusiastic about India's modernity should be a crumbling medieval fort? Since the Purana Qila also houses the Delhi zoo, George Bush's audience will be a few hundred caged animals and an approved list of caged human beings, who in India go under the category of "eminent persons." They're mostly rich folk who live in our poor country like captive animals, incarcerated by their own wealth, locked and barred in their gilded cages, protecting themselves from the threat of the vulgar and unruly multitudes whom they have systematically dispossessed over the centuries. So what's going to happen to George W. Bush? Will the gorillas cheer him on? Will the gibbons curl their lips? Will the brow-antlered deer sneer? Will the chimps make rude noises? Will the owls hoot? Will the lions yawn and the giraffes bat their beautiful eyelashes? Will the crocs recognize a kindred soul? Will the quails give thanks that Bush isn't traveling with Dick Cheney, his hunting partner with the notoriously bad aim? Will the CEOs agree? Oh, and on March 2, Bush will be taken to visit Gandhi's memorial in Rajghat. He's by no means the only war criminal who has been invited by the Indian government to lay flowers at Rajghat. (Only recently we had the Burmese dictator General Than Shwe, no shrinking violet himself.) But when Bush places flowers on that famous slab of highly polished stone, millions of Indians will wince. It will be as though he has poured a pint of blood on the memory of Gandhi. We really would prefer that he didn't.
It is not in our power to stop Bush's visit. It is in our power to protest it, and we will. The government, the police and the corporate press will do everything they can to minimize the extent of our outrage. Nothing the happy newspapers say can change the fact that all over India, from the biggest cities to the smallest villages, in public places and private homes, George W. Bush, the President of the United States of America, world nightmare incarnate, is just not welcome. |
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An Extraordinary Conference By Uri Avnery A FINAL score of 1:1 may not be the most impressive, but for the youngsters of Bil'in it was a glorious achievement. For them, it was not the result that was important, nor even the match itself (against a team from the nearby town of Betunya). What was important was where it took place: on an improvised football field that was hastily leveled on the land that was stolen from the village by the Separation Wall. The match was a part of a unique event. In the poor, little village, with its 1500 inhabitants, which few had ever heard of before the start of its heroic battle against the Wall, an "International Conference on the Joint, Non-violent struggle Against the Wall" took place. In the framework of this event, which lasted for two days, a range of activities was organized: reports and debates about the struggle, the award of honor shields to the families of the nine people who lost their lives in the fight against the Wall, the planting of olive saplings on the stolen land, the inauguration of the football field and the match itself. I had the honor of being invited to deliver one of the opening speeches, before an audience of 300 people - inhabitants of Bil'in, members of the Palestinian parliament, representatives of the struggle in several areas along the Wall, Israeli peace activists and delegates from European solidarity groups. This is what I said: DEAR FRIENDS, Every time I come to Bil'in, I am excited and happy. This village, this little village, has become a symbol in Palestine, in Israel, indeed throughout the world. Your fight reflects the struggle of the entire Palestinian people. Three traits distinguish the struggle of Bil'in, three characteristics that complement each other and together make Bil'in as extraordinary as it is: First, the tenacity, persistence and courage of the Palestinian people.. Second, the partnership with the Israeli peace camp. Third, the support of solidarity movements all over the world. To these one can add another characteristic that marks Bil'in as a shining example: the complete non-violence of the fight. A few days ago, the Dalai Lama visited this country. He met important people and celebrities and had his picture taken with them. I would have advised him to come to Bil'in and learn a lesson in non-violence. WHEN WE try to analyze the struggle, we have always to come back to the essence of the matter: In this country, there live two peoples, two nations, and the aim of our endeavors is to create peace, peace based on justice. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict does not resemble any other struggle in the world. It is not a repeat of the South African ordeal, nor a second edition of the Algerian War of Liberation. This is a unique conflict, brought about by unique circumstances. A famous historian described it this way: A person lives on an upper floor of a building in which a fire has broken out. To save his life, he jumps out of a window and lands on top of a passer-by, who is grievously hurt. Between the two, a mortal enmity ensues. Who is in the right? The person who jumped out of the window to save his life? Or the second person, who was hurt and ruined without having done anything wrong? The Zionist movement was born because Europe was becoming a hell for the Jews - fifty years before the Holocaust, the terrible Holocaust that killed millions of Jews, and in the wake of which the State of Israel was founded. The first Zionists believed that the country was empty. Their main slogan was: "A country without people for a people without a country." When the Zionists discovered that there was a population already living in this country, they tried to push it out. This effort continues until this very day - and so does the tenacious struggle of the Palestinian people for its existence and its land. That is the reality of the conflict - two peoples living in the same country and fighting each other. The struggle of Bil'in against the Wall that is stealing its land is a part of this historic conflict. THIRTY TWO years ago, right after the Yom Kippur War, the Ramadan War, Yasser Arafat drew the conclusion that there is no military solution to this conflict. He resolved to seek a political settlement. A small group of Israeli peace activists decided to join this initiative. We set up the Israeli Council for Israeli-Palestinian Peace. Arafat instructed his emissaries to contact us - first Sa'id Hamami, then Issam Sartawy, two senior Fatah leaders. Both were later murdered by the enemies of peace and the enemies of Arafat. May their memory live with us. In 1982, in the middle of the Lebanon War, I crossed the lines and met with Arafat in beleaguered Beirut. In the middle of the battle, in the middle of the bombardments, Arafat talked about peace between our two peoples. Arafat was already laying down a strategy based on three principles: to persist in the struggle of the Palestinian people, to hold out the hand to the Israeli peace camp and to call for international solidarity. These are also the three principles of Bil'in today. YOU MAY ask - indeed, you must ask: What has the Israeli peace movement achieved? On the face of it - nothing. On the contrary, since the Oslo agreement, the situation of the Palestinians has worsened from year to year. The economic misery is deepening even further. Every day, people are being killed. The construction of the monster Wall is continuing. The racist settlements are spreading rapidly. Just now we learned that the Jordan Valley - a third of the West Bank - is being cut off from the Palestinian territory and practically annexed to Israel. The victory of Hamas in the Palestinian elections is a result of these actions. All this is happening in plain view. But below the surface a contrary process is at work. Fifty years ago, only a handful of people in Israel and around the world recognized the existence of the Palestinian people. Even 32 years ago, Golda Meir could declare that "there is no such thing as a Palestinian people". Nowadays there is no normal person in Israel and the world who denies the existence of the Palestinian people and its right to a state of its own. That is a victory for the tenacious Palestinian struggle, but also for the Israeli peace movement. Twenty years ago, when we called for negotiations with the Palestinian Liberation Organization, we were a small band. We were told that Arafat was a murderer, that the PLO was a terrorist organization, that the Palestinian Charter called for the destruction of Israel - exactly the same phrases which are now being used about Hamas. But a few years later, the State of Israel recognized the PLO, negotiated with it and signed an agreement with it. That was a victory for the tenacious Palestinian struggle, but also a victory for the Israeli peace movement. DEAR FRIENDS, it is very easy to despair. Every one of us has moments of depression. But I am convinced that peace will win, justice will win. A few weeks ago I was in Berlin. In the shops there, pieces of the Berlin Wall are on sale. I paid 2.50 Euros for one of them. The day will come when here, in Bil'in, in the free State of Palestine, one will be able to buy pieces of the Wall that we are fighting against today. Every time when I am in Bil'in and other places in occupied Palestine, I can't help thinking what a paradise this country would be if there were peace, peace based on justice and mutual respect.
This peace will come. And when it comes, the last wish of Yasser Arafat, whose picture hangs here, will be fulfilled: his remains will be interred in Jerusalem.
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The World That Dick Built By Sheila Samples This is the guy who pulled the trigger of the gun that fired the round that hit his friend that ruined the hunt and shed some light on the world that Dick built... Four days after blasting 78-year-old hunting partner Harry Whittington in the face, neck and chest with birdshot, vice president Dick Cheney emerged from his fortified bunker to make a snarling, unapologetic taped announcement to Fox News' Brit Hume that basically amounted to what he did on his own time was his own business. Dick said shooting Harry the previous Saturday was one of the worst days of his life -- which is quite an admission considering the fate of those who have been in Dick's crosshairs over the years. Harry, no longer Dick's friend but a mere "acquaintance," emerged from the hospital two days later to apologize to the media for the delay he had caused by having an operation, a heart attack and a shotgun pellet in his heart. Harry begged Dick and his family to forgive him for the trouble he and his family had caused them. "We all assume certain risks in whatever we do, whatever activities we pursue," Harry said. "And regardless of how experienced, careful and dedicated we are, accidents do and will happen -- and that's what happened last Friday... " Last Friday? Now -- if you're a reporter, wouldn't you be a teeny bit interested in whether the shooting occurred on Friday rather than Saturday? Wouldn't you wonder why it took three hours to get Harry to a hospital 20 minutes away when Dick's ambulance was on the scene, why it took four days -- perhaps five -- for Dick to go public? Perhaps it would even cross your mind that Dick might be waiting to see which story he should peddle. If Harry died, he could send ranch owner Katharine Armstrong out to say she had seen it all and it was poor, dead Harry's fault. If he survived, Dick would suck it in and somberly tell a sympathetic Hume -- "Ultimately I'm the guy who pulled the trigger that fired the round that hit Harry..." But even then, Dick and Katharine couldn't keep their stories straight. Katharine first said she was sitting in a car and wasn't aware of an accident until she saw the Secret Service guys running toward the group. Then she remembered she was right there at Dick's elbow and saw the whole thing, a bonafide eye-witness and the only one qualified to deal with the media. According to Katharine, there was "zero, zippo" drinking that day, but then she remembered there might have been a "few" beers consumed, and even Dick admitted he "popped a top" at the pre-hunt barbeque. Members of the press corps might wonder why Dick chose to return to the house and fix himself a cocktail rather than accompany his victim to the hospital. They might also be interested in comments made by Dick's Secret Service agents who say Dick was "clearly inebriated" when he bagged Harry. Capitol Hill Blue's Doug Thompson reports, "According to those who have talked with the agents and others present at the outing, Cheney was drunk when he gunned down his friend and the day-and-a-half delay in allowing Texas law enforcement officials on the ranch where the shooting occurred gave all members of the hunting party time to sober up." Thompson says the agents reported that members of the hunting party, including Dick, consumed alcohol "before and during the hunting expedition," and their report also noted that "Cheney exhibited 'visible signs' of impairment, including slurred speech and erratic actions." But reporters don't ask such questions in Dick's world. Those who are not house-broken are, at a minimum, paper-trained. They don't ask questions in the house or even close to the house for fear of tracking the resulting mess in on the rug. Their yapping and barking on-camera at White House press secretary Scott McClellan concerned just one issue -- they should have been told first. "We have cell phones," they wailed. "We have Blackberries! We're the press corps -- we should have been given the story before a local newspaper!" There's a big difference between being "given" a script to copy and hitting the investigative trail to dig up what really happened. Apparently, no one in the mainstream media dared question Dick's final taped account. Not one questioned the 14-hour delay in the Kenedy County Sheriff's Department getting access to Dick nor wondered why the Sheriff would send a deputy to dutifully jot down Dick's account and take depositions from other parties without asking pertinent questions about alcohol consumption, or why Dick can't get it straight whether he "turned right," as he said several times, or "counter-clockwise" as he is saying now. While reporters were frenziedly chasing their tails, Internet reporter Joseph Ehrlich wrote an excellent piece wherein he addressed both questions and answers in this tangled affair. Ehrlich meticuously laid out the timeline, the elaborate behind-the-scenes machinations, and Dick and Katharine's ridiculous efforts to cover up what actually occurred, to include having the Secret Service bump the time of the shooting to 5:50 PM to put the sun in Dick's eyes when he pulled the trigger. Ehrlich even quotes Harry's daughter who, in a strange revelation, said that after her father was shot, he lay there for such a long time "he was unsure whether he was being taken to the hospital or the morgue." Such a ghoulish remark is more than passing strange, yet the media failed to pick up on it. Little attention has been given to poor Harry other than he is a 78-year-old Austin attorney, and the victim of yet another Dick Cheney "accident." In truth, Harry, like those with whom he cavorts, is a multi-millionaire, and a major Republican player and donor. Bush appointed Harry to chair the Texas regulatory Funeral Service Commission in 1999, just in time to force the commission to settle a whistleblower lawsuit shortly before the 2000 election. Harry managed to keep Bush out of the courts and out of jail in the burgeoning Funeralgate scandal that theatened to engulf not only Bush but Robert Waltrip, owner of Service Corportion International (SCI), the largest funeral corporation in Texas; Joe Albaugh, Bush crony, campaign manager and former FEMA director; Texas Attorney General (now Senator) John Cornyn; and, of course, Bush counsel (now U.S. Attorney General) Alberto Gonzales. Dick's world is an incestuous world whose core is Texas power and money -- lots of it. As Sydney Blumenthal writes in Salon, both Dick and Karl Rove literally owe their present positions to Katharine and her family. "Anne Armstrong, Katharine's mother, was on the board of Halliburton that made Dick Cheney its chief executive officer," Blumenthal said. "Tobin Armstrong, Katharine's father, financed Karl Rove & Co., Rove's political consulting firm." Blumenthal says Katharine is a lobbyist for Houston law firm Baker Botts, founded in the 19th Century by the family of James A. Baker, former secretary of state, Poppy Bush's buddy and the architect of the 2000 presidential coup d`etat that gave the presidency to Bush and Dick. The people who inhabit Dick's world possess such power they can silence an entire White House press corps in mid-yelp -- such arrogance they can turn away law enforcement officers and delay an investigation until a more convenient time, even though a man has been shot in the face. Bill Moyers, formerly of PBS, now President of the Schumann Center for Media and Democracy, very succinctly sums them up...
"It is a Dick Cheney world out there," Moyers writes, "--a world where politicians and lobbyists hunt together, dine together, drink together, play together, pray together and prey together, all the while carving up the world according to their own interests."
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First, he withheld all news of the shooting for nearly 24 hours. Even then, he handed-off the task of facing the media to Katharine Armstrong, the lobbyist who was host of the Texas quail shoot. Dick himself had silently fled back to Washington. Second, Cheney's spinners tried to hide the seriousness of the shooting. Armstrong gaily reported that the victim had been "peppered" with "a bunch of little-bitty pellets." Excuse me, but you "pepper" eggs; a shotgun is loaded to kill. And one of those "little-bitty pellets" lodged in the lawyer's heart, later triggering a heart attack. Third, Cheney's spinners rushed out to blame the victim! They scolded the lawyer for walking up behind Cheney without announcing his presence. Excuse me again, but the first rule of hunting safety is to look before you shoot. It wasn't the lawyer who pulled the trigger - it was Dead-Eye Dick. Fourth, it was four full days before Cheney was forced by mounting political pressure to come out of hiding and do what he should have done within hours of the shooting: Take personal responsibility and publicly apologize. But there's a fifth story that the media has missed: The cost to tax payers for Cheney's little quail shoot. Flying to Texas on Air Force Two costs some $55,000 an hour. He also travels with a full secret service detail and a personal cardiologist - and an ambulance and EMS crew are with him at all times. Yes, Cheney needs to have some down time - but are there no birds for him to kill in nearby Washington? This is Jim Hightower saying... While families are literally having to hold bake sales to buy armor for our troops in Iraq, Cheney is socking us for about $300,000 to go shoot quail!
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The double standards by which western civilization (?) has achieved its
success are, like many of its other contradictions, presently under
assault.
The West's definition of freedom has never been so glaringly revealed
to
mean whatever the deniers of freedom for others choose to call it for
themselves. Confusing? That may be why we tolerate it, and perhaps when
that tolerance becomes resistance, the world will become a better and
more peaceful place.
The exercise of democratic freedoms seem quite clear to those who are
supposed to have them. Even while complaining about voter fraud, stolen
ballots and a threatened police state, we are mind managed into
believing we have freedoms unknown to nations deemed lower than ours on
the social evolutionary scale. And when it comes to consuming products
in the marketplace - whether we need them or can afford them - there is
no question that we in the West enjoy far more freedom than billions of
people who live in political economic ghettos, outside the walls of the
global shopping center.
But along with goods and services we consume a commercial fiction, sold
to us as economic reality, and a diet of murderous lies, fed to us as
political truth. This enables us to stumble through life so busy with
mass consumption - and the medication, therapy and religion to make it
palatable - that we hardly notice the world and the role we play in it,
until it literally blows up in our faces.
When the 911 tragedy shocked the USA, it was a wake up call, but the
propaganda machine worked to put the general population into a deeper
state of confusion than is usually the case. Thus, we found ourselves
in
the incredibly bloody, stupid and deceitful war on terror, possibly
surpassing the old cold war in its economic waste and political
insanity.
We have been subjected to a distorted world view which convinced us
that
Afghanistan, then Iraq, and more lately Iran, threatened our freedom to
shop. And that all these nations are led by demonic tyrants, depicted
as fundamentalist psychopaths by our media politicians, who would fail
any sanity test devised by official psycho-cratic authority. But aside
from shortcomings of mental health in a West which labels everyplace
else as mad, our morality and language problems loom as large, and as
perilous.
Having failed to legitimize its lunatic story of weapons in Iraq as
reason for the invasion and destruction of that relatively helpless
nation, the regime invented a fable about spreading democracy. While
most of the world laughed hysterically, many innocent Americans bought
this tale. But when the opposition party and all the sanctioned centers
of criticism went along with the program, the problem became far more
critical and dangerous.
Especially so when the call for democratic elections led to some actual
choice for people who previously had almost none, and they insisted on
choosing other than those chosen for them by their alleged benefactors.
Islamic fundamentalists won votes in many places, especially in
Palestine, and the Empire - led by the USA and Israel - had an
intellectual hemorrhage.
With the West's hypocritical interpretation of freedom melting faster
than the Greenland ice cap, it remains for the rest of the world to
update a noble concept, born of often ignoble people able to sit around
and theorize its existence while slaves did their work. Freedom is
being
redefined, in places like Venezuela, Bolivia and Palestine. Whether
deemed politically correct by the West or not, the voice of the
majority
is not only being heard, but translated into power. This has made the
forces of racist, imperial domination apprehensive enough to threaten
even more bloodshed than they have already caused.
The retaliatory power of the new voices of freedom may become nearly as
violent as the old voices of its most hypocritical form, especially if
the West's provocation and suppression continues. But a more hopeful
outcome may find the disease of violent crusader Christianity cured by
the compassion and peace up to now only preached by that faiths all
too
silent majority. And violent Zionist zealots may finally be subdued
with
the material realization of a biblical sense of Jewish justice that has
been more theoretical than practical, until now.
If progressive congregations within the dominant western religions
cannot unite with their secular counterparts and bring about change
that
involves substantial, truly democratic freedoms, outside forces will
have to intervene and prevail. The present situation, with the fire of
apprehension and fear being stoked by propaganda and ignorance, could
lead to more violence and worse destruction than ever.
A more hopeful outcome will depend on the old world bringing its
definition of rhetorical freedom into harmony with the new demand for
freedoms material substance. Discounting the majority winners of
elections when they are deemed unacceptable by ruling minorities, and
locking people in prison for daring to probe historic matters deemed
beyond any questioning, are hardly the way to create freedom and a
future of peace and justice among nations . Only western rhetoric
strives for that goal, but it must be balanced by a material outcome,
or
a heavenly mythology will wind up creating a most hellish reality.
A morality is needed that doesn't depend on military power for a
definition of freedom, nor on the dualism that acts as foundation for
the double standards that rationalize western truth. Another world is
certainly possible, and growing masses of humanity have reason to hope
for the best. But if they don't unite and work for it, we can surely
expect the worst. In the words of an old song, freedom will then become
just another word for nothing left to lose.
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DO YOU BUY Dubai? That's this season's big hit, a zany farce with pompous officials in the Bush administration and their hysterical courtiers in the mass media asserting positions that are patently absurd but hilarious to watch. Audiences are eating it up.
Great fun - but not for everyone. Feel the pain over at Fox television. How do you go on stoking xenophobic hysteria against the Arabs when the Golden Boy in the White House has turned over management of American ports to an emir who once backed the Taliban? OK, so now he's a good guy, responding to Daddy Bush's charity pitch by throwing $100 million to Katrina victims, and before that another million into the Bush presidential library. But how do you sell that to a Fox television audience brainwashed to believe that Saddam Hussein is indistinguishable from Osama bin Laden because they both speak Arabic?
Oh, to be Lou Dobbs over at CNN, who never liked anyone connected with the Mideast, including the president, and who now sends reporters out in the dark of night to track mysterious cargo. Some guys have all the fun - particularly those traitors who don't realize there is a war on and that it's our patriotic duty to support the president, even if he's endangering the country.
Now, maybe this port deal is not really that big a threat to U.S. security, but then neither was Saddam Hussein. That didn't stop Bush from ripping up Iraq and turning it into a showcase for religious fratricide. So he makes mistakes, but he's our president and we are in a WAR, a War on Terror. Terror, terror, TERROR, all the time.
But now, we're getting mixed messages. First, the president told us that in a war on terror you trust your own government to provide Homeland Security. You put your faith in the stern, electronic wand-waving Americans in white shirts and TSA epaulettes who check your shoes at the airport; those upstanding Americans who report to other upstanding Americans, like Michael Chertoff, and people he trusts. Now they tell us it's OK to have some Arab as the guy in charge of checking our shoes - excuse me, ports?
Yeah, I know, to be the least bit queasy about turning over our ports to guys who supported the Taliban when that bunch of religious maniacs were harboring bin Laden is, as the Bush apologists tell us, just xenophobic. Dubai was not alone; Saudi Arabia and Pakistan did the same, and they are now trusted allies. These are crazy times, and there are some unnerving oddities in Bush's foreign policy, but don't worry: As soon as Hussein is tried and hanged, democracy will flower in the Arab world and the war on terrorism will be over. In the meantime, we have to put up with some contradictions, like trusting Arabs to own port-management companies, even as we scapegoat them everywhere else.
And even if you are a teensy-weensy nervous about it, remember that the Bushies have made it clear that the management companies don't have anything to do with port security, because that's safely in the hands of U.S. Customs and the U.S. Coast Guard.
Ooops, well, not according to the Coast Guard.
Just when things looked like they were quieting down, Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, chair of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, had to go and mess it up for the president by releasing details of a very embarrassing Coast Guard warning that the White House had ignored. "There are many intelligence gaps, concerning the potential for [Dubai Ports World] ... assets to support terrorist operations, that preclude an overall threat assessment of the potential merger," stated the Coast Guard document.
No biggie. I get it, when it comes to national security, who are you going to trust, the president of the United States, our commander in chief or those sailor boys in the Coast Guard who are already backing off? But this is a very unpopular lame duck president, and some Republican legislators are getting nervous. For example Collins, who broke ranks to warn, "This report suggests there were significant and troubling intelligence gaps ... That language is very troubling to me." Hey, no problem, reassures fellow Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona. It could be worse - the port managers could be Chinese communists! The Chinese are even less free than the people of Dubai, he insists, so we've dodged a bullet there. Some spoilsports might point out that Beijing never recognized the Taliban and hardly coddles religious fanatics. But that would ruin this wonderful farce, and I wish it a very long run. Do you buy Dubai? Yeah, loved every minute.
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The Pentagon Archipelago By Chris Floyd When I read the passage below from Moazzam Begg's account of his years in Bush's Terror War prisons, I had a strange feeling of dislocation: it was as if 30 years had suddenly fallen away and I was back in high school, reading Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago in stunned disbelief at the hideous cruelty inflicted on the prisoners -- deliberately, as a carefully calculated instrument of state policy. And all of it done in the name of national security, of course, to protect the nation against "terrorists" and "traitors." Solzhenitsyn's books -- not just the factual Gulag but also the deep-delving fiction of his middle years, the powerful First Circle and Cancer Ward -- were enormous influences on my own understanding of politics, power and morality. Years later, I was in Moscow when he returned to Russia from his long exile, having outlasted the system of state terror that had consumed so many of his compatriots. However much I had come to disagree with some of his political positions on certain issues, it was a still a moment of triumph for the deeper truths and moral courage that he continued -- and continues -- to represent. How sickening, then, to find myself last Saturday reading of the precisely the same kind of state terror that Solzhenitsyn described (and survived) once again being inflicted on innocent people -- and this time in my name, under the flag of my country, at the express order of the leaders of my government. Bush is trying to turn us all into the kind of quiet collaborationists and cowed enablers of atrocity that we habitually decry when speaking of the Soviet Union or Nazi Germany: "Oh, how could they have let such awful things go on? Why did they stand silently by? How could they swallow all those monstrous lies? I would never have stood for that kind of thing!" Well, tens of millions of Americans are standing for it right now -- every bit as quiescent as the most head-down, eyes-averted Soviet citizen or German burgher: countenancing, condoning, even celebrating brutal acts of state terror, and swallowing the tyrant's eternal lie that his crimes are committed to protect the people. For a few crumbs of prosperity from the elite's banquet table, for a few flattering fairy tales about national greatness, national goodness and historical destiny, for a few comforting murmurs to chase away the craven fear of madman monsters across the sea, they have sold their priceless birthright of liberty. It's no longer a matter of what crimes Americans will swallow; now the great question of the day is: what won't they swallow? They've walked this far down the road of darkness - how much farther will they go? Will we one day need a Solzhenitsyn to catalogue our shame, our cruelty and our cowardice? Excerpt from My Years in Captivity , from The Guardian: After that first heavy interrogation they took me into another room and left me there. Guards tied my hands behind my back, hog-tied me so that my hands were shackled to my legs, which were also shackled. Then they put a hood over my head. It was stuffy and hard to breathe, and I was on the verge of asthmatic panic. The perpetual darkness was frightening. A barrage of kicks to my head and back followed. Lying on the ground, with my back arched, and my wrists and ankles chafing against the metal chains, was excruciating. I could never wriggle into a more comfortable position, even for a moment. There was a thin carpet on the concrete floor, and a little shawl for warmth - both completely inadequate. I lost track of day and night - not only was I usually in the hood but, in any case, the window was boarded up. Eventually, someone came in and removed the hood. I was there in isolation for about a month. Once they kept me from sleeping for about two days and two nights. A guard kept coming in and if I nodded off he woke me. By the end of that I was completely drained and disoriented. I never knew what was going to happen. Sometimes they'd take me to an outside toilet - used by the military as there wasn't one upstairs. But even then I was hooded, and the hood came off only when I was in the latrine area. There on the wall, in big black letters, were the words "Fuck Islam". For days on end I was alone in the room. Then they'd come for me and go over and over exactly the same ground: the camps, my role in training, my role in al-Qaeda, my role in financing 9/11. Sometimes it was the CIA, sometimes the FBI; sometimes I didn't even know who they were. All of them wanted a story that didn't exist. There are no words to describe what I felt like. [End excerpt] And yet, underneath the massive slab of state terrorism, tendrils of human understanding and sympathy do survive between individuals, as was widely evident in the Soviet Union and even in Nazi Germany. Begg describes one such thread formed with what he considered the most unlikely suspect: an old, Bible-reading Alabama redneck, one of the guards responsible for holding him captive - away from his family, away from his life, for no reason, without any evidence, save for wild accusations most likely extracted by torture - for weeks, for months, for years on end. Excerpt: I made a huge discovery during incarceration, about relating to people. When I first saw Sergeant Foshee, I thought, "He's too old to be in the army; they must be desperate." And when he asked me, in his Alabama drawl, if I was English, I thought, "Another typical raghead-hating, stars-and-bars, KKK-type redneck." Most of the time, when he was in my room, Foshee sat there reading the Bible, and we didn't speak. I'd heard from other guards that Foshee was racist, didn't like women in the army, hated JFK, lost his temper quickly and ordered people about. Back in the US he worked as an undercover narcotics agent. But he was also a Vietnam veteran. "Excuse me, Sergeant, do you mind if I ask you something about Vietnam?" As a teenager I'd been fascinated by the Vietnam War, and even then I'd identified with the underdog. I felt compelled to ask this vet from Nam about his experiences. I must have asked the right question. Foshee loved giving me his recollections, and I couldn't get enough. He described graphically the assaults he'd been in, the friends he'd seen killed, the civilian massacres, and the stress he'd suffered on return to the US. Several of his comrades had been POWs. Then came the inevitable comparison between them and us. Foshee was deeply disturbed by our treatment as detainees. He couldn't understand why we weren't treated as POWs. For us he had a soldier's respect. "I don't know if you've done anything, but they say this is a war. You should all be sent home, 'cos the war's over. Or you should be treated like POWs. I know there are people here who fought the Soviets for years and even I'm a baby compared with them -- in age and experience. I get so pissed when I see those punkass kids treating y'all that way, when they ain't done a thing for this country." He was talking about soldiers in Echo who had soaked detainees with water, then left the air conditioning on full. To me Foshee was an enigma: his attitudes were clearly Republican, and yet he did not like what he was seeing... When Foshee heard about the incident [an episode when Begg, maddened by years of pointless confinement, exacerbated by the invasion of his room by a stream of maggots, lost control and trashed his cell] , he was very upset and tried to comfort me with stories of the Hanoi Hilton, how some of his friends had survived torture and solitary - and some hadn't. I had. I made a few friends with guards over the years in US custody, but only one ever earned my respect. [End excerpt] Moazzam Begg was kidnapped in Pakistan in January 2002. As the Guardian notes in an accompanying story: "During his internment, he spent virtually two years in solitary, was kicked and beaten, suffocated with a bag over his head, stripped naked, chained by his hands to the top of a door and left hanging, and led to believe he was about to be executed." The only "evidence" against him was the statement by a Pakistani captive that his instructor in an al-Qaeda camp had been named "Abu Umamah." This is a common Arabic construction, whereby parents are called after the names of their children: "Abu Umamah" means, "father of Umamah," which was the name of Begg's oldest daughter. (Similarly, the Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas is usually referred to as "Abu Mazen." Although this is often called his "nom de guerre" in the Western press, as if it were the kind of sinister nickname that Bolshevik terrorists took to cloak their true identity - "Stalin," the man of steel, "Molotov," the hammer, etc. - it is in fact just a homely way of saying that Abbas is the father of a boy named Mazen.) From this tidbit of meaningless information -- there are countless Muslims known as "Abu Umamah" - American interrogators spun a wild fantasy of Begg - a British teacher born and raised in Birmingham, where his secular parents sent him to the Jewish King David School for years - as an international mastermind, a veritable Doctor Evil: "Two FBI agents began the questioning, convinced I was involved in some nefarious web of plots, from planning to assassinate the Pope to masterminding al-Qaeda's finance operation in Europe, or being an instructor in one of its Afghan training camps. They had their perceptions about me and were searching for ways to confirm them - preferably from my own mouth. By now I'd been raised to the status of some rogue James Bond-type figure. They thought I was a graduate from some prestigious British university, that I was fluent in a dozen languages, that I was an expert in computers and several martial arts....Had it not been for this ludicrous situation I'm in, I would have been flattered," I once said to them. "I should ask you to write my rsum - I'd find a job anywhere." But it was no joke, of course. One of the tools they used to torment Begg was photos of Umamah herself, which they had somehow obtained - stolen from his family home perhaps? - shortly after his capture. When that didn't work, the beatings and bindings described above began. As I wrote two years ago, describing the plight of three other innocent British Muslims who'd been ensnared in Bush's global net: "The treatment of these three innocent men, chained and beaten for two years, is not just a crime, but also - like that other crime, the invasion of Iraq - an enormous waste of time and resources in the "war on terrorism." We saw the grim fruit of this waste in Madrid on March 11. "But of course, the Pentagon Archipelago wasn't designed to fight terrorism; it's designed to advance terrorism - state terrorism. Its purpose is to establish the principle of arbitrary rule - in the name of "military necessity" - above the rule of law, in America and around the world. It's part of an overarching system of terror - aggressive war, assassination, indefinite detention, torture - employed to achieve the Regime's openly-stated ideological goal: "full spectrum dominance" of global politics and resources, particularly energy resources. Al Qaeda has the same goal, and uses the same methods, albeit on a smaller, "asymmetrical" scale. "Now we are all at the mercy of these entwined terrorist factions - both led by fundamentalist sons of two financially linked elitist clans. We will see more Guantanamos, more Madrids, before this long, dark night is over."
Moazzam Begg was released from captivity in January 2005, with all the false charges against him dropped.
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The U.S. Disconnect On Bush Abuses By Robert Parry The U.S. news media is experiencing a cognitive meltdown as it tries to hold onto the traditional view of the United States as a beacon for human rights while facing the new reality in which George W. Bush has plunged the nation into the dark arts of torture, assassination and "disappearances" more common in "death-squad" states. Rarely has that disconnect been more clearly on display than on the Feb. 28 editorial page of the Washington Post. The lead editorial, entitled "Homicide Unpunished," criticizes the Bush administration for letting off U.S. interrogators implicated in murder and torture in Iraq and Afghanistan, but the page's final editorial hails the Bush administration for demanding that the United Nations purge its human rights organization of human rights violators. That final editorial, entitled "Prodding the U.N.," reads like something written from the not-so-distant past when the United States could credibly point fingers at nations with poor records for respecting civil liberties and human rights. "The administration refused to accept a proposed structure for this new (U.N. human rights) body, reasonably fearing that it would protect human rights abusers rather than put pressure on them," the Post said, listing those offending nations as Zimbabwe, Sudan, China and Cuba. The Post added that Washington should confront allies, such as Pakistan and Egypt, and tell them "that relations with the United States will be affected if they resist a serious U.N. human rights body." The Big Elephant Leaving aside the question of whether some of these U.S. allies have appreciably better human rights records than the countries on the Post's list, the editorial also ignores the bigger elephant in the room, whether Washington retains the moral standing to lecture anybody about respect for human rights and international law. After all, just six inches above the editorial praising Bush's human rights position at the U.N. is the other editorial describing how the Bush administration gave only slaps on the wrist to interrogators implicated in torturing detainees to death since 2002. Indeed, the hypocrisy within this hypocrisy is that the only serious jail time has been meted out to the Abu Ghraib guards who were photographed posing Iraqi prisoners naked in humiliating postures but didn't kill anyone. The lead Post editorial notes that Corporal Charles A. Graner Jr., who supervised Private Lynndie England and other guards on the Abu Ghraib night shift, did appear in one photo with a dead Iraqi prisoner, but Graner wasn't responsible for the man's murder. Nevertheless, the sexually-oriented photos of naked Iraqis had infuriated President Bush and many Americans in his Christian Right base, so Graner got 10 years in jail and seven other low-level guards, including England, also were sentenced to prison. By contrast, the Navy SEAL and CIA interrogators who tortured to death Iraqi Manadel al-Jamadi (the victim in the Graner photo) were spared any serious punishment. On Nov. 4, 2003, the interrogators had taken turns punching and kicking Jamadi before shackling him and hanging him five feet off the floor, where he died of asphyxiation. "Nine members of the Navy team were given 'nonjudicial punishment' by their commanding officer; the 10th, a lieutenant, was acquitted on charges of assault and dereliction of duty," the Post wrote. "None of the CIA personnel has been prosecuted. The lead interrogator, Mark Swanner, reportedly continues to work for the agency." The Rule The Jamadi case also wasn't an exception; it was the rule. A new report by Human Rights First documented that only 12 of 98 deaths of detainees in U.S. custody have resulted in any punishment for implicated U.S. officials. Even in the eight cases when the deaths have resulted from torture, the stiffest penalty was five months in jail. "The report documents many of these cases in devastating detail," the Post noted. "There is, for example, the case of former Iraqi Gen. Abed Hamed Mowhoush, who in November 2003 was beaten for days by Army and CIA interrogators, then stuffed into a sleeping bag, wrapped with electrical cord and smothered. "The case was classified as a murder, but only one person was court-martialed, a low-level warrant officer. After arguing, plausibly, that his actions were approved by more senior officers under a policy issued by the then-commander in Iraq, Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, his punishment was to be restricted for 60 days to his home, workplace and church." Human Rights First reported that in dozens of prisoner deaths, "grossly inadequate reporting, investigation and follow-through have left no one at all responsible for homicides and other unexplained deaths." The Post editorial traced this pattern of brutality and neglect all the way to the top. "Commanders, starting with President Bush and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and extending through the ranks, have repeatedly declined to hold Americans accountable for documented war crimes," the Post wrote. "The defacto principles governing the punishment of U.S. personnel guilty of prisoner abuse since 2002 now are clear: Torturing a foreign prisoner to death is excusable. Authoring and implementing policies of torture may lead to promotion. But being pictured in an Abu Ghraib photograph that leaks to the press is grounds for a heavy prison sentence." While this disparity between punishments given the Abu Ghraib night shift and the more lethal work of CIA and military interrogators can't be disputed, the other disconnect - demonstrated by the two Post editorials both appearing on Feb. 28 - may be harder to explain. Even as the world looks on in horror - as the United States eviscerates its reputation for promoting human rights - the Post and other U.S. news outlets cling to the now-outdated notion of America as the undisputed human rights champion when it lectures the U.N. on how to isolate human rights abusers.
What the Post editorial board can't seem to get its brain around is that the United States might now fit better in the category of abusive states, the ones that Bush wants excluded from the new U.N. human rights commission. Otherwise, that new body - like its predecessor - might lose all credibility.
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| Bush Puts Port Safety In Some Dubious Hands By Joe Conason When Washington politicians protest the purchase of American port facilities by an Arab company, it is natural to suspect prejudice or protectionism or both. When normally supine Republicans such as Bill Frist and Peter King defy the Bush administration to join Democrats like Hillary Rodham Clinton and Charles Schumer, the smell of election-year opportunism is almost overwhelming. Yet in this case, the bipartisan opposition may be not only populist but prudent. Certainly, there are valid reasons to question the White House decision to allow the purchase of the British company that now operates several major U.S. ports by Dubai Ports World, a firm owned by the United Arab Emirates. While the President and his family may adore the Emirates-as they do most of the oil-producing dictatorships in the Persian Gulf-that peculiar Bush preference doesn't necessarily reflect broader American interests. Questions about the U.S. approval of Dubai Ports World should begin with the fact that it is not a private business but a government-owned enterprise. The "free-market" fanatics of the Bush administration and the conservative movement should explain exactly why they believe a corporation owned by a foreign state is an acceptable business partner, when they so vigorously oppose public ownership of any economic entity within the United States. Even the Cato Institute, that bastion of libertarian thought, is urging the approval of the Dubai deal. Imagine the ideological fury among conservatives if our own federal government proposed to take over the operation of American ports (which might not be such an awful idea, considering the risk we now confront from nuclear or other threats that could be shipped into our cities by terrorists). They would scream about "socialism" and unfair competition with private enterprise. After all, they resisted the establishment of the Transportation Security Administration after 9/11 because of their knee-jerk preference for private security firms. Yet the tribal rulers of the U.A.E. evidently should be encouraged to profit from government enterprise, while the free people of the United States cannot. The sheiks who run the Emirates permit no such foreign incursion in their own national enterprises. Although they give lip service to open trade-and encourage foreign participation in their designated free-trade zones-they strictly regulate foreign investment in key sectors. According to the State Department and the U.S. Trade Representative, foreign investment in the U.A.E. is heavily restricted. Americans cannot own land there. No business can operate there without majority U.A.E. ownership. Those rules reflect the harsh and undemocratic nature of the Emirates, whose government is rooted in Wahhabi Islam. The blessings of liberty as enunciated by the Bush doctrine have made little impression there-a country where labor unions are banned, free speech and association are unknown, and violations of human rights are common. The State Department's most recent report on human trafficking in 2005 denounced the U.A.E. for its failure to act against that evil practice. Busloads of workers are herded into the country annually under conditions resembling indenture, and planeloads of women are flown in for sexual exploitation. Even children are not exempt from the medieval labor market, with thousands of boys illegally imported to serve as "child camel jockeys"-which sounds like a stupid joke but is emphatically unfunny, as hundreds of them are maltreated and injured every year. The ruling Emirate families make every important decision secretly and without accountability-in conditions that preclude transparency while encouraging corruption and intrigue. But the Bush administration insists that despite all those flaws, the Emirates are now our staunch allies in the war on terror. Not so many years ago, those same ruling families were deeply involved in financing terrorism, dating back to their investment in the Bank of Credit and Commerce International. Emirate leaders formerly maintained intimate ties with the Taliban and Al Qaeda. Indeed, a missile strike intended for Osama bin Laden had to be called off in 1999 because certain Emirate royals were present at his hunting camp in Afghanistan. Later, the 9/11 conspirators-who included at least two U.A.E. citizens-operated through safe houses and bank accounts located in Dubai, according to the 9/11 Commission report. As President Bush pointed out in 2004, the U.A.E. also provided a convenient cover for A.Q. Khan, the Pakistani physicist who operated an Islamist nuclear-weapons ring that threatened global security. Undisturbed by the usually meddlesome government, Mr. Khan's deputy ran a computer firm in Dubai for years as a front for the ring.
Now, that unfortunate history notwithstanding, the Secretaries of Defense and Homeland Security promise that the Dubai deal will not jeopardize our safety. Bland assurances from Donald Rumsfeld and Michael Chertoff mean little, given their own poor records and stupid decisions. The United States has no obligation to trust its ports to the Emirate sheiks-and every obligation to place public safety above oligarchic profit.
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Mahatma Bush By Norman Solomon Evidently the president's trip to India created an option too perfect to pass up: The man who has led the world in violence during the first years of the 21st century could pay homage to the world's leading practitioner of nonviolence during the first half of the 20th century. So the White House announced plans for George W. Bush to lay a wreath at the Mahatma Gandhi memorial in New Delhi. While audacious in its shameless and extreme hypocrisy, this PR gambit is in character for the world's only superpower. One of the main purposes of the Bush regime's media spin is to depict reality as its opposite. And Karl Rove obviously figured that mainstream U.S. media outlets, with few exceptions, wouldn't react with anywhere near the appropriate levels of derision or outrage. Presidential rhetoric aside, Gandhi's enthusiasm for nonviolence is nearly matched by Bush's enthusiasm for violence. The commander in chief regularly proclaims his misty-eyed pride in U.S. military actions that destroy countless human lives with massive and continual techno-violence. But the Bushian isn't quite 180 degrees from the Gandhian. The president of the United States is not exactly committed to violence; what he wants is an end to resistance. "A conqueror is always a lover of peace," the Prussian general Karl von Clausewitz observed. Yearning for Uncle Sam to fulfill his increasingly farfetched promise of victory in Iraq, the U.S. president is an evangelist for peace -- on his terms. Almost two years ago, in early April 2004, the icy cerebral pundit George Will engaged in a burst of candor when he wrote a column about the widening bloodshed inside Iraq: "In the war against the militias, every door American troops crash through, every civilian bystander shot -- there will be many -- will make matters worse, for a while. Nevertheless, the first task of the occupation remains the first task of government: to establish a monopoly on violence." The column -- headlined "A War President's Job" in the Washington Post -- diagnosed the problem and prescribed more violence. Lots more: "Now Americans must steel themselves for administering the violence necessary to disarm or defeat Iraq's urban militias, which replicate the problem of modern terrorism -- violence that has slipped the leash of states." For unleashing the Pentagon's violence, the rationales are inexhaustible. In an important sense, it's plausible to envision Bush as a lover of peace and even an apostle of nonviolence -- but, in context, those sterling invocations of virtues are plated with sadism in the service of empire. The president of the United States is urging "peace" as a synonym for getting his way in Iraq. From Washington, the most exalted vision of peace is a scenario where the occupied no longer resist the American occupiers or their allies.
The world has seen many such leaders, eager to unleash as much
violence as necessary to get what they want, and glad to praise
nonviolence whenever convenient. But no photo-op can change the
current reality that the world's most powerful government is also, by
far, the most violent and the most dangerous.
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The Boomerang By William Rivers Pitt The flap over the United Arab Emirates taking control of several American ports, the subject of much hot talk over the last several days, is born of several factors. It is only partially about global economics. America's trade relationship with the UAE is the third largest in the Middle East after Saudi Arabia and Israel, so the gospel of "free trade" is definitely in play. This flap is also only partially about national security. There is, of course, concern that a nation connected to the 9/11 attacks will manage several vital entry points to the country. There is also the quid pro quo aspect to this deal; the UAE docks more American warships than any other Middle Eastern nation, and the thinking apparently goes that if they can do this safely, they can manage ports over here. By the by, this UAE deal is also about standard issue straight-out-of-central-casting Bush administration cronyism. Two major players in the establishment of this deal were John Snow and David Sanborn. Snow, the Treasury Secretary, was chairman of the CSX railroad firm before joining the administration. In 2004, CSX sold its international port operations to Dubai Ports World, the UAE-backed company tapped to run our ports, for $1.15 billion. Sanborn used to run Dubai Ports World's European and Latin American operations. He was tapped last month by Bush to head the US Maritime Administration. Convenient, that. So there's some economics, some national security concern, and some good old fashioned insider horse trading going on here, but none of these alone or combined tells the whole story here. The administration has swallowed a 45-day "review" of this deal, so as to temporarily avoid the need for Bush to veto any legislation blocking it, and so as to avoid the very real possibility that his veto could be overridden in Congress. In the interim, we can take a look at what is truly motivating the noise surrounding this issue. The true basis of the scandal is based upon two things: politics, and the boomerang. The politics part is easy. Democrats, ever fretting over looking "weak" on national security, are going full hawk on this deal to make Bush and Congressional Republicans look weak on the issue of protecting America. Given the fact that very few Americans know much of anything about how our ports are managed - it bears noting that a large number of our ports are already managed by foreign countries like China and Singapore - it is a tactic that has some traction. There is also a legitimate security concern that cannot be overlooked. The deal, when originally announced, had Dubai Ports World taking control of six major ports. In point of fact, DP World will be taking control of 21 American ports: 11 on the East Coast from Portland, Maine to Miami, Florida, and 10 on the Gulf Coast, from Gulfport, Mississippi, to Corpus Christi, Texas. Calls to ensure that security will not be compromised in this process are well founded. Republicans, on the other hand, are yelling about this ports deal in order to put some daylight between themselves and a congenitally unpopular president during a midterm election year. Are they nervous? Bet on it. David Horowitz hosted his Restoration Weekend in Phoenix last weekend, an annual right-wing confab where conservative banner-carriers gather to plot the overthrow of church-state separation and Roe v. Wade. According to reports, the attendees this weekend are seeing blood on the moon. "We have to acknowledge we have a President who is not popular," said former congressman Pat Toomey, head of the Club for Growth, during the weekend festivities. "The war in Iraq is the 800 lb. gorilla in the room and a major downturn could drown anything we do. We won in 1994 because we promised small government and going into the 2006 elections this is key idea we have abandoned." "I feel the Republican Party in my state and nationally is a party that has lost its way," said former Colorado state senator John Andrews. "We need to find our way back to a reason to vote Republican." "I believe these scandals are the end of the 1994 Revolution," said conservative congressman John Shaddeg, in reference to Jack Abramoff. "All this seriously threatens the Republican majority. It might be hard to shrink government as we promised. But it's not that hard to be honest and we haven't." "The demoralization of the base is real," said Missouri Lt. Governor Pete Kinder. "I hear it everywhere." So there it is. Both parties are making hay off this ports deal to position themselves for the midterm elections. It isn't much of a political surprise that the Democrats are attacking the administration over this, but it is telling indeed to see Republicans running scared from the president they have stapled themselves to for the last five years. Which brings us to the boomerang, the real reason why this ports deal has become a scandal. Since September 12, 2001, George W. Bush and his administration have used every available opportunity to scare the cheese out of the American people in order to get what they want. Fake elevations of the security alert to cover political messes, plastic sheeting and duct tape, mushroom clouds, weapons of mass destruction, and all cloaked in a none-too-subtle message that all Muslims and every Arab nation are to be feared and reviled - this has been the ticket for the passing of every budget, the basis for every campaign, and the establishment of the false rationale for an invasion of Iraq. Some have claimed opposition to this ports deal stems from anti-Arab racism. If this is true, that racism can be laid upon the doormat in front of the White House door. When a president spends every day of five years terrorizing his own people about potential attacks from west Asia, frightening them on an hourly basis for no other reason than that it makes the populace easier to govern, a degree of anti-Arab racism is bound to flower. In short, the administration bought this scandal with five years' worth of hard propaganda work. Observed from a distance, it should not surprise anyone that this issue has blown up on them. It is a wonder, frankly, that the administration didn't see this coming. They didn't and here we are. There are a lot of boomerangs flying around these days. The invasion and occupation of Iraq was begun on false premises. It has caused the deaths of 2,293 American soldiers, the grievous injury of tens of thousands more American soldiers, the deaths of thousands of Iraqi soldiers and police officers, and the death and maiming of tens of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians. It disgraced the United States across the globe when pictures of torture in Abu Ghraib prison were released. It has ruptured the federal budget to such a degree that basic, vital services are being cut to pay for it. And now it has led to the doorstep of the civil war that so many have warned about. The bombing of one of Shi'ite Islam's holiest shrines in Samarra last week has led to an explosion of sectarian violence across Iraq. Worse, the Shi'ite-Sunni divisions that exist in nine Middle Eastern nations, including Kuwait, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt, could be exacerbated to the point of violence by what is happening in Iraq. In other words, we are looking at the real potential of a regional conflagration over religion that will make the Catholic-Protestant carnage in Ireland look like a quaint tea party by comparison.
That is a boomerang which could wind up smacking us all in the end.
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 Heil Bush, Dear Statthalter Rounds, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your eagerness to get the Womens readjustment bill before our friends on the Extreme Court which will keep the ladies in their places, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Rethuglican Governor Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at the "Fuhrer Bunker" formally 'The White House' on 03-15-2006. We salute you herr Bounds, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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AUSTIN, Texas -- So, aside from the fact that it's politically idiotic and at least theoretically presents a national security risk, just what is wrong with the Dubai Ports deal?
As President George W. Bush actually said, "I want those who are questioning it to step up and explain why all of a sudden a Middle Eastern company is held to a different standard than a Great British company. I'm trying to conduct foreign policy now by saying to the people of the world, we'll treat you fairly."
So, what's wrong with that? There's our only president standing up against discrimination and against tarring all Arabs with the same brush and all that good stuff. (The fact that it was Mr. Racial Profiling speaking, the man who has single-handedly created more Arab enemies for this country than anyone else ever dreamed of doing is just one of those ironies we regularly get whacked over the head with.)
OK, here's for starters. We have already been warned that, should we back out of the DP deal, the United Arab Emirates may well take offense and not be so nice about helping us in the War on Terra -- maybe even cut back its money, as well as its cooperation. This is a problem specific to the fact that we are dealing with a corporation owned by a country: A corporation only wants to make money, a corporation owned by a country has lots of motives.
Second, this is a corporation, consequently its only interest is in making money. A corporation is like a shark, designed to do two things: kill and eat. Thousands of years of evolution lie behind the shark, where as the corporation has only a few hundred. But it is still perfectly evolved for its purpose. That means a corporation that makes money running port facilities does not have a stake in national security. It's not the corporation's fault any more than it's the shark's.
The president is quite correct that a "Great British" corporation has no more or less interest in helping terrorists than an Arab corporation. It is not the corporation that is supposed to have other interests -- it is government. But as Michael Chertoff, secretary of homeland security, said, "We have to balance the paramount urgency of security against the fact that we still want to have a robust global trading system."
"Balance" is the arresting word here -- keep your eye on "balance." We have an administration that is absolutely wedded to corporate interests, both American and global. It honestly believes that "free trade" is more important than the environment and more important than the people. It has repeatedly demonstrated it is willing to let both go in order to foster free trade. There is no "balance" in its consideration on these issues, and now it turns out not much in "balancing" national security, either.
The people running this country -- and that includes most of the leaders of both parties -- have proven again and again they are perfectly willing to outsource American jobs, American wage standards, and American health and safety standards all for the sacred, holy grail of free trade. Why would it surprise us that national security is ditto?
I am amused by Chertoff's use of the word "balance." Since the administration has done zip, nada, zilch about port security, it's unclear what he's trying to "balance." In 2002, the Coast Guard estimated it would take $5.4 billion over 10 years to improve port security to the point mandated by the Maritime Transportation Security Act. Last year, Congress appropriated $175 million. The administration had requested $46 million, below 9-11 levels.
As David Sirota points out, the administration has been negotiating a free trade deal with the United Arab Emirates at the same time the port deal was being negotiated. This whole thing is about free trade and the lock big corporations have on our government to further free trade. Sirota also points out you will see and hear almost no discussion of this fact in the corporate news media.
I have no idea whether DP World represents a security threat, but U.S. News & World Report said in December that Dubai was notorious for smuggling, money laundering and drug trafficking in support of terrorists. I suppose the same could be said of New York, but it doesn't sound pleasant.
Dubai is believed to be the transfer port for the spread of nuclear technology by the Abdul Qadeer Khan network. David Sanborn, an executive who ran DP World's European and Latin American operations, was chosen last month by Bush to head the U.S. Maritime Administration, according to the New York Daily News.
It'll be interesting to see just how much power the free trade lobby has over the political establishment. Right now, both Democrats and Republicans are yelling about what appears to be a dippy idea. Let's see what hearing from their contributors brings about.
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Ever since Scooter Libby was indicted, Tucker Carlson has had a lot to say about the central players in the legal drama, Libby and Patrick Fitzgerald. On his MSNBC show and on his blog, he's been unfailingly supportive of Libby and critical of Fitzgerald.
Here was his takedown of Fitzgerald the day the indictments were announced:
Pat Fitzgerald gave us all a long lecture this afternoon about the grave harm leaks like this do to America. "National security was at stake," he said. But when a reporter asked Fitzgerald how the leak of Valerie Wilson's name had hurt the country, he refused to answer.... If Patrick Fitzgerald believes the leak of Valerie Wilson's name constitutes a crime, he ought to indict someone for it. Otherwise, he ought to spare us the lectures.
A few weeks later, following the post-indictment revelation of Bob Woodward's involvement in the story, Carlson asked:
What else doesn't Pat Fitzgerald know? After two years of investigating the case, he had no idea Woodward was a recipient of the Plame leak (something anybody who lives in Washington would have guessed immediately), and learned only when he was told by an unnamed administration official. Yet Fitzgerald's ignorance didn't prevent him from accusing Libby - falsely and in public - of undermining this country's security. Fitzgerald should apologize, though of course he never will.
[snip]
When are journalists going to realize that Fitzgerald is their enemy, and the enemy of the public's right to know what its government is doing?
[snip]
[W]hat the hell is this investigation about anyway? Fitzgerald's original job description was simple: Find out who leaked Valerie Plame's name, and determine whether that leak was a crime. After two years, he seems to have concluded what was obvious right away: No, the leak was not a crime. Yet he has kept his investigation alive, as independent counsels always do. Meanwhile, people's lives are being disrupted and in some cases destroyed. What is the justification for this? I'd love to hear Fitzgerald himself explain.
But when it came to Libby, Carlson's had nothing but love, castigating the White House for telling staffers not to talk to Libby in the wake of his indictment: "It is so offensive to me... not only is this morally wrong -- this is a guy who devoted his whole life to the vice president. He's got little kids. He worked 18 hours every day for five years."
Carlson also slammed the Vice President for a lack of loyalty to his former chief of staff:
You'll notice that Cheney has said next to nothing about Libby since the day he was indicted. He hasn't stood up for him in public. He hasn't raised money for his legal defense fund. He's apparently done nothing to prevent Bush aides from telling White House staffers not to have any further contact with Libby. In other words, Cheney is acting like most politicians: He demands total loyalty, and gives very little in return.
But with all he's had to say about the case, there is one thing that Tucker Carlson has failed to mention: That his father, Richard Carlson, is on the advisory committee of the Libby Legal Defense Trust, the GOP-heavy-hitter-laden group that has so far raised $2 million.
Indeed, Richard Carlson was the Early Money Is Like Yeast of Libby defense fund-raisers, having couriered a check to Libby's home the morning he was indicted.
And Tucker Carlson's connection to Libby's defense fund isn't just familial. A quick scan of the Libby website shows that Scooter's high-powered pals appreciate the things that Richard's boy is saying.
In a section titled "What You Aren't Hearing About Scooter Libby," a cobbled version of Tucker Carlson's "What the hell is this investigation about" quote is prominently displayed, just under pro-Libby blurbs from President Bush and Vice President Cheney.
But while Carlson has mentioned the legal defense fund on the air and on his blog (including chiding Cheney for not donating to it), he hasn't seen fit to offer up an "in the interest of full disclosure" type disclaimer. Speaking of which: In the interest of full disclosure, I have known Richard Carlson for a number of years, and have always found him to be a very charming and gracious man. In fact, he's blogged on the Huffington Post. And if he wants to give his money to Scooter Libby, that's certainly his right.
See, Tucker, transparency is as easy as that.
Of course, I'm not telling Tucker Carlson anything he doesn't already know. In fact, during a recent debate with Eric Alterman at the University of California at Santa Barbara, Carlson said, "[News outlets] should not allow reporters to cover things where their interests are at stake." Their interests? Their father's interests? Their children's interests? Bottom line: it's so easy to be above board and up front about these things. And it's so important, especially for someone like Tucker who doesn't just toe the Republican Party line -- including on big issues like the war in Iraq.
But this seems to be a bit of sore spot for Tucker. In a 1997 column, Howard Kurtz wrote about a dust-up over an article Tucker Carlson had written in The New Republic, in which he slammed Grover Norquist as a "cash-addled, morally malleable lobbyist" for his dealings in the Seychelles islands -- but failed to mention that his father, as U.S. ambassador to the Seychelles, had butted heads with Norquist over those dealings.
At the time, Tucker Carlson told Kurtz that there had been no need for him to run a "disclaimer" because "I didn't talk to my dad about the piece."
I wonder if, nine years later, he'll use the same line to explain away his lack of a Libby disclaimer: "I never talked to my dad about the case."
What do you say, Tucker?
... Dwayne Booth ...  |
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Hello I'm Dick Cheney
I heard old Harry comin'
When I was just a baby
I'm up with rich folks flyin'
Well if they freed me from the rule of law
Ah... Go fuck yourself
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Parting Shots...
  Dear Mrs. Bowers:
I am currently pregnant and thinking about having an abortion. I think that the decision to abort is an intimate decision that a woman should make with her doctor, but I need advice.
Unlucky with a Diaphragm
Dear Lucky Girl:
A woman has many intimate choices in life. How far to let that infernal electrolysis beast at the spa burrow beyond the panty line? Go with French cut or a sheer low-slung silk bikini? Douche or wing it with perfume through Friday and hope for the best?
The decision to dispose of a potential money-making adoption-item is not such a choice. Let me make something very clear. I am absolutely, totally against abortion now that there is the Mrs. Betty Bowers Christian Adoption Superstore! Mrs. Betty Bowers Christian Adoption Superstores will be opening at outlet malls throughout the country starting this summer! With their designer pink and baby-blue dcor, wide aisles and convenient drive-through window, they will provide a cheerful place for young mothers to trade in their messy little mistake for a nice wad of clean cash! Barren or simply busy heterosexual, married couples can wander the Plexiglas display cases for the adoption-item they can pass off as the fruit of their own loins. Then, they can enjoy a lovely cup of latte at the in-store Mrs. Betty Bowers Christian Coffee House, while trying to arrange for the substantial loan from the Mrs. Betty Bowers Christian Bank representative to finance their fabulous new purchase.
So, you see, your timing couldn't be better! Mrs. Betty Bowers Christian Adoption Superstores will guarantee handsome fees* for adoption-items that pass our 45-point quality inspections. (I regret to say that if your adoption-item is of mixed race, I can't get you cab fare, so don't waste either of our time by even bothering to fill out the lengthy application.)
Call me, Mrs. Betty Bowers, and "Turn That Illegitimate Tender Bundle Into A Legal-Tender Bundle!" (SM)
* All customers of Mrs. Betty Bowers Christian Adoption Superstores act as sureties to guarantee Mrs. Bowers' brokerage fee(s) and a UCC lien attaches to the adoption item until such fee(s) is paid in full.
So Close To Jesus, He Uses My Birthday When Buying Lotto Tickets
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Issues & Alibis Vol 6 # 09 (c) 03/03/2006
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In This Edition
Garrison Keillor with a clarion call to, "Impeach Bush!"
Uri Avnery watches as Putin plays again, "And The Great Game Goes On."
Mary Pitt says, "Planned Media Gag May Save America."
Jim Hightower equates, "Money Trumps Security."
Michael A. Schiller sends in a poem, "Out Of Control."
Ted Rall recalls, "The Legend Of United Flight 93."
Chris Floyd reveals, "Fighting For Their Lies: The Deadly Delusions Of America's Troops."
Robert Parry wonders, "Fighting Terror Or Pushing Bigotry?"
Joe Conason inquires, "Who Dares To Question
The Dubai Port Deal?"
Norm Solomon asks, "Digital Hype: A Dazzling Smokescreen?"
William Rivers Pitt walks us through, "The Politics Of Shoe Leather."
Missouri State Representative David Sater wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award.'
Molly Ivins reports, "South Dakota Revokes A Woman's Right To Choose."
Arianna Huffington goes all existential in introducing, "The White House's New Iraq Messaging Team: Ionesco, Beckett, And Genet."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department 'The Whitehouse.Org' reviews the, "President's Remarks On Totally Safe Fire Sale Of American Ports To Arab Nation We're Desperately Trying To Bribe Into Not Blowing Us Up" but first Uncle Ernie follows, "American Fascism On The March."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Matt Bors with additional cartoons from Tom Tomorrow, Micah Wright, Robert Crumb, Ted Rall, Internet Weekly.Org, Old American Century.Org, Daryl Cagle, Worth 1000.Com, Pablo On Politics.Com and The Whitehouse.Org.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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American Fascism On The March By Ernest Stewart
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
With the release of the tapes showing Bush being informed days before Katrina hit with what was very likely to happen, we find that good ole Brownie wasn't quite that big of a jerk after all. One can only conclude FEMA held back on New Orleans because of their large black Democratic population. Don't believe that statement? Then just compare and contrast with the four hurricanes that hit Florida in 2004. Before each hurricane arrived FEMA was there and set up awaiting the hurricanes arrival, ready to rock and roll. And moments after they struck FEMA was busy as bees taking care of the white folks who got it socked to them. Also it helps if your seditious brother Jebthro is the governor. Can't have little brother looking bad, can we? New Orleans was supposed to be the training ground for the new SS as Cheney hounded the Louisiana governor Kathleen Blanco to declared Martial Law so that we could unleash federal troops on the darkies. Instead old dead-eye had to settle on sending in the trigger happy Blackwater mercenaries. Psychopathic hired guns, these guys aren't rent-a-cops folks. These goons replaced the US. Marines in Iraq guarding both US Gaultliters; L Paul Bremer and John Dimitri Negroponte. This is where Navy Seals and Green Berets go when they're too crazy even for the Army and Navy; imagine that if you can! Of course there is the National Guard but most of them were over in Iraq securing the "Crime Family Bush's" oil. Do you remember the two photos showing people in chest deep water where the white people had "found" the stuff they were carrying but the black people had "looted" theirs? Remember the headlines from the "Army Times" that called New Orleans residents "Americans Insurgents" and warned all "looter scum" will be shot on sight. The Guard commander general Larry Jones said of New Orleans, "Welcome to Little Somalia." Isn't that special? Meanwhile our beloved fuhrer has been out making enemies for America all over the world with his trip to Afghanistan, India and Pakistan. Smirky's highlight was when he announced plans to break several atomic treaties and several US laws by supplying India with American technology and fuel for their reactors, which will triple the capacity of their illegal nuclear bomb program. Can you imagine the stink that our rat-wing media would have made if Clinton would have broken one single nuclear treaty or law? The laws and treaties which Bush breaks all the time whenever the mood strikes him. What was once certainly considered treason is now seen as par for the course! The treaties that he's breaking are the same ones that we're getting ready to invade Iran for breaking. More of the same ole, same ole, don't do as we do, do as we say. Bush is what 'Tweety Bird' calls a "Hypo-twit!" Not only does this give Iran the green light on their own nuclear programs but think about what this says to our good "friends," the Pakistanis; whom we won't be supplying with the same nuclear goodies. Pakistan's dictator General Pervez Musharraf; who like Bush, came to power in a bloodless coup d'etat and therefore will be assassinated or otherwise removed from office to be replaced no doubt by some America hating Ayatollah who unlike the rest of the Muslim world has an ever growing supply of nuclear weapons. He may also see the writing on the walls about how we treat our allies. Remember that Osama, Saddam and Iran used to be our allies too. And with our good friends in Dubai handling our ports it's just a matter of time before city busting A-bombs start flooding America. Now if the above wasn't bad enough news how about the Missouri legislature getting ready to vote on a bill that would make Yah Weh the official god of Missouri, forsaking all other gods! This bit of treason is being sponsored by this weeks winner of the Vidkun Quisling Award Missouri State Representative David Sater (This is the award given each week for treason by an American traitor or traitors). Apparently David has never read the first line of the first Amendment to the US. Constitution? Right at the very top of the "Bill of Rights" David it says, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion." Just exactly what part of that don't you understand David? Like South Dakota's and now Mississippi's illegal ban on abortions this law was proposed because of the far right shift on the Extreme Court with the addition of Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts and Sammy (the Coat-hanger) Alito. If you think things have been bad in the first 5 years of the Junta's rule just wait a year or two until all these new laws make it to the rubber stamp of the Extremes. Fasten Your Seat Belts America, It's Going To Be A Bumpy Flight!
We'd like to welcome Mary Pitt to our little band of "merry pranksters!" Mary joins us our her own free will.* ********************************************
We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
 Impeach Bush The man was lost and then he was found and now he's more lost than ever -- and he's taking us into the darkness with him. It's time to remove him. By Garrison Keillor These are troubling times for all of us who love this country, as surely we all do, even the satirists. You may poke fun at your mother, but if she is belittled by others it burns your bacon. A blowhard French journalist writes a book about America that is full of arrogant stupidity, and you want to let the air out of him and mail him home flat. You hear young people talk about America as if it's all over, and you trust that this is only them talking tough. And then you read the paper and realize the country is led by a man who isn't paying attention, and you hope that somebody will poke him. Or put a sign on his desk that says, "Try Much Harder." Do we need to impeach him to bring some focus to this man's life? The man was lost and then he was found and now he's more lost than ever, plus being blind. The Feb. 27 issue of the New Yorker carries an article by Jane Mayer about a loyal conservative Republican and U.S. Navy lawyer, Albert Mora, and his resistance to the torture of prisoners at Guantnamo Bay. From within the Pentagon bureaucracy, he did battle against Donald Rumsfeld and John Yoo at the Justice Department and shadowy figures taking orders from Dick (Gunner) Cheney, arguing America had ratified the Geneva Convention that forbids cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment of prisoners, and so it has the force of law. They seemed to be arguing that the president has the right to order prisoners to be tortured. One such prisoner, Mohammed al-Qahtani, was held naked in isolation under bright lights for months, threatened by dogs, subjected to unbearable noise volumes, and otherwise abused, so that he begged to be allowed to kill himself. When the Senate approved the Torture Convention in 1994, it defined torture as an act "specifically intended to inflict severe physical or mental pain or suffering." Is the law a law or is it a piece of toast? Wiretap surveillance of Americans without a warrant? Great. Go for it. How about turning over American ports to a country more closely tied to 9/11 than Saddam Hussein was? Fine by me. No problem. And what about the war in Iraq? Hey, you're doing a heck of a job, Brownie. No need to tweak a thing. And your blue button-down shirt -- it's you. But torture is something else. When Americans start pulling people's fingernails out with pliers and poking lighted cigarettes into their palms, then we need to come back to basic values. Most people agree with this, and in a democracy that puts the torturers in a delicate position. They must make sure to destroy their e-mails and have subordinates who will take the fall. Because it is impossible to keep torture secret. It goes against the American grain and it eats at the conscience of even the most disciplined, and in the end the truth will come out. It is coming out now. According to the leaders of the bipartisan 9/11 Commission, our country is practically as vulnerable today as it was on 9/10. Our seaports are wide open, our airspace is not secure except for the nation's capital, and little has been done about securing the nuclear bomb materials lying around in the world. They give the administration D's and F's in most categories of defending against terrorist attack. Our adventure in Iraq, at a cost of trillions, has brought that country to the verge of civil war while earning us more enemies than ever before. And tax money earmarked for security is being dumped into pork barrel projects anywhere somebody wants their own SWAT team. Detonation of a nuclear bomb within our borders -- pick any big city -- is a real possibility, as much so now as five years ago. Meanwhile, many Democrats have conceded the very subject of security and positioned themselves as Guardians of Our Forests and Benefactors of Waifs and Owls, neglecting the most basic job of government, which is to defend this country. We might rather be comedians or daddies or tattoo artists or flamenco dancers, but we must attend to first things.
The peaceful lagoon that is the White House is designed for the comfort of a vulnerable man. Perfectly understandable, but not what is needed now. The U.S. Constitution provides a simple ultimate way to hold him to account for war crimes and the failure to attend to the country's defense. Impeach him and let the Senate hear the evidence.
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And The Great Game Goes On By Uri Avnery IF YOU want to understand the policy of a country, look at the map!" advised Napoleon. What he meant was: Regimes come and go, rulers rise and fall, ideologies flourish and wither, but geography stands forever. It's geography that decides the basic interest of every state. Vladimir Putin, heir of Czars and Commissars, looked at the map. Looked and picked up the telephone to invite the Hamas leaders. A HUNDRED years ago, the whole expanse from India to Turkey was a battlefield between Russia and the main Western power at that time - the British Empire. Adventurers, spies, diplomats and plotters of all stripes roamed the area. This contest was known as "The Great Game". In time, the actors changed. The Bolsheviks took the place of the Czars, the American Empire succeeded the British. But the Great Game went on. When the Soviet Union collapsed, it seemed as if the game had come to an end. Russian influence disappeared from the region. The Soviet empire dissolved, and what remained was too weak, too poor, to take part in the game. It had no jetons. And now, with one stroke, Putin has changed everything. Inviting Hamas to Moscow was a gambit of genius: it didn't cost anything, and it put Russia back on the map of the Middle East. While the whole world was still puzzled and confused by the Hamas victory, Putin used the sharp scalpel of unemotional logic and made the first move of a new game. This way, the new Czar of all the Russias exploited the weakness of his rivals. President Bush has got himself into a dismal position. When all the other pretexts for his bloody Iraqi adventure had evaporated into thin air, he raised a new flag: democracy in the Middle East. He imposed new elections on the Palestinians. In these elections, the most democratic one could imagine, the winner was - alas! - Hamas. What to do? To declare that democratic elections are good only if they deliver the outcome we desire? To boycott the Palestinian authority, now the "Second Democracy in the Middle East"? To starve the Palestinians until they elect the "right" leadership? Bush could, of course, recognize the elected Hamas government. But how could he do that? After all, the United States has put Hamas on its list of terrorist organizations - not only its military wing, but the whole movement, including the kindergartens and mosques. Now they are caught up in the Clash of Civilizations, the apocalyptic battle between the West and Islam. Nothing to be done. America is a chess-player caught in a position of stalemate - unable to make any move at all. Europe is in a similar situation. Like a mental patient in a straitjacket, it cannot move its arms. It put on this jacket itself. Under American and Israeli pressure, it put Hamas on its terror list, and thus condemned itself to total impotence in the new situation. Putin does not laugh often. But now, perhaps, he may be permitting himself a thin smile. THE PALESTINIANS, too, are quite confused. In these elections they surprised themselves, and, no less, Hamas. Inside Fatah, there are contradictory views about what to do. The good of the Palestinian people clearly demands a wide coalition, which would include all parties, in order to overcome the crisis and prevent a boycott of the Palestinian Authority by the world. But the narrow party interest of Fatah says otherwise: Let's compel Hamas to govern alone. It will break its head, the world will boycott it. After a year or two, the Palestinian public will return Fatah to power. That's Realpolitik, but dangerous. During the one or two years, the Israeli government will enlarge the settlements, build more and more of the Wall, fix new borders, annex the Jordan valley - the sky is the limit. The reaction of the Palestinian public may be quite different from what the Fatah people imagine. Hamas is also baffled. It knows full well that the elections were less an ideological breakthrough than a protest vote - more against Fatah than for Hamas. Now Hamas must gain the heart of the Palestinian people, and the people want an end to the occupation, and peace at last. Hamas does not want the world to ostracize the Palestinian Authority and starve the population. But it cannot change its skin on the morrow of its victory. What will the Palestinians say if it suddenly declares that it is ready to recognize Israel's right to exist, to disarm and annul its charter? That it has sold its soul to Satan in order to enjoy the comforts of power? That it is as corrupt as Fatah? If Israel and America wanted to lead Hamas towards a path of peace, they would ease its way towards the desired change. They could find mechanisms for the transfer of the money due to the Palestinians. They could be satisfied with an announcement that the new government is based on the Oslo Agreement (which includes the recognition of Israel) without demanding that Hamas humiliate itself in public. They could agree to a Hudna (armistice) for the transition period and put an end to all violent action by both sides. Hamas can be disarmed by including its fighters in the official security forces. And, of course, and most importantly - prisoners could be released. But the present Israeli government shows no interest in making it easy for Hamas. And if the Israeli government is not interested, what American politician, if not bent on suicide, can say otherwise? IN ISRAEL, the Hamas victory has not given rise to sorrow and lamentations. On the contrary. Israeli leaders could hardly hold back from dancing in the streets. At long last, it has become perfectly clear that "There is No One to Talk With". If Yasser Arafat was no partner, and if Mahmoud Abbas was no partner, Hamas is the mother of all no-partners. Nobody can rebuke us for going on with "targeted killings", destroying the Palestinian economy, building walls, breaking up the West Bank territory, cutting off the Jordan valley and generally doing whatever we feel like. And if, with God's help, Palestinian terrorism starts again, we can say to everybody: "We told you so!" But in Israel, too, there is a lot of confusion. Under American pressure, Ehud Olmert was compelled to transfer to the Palestinian at least once the revenues that Israel has collected on their behalf. He was immediately attacked for "surrendering" to Hamas. Even this small act of surrendering stolen money has caused a political storm. The Israeli election, due to take place in 24 days, casts its shadow on everything.
Now comes Putin's daring step. He makes it easier for the Hamas leadership to moderate its stance - if it is ready to join the political game. He also makes it easier for the government of Israel - if the government of Israel wants dialogue and peace. And, above all else, he is announcing that Russia is back in the Great Game.
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 Planned Media Gag May Save America By Mary Pitt Senator Pat Roberts, (R-KS), has announced that he is working on a bill that if passed, will criminalize the publication of any "classified" information by the media. This would make the reporter who writes, and the news media for whom they work, equally liable under the anti-spy regulations with any whistle-blower who dares to try to get the truth out regarding the misfeasance and malfeasance of this administration. However, the very suggestion of the revocation of the First Amendment may be the one thing that will wake up our sleeping media to the truth of what has been and is being done to our democracy. Now the test for publish-ability will not be truth and verifiability but permission from the White House on pain of spending a long vacation in Halliburton's new Camp Northwoods. For much too long the media, like most of the citizenry, have viewed the ultimate takeover of our nation by the Neo-Cons as "just politics," a simple little game where we choose sides and cheer for our favorite team. Much of the failure of the media as the watchdog of our liberty may be blamed on the revolution in the culture that causes most people to receive their news from their television sets. In that setting, much of the "news" is merely read by some young person who is chosen for looks, personality and ability to "perform" before the cameras. We no longer have the Walter Cronkite or the Edward R. Murrow who will really go out and report on the news first-hand. Now, the second-generation television reporters like Tom Brokaw and Peter Jennings have gone on to greener pastures and we have been left with the "readers". We were spoon-fed the story about the "heroism" and the "rescue" of Jessica Lynch in Iraq when the truth was something quite different. We were regaled with tales of the valiant death of Pat Tillman who, with all due respect, was not the hero that they told us he was but a victim of "friendly fire." The stories were written as propaganda by "media consultants" before it was ever presented to the reporters. For the past five years, the "news" on television, radio, and too often, in the written media has consisted of plants, press releases, and political hype. However, some few reporters have remembered their legacy and have actually reported independent news that is really important to the American people. We have learned of the manipulations of Tom Delay and Jack Abramoff, the perfidy of I. Lewis (Scooter) Libby and "other unnamed sources" in exposing the identity of a CIA operative, the warrantless tapping of our telephone lines, the loss of control of our seaports, and the constant invasion of our nation by some millions of illegal immigrants across our Southern border, many of them armed and dangerous. The alarm has been sounded. This independent streak in the press must be stopped and it will be criminalized! In the "news commentary," we have had the rabid partisans like Bill O'Reilly and Tucker Carlson and the Republicrats like Chris Matthews who try to walk on both sides of the street at the same time. These are not "reporters" of whom we have far too few. Recently we have had the right to be proud of those reporters who were on the scene in New Orleans, apparently before the White House realized there was a problem and who made live reports that were complete and truthful. If they had been allowed to do this at the onset of the "War on Terror," it is entirely possible that Afghanistan would be pacified and Iran would not have been attacked in the first place! We would have known that the infamous World Trade Center bombers were from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Dubai and their only connection with Afghanistan was that it was the place where Osama bin Laden had taken up temporary residence. We would have known that there was a lot of doubt about Saddam's possession of the infamous WMD and his ties to Osama Bin Laden. We would have been aware that we were being lied to and we would have made this a one-term presidency. But this administration "took office" on a claim of "openness and transparency" and promptly locked the door and pulled the shades! Reporters were instantly reduced to the status of stenographers as they dutifully wrote down the words of Scott McClellan to be parroted by the "commentators" on the nightly news. In turn, those commentators with their pre-arranged guests spouting the "party line" spent a mesmerizing few minutes smoothing out the edges of the real news and reassuring us that this was still the same good ole U S of A. A few managed to come close to criticism of the president and his hired flunkies, but then they felt the big bulge in their pants and backed off. No, not that bulge, silly! It was their fat Republican wallets! We saw the spectacle of Judy Miller being trucked off to jail for refusing to divulge which administration official revealed the identity of Valerie Plame while others were threatened with the same. However heroic this may seem, the fact is that the investigation was by an independent prosecutor investigating malfeasance by the administration! The gist of that story is that it is all right for the administration to break the law and require confidentiality from the press but that a "whistle-blower" will not be accorded the same rights. Even the vaunted "Gray Lady," The New York Times was so intimidated that they sat on the story that the government was eavesdropping on the telephones of American citizens for a year at the request of the administration. Will the members of the press realize that they have been used like a two-dollar whore and are being put back on the street? Now that the "freedom of the press" is being threatened, will we see a burst of real reportorial zeal? Now that they are face-to-face with a gag, will they dig harder for the truth and actually tell it to the public? Will they, after all, become the public interest organ which has brought down such tyrants as Joe McCarthy and Richard Nixon? Or have they lost their fire and become, as have so many Americans, afraid to take the scab off the festering sore that has invaded our democratic government and allow it to be treated by the disinfectant of the ballot box?
Stay tuned. |
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Three blind mice. George, John, and Michael. See how they run. George is, of course, George W, and he tells us constantly that he's always on the alert to make America secure from foreign terrorists. But, whoa - he then okays a $6.8 billion deal to let a government-owned company from the United Arab Emirates take over the operation of six major U.S. ports! Holy Osama, shrieked George's Republican allies, the UAE was a financial and operational base for the 9/11 crashbombers! Our ports are terribly vulnerable to terrorists as it is, but putting the UAE in charge is madness. But George bristled, saying he'll veto any congressional effort to stop it. Then came John - treasury secretary John Snow. Failure to complete this deal, he cried, would "tell the world that investments in the United States from certain parts of the world aren't welcome. That sends a terrible message." No it doesn't, John. It sends an honest and strong homeland security message. Next, Michael came running out to embrace the deal - Michael Chertoff, the homeland security czar. His sole job is to defend America, but suddenly he went all wobbly on us: "We have to balance the paramount urgency of security against the fact that we still want to have a robust global trading system," he proclaimed. Ah ha! While the Bushites like to talk tough and fly the flag of national security, their foremost loyalty is to the flag of global corporate power. It's received little coverage, but the UAE now ranks behind only Saudi Arabia and Israel as corporate America's top trading partner in the Middle East. Also, for two years, the Bushites have quietly been negotiating a corporate-backed "free trade" deal with this oil monarchy. They don't want anything to squirrel these corporate ties
- even if it requires giving the emirs control of six of our ports. This is Jim Hightower saying... For Bush & Company, money even trumps national security. |
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Plastic boxes save me from confusion
The world around me seeming so unreal
Can't take their word this time |
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NEW YORK--On the first anniversary of the crash of United Airlines Flight 93, Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge delivered a speech at the site of the disaster in western Pennsylvania. "Faced with the most frightening circumstances one could possibly imagine," he told grieving relatives of the passengers and crewmembers aboard the fourth plane hijacked on 9/11, "they met the challenge like citizen soldiers, like Americans." He recited the now-familiar story of passengers learning by phone about the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, deciding to fight back and breaking into the cockpit--a heroic act that led to their own deaths while sparing countless others in Washington.
"The terrorists were right to fear an uprising," Ridge rhapsodized. "The passengers and crew did whatever they humanly could--boil water, phone the authorities, and ultimately rush the cockpit to foil the attack."
Ridge's boss repeatedly used United 93 to close his standard stump speech. Calling the passenger revolt "the most vivid and sad symbol of them all," George W. Bush said: "People are flying across the country on an airplane, at least they thought they were. They learned the plane was going to be used as a weapon. They got on their telephones. They were told the true story. Many of them told their loved ones goodbye. They said they loved them. They said a prayer; a prayer was said. One guy said, 'Let's roll.' They took the plane into the ground."
The legend of Flight 93 had everything a nation caught with its pants down needed to feel better about itself: guts, heroism, self-sacrifice. Best of all, it was marketable--by Hollywood and by a president willing to surf on a kind of heroism notably absent from his own life. (Theatrical release of the second "United 93" movie is scheduled to open April 28.) Lisa Beamer, widow of the passenger credited with the call-to-arms "let's roll," wrote a bestselling book by the same name, applied for a trademark on the expression, and is now working the Christianist lecture circuit.
Actually, the 9/11 Commission found, the evidence indicates that what Todd Beamer (or someone else) said was not "let's roll," but "roll it"--possibly referring to an airplane service cart the passengers may have wanted to use to break down the door into the cockpit. Too bad-. "Roll it" sounds less cinematic, and more like a book about cinematography.
The first indication that government officials were covering up the truth about United 93 came with their refusal to make public the cockpit voice recording (CVR). Releasing CVRs after a crash has long been standard practice; pilots' last, usually profane, utterances have become a clich. Yet the FBI stonewalled victims' relatives for months after 9/11.
"While we empathize with the grieving families," assistant director John Collingwood wrote one widow, "we do not believe that the horror captured on the cockpit voice recording will console them in any way." And yet, if the tape contained inspiring proof of the passenger revolt and its success, it would have been one hell of a lot more consoling than Tom Ridge's oratory. Why not release it?
Finally, after seven months of political pressure, the FBI allowed United 93 relatives to listen to the CVR. The feds told the families not to reveal what they'd heard. "They said the information on the tapes could be possibly used in the prosecution of [alleged "20th hijacker" Zacarias] Moussaoui, and anything that we say could affect the case in a negative way," said the brother of one of the victims.
Though they studied the recording, the 9/11 Commission found zero evidence that the passenger revolt succeeded, that they made it into the cockpit and, as Bush claimed, "took the plane into the ground." Tom Kean & Co. offered only conjecture: "The hijackers remained at the controls but must have judged that the passengers were only seconds from overcoming them."
"Must have." At a time when war can be justified by waving around a bottle of fake anthrax on TV, "must have" is judged adequate proof.
Another eyebrow-raising portion of the official account of Flight 93 states that "the passengers and flight crew began a series of calls from GTE airphones and cellular phones" after the hijacking. Ever forgotten to turn off your cellphone during a flight? I have. Try it yourself: Cellular telephone calls tend to drop when you're driving at 60 miles per hour; passenger jets travel up to ten times that speed. Moreover, there's zero signal, and thus no ability to place a call, above 8,000 feet. Flight 93, en route from Newark to San Francisco at a cruising altitude of 35,000 feet, dropped 700 feet when it was hijacked at 9:28 am. Cell calls? Not likely.
The Bush Administration has alternately claimed that the White House, then the Capitol, and finally the White House again was the target of the Flight 93 hijackers. Sure, it's possible that the same terrorists who didn't know that New Yorkers don't start work until nine--the World Trade Center was struck at 8:42--wouldn't have thought to check Bush's schedule to find out whether he'd be home that morning. But if the White House was the objective, why not hit it first? After all, if Bush had been home when the news from New York first broke, he would have been whisked away to Dick Cheney's secret undisclosed location. If the government doesn't know what the target was, they shouldn't say that they do.
What happened to United 93? There was almost certainly a passenger uprising. Did it succeed? Probably not.
The 9/11 Commission Report says that "at some time between 10:10 and 10:15" Dick Cheney ordered the Air Force to shoot down the plane, which had turned east towards Washington. The plane had already crashed at 10:03. But the regional air traffic control center in Cleveland asked the FAA whether military fighter jets should be dispatched at flight at 9:36, giving the Air Force more than enough time to intercept before the fatal plunge into the field at Shanksville. Was United 93 shot down, despite the official story?
Local media accounts offer some evidence of that possibility. The September 13, 2001 Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported, for example: "In a morning briefing, State Police Major Lyle Szupinka confirmed that debris from the plane had turned up in relatively far-flung sites, including the residential area of Indian Lake [two and a half miles from the crash site]."
Flight 93 "headed down...rolled onto its back," and crashed, leaving a smoldering crater. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette again: "[Indian Lake marina employee John] Fleegle said he climbed on the roof of an abandoned cabin and tossed down a burning seat cushion that had landed there. By Wednesday morning, crash debris began washing ashore at the marina. Fleegle said there was something that looked like a rib bone amid pieces of seats, small chunks of melted plastic and checks." Seats and bones don't fly two and a half miles from a crash. Their location could indicate an initial explosion, such as that from a missile hitting a plane.
If the Air Force shot down Flight 93 to protect the capital, it was the only time on 9/11, or since, that the Bush Administration has done something to keep America safe. Whether they were concerned about being second-guessed or for the financial health of the airline industry, we'll never know. We do know that they've become knee-jerk liars, even covering up the rare occasions when they do something right. Perhaps they don't really know what happened up there. If so, they ought to say that rather than promote more fairy tales about Flight 93.
The passengers did try. The only thing that takes away from their heroism is Bush's lies. So. Now that Zacarias Moussauoi has been convicted, where's that tape?
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Fighting For Their Lies: The Deadly Delusions Of America's Troops By Chris Floyd While much has been made of the recent poll showing that a majority of U.S. troops on the ground in Iraq think we should get out - heartening news for all those who oppose Bush's bloodsoaked war crime - the poll contained another revelation that should disturb anyone - anti-war or pro-war - who still believes in American democracy: the fact that some 85 percent of US forces in Iraq believe they are fighting to avenge Saddam Hussein's role in the September 11 attacks. (Alex Sabbeth at Consortiumnews.com has more on this, and on Bush's broader propaganda war, in America Anesthetized.) Saddam Hussein played no role in the September 11 attacks, of course; even the Warmonger-in-Chief has been forced to admit this indisputable fact, in public. It has also been confirmed by multiple investigations by the intelligence services, and even by the whitewashing, Bush-run, see-no-evil-unless-it-speaks-Arabic 9/11 Commission. Yet American troops have been thoroughly inculcated with this false notion - no doubt deliberately. The dangers of infecting the armed forces with such partisan propaganda are immense. First, think of how this notion has skewed the reaction of American soldiers to the Iraqi people, especially anyone accused or suspected - for whatever reason, or none at all - of being an insurgent, or a "Baathist diehard," etc. To an American soldier blinded by the deliberate Bush lies, such people would appear to be nothing but evil terrorists complicit in the murder of thousands of innocent Americans. And in fact, all Iraqis would be tarred by this brush: for how could a soldier out on patrol distinguish which of the seething mass of foreigners surrounding him had been a supporter of the man who (supposedly) attacked America? Putting deluded soldiers in such a position, fed with such lies, is a formula certain to produce atrocities and abuse. No wonder we have seen so many cases of American soldiers being quick on the trigger, quick with the boot and the fist, belligerent and brutal in tumultuous house searches, eager to "soften up" prisoners for CIA interrogators, and so on. Most of them believe they are there to avenge murdered Americans, and that anyone who opposes their presence - or even looks at them wrong - must be part of the system that (supposedly) produced 9/11. The evil of this deliberate policy is great in itself; but the broader implications are perhaps even worse. For consider this: if American troops can be propagandized to believe such a transparent lie about Iraq's non-existent connection to 9/11 - what can't they be manipulated into believing? And remember, this mass military delusion has been manufactured in an age when soldiers have far more access to outside information than ever before (despite the Pentagon's strenuous efforts to clamp down on anything Don Rumsfeld doesn't want them to hear). Can they be made to believe that, say, the government of Hugo Chavez is directly tied to al Qaeda and must be overthrown? Can they be made to believe that Saddam's non-existent weapons of mass destruction are actually parked in Damascus and must be seized by force? Can they be made to believe that Iran is sending agents across the Iraqi border to kill them and is about to nuke their loved ones in the Homeland as well? (The latter is in fact the latest propaganda campaign from the Bushists: Rumsfeld rolled out the Iranian infiltration line just yesterday, despite its utter and transparent foolishness: why would the Iranians seek to destabilize an Iraqi regime that, thanks to Bush, is now dominated by Shiite factions that were nurtured, armed, trained and financed by Tehran itself? And of course, this week both Dick Cheney and John "I'm Not Foaming at the Mouth, It's a Moustache" Bolton were pounding the war drums over the Iranian nuclear "threat" - at about the same time their boss was rewarding India for its own secret nuclear arms program, with a deal that guarantees the dangerous proliferation of nuclear weapons in one of the world's most volatile regions.) But why stop with new foreign aggression? If American soldiers can be manipulated into believing the non-existent connection between Saddam and al Qaeda - why not a non-existent connection between some domestic faction and terrorism? What if you convinced the troops that, say, some Democratic leader was a traitor in league with terrorists? Or the anti-war movement in general? Or environmentalists? Or Muslims? Or Mexicans? Or Jews? Or any other group that some president down the line - armed with the dictatorial powers seized by Bush under the rule of the "unitary executive" - decides to eliminate?
We have, once again, crossed a dangerous Rubicon. If American soldiers can now be deliberately manipulated into fighting a war based on a transparent and publicly proven lie, in the service of the political ambitions and personal fortunes of a partisan faction, then we are well and truly through the looking-glass. We have reached the same pitch of civic degradation as the late Roman Republic, where the legions became the tools of ruthless warlords, jockeying for dominance, despoiling whole peoples and slaughtering thousands in the process. Once unlimbered, this weapon will be used again and again. With each passing day, the Bush Factionists - and all their many sycophants and enablers, in both parties, throughout the Establishment - are sowing a monstrous future for America, and the world.
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Fighting Terror Or Pushing Bigotry? By Robert Parry It's hard to conceive how the United States will win a "war of ideas" in the Islamic world when American leaders flock to a Washington conference where Muslims are publicly insulted and the U.S. officials fail to voice objections to the bigotry. That's what happened at this week's annual meeting of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee whose invitees included Vice President Dick Cheney, Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman, former Democratic vice presidential nominee John Edwards, Virginia's ex-Democratic Gov. Mark Warner, and Sens. Evan Bayh, D-Ind., and Susan Collins, R-Maine. In a luncheon speech on March 6, Israel's Ambassador to the United Nations Dan Gillerman entertained the AIPAC crowd with what the Washington Post described as "straight talk," including a comment that came close to equating Islam with terrorism. "While it may be true - and probably is - that not all Muslims are terrorists, it also happens to be true that nearly all terrorists are Muslim," Gillerman said to the crowd's delight. Gillerman's comment earned him a description in a column by the Washington Post's Dana Milbank as "the undiplomatic diplomat." Milbank also observed that "words are seldom minced at the annual (AIPAC) meeting." [Washington Post, March 7, 2006] But what was perhaps more glaring was the fact that Gillerman's professed uncertainty whether "all Muslims are terrorists" did not raise a protest, condemning it as an ugly example of anti-Muslim bigotry. It is hard to imagine a similar formulation about any other ethnic or religious group that wouldn't have erupted in controversy. Instead, U.S. officials and politicians - both Republican and Democrat - avoided criticizing Gillerman or almost anything else about AIPAC, bowing to its legendary power to make or break American political leaders. Indictments The pro-Israel lobbying group hailed the conference as a stunning success, drawing a record number of 4,500 participants despite the pending criminal case against two ex-AIPAC officials Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman, who are facing charges of illegally disseminating U.S. government secrets. As Milbank's column noted, there was a studied silence about the Rosen-Weissman case as AIPAC preferred to stay focused on Islamic terrorism and other perceived threats coming from Iran and the Palestinians. On March 7, Cheney addressed the AIPAC conference, making no reference to Gillerman's Muslim slur. Instead, Cheney urged unwavering support for the Bush administration's War on Terror and threatened Iran with "meaningful consequences" if it doesn't submit to international demands for reining in its nuclear program. "For our part, the United States is keeping all options on the table in addressing the irresponsible conduct of the regime," Cheney said. "And we join other nations in sending that regime a clear message: We will not allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon." But Cheney made no demands that other regional countries that secretly developed nuclear bombs - Israel, Pakistan and India - cease their programs or that older nuclear powers - the United States, Great Britain, France, Russia and China - reduce or eliminate their nuclear arsenals. Indeed, President George W. Bush had just completed a trip to India where he reversed longstanding U.S. counter-proliferation policy by agreeing to end a moratorium on India's access to nuclear fuels, technology and parts while allowing it to continue its nuclear weapons program. Bush's nuclear deal with India - a largely Hindu country - drew criticism from arms-control experts and Muslims as a dangerous double standard that could spur an arms race in South Asia and the Middle East. One-Sided Though Cheney's speech avoided explicitly anti-Muslim language, he singled out Islamic extremism as the greatest threat to the world. The Vice President echoed Bush's previous remarks about the supposed danger of Islamic terrorists building an empire that would stretch from Spain to Indonesia - and serve as a base for attacking the United States. "The terrorists believe that by controlling one country, they will be able to target and overthrow other governments in the region, and ultimately to establish a totalitarian empire that encompasses a region from Spain, across North Africa, through the Middle East and South Asia, all the way around to Indonesia," Cheney said. But the reality, as known to U.S. intelligence, is far less apocalyptic. Before the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, Osama bin-Laden's al-Qaeda was holed up in what might be called the ends of the earth, the mountains of Afghanistan - after his forces were ousted from countries across the Arab world and even were booted out of Sudan. The Bush administration's failure to capture or kill bin-Laden and other top al-Qaeda leaders during the military offensive around Tora Bora in December 2001 allowed the terrorists to regroup and rebuild support among Islamic extremists - aided by Muslim anger over Bush's invasion of Iraq in 2003. But even with al-Qaeda's limited comeback, its leaders don't share the grandiose vision that Bush and Cheney ascribe to them. In 2005, an intercepted letter allegedly written by bin-Laden's deputy Ayman Zawahiri set much more modest goals, fretting that a sudden U.S. withdrawal from Iraq might cause the jihadists to give up and go home. "The mujahedeen must not have their mission end with the expulsion of the Americans from Iraq, and then lay down their weapons, and silence the fighting zeal," the "Zawahiri letter" read. [For details, see Consortiumnews.com's "Al-Qaeda Letter Belies Bush's Iraq Claims."] Yet, while avoiding Gillerman's "straight talk" about Muslims, Cheney substantively agreed with the Israeli ambassador's assessment of terrorism as almost exclusively a Muslim tactic - one that flourished because it didn't draw a sufficiently harsh U.S. response. "Over the last several decades, Americans have seen how the terrorists pursue their objectives," Cheney said in his AIPAC speech. "Simply stated, they would hit us, but we would not hit back hard enough. "In Beirut in 1983, terrorists killed 241 Americans, and afterward U.S. forces withdrew from Beirut. In 1993 we had the killing of American soldiers in Mogadishu, and the bombing of the World Trade Center in New York. Then came the attack on the Saudi National Guard Training Center in Riyadh in 1995; the killings at Khobar Towers in 1996; the attack on our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998; and, of course, the attack on the USS Cole in 2000." Cheney's Bias However, Cheney's one-sided recounting of history reflects an anti-Muslim bias on two levels. First, it ignores the long history of terrorism practiced around the world by people of nearly all religions and ethnic backgrounds. In 1976, for instance, Chile's U.S.-backed dictatorship sponsored a terrorist bombing on the streets of Washington, killing Chilean dissident Orlando Letelier and an American co-worker, Ronni Moffitt, yet then-CIA Director George H.W. Bush protected Chile's leaders from exposure and prosecution. [See Robert Parry's Secrecy & Privilege.] Even today, the current Bush administration is blocking attempts to bring another anti-communist terrorist, Luis Posada Carriles, to justice over his alleged role in bombing a Cuban airliner. [See Consortiumnews.com's "Bush Family's Terrorism Test."] Cheney's speech also ignored more recent acts of terrorism committed by non-Muslims. For instance, there was no reference in his speech to home-grown right-wing terrorists like Timothy McVeigh, who was convicted and executed for blowing up the federal building in Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995. For that matter, Cheney offered no self-criticism of the "shock and awe" violence that the Bush administration inflicted on Iraq, killing thousands of civilians in a war launched over false claims about Saddam Hussein's supposed weapons of mass destruction. At the start of the invasion, Bush ordered the bombing of a Baghdad restaurant where Hussein was suspected of having dinner. Though it turned out Hussein wasn't there, the attack left 14 civilians dead, including seven children. One mother collapsed when her headless daughter was pulled from the wreckage. But for Cheney and Gillerman, these examples don't seem to count. Defining Terrorism A second point undermining Cheney's argument before AIPAC is that some of the cases he cites aren't acts of terrorism - which is classically defined as violence directed against civilians to achieve a political goal. In the case of the 1983 bombing in Beirut, for instance, the attackers targeted the Marine barracks because the Reagan-Bush administration's mission creep had led U.S. forces to intervene militarily against some Muslim elements in the civil war then raging in Lebanon. So, while the killing of the Marines was horrible, it wasn't terrorism. Similarly, the "Black Hawk Down" incident in the Somali city of Mogadishu wasn't an act of terrorism; it was a battle between U.S. Special Forces units and militia troops loyal to a local warlord. Indeed, the Somali militia was reacting to a surprise attack by the American troops, not vice versa. What Cheney appears to be saying is that anytime American troops are killed in a conflict whatever the factual circumstances, they are the victims of "terrorism" - with all that word's emotional and propagandistic value. Conversely, acts ordered by President Bush and U.S. allies can never be considered "terrorism" whatever the facts may suggest. There has been a similar blurring of lines in regard to attacks by Iraqi insurgents against U.S. occupation forces in Iraq. While some incidents, such as the destruction of mosques and the killing of civilians, do constitute terrorism, bombs directed at U.S. troops as they patrol Iraqi territory are military ambushes or sabotage, not terrorism. While some Americans might want Iraqi insurgents who are responsible for killing U.S. troops to bear the opprobrium of the disgraced title of "terrorist," the selective application of the word - as favored by Cheney and Gillerman - carries its own danger. Since U.S. policy forbids negotiations with "terrorists," peace talks with Iraqi insurgents would be barred. That, in turn, could lead to an indefinite war in Iraq and vastly more death and destruction on all sides. That might serve the goals of some neoconservative ideologues - and ironically the interests of Osama bin-Laden - but it is almost certainly not in the interests of U.S. troops in Iraq - nor of the American people.
If there is any hope left of winning the "war of ideas" in the Islamic world, it might well begin with stopping offensive comments about Muslims and protesting when bigoted remarks are uttered by the likes of Ambassador Gillerman.
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| Who Dares To Question The Dubai Port Deal? How fortunate that the opinion pages of our mightiest newspapers are open to diverse viewpoints. We would otherwise miss the opportunity to learn from liberal, conservative and centrist pundits alike that opponents of the Dubai ports deal-which now include about 70 percent of the American public-must be crazed, racist and xenophobic. One original thinker after another insists that there can be no honest criticism of the Dubai deal. They tell us that every critic, no matter how measured, is a protectionist bigot; and that every argument, no matter how rational, is a calumny against Arabs and Muslims. There is a strange whiff of demagogy in these screeds. In The New York Times, David Brooks laments America's sudden inundation by "a xenophobic tsunami." That newspaper's Thomas L. Friedman warns us against "global ethnic profiling." And Nicholas Kristof huffily declares in its pages that "this fuss about ports is really about Arabs." Mr. Brooks proclaims that any concern about potential security problems is "completely bogus," while Mr. Friedman describes such concerns as not only "bogus" but "borderline racist." Mr. Kristof refers slyly to "the arguments of those who believe we should discriminate against Arabs." The same ugly insinuations can also be found in The Washington Post, parroted under the bylines of Richard Cohen and David Ignatius. Mr. Ignatius regards dissent from the Dubai deal as simply "racist," while Mr. Cohen prefers to squawk "xenophobic." Such is the conventional mainstream wisdom, which blesses all trade as "free trade" and venerates corporate globalization as the one truth faith. To question those assumptions, even in the name of national security, is considered a sign of benighted partisanship, economic ignorance or worse. Now all these literary worthies have suddenly acquired profound and unimpeachable knowledge about our ports. With breathtaking arrogance, they claim to know what will make us safe and what might endanger us. According to Mr. Friedman, we need not worry about the takeover of several ports by the government of Dubai, because "the U.S. Coast Guard still controls all aspects of port security, entry and exits; the U.S. Customs Service is still in charge of inspecting the containers, and U.S. longshoremen still handle the cargos." According to Mr. Brooks, "nearly every expert who knows something about port security" agrees that there is no reason for worry. These pundits don't condescend to engage in serious debate. They gush over Dubai's luxury hotels and skyscrapers, without mentioning the utter absence of democracy, transparency and human rights. They praise the United Arab Emirates for behaving like an ally against Al Qaeda, while ignoring its recent connections with the Taliban and Osama bin Laden. They seem to think that if any foreign firm is allowed to operate an American port, then a company that is wholly owned by a foreign dictatorship must be treated the same way. If none of that makes sense to you, then you're obviously a racist, bigoted, xenophobic protectionist. Remember that for most if not all critics of the Dubai Ports World takeover, the most troubling issue is the Bush administration's casual approach to vetting the deal. The more we learn about this process, the less confidence we have in it. To doubt the competence of this government is neither xenophobic nor racist. The Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S., an interagency body overseen by the Treasury Department, appears to have performed poorly in examining the Dubai deal. Sadly, that is unsurprising, as the Government Accountability Office pointed out last fall. Like the conventional minds of the newspaper world, Treasury officials tend to value "free trade" above all other considerations, including national security. That is why the G.A.O. has been urging tighter and tougher methods for evaluating foreign investment in critical infrastructure and defense sectors. As for expertise, the collected knowledge of the nation's newspaper columnists on this subject is considerably less than that of the actual experts who have questioned the deal. The pundits certainly know less about port security than Clark Kent Ervin, the former inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security, who currently directs the Homeland Security Initiative for the Aspen Institute, an impeccably moderate and nonpartisan research center. Mr. Ervin recently confessed his doubts on the Op-Ed page of The New York Times (where certain columnists might have read him while perusing their own work with the usual self-satisfaction). The pundits also know considerably less than Joseph King, the former Customs Service special agent in charge of counterterrorism for that agency until 2003. They know less than the Coast Guard officers who turn out to have warned the Committee on Foreign Investment of the "intelligence gap" in the Dubai deal after examining classified information.
In other words, those who have exercised actual responsibility for ensuring the security of our ports believe there is ample reason for concern over Dubai. So let the columnists hiss and fulminate-and let the investigation proceed, with due caution.
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--- David Letterman --- |
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Digital Hype: A Dazzling Smokescreen? By Norman Solomon As each new season brings more waves of higher-tech digital products, I often think of Mark Twain. Along with being a brilliant writer, he was also an ill-fated investor -- fascinated with the latest technical innovations, including the strides toward functional typewriters and typesetting equipment as the 19th century neared its close. Twain would have marveled at the standard PC that we take for granted now. But what would he have made of the intrusiveness of present-day media technology -- let alone its recurring content? It's getting harder and harder to drive out of cell-phone range -- that is, if you really want to. And judging from scenes at countless remote locations, many people would rather not forfeit 24/7 phone access for conversations that involuntary eavesdroppers hear half of. (Virtually always, it seems, the more boring half.) These days, mainstream media fascination with blogs and the bloggers who love them often seems to assume that the very use of the Internet enhances the content or style of what has been written. It's a seductive cyber-fantasy. Speed is useful, and so are hyperlinks and visuals-on-demand, but -- fortunately or not, depending on your point of view -- there's no digital invisible hand that can move any piece of writing very far along the road to worthwhile reading. A central paradox of the rapid advances in media technologies is that the quantum leaps in computer hard drives and software have been accompanied by an approximately zero boost in human mental capacity -- or in what we refer to with such words as "insight," "wisdom" and "compassion." You can't visit a local mall or an online site and pull out a credit card to purchase an upgrade in gray matter or human connection. The momentum of digital communications has conveyed a sense of inevitability. As last year's cutting-edge gizmos become old hat, resistance appears to be futile. But the question is not whether we're "pro" or "anti" technology. More pertinent are inquiries like: What's the point of all this hyper-computerized stuff? How does it relate to the most important meanings of life? To explore the answers to such questions, even the finest desktops and search engines are unlikely to be much help. Mega-outfits like Microsoft and Google offer incredible ease and speed. When we're seeking information or images, they can do almost everything better and faster than we can -- except think and reflect, feel and create, love and mourn... A half-century ago, there was much talk about the fear that machines would replace people in the workplace. Now, "automation" has an almost quaint ring to it. But the high premium put on speedily moving a business agenda goes back many decades. "In an age of advanced technology," Aldous Huxley foresaw, "inefficiency is the sin against the Holy Ghost." In recent years, the corporate emphasis on the efficient use -- and, let's face it, exploitation -- of human beings has become more overbearing. By now, no one expects a big company to exhibit much loyalty to employees in the long run. And the ubiquitous presence of media technologies in the workaday world, from computer to cell phone to BlackBerry, has facilitated chronic employer demands for greater "productivity." While a new digital gizmo may serve the worker, that worker is still expected to serve management's often-insatiable drive for profits -- more efficiently than ever. News outlets routinely provide breathless accounts of the latest digital dazzles. But precious little media attention focuses on the deeper qualities of the human experience, the content of the lightning-fast communications or the ultimate end-product. Data streams move faster than the eye can see. Information doesn't flow, it rockets. But what's it all for?
Even the most wondrous media technologies can't supply an iota of
meaning. Yet the prevalent media discourse keeps equating digital
breakthroughs with human breakthroughs. But that's a very dubious
proposition.
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The Politics Of Shoe Leather By William Rivers Pitt
--- Thomas P. "Tip" O'Neill (D-Mass.), Speaker of the House ---
The thing is, Rudy Perkins played a significant role in one of the great stories of the 2004 election. The thing is, if you met Rudy Perkins in Keene, NH, he'd likely be shaking your hand from behind a folding table covered with political and campaign literature. Perkins has, for the last several years, been working as a dedicated political activist, and in his own small way, helped to turn the state of New Hampshire blue in 2004. Rudy Perkins is one of the founding members of a group called New Hampshire Swing the Vote. Swing the Vote was founded in the run-up to the 2004 Presidential election. The goals of the group were neither grand nor epic in scope; their mission was not to stop the Iraq occupation or impeach George W. Bush. They weren't looking to get involved in the national push to get John Kerry elected president. Their goal was singular and narrow, small and attainable, and entirely local. Swing the Vote sought to flip Cheshire County, in the southwest corner of New Hampshire, to the Democrats. "There were nearly 30,000 eligible voters in Cheshire County who didn't vote during the 2000 election," says Perkins. "Bush won the state by a margin of 7,211 votes. Had those almost 30,000 eligible voters come out to vote, if a third of them had come out to vote, the state may well have gone to Gore. Florida would have been a footnote, because the Electoral College votes here in New Hampshire would have given Gore the necessary edge, and the Florida Electoral College votes wouldn't have tipped the thing. The Supreme Court would never have gotten involved." Analyzing these numbers, the might-have-beens became unendurable to Perkins. He decided that the next election was going to be different. It worked like this: Perkins, along with Swing the Vote steering committee members Bonnie and Leah, cobbled together a group of volunteers as the 2004 election season began to loom. They mapped out Cheshire County and parceled out areas for volunteers to work. The volunteers went out in pairs, clipboards in hand, and knocked on as many Cheshire County doors as they could manage. This was not, however, your standard canvassing project. First of all, the volunteers were sternly instructed not to stand there and proselytize to the people they spoke to. They had a series of questions to ask, beginning with "Are you registered to vote?" before moving on to "Do you vote?" and concluding with "What issues are of most concern to you?" The basic idea was to get people talking. "It was pretty amazing," recalls Perkins. "At first, the person who answered the door would be incredulous, like they were dealing with a salesman. But the questions we asked drew them out, and allowed them to express their opinions without interruption. These days, with the television news convincing people that what they are being told is what they already believe, there isn't a lot of political conversation happening. I got the sense that, for a lot of the people I spoke to, this was the first time they were asked what their opinions were in a long time. For some of them, I really think it was the first time." "It is a strange thing in America," says Perkins, "that, for some reason, talking about politics is improper or impolite or rude. But people really want to talk, they want to express what they believe. I had one guy talk my ear off for twenty minutes and then follow me down the driveway after I left so he could keep telling me what he believed. It was great." Another aspect of their work that was different was the choice of who to canvass. There were many groups making similar efforts in New Hampshire at the time. Some spoke only to registered voters, some only to registered Democrats, some only to registered Republicans. Swing the Vote decided to talk to everyone, Democrat or Republican, registered or unregistered. Each volunteer was given a specific goal: so many doors per day, per week, per month. They wore out the shoe leather in Troy, Alstead, Swanzey, Keene, Dublin, Jaffrey, getting people to talk about what concerned them in the upcoming election. If people weren't registered, they explained how to register. They let people know that New Hampshire allows same-day voter registration, and if they wanted to, they could go down to their polling place on election day, register right there, and vote. It worked. On election day 2004, Cheshire County saw the largest voter turnout in recent memory. Some 6,000 unregistered voters came out, people who had not been targeted by any other group because they were not on any voter roll. They registered, and they voted. Cheshire County went blue, and for only the third time since 1948, New Hampshire was won by a Democratic presidential candidate. "We certainly were not alone in this," says Perkins. "MoveOn, the Sierra Club, America Coming Together and a lot of other groups did great work here. But I do believe that Swing the Vote played an important role in what happened. Kerry lost the election, sure, but not in New Hampshire. We picked a goal, stuck to the mission, and won what we needed to win." That was the trick, Perkins will tell anyone who cares to listen. One of the great difficulties on the Left is an all-encompassing sense that so much has gone wrong, and that so much needs immediate fixing. It can become unutterably daunting to try to take in the whole forest. Rudy Perkins and the Swing the Vote crew are well aware of everything that has gone sideways in the last several years, but they chose to let the forest be. They picked a tree instead, and bent all their efforts to it. "It was all about mission," says Perkins. "We couldn't fix everything, but we could do something about Cheshire County. It required the discipline to stick to that one thing, to avoid drifting, to do it every single day. We needed to keep our volunteers on that same disciplined path - so many doors per day, a goal that can be accomplished. And it was hard. We got more than a few doors slammed in our faces. We walked miles and miles and miles." They picked a critical area and dug in, a small piece of the larger puzzle where they could actually affect change. They did not stop the war in Iraq, end the Washington cronyism, bring accountability back to the White House, or derail the vexing budgetary priorities of this administration and this congress. But had the election gone the other way, Swing the Vote would have, in their own small way, done a great deal to move towards addressing all of these issues. Swing the Vote is digging in again. The 2006 midterm elections are nine months away, but as far as Perkins is concerned, it is entirely the right time to begin the back and fill. All four of New Hampshire's Congressional representatives are Republicans, all four are stalwart supporters of the Bush administration, and two of them - Jeb Bradley in the 1st District and Charlie Bass in the 2nd District - are up for re-election in November. Rudy Perkins and the Swing the Vote crew are going to tackle Cheshire County again. "It has been said many times about each of the last two elections," says Perkins, "that each was the most important election in our lifetime. But I do truly believe that these midterms in 2006 are the most important elections in my lifetime, perhaps the most important elections since 1864. This election could very well determine the fate and future of this country, of our rights, of everything. If the Democrats can take back Congress, or even take back one wing of Congress, everything that has been happening can be stopped." For the record, there are fifteen Republican seats up for grabs in the House this November. Six Republican senators who are running again in November have approval ratings below 50%. Fifteen seats are needed for the Democrats to take back the House, and six seats are needed for the Democrats to take back the Senate. The anemic approval ratings for both Bush and the GOP majority in Congress suggest significant Democratic gains in November are not out of the question. At a minimum, solid gains would position the Democrats to regain control of Congress in 2008, and perhaps the White House as well. "In every sense," says Perkins, "we are looking to emulate the victors. The GOP didn't come to control the entire government by accident. They picked their spots, small areas of critical importance, and worked them. They built what they have from the ground up, one brick at a time. It took a while and a lot of work, but you can see the results today. That's what we have to do, and that's what we are doing."
Big storms gather around small particles. The folks in Swing the Vote can tell you all about that.
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 Heil Bush, Dear staat reprasentativ Satar, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your bill to make Jesus the Lord of Missouri ignoring all other gods which will overthrow the 1st amendment helping to consolidate our strangle hold of the American people, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Rethuglican Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at the "Fuhrer Bunker" formally 'The White House' on 03-15-2006. We salute you herr Satar, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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AUSTIN, Texas -- South Dakota is so rarely found on the leading edge of the far out, the wiggy, the California-esque. But it has now staked its claim. First to Outlaw Abortion This Century. The state legislature of South Dakota, in all its wisdom and majesty, a legislature comprised of sons and daughters of the soil from Aberdeen to Zell, have usurped the right of the women of that state to decide whether or not to bear the child of an unwanted pregnancy. THEY will decide. Women will do what they decide.
These towering solons, representing citizens from the great cosmopolitan centers of Rapid City and Sioux Falls to the bosky dells near Yankton, are noted for their sagacity and understanding. When you think "enlightenment," the first thing that comes to your mind is "the South Dakota Legislature," right?
As well it might. The purpose of the law is to force a decision from the United States Supreme Court, where the appointments of John Roberts and Sam Alito have now shored up the anti-choice forces.
The South Dakota Legislature has made it a crime for a doctor to perform an abortion under any circumstances except to save the life of the mother. There are no exceptions for rape, incest or to preserve the health of the mother. Should this strike you as hard cheese, State Sen. Bill Napoli, R-Rapid City, explains how rape and incest could be exceptions under the "life" clause. Napoli believes most abortions are performed for "convenience," but he told "The NewsHour With Jim Lehrer" about how he thinks a "real-life example" of the exception could be invoked:
"A real-life description to me would be a rape victim, brutally raped, savaged. The girl was a virgin. She was religious. She planned on saving her virginity until she was married. She was brutalized and raped, sodomized as bad as you can possibly make it, and is impregnated. I mean, that girl, could be so messed up, physically and psychologically, that carrying that child could very well threaten her life."
Please stop and reread the paragraph above. See? Clearly Napoli's exception would not apply to the South Dakota woman also interviewed by the NewsHour. "Michelle" is in her 20s, has a low-paying job and two children. And says she simply cannot afford a third. She drove five hours to the state's only abortion clinic.
"It was difficult when I found out I was pregnant. I was saddened because I knew that I'd probably have to make this decision. Like I said, I have two children, so I look into their eyes and I love them. It's been difficult, you know, it's not easy. And I don't think it's, you know, ever easy on a woman, but we need that choice."
But who is she to make that choice when Bill Napoli can make it for her? He explains: "When I was growing up here in the wild west, if a young man got a girl pregnant out of wedlock, they got married, and the whole darned neighborhood was involved in that wedding. I mean, you just didn't allow that sort of thing to happen, you know? I mean, they wanted that child to be brought up in a home with two parents, you know, that whole story. And so I happen to believe that can happen again. ... I don't think we're so far beyond that, that we can't go back to that."
I find this so profound I am considering putting Sen. Napoli in charge of all moral, ethical and medical decisions made by women. Certainly lucky for the women of South Dakota that he's there, and perhaps that's what we all need -- a man to make decisions for us in case we should decide to do something serious just for our own convenience.
Look at some of the incompetent women we have running around in this country -- Condoleezza Rice and Madeleine Albright, now there are a couple of girls in need of guidance from the South Dakota legislature. Female doctors, lawyers, airplane pilots, engineers and, for that matter, female members of the South Dakota Legislature -- who could ever trust them with an important decision?
In South Dakota, pharmacists can refuse to fill a prescription for contraceptives should it trouble their conscience, and some groups who worked on the anti-abortion bill believe contraception also needs to be outlawed. Good plan. After that, we'll reconsider women's property rights, civil right and voting rights.
For years, the women's movement has been going around asking, "Who decides?" as though that were the issue. Well, here's the answer. Bill Napoli decides, and if you're not happy with that arrangement, well, you'd better be prepared to do something about it.
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Listening to the Bush administration's increasingly ridiculous attempts to spin the disastrous reality on the ground in Iraq, I'm wondering if they've hired the venerable messaging team of Ionesco, Beckett, and Genet . The theater of war meets the theater of the absurd.
Don Rumsfeld is the lead absurdist (and we'll get to him in a minute).
But let's start with Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who appeared on Meet the Press on Sunday, and, on the heels of the recent outbursts of sectarian violence that has pushed Iraq to the brink of civil war, declared:, "I'd say things are going well. I wouldn't put a great big smiley face on it, but I would say they're going very, very well from everything you look at."
Really? He can look at bombed out Shiite holy sites, Sunni mosques attacked in retaliation, clerics kidnapped and murdered, militias running wild, an average of 70 attacks each day, and a sputtering political process and think that it's "going very, very well'? What would it take for Pace to say things are just going "very well" -- another 70 attacks a day?
He isn't waiting for Godot. He's waiting for a clue. And an insurgent to say "Have a nice day!" so he can slap that great big smiley face sticker on the brewing civil war.
Later in the interview, when asked why his rose-colored assessment of the war was shared by so few people, Pace slipped off his General's helmet and donned his PR flack's hat, claiming that the real problem isn't the administration's failed policies, it's the failure of the media to spread the word that "we're making very, very good progress."
"I don't think we're getting the goodness out to the American people the way we should," he said. "If you remember back when the war began, we had 24/7 coverage: Folks could watch television, they could read newspapers, they could read magazines, and they could put together their own opinion of what's going on. Now, the amount of coverage from the war zone is much less than it used to be... People don't get a chance to see or hear about all the good things that are happening."
Well, General, it's hard to "get the goodness out" if you can't leave your hotel without being blown up or abducted. Sixty-four journalists have already been killed covering the Iraq war (by comparison, 54 were killed in Vietnam). And 39 have been kidnapped. There are now fewer than 75 foreign journalists covering Iraq, compared to the more than a thousand who were there in Pace's halcyon days of "24/7 coverage".
But why quibble over process? "The media are the problem" is the administration's story -- and it's sticking to it.
Rumsfeld picked up on Pace's blame the media theme at a Pentagon briefing today, claiming the media has blown this whole civil war thing out of proportion: "From what I've seen thus far, much of the reporting in the U.S. and abroad has exaggerated the situation." Sure, what's a little sectarian bloodshed among warring factions, right? As the man said: " Stuff happens."
Rumsfeld was even more expansive on the "press problem" during an interview he gave on Friday to Plum TV, a local TV outlet in Vail, Colorado. "The impression one gets by reading the press," he said, "is that Iraq is aflame. I was over there a month, I guess, ago, and every time I go it's not aflame." This raises the question: just what does he see when he goes to Iraq? Must not be the same scenery all those hyperbolic reporters are seeing. Or maybe he just has a narrower definition of "aflame" (ie if the entire country doesn't resemble the "Backdraft" ride at Universal Studios, then it's "not aflame").
More from Don Rumsfeld, media critic: "If you put a generator into a hospital and save people's lives, it's not newsworthy... What's newsworthy is when some terrorist straps himself up with a suicide vest and goes in and kills a bunch of innocent Iraqis." On some sick level, you can almost admire these guys' gumption: They fight an unnecessary war, create a nightmare in Iraq, and they want us to focus on hospital generators.
And check out this self-contradicting media-bashing Rumsfeld gem: "The impression that one gets from the media that [Iraq] is in total disarray simply isn't accurate. That is not to say that what is being reported doesn't happen. It does." And: "I think that people do understand that [the media] dramatizes things. But that's not to say it's inaccurate."
Got that? It's not that what reporters are reporting "doesn't happen" or is "inaccurate", it's that what they are reporting is "exaggerated" and filled with "a steady stream of errors". Ionesco would have been proud. I half-expected Rummy to turn into a rhinoceros in mid-sentence.
But Rumsfeld truly qualified for the absurdist pantheon when he put his media-trashing aside long enough to put the blame for the White House's Iraq troubles squarely where it really belongs: "I think the biggest problem we've got in the country is people don't study history any more. People who go to school in high schools and colleges, they tend to study current events and call it history... There are just too darn few people in our country who study history enough." There you have it, America's biggest problem when it comes to Iraq: lousy high school history teachers. Damn them!
Here's the theater of the absurd curtain closer on Rummy's Vail interview: it turns out he was in town to pay an unannounced visit to 24 wounded soldiers -- all patients at Walter Reed in D.C. -- who had lost limbs in Iraq and Afghanistan, and were taking part in a program that gives wounded vets an-all-expenses paid opportunity to travel to Vail to learn how to ski and snowboard.
It's an incredibly worthwhile program, and Rumsfeld deserves credit for taking the time to show his support for these courageous soldiers. But the fact that he could spend time with those who have sacrificed so much -- seeing the horrific results of his failed and misguided policies up close and personal -- and then turn around and rail against the sins of war journalists and high school history teachers reminds us that the ultimate absurdity is that he's still the Secretary of Defense.
... Matt Bors ...  |
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Aaaaaaaaaaa-ah, Aaaaaaaaaaa-ah,
We come from the land of the ice and snow,
The hammer of the gods
On we sweep with threshing oar,
Aaaaaaaaaaa-ah, Aaaaaaaaaaa-ah,
We come from the land of the ice and snow,
How soft your fields so green,
On we sweep with threshing oar,
So now you'd better stop and rebuild all your ruins,
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Parting Shots...
 Remarks by the President THE PRESIDENT: Good afternoon. I'd like to take a minute out of my busy schedule of cowering in the Oval Office, staring slack-jawed at the unfolding China Syndrome that is my approval rating, and talk about my totally brilliant idea of outsourcing American's most vulnerable points of entry to the cheapest contractor: a little outfit called "Dubai Ports." Now I am shocked, just SHOCKED, that everybody is acting like by announcing this sale, I done just gave the country a rattlesnake colonic. It's as if I've spent the last five years making America paranoid of brown-skinned folks wearing do-rags on their heads. Look, there are BAD Arabs, and there are LESS-BAD Arabs, just like there are SHIFTY Puerto Ricans, and LESS-SHIFTY Puerto Ricans. And the United Arab Emirates is a bunch of LESS-BAD Arabs that need our business or else. Let's forget that their little coastal paradise is home to just a couple few of those terrorists who did that thing in the far away country of New York City, and that organizations there sympathize and launder the money of terrorists who are busy trying to turn Iraq into some kind of broken, bullet-ridden ghetto like Camden, New Jersey. Let's forget all that and talk brass tacks: when I say turn the irrational fear, paranoia, and xenophobia towards Mooooooslims off, I mean it. Like, NOW. Look, America loves a sale. There is nothing more American than paying the least amount of money for very basic services, like a McRib from McDonalds. It's barely a couple of bucks, yet it tastes just like pig, if pigs were all boneless and jiggly like Jell-O. Dubai Ports offered to watch over six major American ports and they offered to do it cheaper than, say, American companies that don't really need the business because our economy is strong. One might say super-strong, if one were an executive heavily invested in UAE stocks enjoying the spoils of his or his recent year-end bonus. And fine, a couple few talking heads have, over the years, suggested that America's ports are the most likely points of entry for weapons of mass destruction. But hey, if there's one thing I've proved during my presidency, it's that there are never any WMDs where folks think they're gonna be! As for security, let me point out that the companies that run these ports are not in charge of policing the tankers and containers. That is the responsibility of the Coast Guard. Like FEMA, The Coast Guard is now part of the Dept. Of Homeland Security, and judging from the job that glorious bureaucracy did overseeing the Hurricane Katrina natural disaster, I can safely say we have nothing to worry about. I do love fucking with the heads of politically correct Democrats who love to be seen on camera feeling the pain of Arab folk. And like blacks and Hispanics, that pain is sincere, honest, and lasts as long as it takes to cut to commercial. So now the color-blind Democrats are spittin' mad about me selling ports to filthy sand negro terrorists? I must say, it's kind of refreshing to see sensitive Senator Charles Schumer finally go on record as the raghead-hating Jewboy I just knew he was on the inside. Maybe I'm projecting. Or not! (Laughs.) I assure you that a secret cabal of Republican powerbrokers vetted Dubai Ports. This process was as close to legal without being legal as it gets, and while we may make some nobody sub-cabinet official fall on his sword over this deal, I promise you that if any nukes go off, they'll go off in one of the liberal Sodom and Gommorahs of the Northeast or La-La Angeles - or maybe even New Orleans. And hooboy, that shithole could sure use a new paint job. So in short, don't nobody need to worry none about no ports. Just, like, trust me on that. Because when have I ever been wrong or blatantly lied to you? (Winks.)
Thank you, and God Bless the United Arab Emirat- er, United States of America. |
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In This Edition
Noam Chomsky explores, "New World Relationships."
Uri Avnery speaks proudly of a, "A Four-Letter Word."
Mary Pitt with a letter, "To Our Republican Congress."
Jim Hightower shines a light on, "What The Port Deal Reveals."
Nat Hentoff introduces, "The Torture Judge."
Howard Zinn lectures, "Lessons Of Iraq War Start With US History."
Robert Scheer reports on, "Bush's Fantasy Of "Progress" In Iraq."
Robert Parry reviews, "Feingold, Kerry & The Strategists."
Joe Conason watches as the, "Desperate G.O.P. Attacks The Clintons."
Chris Floyd explains, "Trash Talkers: The Black Mud of Bush/Blair Propaganda."
Ted Rall over looks, "The Bottom-To-Top Transfer Of Secrecy."
Federal District Judge David Trager wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award.'
Molly Ivins says, "Enough Of The D.C. Dems."
Maureen Dowd unscrambles, "W's Mixed Messages."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department 'The Landover Baptist Church' warns "Children Will Be Dragged By Their Necks Into The Church Parking Lot On Easter Sunday" but first Uncle Ernie sez, "In America, Anything's Legal: As Long As You Don't Get Caught!"
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Steve Breen with additional cartoons from Derf City, Micah Wright, Mike Wrathell, Ward Sutton, Steve Bradenton, Internet Weekly.Org, Bloggerheads. Com, Dubya's World.Com, Seeds Of Doubt.Com, Old American Century.Org and Infowars.Com
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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In America, Anything's Legal: As Long As You Don't Get Caught By Ernest Stewart
In Jersey anything's legal as long as you don't get caught Tweeter & The Monkey Man --- Travelling Wilburys
You can be anything that you want in America
We are after all a nation of pimps and always have been. A lot of folks wrongly put all the blame for our current fate on the Bush Junta but while they're responsible for a lot of murders, mayhems and the like the one thing they are not is innovators. Invention is the last thing they're capable of. All they did was take advantage of the systems already in place including the incredible naivete of the American people. They're not called "the Sheeple" for nothing folks! (The Sheeple come by it honestly having been brain washed for the last 230 years by the corpo-rats believing we have a democracy when nothing could be further from the truth) So simply impeaching "the Smirked One" and old "Dead-Eye" will do little to stop the creep of fascism that has once again reared it's ugly head in America. What we've always had was a corpo-rat empire being run by the various clicks, clans and cabals. Some have falsely said that we we're based on the Roman Republic when the truth is we were based on the Roman Empire having been an Empire for 150 years before the revolution. With the politicians just being part of the corpo-rat "Entertainment Division. Like the joke from an old National Lampoon album stated, The Republican Party; a leisure service of IT&T! Of course the same can be said of the Democrats, they're owned lock, stock and barrel by the corpo-rats too! Sure, on occasion some politician who could no longer follow ze orders would tell the truth as did Eisenhower in 1960 when he warned of the Military/Industrial Complex but that was nothing new. Old Abe Lincoln had made a similar statement to a friend 96 years before when he said in 1864, "I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. Corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed." Abe too got it wrong. The corpo-rats weren't just taking over but were the reason for the revolution 4 score and 8 years before. The American revolution wasn't a revolt by the people against a tyrant king but a revolt by the American corpo-rats against the British corpo-rats i.e. The Massachusetts Bay Company, The Hudson Bay Company, The East India Company and other English groups. It was a revolution by the rich for the rich but fought for the most part by the poor; pretty much like every other war ever fought. Sure from time to time a president or con-gress had gotten up off it's knees and passed some legislation that held back the corpo-rats for a short time but it never stopped, it just went on behind closed doors. A couple of examples might be the break up of Ma Bell into baby Bells so we'd have true competition but with AT&T buying up SBC and now Bell South Ma Bell is back pretty much the same as always. Another example was that black men have had the right to vote since 1866 and black women since 1920 but having these rights and actually using them are two different things, are they not Jimi Crow? Just as women have the right to control their reproductive organs, except of course if you live in South Dakota and Mississippi, where against federal law the corpo-rat goons that runs the state legislatures have decided that those laws don't apply to them. Don't even get me started about the traitors in the Missouri House and Senate. Or why Lincoln didn't let the southern states secede from the union? The only difference that the current Junta brought was they don't bother any more to hide the facts that they break the laws and treaties at will. Not only do they do it out in the open but they draw attention to it and dare us to do anything about it! And of course the Sheeple totally ignore it or make excuses for the rat-bastards. The outcome of course is there is two systems one for them and the other for everyone else just like it used to be in those wonderful dark ages which we are fast approaching on a world wide scale. For those few real democracies out their, whether you are our friends or foes (it doesn't really matter which you are) look out as sooner or later young Americans will be paying you a visit to bring you our brand of corpo-rat democracy whether you want it or not. Don't forget to throw flowers in the path of our Panzers as they go by! ******************************************** Our one lone hero in the US Senate Russ Feingold has called for the censure of Bush for spying on Americans. While a "drawing and quartering" it ain't, it is however a start in the right direction America. We've all been calling for the Dems to get up off their knees and put a stop to this madness; well time and time again Russ Feingold has stood up for this country and for you and me. Refusing to give his consent to the illegal quagmire that is Iraq. It's time we all stood with him and demand that our Senators join him in this censure vote. Remind your Senators that this is something you will remember come election day, unless of course you "vote" with Diebold machines, in which case, never mind. For those of you looking for a presidential candidate for 2008 let me recommend Russ Feingold. Unlike Hillary he's not a Rethuglican in disguise, he's the real thing. Now if we can just keep the Junta from putting a contract out on him...
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We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
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New World Relationships By Noam Chomsky The prospect that Europe and Asia might move toward greater independence has troubled US planners since World War II. The concerns have only risen as the 'tripolar order' - Europe, North America and Asia - has continued to evolve. Every day, Latin America, too, is becoming more independent. Now Asia and the Americas are strengthening their ties while the reigning superpower, the odd man out, consumes itself in misadventures in the Middle East. Regional integration in Asia and Latin America is a crucial and increasingly important issue that, from Washington's perspective, betokens a defiant world gone out of control. Energy, of course, remains a defining factor - the object of contention - everywhere. China, unlike Europe, refuses to be intimidated by Washington, a primary reason for the fear of China by US planners, which presents a dilemma: Steps towards confrontation are inhibited by US corporate reliance on China as an export platform and growing market, as well as China's financial reserves, reported to be approaching Japan's in scale. In January, the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia visited Beijing, which is expected to lead to a Sino-Saudi memorandum of understanding calling for "increased cooperation and investment between the two countries in oil, natural gas and investment," The Wall Street Journal reports. Already, much of Iran's oil goes to China, and China is providing Iran with weapons that both states presumably regard as deterrent to US designs. India also has options. India may choose to be a US client, or it may prefer to join the more independent Asian bloc that is taking shape, with ever more ties to Middle East oil producers. Siddarth Varadarajan, deputy editor of The Hindu, observes that "if the 21st century is to be an 'Asian century,' Asia's passivity in the energy sector has to end." The key is India-China cooperation. In January, an agreement signed in Beijing "cleared the way for India and China to collaborate not only in technology, but also in hydrocarbon exploration and production, a partnership that could eventually alter fundamental equations in the world's oil and natural gas sector," Varadarjan points out. An additional step, already being contemplated, is an Asian oil market trading in euros. The impact on the international financial system and the balance of global power could be significant. It should be no surprise that President Bush paid a recent visit to try to keep India in the fold, offering nuclear cooperation and other inducements as a lure. Meanwhile, in Latin America, left-centre governments prevail from Venezuela to Argentina. The indigenous populations have become much more active and influential, particularly in Bolivia and Ecuador, where they either want oil and gas to be domestically controlled or, in some cases, oppose production altogether. Many indigenous people apparently do not see any reason why their lives, societies and cultures should be disrupted or destroyed so that New Yorkers can sit in their SUVs in traffic gridlock. Venezuela, the leading oil exporter in the hemisphere, has forged probably the closest relations with China of any Latin American country, and is planning to sell increasing amounts of oil to China as part of its effort to reduce dependence on the openly hostile US government. Venezuela has joined Mercosur, the South American customs union, a move described by Argentine President Nestor Kirchner as 'a milestone' in the development of this trading bloc, and welcomed as a "new chapter in our integration" by Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. Venezuela, apart from supplying Argentina with fuel oil, bought almost a third of Argentine debt issued in 2005, one element of a region-wide effort to free the countries from the controls of the International Monetary Fund after two decades of disastrous conformity to the rules imposed by the US -dominated international financial institutions. Steps towards Southern Cone integration advanced further in December with the election of Evo Morales in Bolivia, the country's first indigenous president. Morales moved quickly to reach a series of energy accords with Venezuela. The Financial Times reported that these "are expected to underpin forthcoming radical reforms to Bolivia's economy and energy sector" with its huge gas reserves, second only to Venezuela's in South America. Cuba-Venezuela relations are becoming ever closer, each relying on its comparative advantage. Venezuela is providing low-cost oil, while in return Cuba organises literacy and health programmes, sending thousands of highly-skilled professionals, teachers and doctors, who work in the poorest and most neglected areas, as they do elsewhere in the Third World. Cuban medical assistance is also being welcomed elsewhere. One of the most horrendous tragedies of recent years was the earthquake in Pakistan last October. Besides the huge death toll, unknown numbers of survivors have to face brutal winter weather with little shelter, food or medical assistance. "Cuba has provided the largest contingent of doctors and paramedics to Pakistan," paying all the costs (perhaps with Venezuelan funding), writes John Cherian in India's Frontline, citing Dawn, a leading Pakistan daily.
President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan expressed his 'deep gratitude' to Fidel Castro for the 'spirit and compassion' of the Cuban medical teams -reported to comprise more than 1,000 trained personnel, 44 per cent of them women, who remained to work in remote mountain villages, "living in tents in freezing weather and in an alien culture" after Western aid teams had been withdrawn. Growing popular movements, primarily in the South, but with increasing participation in the rich industrial countries, are serving as the bases for many of these developments towards more independence and concern for the needs of the great majority of the population.
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A Four-Letter Word By Uri Avnery IN ENGLISH, a "four-letter word" is a rude expletive. It is a vulgar description of a sexual act or organ, and an educated person will not use it. Now it appears that in the Hebrew language, too, there is a four-letter word, which a decent person will not use, especially not in an election campaign. A (politically) correct person will avoid it at all costs. That word is Peace (which in Hebrew consists of four letters).
THIS WEEK, the election propaganda moved from the street to radio and TV. Israeli law accords every list of candidates a minimum of free broadcasting time (10 minutes on TV), with parties represented in the outgoing Knesset getting additional minutes according to their size. No other election broadcasts on TV or radio are allowed.
When an advertising expert plans an election campaign, his aim is not to explain the program of the party that hired him, but to attract voters. He is more a circus juggler than a preacher.
Election propaganda is like a gown: it should emphasize the attractive features of its owner and hide the less attractive ones. The difference is that the advertising expert can invent limbs that do not exist and cut off limbs that do, according the demands of the market.
One of the major headaches of the propagandist is that his candidates may speak up, God forbid, and expose their real views, thus spoiling the show. As a well-known advertising expert told me: "Selling a politician is like selling toothpaste, with one important difference - toothpaste doesn't talk!"
As a result, the election propaganda does not say much about the real aims of the leaders and their parties. One can assume in advance that most of the content of the broadcasts is fraudulent. If a commercial enterprise distributed such a mendacious prospectus on the stock exchange, it would be indicted.
Does this mean that the election propaganda is not interesting? On the contrary, one can learn a lot from it. It does not reflect the real positions of the parties, but it does reflect public opinion. More precisely: public opinion as it appears to the experts, who conduct daily polls, listen to test groups and such.
On this background, it is worthwhile to examine the broadcasts.
IN ONE of his mysteries, Sherlock Holmes observed that the solution lay in the curious incident of the dog in the night. "But the dog did nothing in the night-time!" his assistant exclaimed. "That is the curious incident!" Sherlock replied.
The curious incident in the present election campaign is a word that does not appear at all: the word "peace".
A stranger will not understand its absence. After all, Israel is in a perpetual state of war. The broadcasts themselves are full of frightening Hamas parades. The fear of suicide bombings is stronger in Israel than any other fear. Logic says that a party that promises peace will reach the heights of popularity. Yet, wonder of wonders, no important party is claiming this crown for itself. More than that, no important party so much as mentions the word peace in its broadcasts.
Kadima speaks about Hope, Hope, Hope - without spelling out what kind of hope, hope for what. It speaks of "Might", and even of a "Chance for a Political Move". Peace? Nyet.
Kadima's masterpiece is a TV clip which harnesses to its cause the whole crew - Herzl, Ben-Gurion, Begin, Sharon and Rabin. It shows Herzl announcing the Zionist idea, Ben-Gurion founding the State of Israel, Begin making peace with Egypt, Sharon crossing the Suez Canal in the Yom-Kippur war, and Rabin making peace with -- King Hussein.
King Hussein? Wait a minute. Didn't Rabin sign an agreement with the Palestinian Liberation Organization and shake hands with Yasser Arafat? Wasn't that the high point of his life? Wasn't he awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for that? Wasn't the peace with Hussein almost an afterthought, since Hussein had already been an unofficial ally of Israel for more than 40 years? But Kadima has decided that it must not show Arafat at any price. It could be accused, God forbid, of striving for peace with the Palestinians!
Amir Peretz of Labor might have been tempted to speak about peace, if his handlers had not shut him up in time. He feels much safer talking about children without food and oldsters without pensions.
Likud, of course, does not speak about peace. Binyamin Netanyahu is at his best when scaring people. For this purpose he went down to the junkyard and retrieved some used generals, who testify that Hamas and the Palestinian Authority pose an existential threat to Israel, much as the frightful Iranian bomb. Only the Great Bibi knows how to deal with them. Peace? Don't make me laugh!
Most amusing is Meretz, the party headed by Yossi Beilin, originator of the Geneva Initiative. Its main broadcast shows men and women pushing slips of paper into the cracks of the Western Wall while voicing their most ardent wish. There is a woman yearning for an academic degree, a man who wants to marry another man, a grandpa who longs for money in order to buy a present for his grandson, a Christian woman who hankers for recognition as a Jewess, a mother who desires to send her son to kindergarten, a woman pining for a divorce. And what is the one thing nobody yearns for, longs for, pines for according to the Meretz propaganda people?
You guessed it: That four-letter word again.
WHAT DOES all this say about the Israeli public, 2006?
It says that the huge majority of the Jewish Israelis do not believe in peace. Peace is being conceived as a dream, something that has nothing to do with reality. A party that speaks about peace brands itself as living in a fantasy world. Worse, it may be suspected of "Arab-loving". What could be more disastrous?
So what do Israelis believe in? They want a Jewish State, with as large a Jewish majority as possible. That is agreed among all the Jewish parties. They believe in fixing the final borders of Israel unilaterally, without speaking with those Palestinians. The Palestinians, as everybody knows, have just elected Hamas and want to throw us into the sea.
What borders? Ehud Olmert is gradually disclosing what he has in mind. His map will not surprise the readers of this column. His Greater Israel includes all the territory trapped between the Green Line and the Separation Wall; and in addition the Jordan Valley; Greater Jerusalem, which includes the Ma'aleh Adumim settlement and the territory between it and the city (but giving up some densely populated Arab neighborhoods); the settlement blocs of Ariel, Alfei-Menasheh, Modi'in Illit and Gush Etzion; and "special security areas". He takes care not to draw an actual map, so there is no certainty about the borders of the settlement blocs. But he certainly aims at annexing more than half of the West Bank.
For Netanyahu, that is, of course, blatant treason, a shameful surrender to the Arabs. In his broadcasts, he denounces Olmert's borders as "borders inviting terrorism'. The Likud does actually draw a map, in which the Wall moves right to the center of the West Bank.
Labor and Meretz agree in principle to the annexation of the settlement blocs, but they do not publish maps. They mention half-heartedly some undefined swaps of territory. No wonder, since they dream, almost visibly, of joining the coalition under Olmert that will probably be set up after the election. The map of the coalition is more important than the map of annexations.
And peace? Shhhhhhh...
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To Our Republican Congress By Mary Pitt WOW!!! That felt good, didn't it? You sent the message to Little George, loud and clear, "The security of America is NOT for sale!" At long last, the lion of the American Congress found its hind legs, stood up and roared! This, the first truly bipartisan act since the Bush cabal took over, stomped into the White House, locked the door, pulled the shades and gave the true governing body of the people the proverbial finger, is historic and little less than heroic. For this we thank you! As a life-long Republican who cannot be comfortable in the Democratic Party, this writer felt that the early years of party loyalty were at last, in some small measure, vindicated. For just a little while there we were pleased, gratified and elated that Congress was, at last, acting as an independent branch of government with power equal to the administrative in upholding the will of the people. Unfortunately, this euphoria was dampened with the renewal of the hated Patriot Act regarding which Congress regressed into the, "Anything you want, Boss", mode of the past five years. However, the determination to continue with the promulgation of a measure to enact into law the principle of American control of all installations essential to American security would indicate that the change in attitude may continue. It will take a long while to correct the errors that have been made during the last five years but if Congress has truly regained their sense of equal power, there will be time. We have lived for too long under the yoke of the fear that has been generated largely by the propaganda that has been perpetrated by this administration. We have sacrificed the blood of our children in a campaign of aggression which was inflicted upon us by the lies and manipulation of a gang who are experts at spreading fear and dissension. When the Republican Party chose Little George as their standard-bearer in 2000, we were aghast. Surely there was somewhere in this party of accomplished executives and "king-makers" a better and more accomplished person who could have become the President! This man, who has done nothing spectacular in his own life without the help if his father and his friends, was the most unlikely executive you could have found. Was there no war-weary soldier desiring nothing more that peace upon the earth like Eisenhower? Were there no diplomats like General Marshall, no successful businessmen who had grown up poor and thus related to the common people, no men with real vision for the future of the nation other than world conquest, or no public relations experts like Ronald Reagan? Was there nobody who had truly, by his own accomplishments, earned the honor of holding the highest office in the land? Nobody with a vision of a "shining city on a hill" or even a "kinder, gentler nation"? True, this man, with his financial backing already in place and with his cabal of determined power-grabbers behind him, came in like a whirlwind, bombarded the voters with his message of Christian "compassionate-conservatism", and flummoxed everybody, including you! But it was immediately evident, once he took office, that he had absolutely no respect for the power of Congress or for the niceties of political life. While you were lining up obediently, according to protocol, practicing the customary lock-step down the aisle and the "honeymoon" with your new President, he was already beating you over the head with "executive orders" All the regulations which you had passed over the years were negated regarding all presidential papers, effectively hiding them from the view of historians forever. You simply smiled and said, "Okay, honey, if it makes you happy." After this initial "slapping around" had accustomed you to the pain, it continued as, while failing to actually veto any of your legislation, he signed with annotated "exceptions" stating that the law applied to everybody else but not to his minions in the Executive Branch. He persuaded you to enact legislate permission for him to "use his own judgement" in response to the emergency created by the dastardly attack on the World Trade Center. It was SO easy just to crawl under your desks and allow the "macho man" to take over the task of protecting you and the American people. Then you found that the initial "authorization" that you gave to allow him to deal with Osama Bin Laden was stretched into the authority to preemptively attack another sovereign nation, Iraq. It was not until after as many Americans had died or been maimed for life as were harmed in the World Trade Center attack that you began to learn that, not only were there no WMD's in Iraq, but the people of Iraq did not want us to invade them and destroy their homes and their children, and we were certainly not greeted with "flowers and candy". And now your "leader" wants to attack another nation, based upon those same suppositions and innuendo! Meanwhile, having been reared steeped in the philosophy of lower taxes and reduced spending, you went along with the tax cuts for the rich as a stimulant to the economy while almost destroying all the social safety nets that had been instituted during the previous century. It was "for our own good", he said, and would "stimulate our economy". At the same time, he told us that "off-shoring is good for American industry" while factory after factory moved overseas and Americans were reduced to holding multiple minimum-wage jobs in order to survive. In the meantime, your "leader" was going on a spending binge, tossing money into the pockets, not only of his re-tread criminals from Watergate and Iran-Contra, but to his business-buddies via no-bid contracts for "rebuilding" Iraq. The knowledge has arrived, too late, I fear, that your errors have led you and the nation to the very brink of bankruptcy. As with the typical very-abused wife, you now find yourself at the crossroads. There are very few options for you. You cannot go on as you have been or you will share the blame for the consequences, the voters will revolt, and you will lose your vaunted status and somebody else will take your place. The most severe available option would be "divorce" or impeachment which you would certainly not like to consider for all the obvious reasons. The second would be to continue to roar, to let this man know, in no uncertain terms, that this behavior will no longer be tolerated, that he may have mortgaged the nation and its future but you will not allow him to forfeit it completely. He must be told that he has had five years in which he has wrought disaster after disaster upon the normal working arrangements and that now he has three years left in which to correct it, (it will take him that long to find and negate all those "executive orders" which he has been creating behind your back). Tell him that you will not allow him to claim an "executive exception" to the measures that you pass or you will pull them back and pass them by veto-proof majorities to which he cannot claim an exception. Tell him that you are accepting his "personal responsibility" mantra and insist that he do the same.
You have taken a stand on the national security as regards the Dubai ports deal and that is a good step. But, as we who have worked with battered women know, you cannot go back! If you allow him to bully you one more time, you are lost again! You must follow your conscience and the dictates of your constituents, (as you are sworn to do), and reconstitute, as much as you can, the democracy of which we have all been so proud for all of our lives. Tell him in no uncertain terms that there will be no more tax cuts for the rich at the expense of the working class, that his agenda of world aggression will no longer be tolerated, and from now until the end of the Republic, the United States of America will stand for peace and the brotherhood of mankind, on a truly solid financial basis, and with three EQUAL branches of government who will all be equally considerate of the welfare of the electorate. Time is running out and your future, and ours, depends upon it.
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It was big news when the Bushites authorized the United Arab Emirates to take over the operation of some U.S. ports. Behind the headlines, however, were several little revelations that I found to be somewhere between curious... and alarming. Let's start with a fun one. Guess who is lobbying for the Arab company that is to take over the ports? Bob Dole! Yes, the former-GOP presidential nominee, who was last seen doing TV ads for Viagra, has been lobbying on behalf of UAE's oil-rich monarchs. From selling Viagra to selling U.S. ports - what a guy! And guess who also has a curious connection to the emirs? Daddy Bush! One of the seven ruling families of this al Qaeda-linked monarchy is a major contributor to the George H. W. Bush Presidential Library, listed in the top donor category of, "$1 million or more." More alarming is the news that very few of our country's ports are American-operated these days. Unbeknownst to the public, 80 percent of our crucial seaport terminals are now run by entities flying the flags of Singapore, China, and other nations. For me, however, the most stunning revelation is that - once again - no one at the top was on watch! George W himself was totally unaware that the sale was even being considered until the news hit the media fan. Likewise, Donnie Rumsfeld and Condi Rice were clueless - even though both sit on the committee that oversees such deals. Worst of all, though, Michael Chertoff, the head of homeland security, was also blissfully ignorant! His sole job is to be on the alert for any and all security risks - but no one at this $41.1 billion agency shook the secretary awake to say: Sir, you might want to sneak a peak at this one. This is Jim Hightower saying... The port deal reveals more about the Bushites than it does about the emirs. How can they be so scandalously blas about our security? |
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Mr. Arar to be tortured, a judge can do nothing about it. --- Georgetown University law professor David Cole --- New York Law Journal, February 17 2006
Arar was flown to Syria, where he was tortured for nearly a year in solitary confinement in a three-by-six-foot cell ("like a grave," he said). He became, internationally, one of the best-known victims of the CIA's extraordinary renditions-the sending of suspected terrorists to countries known for torturing their prisoners. Released after his ordeal, Arar has not been charged with any involvement in terrorism, or anything else, by Syria or the United States. Stigmatized by his notoriety, still traumatized, unemployed, he is back in Canada, where the Canadian Parliament had opened an extensive and expensive public inquiry into his capture and torture. The United States refuses to cooperate in any way with this investigation. Maher Arar sued for damages in federal court here (Maher Arar v. John Ashcroft, formerly Attorney General of the United States, et al.). Representing Arar for the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights, David Cole predicts, and I agree, that if Judge Trager's ruling is upheld in an appeal to the Supreme Court, the CIA and other American officials will be told "they have a green light to do to others what they did to Arar"-no matter what international or U.S. laws are violated in the name of national security. Following the dismissal of Arar's case by Trager (former dean of Brooklyn Law School), Barbara Olshansky (deputy legal director of the Center for Constitutional Rights) underscored the significance of what Trager has done to legitimize the Bush administration's doctrine that in the war on terrorism, the commander in chief sets the rules. Said Olshansky: "There can be little doubt that every official of the United States government [involved in the torture of Maher Arar] knew that sending him to Syria was a clear violation of the U.S. Constitution, federal statutes, and international law . . . This is a dark day indeed." To fathom the darkness of Trager's decision that Maher Arar has no constitutional right to due process in an American court of law for what he suffered because of the CIA, it's necessary to be aware of a decision directly on point by New York's Second Circuit Court of Appeals in 1980. In this landmark decision, Filrtiga v. Pea-Irala, David Cole points out, the appeals court decided that "the prohibition on torture was so universally accepted that a U.S. Court could hold responsible a Paraguayan official charged with torturing a dissident in Paraguay . . . The [U.S.] court declared that when officials violate such a fundamental norm as torture, they can be held accountable anywhere they are found." (Emphasis added.) That 1980 Second Circuit Court of Appeals decision proclaimed: "The torturer has become the pirate and slave trader before him . . . an enemy of all mankind." (Emphasis added.) The kicker is that this decision giving American courts jurisdiction over cases of official torture in other countries was reaffirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court in June 2004 (Sosa v. Alvarez-Machain). Now let us hear how Judge Trager justifies his dismissal of Maher Arar's suit for the atrocities he endured in Syria because of the CIA. In his decision, Trager said that if a judge decided, on his or her own, that the CIA's "extraordinary renditions" were always unconstitutional, "such a ruling can have the most serious consequences to our foreign relations or national security or both." A judge must be silent, even if our own statutes and treaties are violated! What about the separation of powers? Ah, said Trager, "the coordinate branches of our government [executive and legislative] are those in whom the Constitution imposes responsibility for our foreign affairs and national security. Those branches have the responsibility to determine whether judicial oversight is appropriate." Gee, I thought that the checks and balances of our constitutional system depend on the independence of the federal judiciary, which itself decides to exercise judicial review. Judge Trager went further to protect the Bush administration's juggernaut conduct of foreign policy: "One need not have much imagination to contemplate the negative effect on our relations with Canada if discovery were to proceed in this case, and were it to turn out that certain high Canadian officials had, despite public denials, acquiesced in Arar's removal to Syria." "More generally," Trager went on, "governments that do not wish to acknowledge publicly that they are assisting us would certainly hesitate to do so if our judicial discovery process could compromise them." But judge, the Canadian government itself is now actively involved in an inquiry to discover, among other things, what happened to Arar, and how. And in Europe, there is a fierce controversy over whether governments there have been covertly involved in facilitating the CIA's kidnapping of terror suspects from other lands. Is it the job of a federal judge here to protect other governments from embarrassment and eventual punishment by their own courts for helping the United States commit crimes? And what about our own government's criminal accountability? The February 17 New York Law Journal noted that "Judge Trager said that even assuming the government had intended to remove Maher Arar to Syria for torture, the federal judiciary was in no position to hold our government officials liable for damages 'in the absence of explicit direction by Congress . . . even if such conduct violates our treaty obligations or customary international law.' " (Emphasis added.)
If independent federal judges cannot hold our government accountable, who can? Fortunately, Judge Trager is not on the Supreme Court. But look at whom George W. Bush has appointed to be our custodians of the Constitution!
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On the third anniversary of President Bush's Iraq debacle, it's important to consider why the administration so easily fooled so many people into supporting the war.
I believe there are two reasons, which go deep into our national culture.
One is an absence of historical perspective. The other is an inability to think outside the boundaries of nationalism.
If we don't know history, then we are ready meat for carnivorous politicians and the intellectuals and journalists who supply the carving knives. But if we know some history, if we know how many times presidents have lied to us, we will not be fooled again.
President Polk lied to the nation about the reason for going to war with Mexico in 1846. It wasn't that Mexico "shed American blood upon the American soil" but that Polk, and the slave-owning aristocracy, coveted half of Mexico.
President McKinley lied in 1898 about the reason for invading Cuba, saying we wanted to liberate the Cubans from Spanish control, but the truth is that he really wanted Spain out of Cuba so that the island could be open to United Fruit and other American corporations. He also lied about the reasons for our war in the Philippines, claiming we only wanted to "civilize" the Filipinos, while the real reason was to own a valuable piece of real estate in the far Pacific, even if we had to kill hundreds of thousands of Filipinos to accomplish that.
President Wilson lied about the reasons for entering the First World War, saying it was a war to "make the world safe for democracy," when it was really a war to make the world safe for the rising American power.
President Truman lied when he said the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima because it was "a military target."
And everyone lied about Vietnam - President Kennedy about the extent of our involvement, President Johnson about the Gulf of Tonkin and President Nixon about the secret bombing of Cambodia. They all claimed the war was to keep South Vietnam free of communism, but really wanted to keep South Vietnam as an American outpost at the edge of the Asian continent.
President Reagan lied about the invasion of Grenada, claiming falsely that it was a threat to the United States.
The elder Bush lied about the invasion of Panama, leading to the death of thousands of ordinary citizens in that country. And he lied again about the reason for attacking Iraq in 1991 - hardly to defend the integrity of Kuwait, rather to assert U.S. power in the oil-rich Middle East.
There is an even bigger lie: the arrogant idea that this country is the center of the universe, exceptionally virtuous, admirable, superior.
If our starting point for evaluating the world around us is the firm belief that this nation is somehow endowed by Providence with unique qualities that make it morally superior to every other nation on Earth, then we are not likely to question the president when he says we are sending our troops here or there, or bombing this or that, in order to spread our values - democracy, liberty, and let's not forget free enterprise - to some God-forsaken (literally) place in the world.
But we must face some facts that disturb the idea of a uniquely virtuous nation.
We must face our long history of ethnic cleansing, in which the U.S. government drove millions of Indians off their land by means of massacres and forced evacuations.
We must face our long history, still not behind us, of slavery, segregation and racism.
And we must face the lingering memory of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
It is not a history of which we can be proud.
Our leaders have taken it for granted, and planted the belief in the minds of many people that we are entitled, because of our moral superiority, to dominate the world. Both the Republican and Democratic Parties have embraced this notion.
But what is the idea of our moral superiority based on?
A more honest estimate of ourselves as a nation would prepare us all for the next barrage of lies that will accompany the next proposal to inflict our power on some other part of the world.
It might also inspire us to create a different history for ourselves, by taking our country away from the liars who govern it, and by rejecting nationalist arrogance, so that we can join people around the world in the common cause of peace and justice.
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Bush's Fantasy Of "Progress" In Iraq By Robert Scheer What is he thinking? On a day when Shiite vigilantes conducted hangings in Sadr City in reprisal for the killing of scores of their co-religionists in a market bombing, President Bush continued to insist that progress in Iraq justified staying the course. "By their response over the past two weeks, Iraqis have shown the world that they want a future of freedom and peace," he said Monday. 'We're helping Iraqis build a strong democracy so that old resentments will be eased and the insurgency marginalized." Contrast that fantasy with the same day's harsh news: 'In Sadr City, the Shiite section in Baghdad where the terrorist suspects were executed, government forces vanished," reported the New York Times. 'The streets are ruled by aggressive teenagers with shiny soccer jerseys and machine guns. They set up roadblocks and poke their heads into cars and detain whomever they want. Mosques blare warnings on loudspeakers for American troops to stay out. Increasingly, the Americans have been doing just that." The next day, 87 corpses, all male, were found scattered throughout the city, shot or strangled after being bound and blindfolded. This, in turn, was in apparent reprisal for a series of bombings on Sunday targeting Shiite civilians which killed 58 and wounded 300, according to Iraq's Health Ministry. Of course, the drip-drip of American troop deaths continues, as Lance Cpl. Bunny Long, 22, of Modesto, Calif., will be coming home in a flag-draped casket after being killed Friday by a suicide, vehicle-borne, IED. If such constant mayhem is taken as a sign of progress, three years after the U.S. invasion, then Bush surely will be thrilled by what the future holds. The British, on the other hand, have seen the handwriting on the wall and once again have begun to flee an imperial disappointment in Mesopotamia, announcing they are reducing their forces by 10 percent. Clearly, London has grasped what Bush cannot: The three-year occupation by Western armies is an incitement to guerrilla violence, not an impediment. Of course, Bush would have us believe this expanding civil war is the work of insidious foreigners rather than of competing agendas arising from within an Iraq society long stunted by colonialism and dictatorship. It does not occur to him that he is the foreigner who the majority of Iraqis hold responsible for the country's despair, and whose occupation immeasurably strengthens the hand of extremists on all sides. Bush's neoconservative Svengalis apparently failed to alert him to the possibility that religious, ethnic and nationalist sentiments might trump his plans for a Western-imposed 'democracy," subservient to U.S. interests. Or that U.S.-engineered elections would be won by allies and disciples of the radical Shiite government in the 'evil axis" capital of Tehran. Such bright contradictions were on display in Bush's latest strategically bankrupt 'plan" for victory: Spending $3.3 billion to fight the improvised explosive devices (IEDs) Bush now claims Iran is smuggling into Iraq - to the very Shiite forces that won the U.S.-engineered election and are positioned to form the first real post-Hussein government. The IEDs, mentioned a whopping 26 times in the speech, have obviously come to replace that nonexistent WMD threat as the centerpiece of Bush's Iraq policy. We will stop them, he says, by bumping anti-IED-related spending by a factor of 22, from %$150 million in 2004 to $3.3 billion. 'We're putting the best minds in America to work on this effort," Bush said. Why not put a few of them to work on figuring how to extract the U.S. military from Iraq instead? After all, that is where all the IEDs happen to be exploding. But, of course, this alternative, to stop making U.S. troops targets in the midst of a raging civil war in a Muslim country that the United States has no business occupying, was summarily dismissed by our president. '[M]y decisions on troop levels will be made based upon the conditions on the ground and on the recommendations of our military commanders, not artificial timetables set by politicians here in Washington, D.C.," he said. Has the president never read our Constitution, which mandates civilian control over the military? Does he not grasp that he is himself a Washington politician? How can you effectively sell democracy to the world when you mock it so contemptuously at home?
You can't. Not until the public and its representatives force this administration to change its disastrous course can we begin to restore international respect for the American political system that Bush has so masterfully subverted.
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Feingold, Kerry & The Strategists By Robert Parry Years before Sen. John Kerry fell under the spell of national Democratic "strategists," he believed that a Democrat's best hope for winning the White House was to run as an insurgent. To overcome built-in Republican advantages, Kerry felt a Democrat had to show principle and challenge the status quo. But Kerry had that thinking beat out of him. In the late 1980s, he got pummeled by the mainstream news media and the political establishment for exposing cocaine trafficking by Nicaraguan contra rebels and for embarrassing their Reagan-Bush patrons. Respectable Washington didn't want to believe the ugly reality. Mocked by the big newspapers and branded a "randy conspiracy buff" by Newsweek, Kerry was persuaded by party insiders that his political future required him to trim his sails and dump his rebelliousness overboard. [See Consortiumnews.com's "Kerry's Contra-Cocaine Chapter."] So, by the time he ran for president in 2004, Kerry was silent about his heroic investigations of the 1980s. He presented himself instead as a careful politician who spoke in a fog of nuance. Whenever he seemed poised to crush the bumbling George W. Bush, Kerry retreated into poll-tested platitudes. As it turned out - as the younger Kerry would have understood - the greatest risk was to play it safe. Now, to hear Kerry tell it, he has relearned the lesson that he once knew. He has vowed to fight with clarity and passion. But the tragedy of John Kerry - like "The Natural" in Bernard Malamud's novel (not the movie) - may be that opportunity missed is often a chance lost for good. In life, you often don't get a second act. Except, of course, for Democratic "strategists," who always seem to get a second act, even a third and a fourth, no matter how often they lose. Strategist Bob Shrum, for instance, has been a chronic loser in presidential races but is still sought out by Democratic hopefuls, including John Kerry in 2004. And, when they're not applying their cold hands to Democratic campaigns, the strategists can put a chill on any Democrat's principled behavior by whispering in the ears of journalists that a seemingly noble act is reckless, calculated or somehow both. Feingold Undermined That was the case when Sen. Russell Feingold, D-Wisconsin, proposed censuring Bush for authorizing warrantless wiretaps of Americans outside the legal channels of the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act - and thus in violation of the Fourth Amendment's ban on searches and seizures without the government getting a court's approval. While Feingold's proposal could be viewed as a moderate step - expressing congressional disapproval short of impeachment - Washington Post reporter Charles Babington searched out unnamed "Democratic strategists" to make Feingold's plan look both craven and crazy. "Some party strategists," Babington wrote, "worried that voters will see the move as overreaching partisanship." Then, going in the opposite direction, Babington quoted the strategists worrying that the real problem with Feingold's initiative was that challenging Bush on abrogating the Fourth Amendment wasn't the smartest partisan move. "Several Democratic strategists said (illegal) surveillance issues are not Bush's most vulnerable spot, and they fear the party may appear extremist," Babington wrote. The Post reporter then quoted a strategist, identified only as a former aide to President Bill Clinton, as saying, "It is more likely that a big censure fight would have the effect of rallying folks to his (Bush's) side." The Clinton aide added, "While some in the Democratic base want retribution for what happened to Clinton, I think there is a larger reluctance to try to remove people from office." But the Clinton aide's assessment of motivation - that Democrats "want retribution" for the impeachment drive against Clinton - seems to have little evidentiary support. The grassroots pressure for holding Bush accountable has sprung from outrage over his "preemptive" war in Iraq, his lies and his violations of the Constitution. Without the unattributed quote from the Clinton aide, Babington would have been hard-pressed to find citations among grassroots bloggers or other Democratic activists who want Bush impeached or otherwise punished as retribution for Clinton's humiliation in 1998-99. But the Clinton aide's comment fits with the mainstream media's critique of Feingold's censure resolution as almost all things negative: partisan, "extremist," counter-productive and vengeful. The "Democratic strategists" thus set up the story's kicker line. House Majority Leader John A. Boehner, R-Ohio, called Feingold's resolution "political grandstanding of the very worst kind." [Washington Post, March 14, 2006] The construction of Babington's story also underscores the difficulty that any Democrat faces in trying to take principled stands against Republicans. The Washington Post and other mainstream news outlets will invariably apply a negative spin suggesting some ulterior motive; the Republicans will counter-attack aggressively; and "Democratic strategists" will deliver a sucker punch from behind. Similar muggings hit John Kerry when he tried to investigate the contra-cocaine scandal in the 1980s; battered Al Gore in 2002 when he questioned Bush's rush to war in Iraq; demeaned Rep. John Conyers's hearing on the Downing Street Memo in 2005; and now confront Feingold for daring to seek even a mild form of accountability against Bush.
The lesson for Democrats who want to stand and fight is that they must respond to this three-sided problem with a three-pronged solution: challenging Republican wrongdoing without fear or equivocation; building media outlets that will circumvent the smug mainstream press; and standing behind the rare Democratic politician who shows some courage
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| Desperate G.O.P. Attacks The Clintons When Republican politicians get in trouble, their defense often includes one or both of the following arguments: The Democrats are equally guilty, and it's all Bill Clinton's fault anyway. Such claims may be inaccurate as well as irrelevant, but if echoed often enough by conservative pundits on the airwaves and in the papers, they can serve to distract from the original embarrassment. Consider the example of disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff, who diligently greased his fellow Republicans. The Indian tribes represented by Mr. Abramoff greatly increased the proportion of their political donations to Republicans, while diminishing their donations to Democrats. But many in the media regurgitated the Republican spin that implicated both parties equally. The controversy over Dubai's attempt to purchase control of American ports is provoking a similar response. Quickly and mindlessly, the Bush administration approved the takeover by Dubai Ports World, a state-owned company. By pushing the Dubai deal-with a veto threat against any Congressional interference-Mr. Bush has drawn fresh attention to his family's Middle East entanglements. (Remember his handholding with that Saudi prince?) The Carlyle Group boasts deep financial connections to the United Arab Emirates as well as the Bush family. The President's father and brother Neil have both benefited directly from the largesse of Emirate rulers. As Dubya's public approval plunged toward Nixonian levels and shudders of fear wracked the Republican Party, a snarling counterattack was predictable. Just as inevitable was that the target would be the Clintons. The sideshow began after the Financial Times reported, with more than a touch of exaggeration, that Dubai Ports World executives had received advice from the former President. What should have remained a minor story swiftly blossomed into headlines-and a concerted effort to damage his wife, Hillary Clinton, the junior Senator from New York and possible Presidential candidate. Indignant critics have denounced the Clintons, although for what isn't quite clear. Representative Duncan Hunter, the California Republican now embroiled in the defense-lobbying scandal that brought down his friend Randy (Duke) Cunningham, wrongly accused Bill Clinton of endorsing the Dubai deal. "President Clinton now is on record," said Mr. Hunter on ABC's This Week program, "as advising the emir [of Dubai] on how to make this deal go through." Similar charges have erupted from a columnist at The Nation magazine on the left and from commentators for Fox News and NewsMax on the right-all accusing the Senator and the former President of sneaky perfidy. It is true that the former President's friendship with the Emirate rulers has proved rewarding in the most concrete ways. Like many others around the world, including major corporations, universities, charities and media outlets, they have paid him handsomely over the past several years to deliver speeches, and they contributed to the cost of constructing his library in Little Rock, Ark. Mr. Clinton serves on the board of an investment company that is involved in business deals with Dubai's rulers. To the full extent demanded by Senate rules-which ought to require more information-those foreign sources of family income are disclosed on Mrs. Clinton's personal financial reports. But there is no logical inference that financial emoluments have bought political influence. On the evening of Feb. 17, while Mr. Clinton was traveling in India, he received a call from two Dubai Ports World executives. According to his spokesman, he listened as they explained their troubles with Washington. He responded by advising them to submit to more thorough federal investigation and to guarantee that, should they eventually prevail, they will greatly enhance security in the U.S. ports they oversee. Almost simultaneously with that brief conversation on the other side of the world, Senator Clinton was preparing to introduce legislation that would bar any company owned by a foreign government from owning American port facilities. She announced her plan the same day. Passage of her bill, co-sponsored by New Jersey Democrat Robert Menendez, would instantly and permanently kill the Dubai deal. So despite her husband's friendship with Dubai, Senator Clinton acted against the interests of the emirate's rulers. She could easily have deferred to her senior colleague, Senator Charles Schumer, who has also denounced the Dubai ports deal and introduced restrictive legislation. As for the former President, he is not an advisor to Dubai Ports World and has publicly endorsed his wife's legislation. "Whether it passes or not," said the statement released by his office, "he believes this purchase should not be approved unless the security of our ports can be dramatically improved." Had either of them endorsed the Dubai deal, the outcry over the former President's connections with the United Arab Emirates would be justified. Instead, she has moved to block the deal, and he has supported her bill-and yet their critics are still inflamed.
To understand this curious situation, it helps to know that what the Clintons actually say or do never matters. They're always wrong.
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Trash Talkers: The Black Mud of Bush/Blair Propaganda By Chris Floyd It is not enough for those gentlemen of rectitude, the oh-so-Christian Coalition of George Bush and Tony Blair, to snatch innocent people from around the world and plunge them into a black hole of torture and anguish for years on end. No, even in those rare instances where they finally spit out a victim after grinding his body and mind to bits, they cannot let him rest. They purse him to the ends of the earth, trying to taint his reputation with slander, innuendo and black propaganda fed to willing media accomplices -- anything to muddy the waters, to keep the truth about their despicable enterprise from emerging fully into the light. Victoria Brittain, writing in The Guardian, shows us how it's done in Trial by Spin Machine. Excerpts: The coincidental release of Michael Winterbottom's prize-winning film about the young men from Tipton, Road to Guantnamo, and Moazzam Begg's book, Enemy Combatant, predictably brought the US and British spin machines into full swing last week - so that anyone reading the book or seeing the film would have got the idea that these men may have been badly treated, but they certainly were not innocent. [For more on the Tipton Three, see Caught in a Net of State Terrorism.] Last week the Daily Telegraph flagged an exclusive on its front page. "Begg told FBI he trained with al-Qaeda," was the headline over a full-page article by Con Coughlin, the paper's security correspondent, using an FBI report which, as Begg's book explains, was written by two FBI agents. After Begg had been tortured, threatened with death, offered a job undercover by the CIA, and come to believe he would never see his family again, he signed the "confession", confident that it was so illiterate and inconsistent that no court of law would accept it as having been written by an educated man such as himself. Coughlin had a copy of the book from the publishers, so - assuming he read it - knew all this as he prepared his piece, which has so damaged Begg. Meanwhile, Colleen Graffy, the US deputy assistant secretary of state for public diplomacy, was in London last week on a propaganda offensive. Ms Graffy had visited Guantnamo and witnessed no unpleasant interrogation, no torture and plenty of sports facilities, she told Jeremy Vine on Radio 2. The imperturbable Vine was speechless when she drew from her bag a sample tube used for force-feeding prisoners and explained to him that it had no metal edges and was therefore humane.....[*However, for some reason she didn't offer to stuff down her own gullet, just to show viewers at home how comfy it is. A pity. CF] Five years ago, in the British Journalism Review, David Leigh reported on cases of intelligence services using journalists. One was the 1995 Sunday Telegraph story about the son of Libya's Colonel Gadafy and his alleged connection to a currency-counterfeiting plan. The story was written by Mr Coughlin, the paper's then chief foreign correspondent, and was originally attributed to a "British banking official". In fact - as emerged in a libel case brought by Gadafy's son - it had been given to him by an MI6 officer, who, it transpired, had been a regular contact for years....
The innocence of Begg, the Tipton Three and the other British detainees who have come home is a part of the story of Guantnamo that no official wants people to hear. Like all major miscarriages of justice finally overturned, the officials concerned will never apologise for breaking these men's lives, no one in authority will lose their jobs, and sections of the media will continue to question their innocence.
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 The Bottom-To-Top Transfer Of Secrecy By Ted Rallmn NEW YORK--Bob woke up so hung over from last night's orgy that the only way he could get right was to snort a little coke. Next he downloaded some senior sex porn, caught the latest jihadi agitprop at his favorite Al Qaeda websites and zipped through a school zone doing 100 in his unregistered, uninsured car. Bob leads a lifestyle that you'd assume would make him a fierce advocate of privacy rights. But it's possible to imagine a society in which Bob wouldn't need to keep anything secret. Privacy advocates point to gays and political dissidents when asked to justify the importance of anonymity on the Internet. Civil libertarians say that freedom from unreasonable searches prevents America from becoming a police state. Yet these examples demonstrate an unintended and rarely discussed consequence of the privacy rights movement: Privacy enables oppression by promoting social stigmas. What if Bob's neighbors, friends and colleagues were sexually nonjudgmental? He could hook up with anyone he wanted to without fear of reprisal. Bob needn't worry about the police searching his car, if drugs were legal. If Bob lived in a non-dysfunctional political environment whose popular and self-confident government and citizens chose not to fear but to embrace dissent as an essential part of constructive discourse, no one would consider the books he borrowed from the library "subversive." He would have no more reason to care about the USA Patriot Act than his government would have to use it to examine his library records. Draconian drug laws, neo-Puritan views of sex and political intolerance are forms of social and legal disapproval that create scapegoats, hermits and fugitives. Consider, for example, the closeted gay man. Fearing the opprobrium of family and coworkers and (in some states) the police, his sole consolation is his belief that his "M4M" web posts will stay between him and his Internet service provider. In communities where large numbers of gays refuse to limit their public appearances to leather bars on the bad side of town, and increasingly step forward, other people are forced to recognize their behavior as not aberrant, and for a significant portion of the population (between three and six percent for American men, somewhat lower among women), is not uncommon and even quite normal. Their gayness becomes more widely accepted. Were the violators of other social and legal norms to refuse to hide their activities, their nonconformity would similarly be normalized. Naturally these musings on the perverse relationship between privacy rights and oppression ignore some harsh realities. First, tribalism is a hard-wired human survival mechanism that is difficult to re-route. We are reflexively drawn to the similar and repulsed by the anomalous and the other. Second, before discriminated-upon social segments like homosexuals can summon the courage to make their presence public they must first find comfort in the anonymity of life underground. Finally, history shows that even relatively egalitarian and nonjudgmental societies can regress into willful intolerance. In those places privacy rights must be preserved precisely because one never knows what viciousness the future will bring. After a few brief decades of social progress the United States has lurched back into the dark ages of torture, concentration camps and police harassment of its scapegoats and undesirables--current members: Muslims, blacks, gays, leftists. The result has been to remind us why the right to be left alone in our homes, cars and e-mail is still necessary. A grand irony is that individuals, who need more protection than ever thanks to the ease of information access and transfer in the electronic era, are losing what few privacy rights they have to government officials who, despite drawing salaries from us taxpayers, are acting increasingly secretive. Even as Congress approved the once unthinkable renewal of the Patriot Act's "library provision," which grants government spooks access to your business records, medical files, purchase records and library borrowings, an Associated Press survey found that "states have steadily limited the public's access to government information since the 9/11 terrorist attacks." They even used that excuse to "disappear" prisoners held at the Guantnamo Bay concentration camp. "Personal information on detainees was withheld solely to protect detainee privacy and for their own security," claimed Lieutenant Commander Chito Peppler of the Department of Defense, saying that disclosure "could result in retribution or harm to the detainees or their families." The real "harm" from disclosure would come to the United States, when their families learned that their loved ones were being brutalized. With government officials like that, it's easy to see why some of us still have to sneak around.
POSTSCRIPT: Last week's column should have referenced a call supposedly placed by Mark Bingham, a passenger on United Flight 93, the hijacked 9/11 flight that crashed in Pennsylvania, to his mother in the San Francisco Bay Area. "Hi, Mom," government officials claimed that he said, "This is Mark Bingham. I want to let you know that I love you, and I'm--I'm flying and--I'm in the air." Who identifies himself by their surname to their mother? Hi, Mom, it's me. Hi, Mom, it's Mark. Mainstream media speculated that his odd formality revealed the stress he was under. Others doubt that the call was placed by Bingham or, for that matter, a passenger on Flight 93.
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 Heil Bush, Dear Bundes Richter Trager, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your ruling in the case (Maher Arar v. John Ashcroft, formerly Attorney General of the United States, et al.) that no judge can hold the government responsible sets us free to do whatever we need to, to rule the world, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Judical Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Wolf's Lair" formally 'Rancho de Bimbo' on 05-27-2006. We salute you herr Trager, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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Mah fellow progressives, now is the time for all good men and women to come to the aid of the party. I don't know about you, but I have had it with the D.C. Democrats, had it with the DLC Democrats, had it with every calculating, equivocating, triangulating, straddling, hair-splitting son of a bitch up there, and that includes Hillary Rodham Clinton.
I will not be supporting Senator Clinton because: a) she has no clear stand on the war and b) Terri Schiavo and flag-burning are not issues where you reach out to the other side and try to split the difference. You want to talk about lowering abortion rates through cooperation on sex education and contraception, fine, but don't jack with stuff that is pure rightwing firewater.
I can't see a damn soul in D.C. except Russ Feingold who is even worth considering for President. The rest of them seem to me so poisonously in hock to this system of legalized bribery they can't even see straight.
Look at their reaction to this Abramoff scandal. They're talking about "a lobby reform package." We don't need a lobby reform package, you dimwits, we need full public financing of campaigns, and every single one of you who spends half your time whoring after special interest contributions knows it. The Abramoff scandal is a once in a lifetime gift-a perfect lesson on what's wrong with the system being laid out for people to see. Run with it, don't mess around with little patches, and fix the system.
As usual, the Democrats have forty good issues on their side and want to run on thirty-nine of them. Here are three they should stick to:
1) Iraq is making terrorism worse; it's a breeding ground. We need to extricate ourselves as soon as possible. We are not helping the Iraqis by staying.
2) Full public financing of campaigns so as to drive the moneylenders from the halls of Washington.
3) Single-payer health insurance.
Every Democrat I talk to is appalled at the sheer gutlessness and spinelessness of the Democratic performance. The party is still cringing at the thought of being called, ooh-ooh, "unpatriotic" by a bunch of rightwingers.
Take "unpatriotic" and shove it. How dare they do this to our country? "Unpatriotic"? These people have ruined the American military! Not to mention the economy, the middle class, and our reputation in the world. Everything they touch turns to dirt, including Medicare prescription drugs and hurricane relief.
This is not a time for a candidate who will offend no one; it is time for a candidate who takes clear stands and kicks ass.
Who are these idiots talking about Warner of Virginia? Being anodyne is not sufficient qualification for being President. And if there's nobody in Washington and we can't find a Democratic governor, let's run Bill Moyers, or Oprah, or some university president with ethics and charisma.
What happens now is not up to the has-beens in Washington who run this party. It is up to us. So let's get off our butts and start building a progressive movement that can block the nomination of Hillary Clinton or any other candidate who supposedly has "all the money sewed up."
I am tired of having the party nomination decided before the first primary vote is cast, tired of having the party beholden to the same old Establishment money.
We can raise our own money on the Internet, and we know it. Howard Dean raised $42 million, largely on the web, with a late start when he was running for President, and that ain't chicken feed. If we double it, it gives us the lock on the nomination. So let's go find a good candidate early and organize the shit out of our side.
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WASHINGTON
The good news is the Arabs aren't going to run our ports.
The bad news is the Americans are going to run our ports.
Homeland Security's protection of the ports is a joke. The goof-off Michael Chertoff is remarkably still in charge. The swaggering of the president and vice president on national security has been exposed as a sham, with millions spent shoring up our defenses wasted, with the Iraq war aggravating our danger, and with anti-Muslim feeling swelling among Americans and anti-American feeling swelling among Muslims.
A Washington Post-ABC News Poll this week found that a growing percentage of Americans have unfavorable opinions of Islam. A majority now think Muslims are disproportionately prone to violence.
The creepy John Grisham-style Washington firm called the Carlyle Group, suffused with Arab connections and money, and seeded with Saudi money (including bin Laden family money until after 9/11), even gave some thought to investing in the ports, before backing off.
The nakedness of the ports is so obvious it was a "Sopranos" plot point. A source called Deep Water, who helped check out new hires for the New Jersey port before and after 9/11, told the F.B.I. a couple of years ago about what he saw as gaps in security practices on the waterfront and a "suspicious" flow of recent Arab immigrants, some speaking little English, being hired as port watchmen. Deep Water said he'd recently been interviewed by New York detectives.
President Bush does not seem to understand that it was his bumbling -- rather than our bigotry -- that led Americans to gulp and yelp at the idea of an Arab government running our ports. When the president said yesterday that "my administration was satisfied that port security would not have been undermined by the agreement," he seemed oblivious to the fact that -- after W.M.D., Katrina and Iraq -- many Americans no longer trust this administration to protect them.
Still shaken by his first rebellion by Republicans fed up with White House hubris and hamhandedness, W. chastised lawmakers about xenophobia. "I'm concerned about a broader message this issue could send to our friends and allies around the world, particularly in the Middle East," he said. He said that we had to cultivate moderate Arabs, but that moderate Muslims were shrinking back as violent Islamists pushed ahead.
American skepticism about the Dubai government running our ports is not prejudice. As Denny Hastert put it, "It's counterintuitive." There is nothing wrong with wanting Americans to be responsible for American security. That's not nativism or jingoism or bigotry. It's self-reliance and prudence. Of course, such an attitude can be exploited by bigots. And some bigotry is being fed by scenes on the news every day of Arab fighters blowing things up, leading to the same stereotype of Arabs that existed in the 70's, a caricature limned from terrorism, oil and the petrodollar.
The president also does not seem to understand that he spurred the dissonance that led to this vote of no-confidence. Since Sept. 11, he has been anti-terror but pro-Mideast, a position that has left Americans confused. His enemy is a tactic that's too vague to pinpoint, too vast to ever defeat. In some ways, the country seems more alive to the true origins of the fiends who attacked us than the president.
His nuclear deals have so jumbled up the carrots and sticks that American threats on nuclear proliferation have lost all meaning.
W. and General Rove present the war on terror as Armageddon and World War VIII, yet in every other aspect of foreign policy, it's business as usual. One minute they're scaring Americans into supporting their power grabs by essentially yelling, "They're coming to kill us!" The next minute, the Persian Gulf is still the great nexus for capitalist deals by the likes of Treasury Secretary John Snow, Dick Cheney, Halliburton and the Carlyle Group.
The president preaches that we are seriously threatened by autocratic Arab societies that won't modernize and become free markets, but then his cozy relationship with autocratic Arab regimes, including the Saudis, continues basically unchanged.
As Michael Hirsh of Newsweek summed up in a recent column: "How then did we arrive at this day, with anti-American Islamist governments rising in the Mideast, bin Laden sneering at us, Qaeda lieutenants escaping from prison, Iran brazenly enriching uranium, and America as hated and mistrusted as it ever has been? The answer, in a word, is incompetence."
... Steve Breen ...  |
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As I was goin' over the Cork and Kerry mountains
Musha ring dum a doo dum a da
I took all of his money and it was a pretty penny
Musha ring dum a doo dum a da
Being drunk and weary I went to Molly's chamber
Musha ring dum a doo dum a da
Now some men like the fishin' and some men like the fowlin'
Musha ring dum a doo dum a da
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Parting Shots...
 Attention Parents, Final Notice: Children Will be Dragged By Their Necks Into the Church Parking Lot on Easter Sunday This Easter, If Any Child is Found to Have Handled Easter Eggs, He Will be Dragged by Security to the Parking Lot And May Rejoin His Family Only When the Four-Hour Service is Over. All Little Ones' Hands Will be Thoroughly Inspected for Either Telltale Pastel Dyes or the Distinctive Aroma of Bleach. Urinalysis Will Check for Milk and Semi-Sweet Chocolate. An Important Message From Pastor Deacon Fred Parents and friends, last year we had a serious problem with many of your children acting like unsaved trash and then expecting to be welcomed in the Lord's finest house outside of Metropolitan Heaven. It was brought to my attention that a whole passel of unsaved, little secular hooligans thought they could spend Easter morning gorging on Cadbury's marshmallow bunnies, looking for hardboiled eggs dipped in homosexually inspired colors and celebrating other godless Pagan traditions. They thought they could then slip on their new white patent leather shoes that mommy bought them and come skipping into our Bible believing church on Easter Sunday morning. It never occurred to these sneaky little Pre-K juvenile delinquents that Jesus is going to want to smack the stuffing out of them one of these days for worshiping a rabbit. Moms and Dads out there, you need to make it clear to your youngsters that just because Jesus doesn't run around giving your brats candy - which most of those waddling toddlers need about as much as they need to be buggered all night by a Catholic Priest - is no excuse to fill Jesus' big, "Look What I Did!" day into a pack of secular Christ-hating shenanigans. I'm putting all your kiddies on notice: if they dare bring one stomach in here with so much as one piece of chocolate on Easter, they are in for a bigger surprise than even Jesus gets when he sees their sinning little mugs have the cheek - yes, cheek - to dare to walk amongst His anointed! You all know that modernism has crept into almost every single church in this country except for ours. Why, there are families out there in the liberal Presbyterian wife-swapping suburbs of Des Moines that allow their ghetto-music-listening children to grow up thinking Easter is all about a promiscuous little animal - and not a Heavenly zombie that saved mankind by getting fed up of being dead after three days, dusted Himself off, left His smelly grave and hit the road. We put our foot down in 1952 and said NO! to the foolish modern idea of allowing the enemies of the cross - the unsaved - to fellowship with us. It's unbiblical, anti-Christian, and downright dangerous to allow unsaved people into God's house. God doesn't allow it in Heaven, and as it is in Heaven, SO BE IT ON EARTH! Amen! And I am not about to make exceptions just because the sinner in question's little head barely clears my man's business. As we all know, demons are between three and four feet when not flying - and that is why they are so comfortable in the bodies of children.
Under Section 19.344.22(a)(iv) of the Landover Baptist Piety Protocols (2004 Supp.), children found to have handled Easter eggs are deemed the spiritual equivalent of children who have never called the name Jesus. As such, they are legally unsaved - a status that can only be changed by express written permission from Pastor and a majority of all Deacons after a 90-day waiting period (subject to credit approval). Enemies of this church, whether she be a fresh-faced, nubile young girl with ripe bee-stung lips or some old crone with sloppy, sagging lady parts flapping twelve ways from Sunday, are working full time for Satan and not welcome by the Lord. Thank-You. |
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Issues & Alibis Vol 6 # 11 (c) 03/17/2006
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In This Edition
Greg Palast returns with, "Bush Didn't Bungle Iraq, You Fools."
Uri Avnery reviews, "A Disgusting Exercise."
Mary Pitt follows, "J-Mac And The Prez."
Jim Hightower finds, "Animal Farm Meets The Marx Brothers."
Sheila Samples weighs the future, "With Friends Like These..."
Chris Floyd explores, "Late-Breaking News: USA Wins Vietnam War."
Robert Scheer says, "Bush Bombs In Cleveland."
Robert Parry reports on, "Iraq -- US News Media's Waterloo."
Joe Conason concludes, "Abortion Ban Will Test 'Moderate' Republicans."
Norman Solomon introduces, "War-Loving Pundits."
Eric Alterman explains, "Iraq: The Democrats' Dilemma."
Washington Post reporter Charles Babington wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award.'
Molly Ivins dreams of, "Democracy Over The Electoral College."
Arianna Huffington wonders, "Apocalypse What?"
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department 'The Onion' reports, "Rumsfeld: Iraqis Now Capable Of Conducting War Without U.S. Assistance" but first Uncle Ernie sez, "We've Been Stupid For Too Long."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Gary Brookins with additional cartoons from Ward Sutton, Micah Wright, Bruce Yurgil, Weakly World News, Tom Tomorrow, Neff, Wolf Unalo, Internet Weekly.Org, Buck Fush.Com and Nick Anderson.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Coming soon...
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We've Been Stupid For Too Long By Ernest Stewart
You don't get to be old by being a fool. There are a lot of young, wise men, dead as a muther-fucker --- Richard Pryor
Trouble with being number one is every punk nation/city state on the planet out to make a reputation begins to send mindless aggression your way. So far our little west Taxus prairie monkey and his cabal have managed to alienate about two thirds of the planet; half of which now hate our guts, the remaining third (our NATO allies) are nervous, summer of 1938 in Europe nervous! As we celebrate three years of slaughtering children in Iraq and the total destruction of our economy due to the cost of the war; not to mention all of the better paying middle-class jobs being sent to our new friends in India. Now with Iran dumping dollars and selling it's oil in Euros will not the rest of Asia soon follow too? And when China calls in it's markers if you thought the 1930s were a bee-otch, well you ain't seen nothing yet folks. The reason that so far we aren't all in soup lines is our good friends the "Red" Chinese have been buying our IOUs to the tune of trillions of dollars, not to mention all the other countries that we owe big time thanks to our glorious fuhrer and his corpo-rat pals. For the past 5 years we have been going out of our way to piss off everybody on the planet and have pretty much succeeded with everyone but our partners in crime England and Israel and who knows maybe Canada as well? We can put a few battalions of Canadians to work bashing out brains in the Sunni triangle after they run out of baby seals and give our boys and girls a break from doing the same. They can take the place of the Japanese who are pulling out of Iraq to bring their Samurais home to train new legions of troops for the fun to come. I told you several times did I not; long before the war began, that before we were through with the Iraqis they'd be begging for Saddam to return. The latest poll out of the "cradle of civilization" shows around 70% would prefer Saddam over America. So much for the "Mission Accomplished," eh? Trouble is there is no end in sight, at least not for the Junta. Von Rumsfeld, Dead-eye Dick, Kindasleezy and Smirky have all crawled out from under their rocks to beat up a little support for the current and the new oil wars to come. Before we can conquer the world we have to control all the energy that we can, or as Bush puts it, "My preciousssss. Now consider that there is such a thing as being too stupid to live. A good example would be Pat Tillman! The trouble with killing all the "Lions & Tigers & Bears, Oh MY!" is that they used to eat all the dummies. Thinning the herd is a good thing because those morons never got to breed or found dynasties or even become Presidents. But fear not my friends, old mother nature abhors a vacuum even if it lies between two ears and we are just another stumble of foreign policy away from World War III, which at the current rate might be coming to a city near you next year! This autumn's elections may be our last chance to save the world from another dark age. If we don't replace the House and Senate Rethuglicans as well as the Dixiecrats with liberals that will Impeach the Chimp we are all headin' for the last roundup pardner, if you get my drift? Ergo... Starting next month we'll open a new department i.e. "Election 2006" which will be open through the election with info on the various races and which will be updated constantly. If you know a candidate we should support send us the info to: issues@issuesandalibis.org write "Election 2006" in the subject line and we'll help spread the word. ******************************************** In our "How The Mighty Have Fallen" department consider the strange case of Andrew Young. Andy you'll remember was the right hand man of Dr. Martin Luther King, a US Con-gressman, Mayor of Atlanta, US Ambassador to the United Nations, friend of the down trodden and for the last year paid front man, token and shill for the evilest corpo-rat on the planet! No, I'm not talking about Disney but the even worse Wal-Mart. Before joining Wal-Mart Andy was a paid shill trying to cover up the sweat shops and slave labor for the Nike Corpo-rat. Andy now heads the 5th column group, "Working Families For Wal-Mart" for the usual 30 pieces of silver. When we asked Andy if he had any honor left in him why he hadn't fallen on his sword or perhaps like Judas hung himself we got, "No Comment." Funny thing that, eh? Tsk tsk tsk.
We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
 Bush Didn't Bungle Iraq, You Fools THE MISSION WAS INDEED ACCCOMPLISHED By Greg Palast Get off it. All the carping, belly-aching and complaining about George Bush's incompetence in Iraq, from both the Left and now the Right, is just dead wrong. On the third anniversary of the tanks rolling over Iraq's border, most of the 59 million Homer Simpsons who voted for Bush are beginning to doubt if his mission was accomplished. But don't kid yourself -- Bush and his co-conspirator, Dick Cheney, accomplished exactly what they set out to do. In case you've forgotten what their real mission was, let me remind you of White House spokesman Ari Fleisher's original announcement, three years ago, launching of what he called,
Operation O.I.L. How droll of them, how cute. Then, Karl Rove made the giggling boys in the White House change it to "OIF" -- Operation Iraqi Freedom. But the 101st Airborne wasn't sent to Basra to get its hands on Iraq's OIF. "It's about oil," Robert Ebel told me. Who is Ebel? Formerly the CIA's top oil analyst, he was sent by the Pentagon, about a month before the invasion, to a secret confab in London with Saddam's former oil minister to finalize the plans for "liberating" Iraq's oil industry. In London, Bush's emissary Ebel also instructed Ibrahim Bahr al-Ulum, the man the Pentagon would choose as post-OIF oil minister for Iraq, on the correct method of disposing Iraq's crude. And what did the USA want Iraq to do with Iraq's oil? The answer will surprise many of you: and it is uglier, more twisted, devilish and devious than anything imagined by the most conspiracy-addicted blogger. The answer can be found in a 323-page plan for Iraq's oil secretly drafted by the State Department. Our team got a hold of a copy; how, doesn't matter. The key thing is what's inside this thick Bush diktat: a directive to Iraqis to maintain a state oil company that will "enhance its relationship with OPEC." Enhance its relationship with OPEC??? How strange: the government of the United States ordering Iraq to support the very OPEC oil cartel which is strangling our nation with outrageously high prices for crude. Specifically, the system ordered up by the Bush cabal would keep a lid on Iraq's oil production -- limiting Iraq's oil pumping to the tight quota set by Saudi Arabia and the OPEC cartel. There you have it. Yes, Bush went in for the oil -- not to get MORE of Iraq's oil, but to prevent Iraq producing TOO MUCH of it. You must keep in mind who paid for George's ranch and Dick's bunker: Big Oil. And Big Oil -- and their buck-buddies, the Saudis -- don't make money from pumping more oil, but from pumping LESS of it. The lower the supply, the higher the price. It's Economics 101. The oil industry is run by a cartel, OPEC, and what economists call an "oligopoly" -- a tiny handful of operators who make more money when there's less oil, not more of it. So, every time the "insurgents" blow up a pipeline in Basra, every time Mad Mahmoud in Tehran threatens to cut supply, the price of oil leaps. And Dick and George just LOVE it. Dick and George didn't want more oil from Iraq, they wanted less. I know some of you, no matter what I write, insist that our President and his Veep are on the hunt for more crude so you can cheaply fill your family Hummer; that somehow, these two oil-patch babies are concerned that the price of gas in the USA is bumping up to $3 a gallon. No so, gentle souls. Three bucks a gallon in the States (and a quid a litre in Britain) means colossal profits for Big Oil, and that makes Dick's ticker go pitty-pat with joy. The top oily-gopolists, the five largest oil companies, pulled in $113 billion in profit in 2005 -- compared to a piddly $34 billion in 2002 before Operation Iraqi Liberation. In other words, it's been a good war for Big Oil. As per Plan Bush, Bahr Al-Ulum became Iraq's occupation oil minister; the conquered nation "enhanced its relationship with OPEC;" and the price of oil, from Clinton peace-time to Bush war-time, shot up 317%.
In other words, on the third anniversary of invasion, we can say the
attack and occupation is, indeed, a Mission Accomplished. However, it
wasn't America's mission, nor the Iraqis'. It was an Mission
Accomplished for OPEC and Big Oil. |
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A Disgusting Exercise By Uri Avnery THE CENTRAL theme of this article is disgust. Therefore I apologize in advance for the frequent use of this and similar words. In the thesaurus I find quite a number of synonyms: loathing, revulsion, dislike, nausea, distaste, aversion, antipathy, abomination, repulsion, abhorrence, repugnance, odium, detestation, and some more. They are all present in my feelings about the action that took place in Jericho on Tuesday. IT WAS abhorrent, first of all, because it was an election propaganda gimmick. For a politician to send the army in to collect votes is an abhorrent act. In this action, three people were killed. Many more lives, Palestinian and Israeli, were put at risk. The horrible cynicism of the decision was plain for all to see. Even the voters noticed it: in a public opinion poll two days later, 47% said that the decision was influenced by electoral considerations, only 49% thought otherwise. This is not the first time for Ehud Olmert to walk over dead bodies on his way to power. As mayor of Jerusalem, he pushed for the opening of a tunnel in the area of the Muslim shrines, causing (as expected) dozens of casualties. Binyamin Netanyahu, his accomplice at the time, is made of similar material. Netanyahu, at least, was once a combat soldier, who risked his own life in action. Much more distasteful is a politician who sends others to risk their lives but takes great care not to risk his own. This inglorious band also numbers George Bush and Dick Cheney, two serial war-mongers. Olmert had a problem. His party was slowly sinking in the polls. As time passed, some of the Kadima fans started to notice that Olmert, after all, is no Sharon. Sharon's glory derives mainly from his being a victorious general, who walked around during the Yom Kippur war with a large bandage around his head (to this very day it is not quite clear what purpose it served). Olmert was in urgent need of a military action that would provide him with the laurels of a tough military commander, and would also help him shake off the nickname attached to him by the Likud: Smolmert. (Smol, in Hebrew, means left.) The trick paid off. In the same poll, 20.7% of the voters said that the Jericho action persuaded them to vote for Kadima, or, at least, reinforced their decision to do so. In general, one should beware of a civilian politician who succeeds a leader crowned with military laurels. It is enough to mention the classic case of Anthony Eden, the heir of Winston Churchill, who initiated the Suez war of October 1956. WHAT DOES that war remind us about? The collusion. The British wanted to topple Gamal Abd-al-Nasser, because he had the temerity to expropriate the property of the British shareholders of the Suez Canal Company. The French wanted to bring him down because of his support for the Algerian war of liberation. They conspired with David Ben-Gurion, who wanted to destroy the newly re-equipped Egyptian army. The main middleman of the collusion was Shimon Peres, now No. 2 on the Kadima list. It worked like this: Israeli paratroopers, commanded by Ariel Sharon (founder of Kadima), were dropped near the Suez canal. Britain and France issued a fake ultimatum, calling upon Egypt and Israel to withdraw their forces from the canal - a preposterous demand, since the canal is deep in Egyptian territory. As agreed beforehand, Israel refused, and then the British and French forces invaded the canal area, leaving the Israeli army to take control of the entire Sinai peninsula. The collusion was so primitive and obvious that it was uncovered at once. End of Eden. The Jericho affair is incredibly similar: the British and the Americans pretended to fear for the safety of their monitors, which were stationed in Jericho according to an agreement which we shall touch upon later. They told Mahmoud Abbas that they might withdraw them. At a time secretly agreed upon with the Israeli Prime Minister, the British and American monitors went out and the Israeli army went in. Preparations for the action had been going on for weeks. One thing should be said in favor of George Bush and Tony Blair (and his miserable Foreign Minister, Jack Straw): they have returned the oldest profession in the world to the oldest city in the world. The scarlet thread of Rahav the Harlot (Joshua, 2) leads to this act of prostitution. LIEUTENANT GENERAL Dan Halutz can be proud of this victory. In the past, he became famous for saying that all he feels is a slight bump on his wing when he drops a bomb on a civilian neighborhood, even if women and children are also killed. After that he sleeps well, he said. Now he has won real glory: with the help of dozens of tanks, gunships and heavy bulldozers he has succeeded in capturing six unarmed prisoners in the tranquil, non-violent little town that lives off tourism. In the course of the action, Halutz' soldiers created a disgusting picture that has sullied the image of the Israeli army in the eyes of the hundreds of millions who saw it on their screens. They ordered the Palestinian policemen and prisoners to take their clothes off, and then let them be photographed, again and again - and again and again - in their underpants. There was no need for that. The pretext, that they might have hidden explosive belts on their body, was ridiculous under these circumstances. And even if it had been necessary, it could surely have been done far from the cameras. No doubt: the intention was to humiliate, to debase, to satisfy sadistic tendencies. A person can, perhaps, get over beatings, or even torture. But he cannot ever forget humiliation, especially when it was done in full view of his family, friends, colleagues and all people around the world. How many new terrorists were born at that moment? On that day I happened to visit friends in a Palestinian village in the West Bank. We - my hosts and I - were riveted to the TV screen (mainly Aljazeera). When these pictures appeared, I could not look them in the eye for shame. THE ISRAELI media had a ball. Not just a ball, they went gaga for sheer joy. They contributed their special part to the loathsome event and stood to attention behind the government. Like a flock of parrots, unanimously repeating the mendacious official version. It was a festival of brain-washing. The "Murderers of Ze'evi" have been captured! It was our national duty! We could not rest until they fell into our hands, dead or alive! These three words - "Murderers of Ze'evi" - turned into a mantra. They were repeated endlessly on radio and television, and appeared in the printed newspapers (all of them!) and the speeches of the politicians (all of them!). That's how it is: Israelis are "murdered", Palestinians are "eliminated". Why, for Gods sake? Rehavam Zee'vi, a cabinet minister at the time, preached day and night about "transfer" - the euphemism for driving the Palestinians out of Palestine. Compared to him, Jean-Marie le Pen in France and Joerg Haider in Austria are bleeding-heart liberals. His targeted killing is no different from the targeted killing of Sheik Ahmed Yassin and scores of other Palestinian leaders, including Abu-Ali Mustafa, the chief of the Popular Front, who was allowed by Israel to return from Syria to the Palestinian territories after Oslo. This is part of the endless chain of violence: The Israeli army killed Abu-Ali Mustafa. He was succeeded by Ahmed Sa'adat, who, according to the Israeli security service, ordered the killing of Rehavam Ze'evi in revenge, and whose capture was the aim of the Jericho action. And so it goes on. Let's be clear: I oppose all murders. Theirs and ours. The murder of Abu-Ali Mustafa and the murder of Rehavam Ze'evi. But whoever spills the blood of a Palestinian leader cannot complain about the shedding of the blood of an Israeli one. THERE IS still another side to the affair, which is no less disgusting: the attitude towards the keeping of agreements. Sa'adat and his colleagues were held in Jericho in accordance with an agreement signed by Israel. On the strength of it, they left the Mukata'a in Ramallah, during the siege on Yasser Arafat, and entered the Palestinian jail in Jericho. The US and the UK guaranteed their safety and undertook to monitor their imprisonment. What has happened now in Jericho is a blatant breach of the agreement. The miserable pretexts invented in Jerusalem, London and Washington are an insult to the intelligence of a 10-year old. Israeli governments often regard the breach of an agreement as a patriotic act if it serves our purpose. Agreements are binding only on the other side. This is not only a primitive morality, it is also damaging to our national interests. Who will sign an agreement with us, knowing that it obligates only him? How can Israel convincingly demand that the Hamas leaders "accept all the agreements" signed by the Palestinian Authority?
Many Israelis believe that the Jericho action was a brilliant exercise. I found it simply loathsome.
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J-Mac And The Prez By Mary Pitt The whole nation cheered as Jason McElwain was shown on the news, becoming the hero of his high school basketball team in Greece, New York. This autistic young man, having been given the "honor" of being the team manager for his school, was allowed by his coach to suit up for the last game of the season, (so he would feel connected while sitting on the bench), and was allowed to actually go onto the court in a game that was already "lost" just to give the kid a thrill. To the surprise of everybody, probably not least the unlikely hero, the young man was totally pumped by adrenalin and sank a series of unbelievable shots, winning the game. One who has spent a very long life working with and advocating for persons with handicaps would probably ask, "Why was such a person relegated to the position of 'manager' of the team when he was so obviously gifted at the game? Couldn't be because he was a bit 'different', could it?" However, this did make young Jason a fine example for all the young people in the nation who are suffering from the same or a similar handicap and a ray of sunshine for their parents and friends. The success of this fine young man stands as a beacon for all those who daily struggle with problems of habilitation for such children, too often with a considerably lesser degree of success. Of course, our President, with his popularity at the bottom of the ladder and eager for positive publicity, grasped at the idea of meeting Jason and appearing to truly care about persons with handicaps, and I am sure that Jason was awed and pleased to be in the company of the leader of his nation. But, as usual, these beautiful photo-ops need to be looked at a bit more carefully. First, Jason is far from typical in any way. His parents appear to be well-educated and upper-class, a valuable asset to a child with a disability. They could undoubtedly afford the care, medical, psychological, and habilitative, that is necessary to assist such a person to the full realization of their potential. This is far from true of the parents of most children with early-childhood disabilities. For most it is an immense and lifelong struggle to gain for their children the basic needs of life, searching through the available services that are available to low-income people. Once all the family resources are depleted, which doesn't take very long, they are reduced to seeking services from Medicaid doctors who know little, and often care less, about the specific needs of patients with these conditions. Too often, their medical advice is, "Put him in an institution and forget you had him." Alternatively and more gently, they may advise that the children need "professional help." Now, this would not be the same kind of "professional help" that is available to persons with the private funds to puchase them on the open market but, too often, in state- or county-supported clinics or "residential facilities" where their level of care is decided by the "bean-counters" in governmental offices or the legislators at any level who are mindful of the "bottom line" and the political effect of the necessary tax rate. If the parents are insistent on keeping their child in their own home, "special education" is furnished and they can go and sit in a classroom where they receive a minimum of personal instruction, are not expected to actually learn or to become literate, and mark time until they can receive a "high school diploma," and go on to the next step. This "next step" too often involves going to live in a "group home" where they live with several other people, usually of the same sex and connected only by a similar handicapping condition. Too often, these "homes' consist of being "warehoused," marched off each morning to "sheltered workshops" where they spend each day doing menial work for pennies per day under the supervision of "professionals" whose job is largely to keep them under control while going through the motions of "teaching them to work." When their day is done, they are transported back to their domicile where they are fed, supervised while they spend their "free time" watching television or chatting, and then are hustled off to bed early so they can "work" tomorrow. If they feel the need for personal attention, the best way to get it is to display "behaviors", which gains the desired result for a time. However, over-use of this tactic can bring a prescription for "behavior-modification medication" which will keep them sufficiently drugged that they will not do it again. Very rarely are they allowed to team up with a friend, rent an apartment or a house, and live "independently", since there are few programs which will allow them to learn to make good decisions, to budget, or even to know what is required to live independently. All this time, it is necessary for them to live on the stipend provided by Social Security Dependents' benefits, Social Security Disability, or SSI, most of which is paid to the facility which provides their care, leaving them with very little for "personal expenses" such as clothing and toiletries. When living in a sheltered living situation, they are not even in control of the use of their food stamp allowances, having them "contributed" to the communal kitchen. Nearly all those who are developmentally disabled, autistic, or Down's syndrome are doomed to a life of poverty and control by others, finding their only enjoyment in the limited human contact and the few carefully-controlled recreational opportunities provided for them. These people, through no fault of their own, make up a large percentage of the population who require public support through the government "entitlements" which are, we are told, responsible for the bankrupt condition of our nation. In every legislative session on every level of government, much time is spent on trying to "reduce entitlements", to cut spending, and to reduce even more the assistance which is so essential to the lives of persons with handicaps. Even the recent creation of Medicare Part D serves to reduce the amounts available for their care. Most, if not all, states pay the "premium" from Medicaid funds so that the amount is not deducted from their meager monthly checks, but many find that they must pay the "deductibles" and "co-payments" which were not previously required. In addition, some of the medications on which they have depended for health or for life itself are "not on the formulary" of the insurance company which was chosen for them. One lady of our acquaintance has had multiple coronary by-pass surgery and finds her cholesterol virtually un-controllable, due to a genetic liver defect. The only medication that has proven effective in controlling the problem is a new one that was prescribed by the State Medical School Hospital. You guessed it! This medication is not in the "formulary" and she has to pay for it herself. The cost for two tablets daily is $64.00 per week which is a fixed payment of $275 per month which must be paid from her $700 per month Social Security Disability check.
We must not be overly impressed by the photos and film clips of The Prez joshing and chumming around with J-Mac. It may appear to be that this is a man who is accepting of and concerned with persons with handicaps when in fact he regards them only as unnecessary burdens on the budget of the United States and impediments to his supreme goal of tax cuts for the rich and world conquest. To his elitist outlook, these long-suffering and wonderful people are simply in the same category with the hated "Welfare Queens" and undeserving of any form of public support. If the good people of America allow themselves to be misled by his publicity stunts, we will find that we will have allowed him to destroy these treasured friends and neighbors with his "compassionate kindness".
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It's the National Animal Identification System, authorized by the Patriot Act, but being implemented by the U.S. department of agriculture. This thing will compel every owner of even one cow, horse, pig, goat, sheep, llama, chicken, turkey, duck, goose, or any other form of livestock to be registered in a federal database and to have each and every one of their animals tracked 24/7, from birth to death.
By "every" owner, I don't merely mean the commercial producers with big herds and flocks. NAIS's database will also include old granny who keeps one laying hen in the backyard, city dwellers with a pot bellied pig, families who own a riding horse, someone with a pet goat or goose - everyone.
And by "tracked," I mean that every home, farm, horse stable, county fairground, pigeon coop, or other location that has as many as one of these animals on it will be compelled to register with the government and get a "Premise ID." It will include not only the name, address, phone number, and other personal data on the owner, but also the GPS coordinates of the premises for constant satellite monitoring. The owner will pay an annual fee for the privilege of registering their premises.
Second, owners will be required to have every single one of their animals implanted with RFID tags for constant tracking. Another fee will be assessed for this. There's also a time tax, for owners must report, within 24 hours, all animal "events" - births, deaths, or any trips off the premises. Go to the vet, a horse show, or take your kid's chicken to the county fair, and you must report ... or be subject to a stiff fine.
This is Jim Hightower saying... I'm told that the people who created NAIS did exempt jackasses - because they didn't want to put a chip in their own hides! To fight this insanity, go to stopanimalid.org.
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--- Bo Hopkins in Sam Peckinpah's "The Wild Bunch"(1969) ---
For Rove-Cheney watchers, that immediately begs the question -- what U.S. entity? What does "transfer fully" mean? But, alas, Warner said details about that part of the scam "weren't immediately available." For Warner watchers, especially those of us who have looked at him from every possible angle while scratching our heads, another question springs to mind -- What could Liz Taylor possibly have been thinking back in December 1976 when she took this cranky, cheerless man for a spin on her seventh time around? Before we get too giddy...it's been suggested that DPW hire a "front company" to run port operations. You know, like defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld did when the Congress told him he couldn't have the Total Information Awareness (TIA) data-mining program. Rumsfeld said okay, and took the program into the shadows, out of Congressional oversight and gave it a new name -- Terrorist Information Awareness program. Then, with Congress and the American public appeased, TIA continued business as usual, and is going full-bore today. Several US companies have been mentioned to serve as a U.S. front for DPW, such as SSA Marine Ports Company and Maher Terminals. CNN also suggested CSX World Terminals, but failed to mention that Dubai purchased a major portion of CSX from the Carlyle Group in 2005 and, oh yes, CNN suggested almost as an afterthought that perhaps the best qualified of all "entities" is Halliburton. If you're a Halliburton watcher, you know what that's all about, and it has little to do with qualifications... Who's in charge here? It looks like it's back to the shadows for a port-control strategy session. If you believe either the Bush regime or the UAE will politely back off because of the nuisance of an unhappy American citizenry, you just haven't been watching these guys in action for the past five years. There's too much money and power involved. They'll figure it out. That session ought to be easy. Bush says he's a "strategist" because, he explained, "I create...er..strategy." Can't argue with that. He also claims to be a problem-solver because he solves...er...problems; he says he's a leader because he...er...leads, and brags that he's a war president because he...er...ohhh, never mind. It should be obvious by now that George Bush has no control over the machinations of the government he claims to lead. He admittedly knew nothing about the secretive deal pushed through by the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States (CFIUS) to put six additional U.S. ports, or 24 container terminals, under the control of an Islamic regime that provided -- as Cheney says -- "safe haven" to those who -- as Bush says -- "are lurking, plotting, planning to kill us" until the story broke in the media. White House aides also said that Bush knew nothing about the UAE decision to withdraw until Warner (was Liz drunk?) announced it. Bush's belated threat to veto any amendment to derail the deal didn't scare anybody, least of all Congress, and Warner's success at taking the deal off the table saved Bush the embarrassment of being steamrolled by his own party. They would have us believe that the deal "just happened." Nobody knew. In addition to Bush taking the Abu Ghraib defense, AP's Ted Bridis writes that "...Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and even Treasury Secretary John Snow, who was plucked from CSX World Terminals for the Treasury job and oversees the government committee that approved the deal, all say they did not know about the purchase until after it was finalized." Bridis adds, "The work was done mostly by assistant secretaries." So, who's in control here? Disregard what Israel PM Ariel Sharon allegedly told Shimon Peres, his Minister of Foreign Affairs, a month after the 9-11 attack -- "I want to tell you something very clear, don't worry about American pressure on Israel," Sharon said. "We, the Jewish people control America, and the Americans know it." Yeah? Well, I want to tell you Americans don't know Jack about who controls this country. Israel may be our partner in crime; may be sucking us dry; prodding us to fight its battles -- but the United Arab Emirates, "entities" like the Carlyle Group and Halliburton, and the administration globalization gurus are in control and, as Sam Peckinpah so aptly put it -- they're blowin' this town all to hell. Port watch The critical news about the UAE is what the media, the Congress, and the administration are NOT telling the people. In addition to its multi-million-dollar order for Boeing jets, and a $6.4 billion deal to buy 80 F-16E/F multi-role fighters which will make Abu Dhabi the leading air power in the Gulf, Dubai firms have several lucrative contracts with the Pentagon, which might explain Rumsfeld's tight-lipped, purple-veined fury after a recent congressional hearing as he stood there beside a dreamily nodding Joe Lieberman (?-CT) and deflected media questions to Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Peter Pace, and U.S. Central Commander Gen. John Abizaid. The spectacle of this nation's top military brass lobbying Congress to give a foreign government control over a crucial part of our infrastructure, our military operations and security is appalling. Making the rounds of recent Sunday talk shows, Pace said, "Since 9-11, Dubai is as good a partner and friend as we've had." Pace told a Pentagon briefing on Feb. 21 that the Arab Emirates were "very, very solid partners in the alliance." Abizaid was not nearly so diplomatic. He lashed out at the public and the Congress --"The UAE is absolutely vital to our interests," Abizaid said angrily, and added that the furor over the port control was "nothing but Arab and Muslim bashing that is totally unnecessary." Abizaid should know. He's been bashing, smashing and blowing apart Arabs and Muslims for years... The tantrum Republicans and Democrats are throwing on center stage is very effective at covering the activity teeming in the shadows. Time Magazine's Daren Fonda writes that another Dubai company shows no signs of backing off its Navy contract in the Middle East. Britain sold Inchcape Shipping Services (ISS) to "a Dubai government investment vehicle for $285 million." According to Fonda, ISS "provides services to clients ranging from cruiseship operators to oil tankers to commercial cargo vessels." ISS operates out of more than a dozen U.S. port cities, the article states, "including Houston, Miami and New Orleans." In a June 2005 release, ISS announced it will provide all logistics requirements of U.S. Navy and Coast Guard ships in ports throughout the Middle East. The release also notes that ISS may asked to provide services for U.S. military training exercises and "contingency operations inland." ISS will "partner" for these services with Halliburton's Kellogg, Brown & Root (KBR), which has been awarded billions (and billions) of dollars in no-bid contracts for Iraq reconstruction. KBR watchers might wonder if these "contingency operations inland" have anything to do with its recent no-bid contract to build a network of detainment camps in the U.S. Also under consideration is the sale to Dubai International of (you guessed it) yet another British company that makes precision parts used in engines for military aircraft and tanks. The UAE purchased London's Doncasters Group for $1.2 billion, which operates nine factories, including military production facilities in Connecticut and Georgia. According to Middle East Newsline, Doncasters' clients include Boeing, General Electric, Honeywell and Pratt and Whitney... What should concern Congress and, as a minimum, tweak the curiosity of the media is the UAE's ties to, and protection of, Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda, its recognition of the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan, its thwarting of a CIA attempt to kill bin Laden before 9-11, its massive money-laundering network for terrorist activity, its funding ($23 million) for Neil Bush's IGNITE! learning systems company, and its furnishing two hijackers for the 9-11 attacks. The UAE's appalling record on human slavery should be dragged out of the shadows for all to see. In June 2005, the U.S. State Department reported that the UAE is a major destination for women sex slaves, and it regularly imports, steals or buys children from other countries to serve as camel jockeys to feed the gambling frenzy of oil-rich sheiks. Why the UAE will win We seem to be incapable of wrapping our minds around the concept of "order" that our increasingly totalitarianism government is inflicting upon us. Even as we "high-five" our success at forcing Congress to back out of the Dubai deal, we fail to notice that the power brokers on both sides of this issue have not budged. And they will not. In its initial statement, DPW said transferring operation of the ports hinged on its not losing money on its $6.8 billion purchase of London's Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Co. Otherwise, it would have no alternative but to promise to behave itself and continue to march. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist agrees. On Sunday, Frist said if no buyer is found and the Bush administration can't find any security risks, the deal for DPW to manage and operate U.S. ports could go through. "If everything that the president, the administration has said, and that is that there is absolutely no threatening or jeopardy to our security and safety of the American people ... I don't see how the deal would have to be canceled," Frist told ABC's "This Week." There's no stopping them. With friends like Frist scurrying around in the shadows, and a media willing to distort facts and distract attention, this deal is a no-brainer. Yesterday, an e-mail surfaced from DP World telling managers in Miami that the sale of U.S. assets "could take a while," and for them to assume for now that "ownership...is not going to change." CNN followed up with an opposite-speak report this morning that DP World announced it would divest itself of all U.S. port assets. However, it has hired both a financial advisor and a legal advisor, and the deal will take some time -- possibly four to six months. That's the good news. The bad news is Bush watchers know what kind of mischief this grand strategist is capable of in four to six months. Unless I am mistaken, we will be far more worried about the insurgency in Iran than we are with the port in Miami... The UAE will win because of the Free Trade Agreement we are determined to have in that part of the world. It will win because, as Mike Whitney writes in Online Journal, "The United Arab Emirates is situated at the center of an oil-dependent world. This tiny state forms the promontory that juts out into the famed Strait of Hormuz through which 40 percent of the world's oil passes every day." Whitney says Iran is just across that strait and, if we're going to attack Iran, we must have boots on the ground in Dubai to keep the strait open and ward off the resulting devastation to world oil supplies and financial markets. It will win because the crony alliance that comprises the Iron Triangle of the New World Order -- industry, government and military -- is a power elite that feeds ravenously on the soft underbelly of war like maggots on rotten meat. Until we realize just how precious freedom is, until we work to take back that which was stolen, nothing will change. We must do more than complain and cast worthless votes every few years.
Most Americans are critically aware of the importance of security in the wake of 9-11. But with best friends and partners like the United Arab Emirates, the Carlyle Group and Halliburton controlling the house -- we have little time to worry about enemies at the gate.
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Good evening and welcome to Conglomerate Network News. I'm your host, Teat Hodgkins. Tonight we open with some startling news from Southeast Asia: The United States has won the Vietnam War. Our roving reporter, Jimbo Hooper, joins us from Ho Chi Minh City. Jimbo?
Thanks, Teat. Yes, long after we all thought the final whistle had blown, plucky Team USA pulled out a last-second miracle to clinch victory in the hard-fought Vietnam War. As our viewers will recall - or maybe not, since it was such a long time ago and it's been years since they made one of those Rambo movies to explain it all to us - but anyway, the North Vietnamese army and their insurgent allies in South Vietnam, the King Kongs, fought for decades to, as they might put it, liberate Vietnam's workers from the oppressive hand of the running dog capitalists of foreign imperialism. Or something like that; I can't get wireless at my hotel here for some reason, so I couldn't Google it to be absolutely sure. Anyway, the idea, Teat, was that ordinary people would no longer have to live in crushing poverty just to make money for a few rich folks and foreign corporations. I think quite a few Vietnamesers actually gave their lives fighting for this ideal. And as you've probably seen on the History Channel, Teat, these little guys did a pretty good job at it; they pretty much kicked Uncle Sam's butt right outta here.
Or so it seemed. But it turns out now that what looked like a full-scale, FUBAR bug-out in 1975 was simply a strategic redeployment in depth. The war was fought, of course, on behalf of American big business interests, who bought out the US government and spent the entire Cold War trying to quash, usually by force, the notion that there was any alternative whatsoever - socialist, indigenous, nationalist, democratic, religious - to their own brand of rapacious, unrestrained, unregulated crony kleptocracy, or what President Bush now calls "the single sustainable model of national success." The military option they tried in Vietnam didn't work out too well, but heck, the military was only one tool in the toolbox of these big boys. They could well afford to burn 50,000 or so American lives - along with some 2 million Southeast Asians - while playing the long game.
'Cause here's the thing, Teat. To the Big Biz boys behind America's intervention in Vietnam's anti-colonial insurgency and subsequent civil war, victory was never defined as military success or as freedom, democracy, peace and prosperity for the Vietnamese people. Lord, no! Victory in Vietnam meant only one thing: moolah. If they can make money out of Vietnam, then they win. And they sure made a good pile for a long while there in the old days, through Pentagon contracts - weapons, construction, "military servicing," you name it - and sweetheart deals with the corrupt militarist regimes in South Vietnam. Now, after a long period of retrenchment, they are back in there again, squeezing that cheap gook labor to bring home the bacon to Main Street USA! Or Wall Street USA, anyway. They're still using political connections, baksheesh and grease, and a military option to back it all up - but they've outsourced the whole shebang, including any use of force, to the Vietnamese government itself, which breaks up strikes, keeps wages low and generally makes sure that huge swathes of ordinary people live in crushing poverty to make money for a few rich folks and foreign corporations.
There's this site on the Internet that I saw in Bangkok before I came here - hey, it was five-star all the way there, Teat, my laptop was firing on all cylinders - anyway, there's this CorpWatch site on the net where our viewers can go and get the story: Happy Meals, Unhappy Workers. It's all about these wildcat strikes by workers who toil at coolie wages in big factory complexes in old Saigon to churn out cheap tat for Disney, Hallmark, Starbuck and McDonald's Happy Meals.
Here's how the Corpwatch guys put it: "To remain attractive to foreign investment, government officials argue, Vietnam must provide the kind of cheap, docile labor force that foreign investors demand. But on paper, at least, Vietnam's workers are supported by has some of the strongest labor laws in the world. 'When foreign investors enter Vietnam, they must follow the country's labor rules,' says security manager Long Nguyen. 'If they don't, the Vietnamese government has the responsibility to enforce the law or expel the company. The government has to protect the worker. The unions that represent workers in factories of foreign and joint-stock companies are weak. They don't have the strength to stand up to the management.' Since the influx of private companies started a few years ago, however, enforcement of policy has been lax. According to the International Labor Organization, only 10 percent of workers in the export sector are represented by a trade union and observers can't remember a single case when a company has been forced out for breaking the law. So, most expect continued low wages and increasing numbers of wildcat strikes."
Here's more from Corpwatch: "For example, 10,000 workers staged an illegal strike at Hong Kong-owned KeyHinge toys in the Central Vietnamese city, Danang. The workers, who manufactured plastic toys given away in McDonalds Happy Meals, told Lao Dong newspaper that unless they worked 12 hours a day without overtime they would be fired. The workers also complained they were only allowed two bathroom breaks a day and that the factory only had one cup for drinking water. They told Lao Dong they were treated like animals, not allowed sick days, and fined for any mistakes."
Now, I wonder what your ordinary Joe Ricepaddy thinks about all this, Teat. He might have seen his village destroyed, his mother burned to death with napalm, his father tortured and executed by the CIA's Operation Phoenix, his daughter born deformed from Agent Orange - and here he is schlepping off to slave 12 hours a day for Ronald McDonald. He might just wonder sometimes, "What was the point of all that death and sacrifice and struggle, just to end up here? Ho might as well have run up the white flag back in '62 and sold the place to Chase Manhattan."
So there you have it, Teat: We got McDonald's, Walt Disney and Starbucks banking big profits from exploited, unprotected, politically repressed cheap labor in the dark, satanic mills of Saigon. And you're gonna tell me that America lost the Vietnam War? No way, baby. We're the Comeback Kids! I just wish you were here to drink in the rich aroma spreading from all these factories behind me, the sewage, the smoke, the garbage, the indelible odor of human poverty. It smells like....victory.
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Bush Bombs In Cleveland By Robert Scheer On the third anniversary of the beginning of his Iraq catastrophe, President Bush yet again dealt in denial, but this time the carefully screened audience at the Cleveland City Club wasn't buying it. Perhaps most on target was an elderly gentleman who cited what he said were the three main reasons for going to war in Iraq - WMD, Iraq's ties to the Sept. 11 terrorists and the alleged purchase of nuclear material from Niger - and then noted dryly that all three of these rationales turned out to be false. "How do we restore confidence that Americans may have in their leaders and to be sure that the information they are getting now is correct?" he asked the president. How indeed? "That's a great question," began Bush by way of dissembling. "First, just if I may correct a misperception. I don't think we ever said - at least I know I didn't say - that there was a direct connection between Sept. 11 and Saddam Hussein." Really? So when he said in his May 1, 2003, "Mission Accomplished" speech on the deck of the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln that "we have removed an ally of Al Qaeda," he meant a different gang with the same name as the one blamed for the attack on the World Trade Center twin towers and Pentagon? It is his way of finessing the firm conclusion of the bipartisan Sept. 11 commission that Hussein was an opponent of Al Qaeda and never an ally. Yet that didn't stop Bush from again on Monday insisting that "the central front on the war on terror is Iraq." Meanwhile, that old "central front," woolly Afghanistan, is now all sewed up, Bush reassures. "Twenty-five million people are now free, and Afghanistan is no longer a safe haven for the terrorists." Apparently the president missed the director of the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, Gen. Michael Maples, giving testimony to Congress a few weeks ago that Taliban resurgence now presents "a greater threat to the Afghan central government's expansion of authority than at any point since late 2001." To be sure, occupied Iraq is useful to Al Qaeda and its ilk - as a recruiting poster. In this and myriad other ways, the United States military's continued heavy-handed presence in Iraq strengthens the hands of extremists and demagogues who can appeal to latent Iraqi nationalism and Muslim pride. Yet we seem to have forgotten that terrorists don't really need Iraq as "a safe haven for terrorists to plot new attacks against our nation," as Bush put it - they are just as likely to be drawn from countries that are nominally our allies, such as the 15 hijackers recruited under the noses of the Bush family's sheik friends in Saudi Arabia. Finally, for old times' sake, Bush trotted out his now hoary excuses for those missing Iraqi WMD he so trumped up to get us psyched for a "preemptive" war three years ago, again blaming the deception on everyone except himself. "Like you, I asked that very same question, 'Where did we go wrong on intelligence?' " he plaintively responded to his questioner. "The truth of the matter is that the whole world thought that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction." Not so. Most of the world thought it best to wait for the U.N. inspectors, then on the ground in Iraq, to complete their work before answering that question. Those inspectors had found no evidence of WMD and this president knew full well that would probably be their final conclusion when he ordered the preemptive invasion. Yet he justified it by referring to the 9/11 attack, warning, "We cannot wait for the final proof - the smoking gun - that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud." On Tuesday, the Associated Press reported that a treasure trove of translations of audio tapes of top-level Iraqi meetings involving Hussein, released at the request of U.S. Rep. Peter Hoekstra, the Republican chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, show that Iraq had destroyed its WMD program by 1992. Those tapes were obtained soon after the 2003 invasion, yet the Bush administration kept them secret while continuing to assert that Iraq had an active WMD program.
As opposed to ordinary people in this country and the world, Bush has access to the same detailed information that the Sept. 11 commission used to conclude that the terrorist acts of Sept. 11 and others conducted by Al Qaeda bore no relation to Iraq. It is hardly an advertisement for American democracy that he was able to operate before the war and as recently as this week as if the truth will never be allowed to hold him accountable - though not in Cleveland, which is something to cheer about.
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Iraq -- US News Media's Waterloo By Robert Parry For more than three decades, the U.S. news media has been living off - or living down, depending on your perspective - its Watergate-era reputation of helping to unseat a power-abusing President and exposing a raft of other political scandals. But the U.S. media's debacle over Iraq - failing to seriously question George W. Bush's case for invasion and often acting as pro-war cheerleaders as the casualty lists lengthened - has dealt a death blow to that 30-year-old mythology. The bloody spectacle of Iraq has become the Waterloo of Washington's "Watergate press corps," its crushing defeat. Even the nation's preeminent news outlets, such as the New York Times and the Washington Post, were sucked into the fiasco, shattering the trust that many Americans had placed in their "free press" as a vital check and balance on Executive power. By contrast, many poorly funded Web sites did a much better job of standing up to the political pressures, showing skepticism and getting the story right. The third anniversary of Bush's Iraq invasion stands as a marker, too, for the slide of the U.S. news media's big-name talking heads into the status of laughingstock, even if they're too vain to know that the derision's about them. [For details, see below.] Imperial Power Over the past three years, as the Bush administration has unveiled the United States as an imperial power that plays by its own rules, it has dawned on more and more Americans that the old institutions - the Congress, the courts and the press - that were supposed to protect the Republic had long since crumbled into decay. Yet, because of the lingering Watergate myth, many Americans were most shocked to find that the scrappy, idealistic Washington press corps had evolved into a careerist, courtier news media. Even well-informed Americans were perplexed over how the press had become almost the opposite of its press clippings. After all, in the 1970s, American reporters became heroes to many for exposing Richard Nixon's crimes and revealing other abuses, such as the Pentagon's Vietnam War lies and CIA spying on U.S. citizens. Conversely, the reporters were hated by Nixon's loyalists, who called them the "liberal media." Though these extremes of Watergate images - of heroes or villains - never captured the precise picture, they did serve real political and professional needs. The news media relished its elevated heroic status, while the detractors built a cottage industry around the goal of neutralizing the "liberal media." In truth, however, reporters always operated within tight parameters set by their publishers and news executives, most of whom could be counted as wealthy members of the Establishment. Journalists rarely wandered too far afield out of fear of losing a job or a promotion. But the Vietnam War and Nixon's Watergate excesses shattered the national political consensus, creating a brief period of competing power centers and relative openness. The divisions within the Establishment, in effect, gave the reporters space to obtain information and publish stories that previously would have been kept secret. By the 1980s, however, that moment had passed. A new framework was put in place to constrain press independence. [For details, see Robert Parry's Secrecy & Privilege.] Still, right-wing press "watchdogs" and an expanding conservative media hammered away at perceived "liberal bias," and mainstream reporters learned that the biggest threat to their careers was to be stuck with the "liberal" label. Terror Attacks The Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks made dissent and skepticism even riskier. Journalists, politicians and even citizens who questioned Bush and his emerging "preemptive war" policies were denounced as unpatriotic and unhinged. [See Consortiumnews.com's "Politics of Preemption."] As a result, the media's pro-Bush pandering reached new heights. For instance, on Dec. 23, 2001, NBC's Tim Russert joined New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, Cardinal Theodore McCarrick and First Lady Laura Bush in musing about whether divine intervention had put Bush in the White House to handle the Sept. 11 crisis. Russert asked Mrs. Bush if "in an extraordinary way, this is why he was elected." Mrs. Bush objected to Russert's suggestion that "God picks the President, which he doesn't." Giuliani thought otherwise. "I do think, Mrs. Bush, that there was some divine guidance in the President being elected. I do," the mayor said. McCarrick also saw some larger purpose, saying: "I think I don't thoroughly agree with the First Lady. I think that the President really, he was where he was when we needed him." In this climate of fear and fawning, U.S. journalists knew intuitively that to question Bush's leadership could be fatal to one's career. News organizations and individual journalists concluded that their corporate and personal financial interests were best served by waving the Red-White-and-Blue, instead of raising red warning flags. As the Iraq War hysteria built in 2002, the New York Times published false stories about Iraq building a nuclear bomb. The Washington Post's opinion pages virtually excluded skeptical commentary and its own editorials cited Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction as a fact, not a point in dispute. The U.S. news media's "group think" reached its zenith on Feb. 6, 2003, the day after Secretary of State Colin Powell detailed the supposed U.S. evidence of Iraqi WMD before the United Nations Security Council. The Washington Post's editorial pages stood as a solid phalanx behind Powell's presentation. The newspaper's editorial board judged Powell's WMD case "irrefutable" and added: "it is hard to imagine how anyone could doubt that Iraq possesses weapons of mass destruction." That opinion was echoed across the Post's Op-Ed page. "The evidence he (Powell) presented to the United Nations - some of it circumstantial, some of it absolutely bone-chilling in its detail - had to prove to anyone that Iraq not only hasn't accounted for its weapons of mass destruction but without a doubt still retains them," wrote Post columnist Richard Cohen. "Only a fool - or possibly a Frenchman - could conclude otherwise." Post columnist Jim Hoagland demanded the surrender of any Bush-doubting holdouts: "To continue to say that the Bush administration has not made its case, you must now believe that Colin Powell lied in the most serious statement he will ever make, or was taken in by manufactured evidence. I don't believe that. Today, neither should you." Not that there were many skeptical voices in the U.S. media still needing silencing. [In contrast to the mainstream coverage on Feb. 6, 2003, Consortiumnews.com published a contrary view about Powell's credibility, "Trust Colin Powell?"] Invading Iraq Competing with Fox News to "brand" its news product as super-patriotic, MSNBC fired host Phil Donahue because his show allowed on some war opponents. Also, reflecting its new direction, MSNBC gave day-long coverage to a diner that renamed "French fries" as "Freedom fries." After Bush ordered the invasion of Iraq on March 19, 2003, U.S. news outlets dropped even the pretense of objectivity. TV anchors opined about what strategies "we" should follow in prosecuting the Iraq War. "One of the things that we don't want to do is to destroy the infrastructure of Iraq because in a few days we're going to own that country," NBC's Tom Brokaw explained as he sat among a panel of retired generals on the opening night of "Operation Iraqi Freedom." Electronically waving the flag, Fox and MSNBC superimposed Old Glory on scenes from Iraq. The networks also broadcast Madison Avenue-style montages of heroic American soldiers at war, amid thankful Iraqis and stirring background music. Fox described the Iraqi militia fighters as "Saddam's goons" and adopted Bush's preferred phrasing for "suicide bombings" as "homicide bombings." While denouncing Iraqi TV for showing pictures of U.S. POWs, Fox and other U.S. news outlets showed footage of Iraqi POWs being paraded before U.S. cameras. CNN wasn't far behind in the super-patriotism sweepstakes, adopting the U.S. code name "Operation Iraqi Freedom" for its coverage, even as televised scenes showed captured Iraqis handcuffed and kneeling before U.S. soldiers. Post-Conquest Rhetoric After U.S. forces toppled Saddam Hussein's statue in Baghdad three weeks into the conflict, pro-war pundits grew even more intolerant of dissent. Fox News anchor Brit Hume chastised journalists who had doubted the ease with which the Iraq War would be won. "They didn't get it just a little wrong," Hume said. "They got it completely wrong." Syndicated columnist Cal Thomas demanded that the words of the doubters be archived so they would be permanently discredited. "When these false prophets again appear, they can be reminded of the error of their previous ways and at least be offered an opportunity to recant and repent," Thomas wrote. Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer declared that "the only people who think this wasn't a victory are Upper Westside liberals, and a few people here in Washington." MSNBC's Joe Scarborough singled out former U.N. weapons inspector Scott Ritter, who had doubted the existence of Iraqi WMD, as the "chief stooge for Saddam Hussein" and demanded that Ritter and other skeptics apologize. "I'm waiting to hear the words 'I was wrong' from some of the world's most elite journalists, politicians and Hollywood types," Scarborough said. "Maybe disgraced commentators and politicians alike, like Daschle, Jimmy Carter, Dennis Kucinich, and all those others, will step forward tonight and show the content of their character by simply admitting what we know already: that their wartime predictions were arrogant, they were misguided and they were dead wrong." "We're all neo-cons now," chimed in MSNBC's Chris Matthews. "The Tommy Franks-Don Rumsfeld battle plan, war plan, worked brilliantly, a three-week war with mercifully few American deaths or Iraqi civilian deaths," said Fox News commentator Morton Kondracke. "All the naysayers have been humiliated so far. ... The final word on this is hooray." CNN's Lou Dobbs said, "Some journalists, in my judgment, just can't stand success, especially a few liberal columnists and newspapers and a few Arab reporters." A couple of weeks after Baghdad's fall, the George W. Bush cult literally took flight when Bush donned pilot gear and landed on a U.S. aircraft carrier off the California coast. On May 1, 2003, he appeared under a "Mission Accomplished" banner and declared the end of major combat. Much of the U.S. news media rhetorically swooned at Bush's feet. "We're proud of our President," Chris Matthews said. "Americans love having a guy as President, a guy who has a little swagger, who's physical. ... Women like a guy who's President. Check it out. The women like this war. I think we like having a hero as our President." "Picture perfect," said PBS's Gwen Ifill. "Part Spider-Man, part Tom Cruise, part Ronald Reagan. The President seized the moment on an aircraft carrier in the Pacific." "If image is everything, how can the Democratic presidential hopefuls compete with a President fresh from a war victory," said CNN's Judy Woodruff. [For a contrary view at the time, see Consortiumnews.com's "America's Matrix." Some pundit quotes above were compiled by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting. Also, see Norman Solomon's "War-Loving Pundits," March 16, 2006] Insurgent War Only after the promised discovery of WMD caches didn't occur - and a bloody insurgency did - did the U.S. news media temper its enthusiasm. The New York Times and the Washington Post recanted some of their false reporting and the major newspapers finally began writing more skeptical articles, including revelations about torture policies and warrantless wiretapping of Americans. Yet, even as the death toll of American soldiers exceeds 2,300 and the number of Iraqi dead soars into the tens of thousands, it can't be said that the career calculations made by most journalists three years ago - to hop on the Bush bandwagon - didn't work out well for most of the leading pro-war pundits. Indeed, except for New York Times correspondent Judith Miller (who resigned amid a controversy over her coziness with administration sources) and Washington Post columnist Michael Kelly (who died in a vehicle accident in Iraq), the roster of leading American pundits remains almost unchanged. Their new "take" on the war is that Bush and his high command deserve credit for orchestrating a brilliant military campaign on behalf of a noble cause but that mistakes were made in not having better WMD intelligence, in not committing more troops and in not implementing a better occupation plan. As recently as last year, many of the top pundits hailed Bush as "visionary" for supposedly infusing the Middle East with democracy. Bush got credit for the Iraqi voter turnout, even though it was driven by the Shiite grab for political dominance; for the anti-Syrian protests in Lebanon over which he had almost no influence; and for some regional elections, like those in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, that were shams. It was not until Islamic militants in Hamas won electoral control of the Palestinian Authority that the U.S. press corps noticed the flaws in Bush's "democracy" justification for the Iraq War, which had surfaced after the WMD stockpiles didn't. But the bottom line for high-paid Washington journalists is that pandering to Bush still makes great career sense. Not only is it easier to take the propaganda handouts from the Bush administration - than to go digging out stories that rely on some terrified whistleblowers - but there is almost no downside to the propaganda stories even when they turn out to be wrong. You can just say you were writing the same thing everyone else was. For American democracy, the only lasting answer to this media crisis will be to build independent press outlets staffed by honest journalists who put truth ahead of career advancement.
But without doubt, one of the uncounted casualties of the Iraq War is the death of the Watergate myth, the notion that Washington journalists are heroes fighting for the public's right to know and protecting the U.S. Constitution.
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| Abortion Ban Will Test 'Moderate' Republicans Whatever else may be said about the august legislators of South Dakota, who have arrogated unto themselves the decision of every woman in that state as to whether to continue a pregnancy, they have accomplished something that could prove important to the entire country. Long before the repercussions reach the U.S. Supreme Court, their law criminalizing abortion may finally bring a measure of candor into this controversy. Such honesty will not be welcome among those who have sought to placate the religious right without arousing the moderate majority. But the passage of the South Dakota bill, soon to be imitated in dozens of other states, should at last require every one of those politicians to explain why he or she believes that rape and incest demand exceptions to the anti-abortion rule. For anyone who really believes that from the moment of conception every fetus becomes a human being, with the same inalienable rights as any other person, there can be no moral distinction in cases of rape or incest. When pregnancy results from a brutal crime, the perpetrator is not the fetus but the rapist. Yet many supposedly pro-life politicians still insist on that exception, despite its rejection by the Catholic hierarchy and Protestant fundamentalist theologians. To demand an exception for rape or incest is and always has been strictly a matter of political convenience rather than moral philosophy. Among the pandering pols who cling to the exception-and thus evade the logic of their own argument-are George W. Bush and John McCain, along with a massive cohort of other ardently "pro-life" elected officials. They are guided by opinion polls that consistently show support for the exception among most Americans, including many who otherwise believe abortion is wrong. Endorsing the exception conveniently allows any politician to sound more moderate without completely forfeiting his or her anti-abortion credentials. The leaders of the religious right and the anti-abortion movement have colluded with their conservative Republican favorites by permitting this little deception. They know that as a practical matter, the exception would have little effect. Thanks to South Dakota's legislators, who forthrightly outlawed abortion for victims of rape and incest, the old dodge has now been exposed. The passage of their bill has required certain moralizing politicians to contort themselves into comical positions. Proving his zeal to make himself acceptable to his critics on the religious right, for instance, Mr. McCain authorized the release of a transparently stupid statement to the press. His spokesman said that the Arizona Republican "would have signed the [South Dakota] legislation, but would also take the appropriate steps under state law-in whatever state-to ensure that the exceptions of rape, incest or life of the mother were included." Signing the legislation, of course, would have outlawed the exceptions. Presidential ambition is twisting the Senator's "straight talk" these days, but Mr. McCain isn't alone in trying to satisfy the religious right without alienating mainstream voters. The Republican governor of South Dakota signed the bill, while simultaneously trying to disown it as something that legislators "chose to do" on their own. Senator John Thune, the South Dakota Republican who unseated Democrat Tom Daschle with anti-abortion rhetoric, promised to "continue to watch [the South Dakota bill] closely as it moves through the courts." How courageous! In Washington, the President's press secretary responded to questions about the bill by noting that it was a "state matter," and that the President always seeks to build a "culture of life," except for those fetuses conceived in rape or incest. It would be interesting to hear Mr. Bush articulate the reasoning that led him to that contradictory position. As we move toward the day of reckoning in the Supreme Court and in state capitals across the country, Americans will have to consider an even harder question. It's an issue that most abortion opponents do not dare to confront. Under the South Dakota bill, abortion will become a felony, but only the doctor who performs the procedure is subject to prosecution. The woman who seeks and pays for the operation is not. Yet if abortion equals murder and must be outlawed, then why should doctors but not patients be subject to criminal penalties for participating in an illegal conspiracy? For anyone who truly believes that terminating a pregnancy is the same as homicide, there can be no moral justification to indict the doctor without prosecuting the patient as well. Such a law denies equal protection to physicians and might well be held unconstitutional-even if there is no right to privacy that shields abortion itself.
It is long past time for Americans to consider these issues with the seriousness they deserve and stop behaving like the politicians who pretend to have it both ways. They should understand that if the religious right wins this struggle, the consequences will be extreme indeed-and there will be no exceptions.
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War-Loving Pundits By Norman Solomon The third anniversary of the Iraq invasion is bound to attract a lot of media coverage, but scant recognition will go to the pundits who helped to make it all possible. Continuing with long service to the Bush administration's agenda-setting for war, prominent media commentators were very busy in the weeks before the invasion. At the Washington Post, the op-ed page's fervor hit a new peak on Feb. 6, 2003, the day after Colin Powell's mendacious speech to the U.N. Security Council. Post columnist Richard Cohen explained that Powell was utterly convincing. "The evidence he presented to the United Nations -- some of it circumstantial, some of it absolutely bone-chilling in its detail -- had to prove to anyone that Iraq not only hasn't accounted for its weapons of mass destruction but without a doubt still retains them," Cohen wrote. "Only a fool -- or possibly a Frenchman -- could conclude otherwise." Meanwhile, another one of the Post's syndicated savants, Jim Hoagland, led with this declaration: "Colin Powell did more than present the world with a convincing and detailed X-ray of Iraq's secret weapons and terrorism programs yesterday. He also exposed the enduring bad faith of several key members of the U.N. Security Council when it comes to Iraq and its 'web of lies,' in Powell's phrase." Hoagland's closing words banished doubt: "To continue to say that the Bush administration has not made its case, you must now believe that Colin Powell lied in the most serious statement he will ever make, or was taken in by manufactured evidence. I don't believe that. Today, neither should you." Impatience grew among pundits who depicted the U.N.'s inspection process as a charade because Saddam Hussein's regime obviously possessed weapons of mass destruction. In an essay appearing on Feb. 13, 2003, Christopher Hitchens wrote: "Those who are calling for more time in this process should be aware that they are calling for more time for Saddam's people to complete their humiliation and subversion of the inspectors." A few weeks later, on March 17, President Bush prefaced the imminent invasion by claiming in a televised speech: "Should Saddam Hussein choose confrontation, the American people can know that every measure has been taken to avoid war, and every measure will be taken to win it." In the same speech, noting that "many Iraqis can hear me tonight in a translated radio broadcast," Bush offered reassurance. "I have a message for them: If we must begin a military campaign, it will be directed against the lawless men who rule your country and not against you." The next day, Hitchens came out with an essay featuring similar assurances, telling readers that "the Defense Department has evolved highly selective and accurate munitions that can sharply reduce the need to take or receive casualties. The predictions of widespread mayhem turned out to be false last time -- when the weapons [in the Gulf War] were nothing like so accurate." And, he added, "it can now be proposed as a practical matter that one is able to fight against a regime and not a people or a nation." With the full-scale attack underway, the practicalities were evident from network TV studios. "The American public knows the importance of this war," Fox News pundit and Weekly Standard executive editor Fred Barnes proclaimed a few days after the invasion began. "They are not as casualty sensitive as the weenies in the American press are." And what about the punditry after the ballyhooed "victory" in Iraq? Researchers at the media watch group FAIR (where I'm an associate) have exhumed statements made by prominent media cheerleaders who were flush with triumph. Often showing elation as Baghdad fell, U.S. journalists lavished praise on the invasion and sometimes aimed derisive salvos at American opponents of the military action. One of the most gleeful commentators on network television was MSNBC's "Hardball" host Chris Matthews. "We're all neo-cons now," he crowed on April 9, 2003, hours after a Saddam Hussein statue tumbled in Baghdad. Weeks later, Matthews was still at it, making categorical declarations: "We're proud of our president. Americans love having a guy as president, a guy who has a little swagger, who's physical, who's not a complicated guy like Clinton or even like Dukakis or Mondale, all those guys, McGovern. They want a guy who's president. Women like a guy who's president. Check it out. The women like this war. I think we like having a hero as our president. It's simple." Simplistic was more like it. And, in the rush of stateside enthusiasm for war on Iraq, centrist pundits like Matthews -- apt to sway with the prevailing wind -- were hardly inclined to buck the jingoistic storm. Pseudo-patriotic hot air remained at gale force on Fox News Channel, still blowing strong. "Tommy Franks and the coalition forces have demonstrated the old axiom that boldness on the battlefield produces swift and relatively bloodless victory," Tony Snow told viewers in late April. "The three-week swing through Iraq has utterly shattered skeptics' complaints." What passes for liberalism on Fox also cheered and gloated. Sean Hannity's weak debating partner, Alan Colmes, threw down a baiting challenge on April 25. "Now that the war in Iraq is all but over," Colmes demanded, "should the people in Hollywood who opposed the president admit they were wrong?" Meanwhile, with many liberals at esteemed media outlets joining in praise for the war effort, some commentators who had murmured dissent in the lead-up to the invasion proceeded to ceremoniously eat their hats. Longtime Washington Post columnist William Raspberry was quick to pose self-critical questions: "Shouldn't the [Canadian] prime minister and all of us who thought the war was hasty and dangerous and wrongheaded admit that we were wrong? I mean, with the pictures of those Iraqis dancing in the streets, hauling down statues of Saddam Hussein and gushing their thanks to the Americans, isn't it clear that President Bush and Britain's Tony Blair were right all along?" Like many other commentators, Raspberry was eager to discard skepticism when American might appeared to make right in Iraq. "If we believe it's a good thing that Hussein's regime has been dismantled," his column declared on April 14, 2003, "aren't we hypocritical not to acknowledge Bush's superior judgment?... Why can't those of us who thought the war was a bad idea (or, at any rate, a premature one) let it go now and just join in celebrating the victory wrought by our magnificent military forces?"
The zestful willingness of so many high-profile journalists to serve
as boosters for the "magnificent" war in Iraq three years ago
provides important clues as to why -- even now -- so few are willing
to directly challenge the continuing U.S. war effort. Accommodation
to pervasive militarism is a reflex in mainstream U.S. journalism.
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 Iraq: The Democrats' Dilemma By Eric Alterman A master narrative, once formed in the collective mind of the mainstream media, becomes impervious to interference from inconvenient reality. Today the political narrative demands that the Democrats be derided for their "disarray." Yes, George W. Bush is the most unpopular President since Nixon in the days before his forced resignation. In the most recent AP/Ipsos poll, nearly 70 percent of those questioned believe that the country is on the wrong track. The Bush domestic agenda is politically dead, and his Iraq adventure looks increasingly like it contains the seeds of a regional Armageddon. Yet according to the accepted story line, none of that matters. The Democrats' disarray on how to handle the war dominates the reporting of Adam Nagourney and Matt Bai in the New York Times, of Shailagh Murray and Charles Babington in the Washington Post, of Joe Klein in Time, of the smart boys who write ABC News's "The Note" and Slate, along with that of virtually everyone else charged with reporting on the topic. Personally, I have a hard time understanding why, if it was the Administration that created the Iraq quagmire with its toxic combination of mendacity, incompetence and ideological obsession, it is somehow the responsibility of powerless Democrats to solve it. Given the right wing's stranglehold on both the political process and public discourse, Democrats cannot hope to address this problem or even have their public proposals treated fairly. Why then should they make themselves politically vulnerable by offering up a target for Rove and O'Reilly to torture, twist and otherwise pervert for the purpose of political assassination both in 2006 and again in 2008? What's more, the Iraq situation is deteriorating so rapidly, it is impossible to imagine what will face a Democratic presidential candidate when a genuine plan does become obligatory. Until then, all a potential nominee can do is foreclose future options. Consider 2002. Democrats were desperate to remove the question of Iraq from the agenda in order to fight the election on domestic issues, where they retained their traditional polling advantages. Endangered Southern Dems were begging the Congressional leadership not to put the party out front against Bush on Iraq, lest it open up avenues for a Rovian assault on their patriotism and support for the military. As a result, John Kerry, who began with a genuinely antiwar critique of Bush's folly, was put in the position of having to find a way to support it, lest he compromise his ability to secure the support of his colleagues for his presidential candidacy two years later. According to sources I trust, Kerry actually gave an impassioned speech against the war to an internal Democratic gathering before reversing himself and backing it, albeit in an entirely incoherent fashion. The net result proved to be a disaster, for Kerry and the country, when his various contradictory statements were easily employed to paint the Democratic candidate as indecisive and untrustworthy. (And of course the party's timidity on the war vote did little to protect vulnerable officeholders, making the entire exercise one of futility.) Many on the left are demanding that the Democrats adopt an "out now" policy toward Iraq, but this, too, misunderstands the party's political problem. First off, it's not practical. Even if the leadership were to sign on to an out-now strategy, it has no enforcement mechanism to insure the compliance of those who disagree. The effect would undoubtedly be to reinforce the "disarray/these people can't be trusted to protect us" narrative that remains the Democrats' Achilles' heel. What's more, despite growing public support, a call for withdrawal would be treated in the conservative punditocracy as the equivalent of a call to "cut and run," and hence would open the entire "weak on defense" Pandora's box that almost always dooms Democrats in national elections. And for what? Does anyone truly believe that if the Democratic leadership calls for Bush to quit Iraq, it will actually happen? Nevertheless, it's an awful situation, and all attempts to address it will be fraught with risk. A Democratic refusal to adopt a single position on Iraq collides, strategically, not only with growing dissatisfaction and impatience with the failed Bush strategy there but also with the need for Democrats to nationalize the 2006 election in order to focus attention on Republican incompetence, corruption and ideological extremism. If the model is Newt Gingrich's 1994 "Contract With America," then the party needs to be able to say something, collectively, about Iraq that sounds like more than just pablum. When, at a Washington dinner sponsored by the Third Way organization not long ago, I asked DNC chair Howard Dean about this conundrum, he replied that the concept of a strategic redeployment of US troops could provide the basis for such a position and said he has been working to build a consensus around it "from Murtha to Biden." (We note for the record that no Democratic consensus can include Joe Lieberman, who has been rapidly moving to the right even of most Republicans.) Dean may be correct. As Russell Feingold recently noted, fully forty senators united around an anti-White House resolution back in November demanding "that the president should offer to Congress and the American public an idea of when our military mission in Iraq can come to an end and our brave men and women in uniform can return home." The Republicans panicked and tried to force a vote designed to embarrass the opposition, which did not work. The Democrats' momentum was lost, however, when John Murtha changed the subject to immediate withdrawal and reopened the party's vulnerable flanks. But "redeployment" is not "withdrawal." And Democrats who require more detailed plans to give definition to these terms can begin with those put forth by Lawrence Korb and Brian Katulis of the Center for American Progress, and more recently by the realist foreign policy scholar Barry Posen in a recent symposium in Boston Review.
It's an imperfect solution at best, but we long ago lost the luxury of allowing an imaginary "best" to be the enemy of the "not quite as horrible." Just look at Iraq...
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 Heil Bush, Dear propaganda ansager Babington, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your constant shilling for the Junta and your attacks on Senator Feingold for daring to suggest censure, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Media Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Wolf's Lair" formally 'Rancho de Bimbo' on 05-27-2006. We salute you herr Babington, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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AUSTIN, Texas -- Good news: The Bush people have put out a new "strategy." The bad news is it's the same as the old one.
The Pentagon's strategic review plan again commits us to promoting democracy hither and yon through such effective means as pre-emptive war, bombing and other good stuff.
This is the same plan we've been working from, with mixed results so far. In the Middle East, the Palestinians had an election and put Hamas in charge. That didn't seem to make anyone happy. Lebanon had an election and put Hezbollah in charge. The theory that democracy would solve all problems is especially dicey in Iraq. The Iraqis have now elected an entire government, but they don't seem to be able to get it to gel. Meanwhile, we are committed to forcing democracies into existence as though they were so many slow spring bulbs.
I do like the idea of supporting democracy, however, and think we should try it -- especially here in the U.S. of A. To this end, a couple of dandy ideas are now circulating, and I think they're worth your support and excitement. For ages, all good reformers have wanted to get rid of the Electoral College and have direct popular election of presidents, instead. The disastrous election in 2000 finally culminated in Bush v. Gore, a Supreme Court decision so bad even the court disowned it at the time.
Every nightmare scenario about just how screwed up things could get with the Electoral College all came true. What a giant mess: a textbook case of why the Electoral College is toxic piffle. But the desire to Do Something about the mess in 2000 burned itself out. The Republicans who took over Congress are just not natural reformers.
Trouble is, the system has just about "ruint" presidential elections, which now turn on a handful of swing states, while everyone else is ignored. While millions of dollars, hours of political ads and hordes of politicians descend every four years on the swing states, you can barely tell there's an election going on in the rest of the country. Should you live safely tucked into a solidly red or blue state, your vote is unsought, uncounted and unnecessary -- we know how your state's votes will be cast whether you vote or not.
There is a new move promoted by the Campaign for a National Popular Vote to end-run all the problems normally associated with abolishing the Electoral College. This is a state-by-state effort to instruct each state's electors to vote for whichever candidate gets the most popular votes nationwide. Look at 2004: A switch of 60,000 votes in Ohio would have thrown the entire election to John Kerry, despite the fact that George Bush was 3 million votes ahead nationwide.
The Campaign for a National Popular Vote has a dandy new approach. Instead of trying to amend the Constitution through a long, difficult process that can and will be stalled by small sates, the campaign proposes a simpler, elegant solution. According to the Constitution, each state legislature can instruct its own electors to cast their votes however the state decides, usually as winner-take-all for whichever candidate carries the state. But there is no reason a state legislature cannot instruct its electors to vote for whomever wins the popular vote.
Democracy! What a concept! The states can do this one-by-one, subscribing to an interstate compact that would take effect when enough states join to elect the actual winner -- a majority of the 538 electoral votes.
Wouldn't it be fun? Candidates campaigning everywhere -- everyone's vote wanted? Democrats in Texas, Republicans in New York, all sought after, cared about as though we actually matter. Yes, this would make campaigns harder on candidates and probably more expensive, as well. And that in turn makes public campaign financing all the more likely. Yea!
Another potentially hopeful development lurks in the Texas redistricting case. True, if the Supreme Curt reverses the appalling Texas plan, the guy most likely to benefit is Rep. Tom DeLay (he would get back a slew of Republican voters he gave away), but sest la vye. Gerrymandering congressional districts -- an art form long practiced by both parties -- may have an aged pedigree, but like money in politics, it has gone so far that it is destroying democracy.
With computers, districts can be drawn to such perfect political one-sidedness that there is, in fact, no point in holding elections at all. The Supreme Court is highly unlikely to stop this process entirely, but even a check on it would be useful.
There is another simple, elegant solution for this problem. Iowa already uses it -- a nonpartisan redistricting commission. The result is that three of Iowa's four congressional seats are competitive. Politicians actually have to go out and listen to voters in order to get elected.
In most districts, re-election is so automatic it might as well be a hereditary right. When at least 98 percent of Congress gets re-elected every year, one really has to question whether democracy exists at all in this country. Now's our chance -- sign us up for the Pentagon democracy plan.
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Did you catch Bush's evangelical-deer-caught-in-the-political-headlights moment Monday?
It came during the Q & A session following his speech on Iraq. The first question came from a woman who asked: "[Author Kevin Phillips] makes the point that members of your administration have reached out to prophetic Christians who see the war in Iraq and the rise of terrorism as signs of the apocalypse.
Do you believe this, that the war in Iraq and the rise of terrorism are signs of the apocalypse? And if not, why not?"
The president was clearly taken aback. He reacted as if he'd just seen a burning bush -- or had just been asked a really hard math question.
First he hemmed. Then he hawed. Then he hemmed some more.
"Um... uh... I... The answer is, I haven't really thought of it that way," he finally spit out. "Here's how I think of it. The first I've heard of that, by the way. I guess I'm more of a practical fellow." He then abruptly Left Behind the question at hand and went off on a long, standard-issue answer about 9/11 and fighting terrorists over there so we don't have to fight them over here.
It was the least convincing performance since, well, since the why-I'm-optimistic-about-Iraq speech that preceded it.
I mean, come on. The man is a born again, evangelical Christian whose favorite political philosopher is Jesus, has let it be know that God speaks to -- and through -- him, believes "in a divine plan that supercedes all human plans"... and he wants us to buy that he's never even heard of, let alone thought about the biblical implications of terrorism in relation to the apocalypse?
Sorry if I find this Revelation just a little hard to swallow.
After all, the notion that we are fast approaching the end of the world is not being espoused by some street corner Jeremiah wearing a "The End is Nigh!" sandwich board. Roughly 50 million Americans believe in some form of End-Time philosophy. And check out the best-seller lists: the apocalyptic Left Behind series of books have repeatedly been among the country's best selling titles, with over 70 million copies sold.
End-Timers have also spawned a mini-industry of imminent doomsday Web sites like ApocalypseSoon.org and Raptureready.com. The latter features a Rapture Index that, according to the site, acts as a "Dow Jones Industrial Average of end time activity" and a "prophetic speedometer" (the higher the number, the faster we're moving toward the Second Coming). For those of you keeping score, the Rapture Index is currently 156 -- an off-the-chart mark of prophetic indicators.
Questions about Bush having an apocalyptic worldview have been bandied about for years. So much so that his chief speechwriter, Michael Gerson, felt compelled, at a 2004 conference, to dismiss the idea that the invasion of Iraq had anything to do with goosing the Rapture: "The president is not reading [Left Behind author] Tim LaHaye for his Middle East policy," he sniffed.
So why the president's over-the-top, "first I've heard of that" denial? If he really hasn't given any thought to the idea that the war on terror, which he has so frequently described as a battle between "good" and "evil," is in any way connected to the Biblical battle of Armageddon, wouldn't a simple "Hell no" have sufficed?
... Gary Brookins ...  |
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Well there's this dance, you ought to know
Zip gun, zip gun bop
Well there's flat-foot Louie
Now you take that cat Mugs
Zip gun, zip gun bop
(Spoken)
So now you can see
Zip gun, zip gun bop
Zip gun, zip gun bop
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Parting Shots...
 WASHINGTON, DC-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Monday that escalating violence in Iraq demonstrates that the Iraqi population is now capable of waging the Iraq war without outside military aid, and pronounced the American mission there "a complete success." Rumsfeld lauds Iraqis' progress in making war. "Over the last month, the Iraqis have been fighting like you wouldn't believe," said Rumsfeld in a press conference at the Pentagon. "New Iraqis are joining the war every day-so many, in fact, that we don't know where they all came from. It's almost as if they came out of nowhere." "The scope and intensity of the combat in Iraq is such that I believe the presence of American forces in the country will no longer be required to help the Iraqi people plummet into meaningless violence," Rumsfeld added. Rumsfeld had harsh words for what he called the "cowardly and small-minded opposition" to American involvement in the region. "Critics of this war who said we couldn't inspire the Iraqi people to stand up and fight for themselves have been proven wrong," Rumsfeld said, gesturing toward a map displaying conflict across the entire nation. "There was the stubborn perception that after greeting us as liberators, the Iraqis had no fight in them, and couldn't effectively defend their interests. Without our presence on their soil, I doubt most Iraqis would ever have lifted a finger or picked up a gun at all. Now, there's almost no stopping them." A Department of Defense analysis released Monday gave the Iraqi combatants high marks for morale, tenacity, and unit cohesiveness, and noted "outstanding improvement" in the following areas: improvised explosive manufacturing, roadside-bomb concealment, sniping, checkpoint attacking, civilian massacres, mosque destruction, and guerrilla-style ambush. "The average Iraqi fighter has made remarkable progress and we are very proud," said Lt. Col. Bailey Whitman, a spokesman for coalition forces stationed in Baghdad. "In the past several weeks, people across Iraq have, in a systematic way unthinkable just three years ago, overrun both Shi'a and Sunni neighborhoods with devastating results. This is an out-and-out success by the standards of the modern American military." The lieutenant colonel's remarks were cut short when a rocket-propelled grenade detonated outside his briefing room, spraying him with dust and pulverized glass. Brushing off his jacket, Whitman gestured to the jagged gash in the wall and smiled. "The Iraqis are doing just fine on their own."
 Iraqi citizens, inspired by the U.S. military presence, prepare for war.
Rumsfeld, however, sought to reassure the Iraqi people that despite their rapid improvement, the U.S. would not abandon them. "We've accomplished a lot," Rumsfeld said. "But there's still so much to take from the people of this rich country, and we're not going to pack up and leave just because they're doing so well on their own. We look forward to working very, very closely with Iraq, once there's a friendly government in place that we can do business with."
Added Rumsfeld: "We plan to be around for a long, long time." |
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In This Edition
Thom Hartmann explores, "Illegal Workers: The Con's Secret Weapon."
Uri Avnery wonders, "Whom To Vote For?"
Mary Pitt asks, "What If We Don't?"
Jim Hightower watches as, "One Senator Takes A Stand."
Mark Morford exclaims, "Long Live The 9/11 Conspiracy!"
Chris Floyd with a must read, "Fear Up Harsh: The Iraqi Civil War in Context."
Ted Rall shows, "Your Tax Dollars At Work."
Robert Parry concludes, "Time To Talk War Crimes."
Joe Conason reports, "Three Years Later, No End In Sight."
Norman Solomon follows the Rethuglicans, "Blaming The Media For Bad War News."
William Rivers Pitt explains, "Incompetent Design."
Nedra Pickler wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award.'
Molly Ivins says, "Pentagon-Investigating-Itself Continues."
Helen Thomas finds, "Bush Still Trying To Convince Nation Of Progress."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department George Carlin, "On The Ten Commandments" but first Uncle Ernie wants to know, "Which Came First?"
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Mark Cohen with additional cartoons from Tom Tomorrow, Micah Wright, Steve Breen, Dubya's World.Com, Internet Weekly.Org, Blood For Oil.Org and Mike Thompson.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Coming soon...
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Which Came First? Are you a Republican because you're a traitorous moron or are you a traitorous moron because you're a Republican? By Ernest Stewart You're familiar with the old question, "Which came first, the chicken or the egg?" Rather obvious isn't it? The egg came first. What laid the egg wasn't quite a chicken yet but what came out of the egg was! So you have to wonder about the Rethuglicans, are they traitors to begin with or were they brain washed into becoming traitors by the party and it's corpo-rat media? Of course I could say practically the same thing about the Demoncrats. I know that there are some very confused liberals in the party wondering what happened to their liberal party? I of course would ask what liberal party are they talking about? Except for a very brief period under Kennedy I really can't find a liberal party under the Dems, can you? While Carter and Clinton leaned a bit to the left they were at best centralist. FDR; who sent hundreds of thousands off to concentration camps through no fault of their own, was hardly a liberal. And yet the majority of Americans whether they know it or not are liberals. We know from "Honest" Abe's Happy Camps he was no liberal and the freedom he granted the slaves had very little to do with it being the right thing and more to do with strategy. Although hundreds of thousands of just "plain folks" who flocked to the service to set the blacks free were liberals, their government wasn't. One might call Teddy Roosevelt a liberal as he accomplished many liberal goals from the National Park System to temporarily breaking up the "Trusts" his party wasn't which is why he had to form his own party "The Bull Moose Party" when the Rethuglicans dropped him in favor of William Howard Taft in 1909. No good deed ever goes unpunished! Just like the myth of the "Liberal Press" the Demoncracts have hardly been liberal. Sure you get the occasional liberal Senator or Congressman but the DNC for the most part has been fascism lite! So you might wonder why if the majority of folks are liberal they don't demand or form on their own a liberal party? For my generation the answer of course is John Kennedy. JFK was a real liberal and you see what happened to him because of that but my generation got the idea that because John was one that the Dems were all liberal too. Wrong what today's kids don't grasp was until recently the South was the domain of the Demoncrats or as they were know "Dixiecrats" you know the ones that opposed the new Rethuglican Party under Lincoln trying to hold on to slavery which is why for 100 years until Lyndon Baines came along the Dems were prized in the south and the Rethuglicans were despised. All that changed with JFK's civil rights laws that LBJ got through Congress and the fact that RFK went after the Ku Klux Klan and other fascist organizations through out the south. Now as the DNC keeps on insisting on giving us candidates to the right of center half of America sits out elections because they're no longer willing to vote for the lesser of two evils which is why we are in the position of having our beloved west Taxus prairie monkey in office and a House and Senate that won't impeach the monkey even though they know he is destroying this country and has committed literally hundreds of impeachable offenses. This is also the reason why Russ Feingold's censure motion has zero support. Sure there is the Green Party but they have about as much chance of electing someone as the Commies do. Like the Commies and the Nazis, the world wide Green Party sprang out of Germany and is controlled there ergo it's not a party to be trusted and hence a foreign party doesn't play well in America. Ergo we need a new home grown Liberal Party if we are ever going to make America the country we've all been brain washed into believing was real. Since we've never been a democracy wouldn't it be nice to give it a try for a change? No electoral college and one person one vote for both House and Senate. With a real democracy we sure as hell wouldn't be in the hopeless fix we're in now, so how about it America. Are you ready at last for a liberal party and a democratic America?
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We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
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Illegal Workers: The Con's Secret Weapon By Thom Hartmann Conservatives are all atwitter about illegal immigrants. Some want to give them amnesty. Others want to reinstitute the old Bracero program. Others want to build a wall around America, like the communists did around East Berlin. Some advocate all of the above. But none will tell Americans the truth about why we have eleven million illegal aliens in this nation now (when it was fewer than 2 million when Reagan came into office), why they're staying, or why they keep coming. In a word, it's "jobs." In conservative lexicon, it's "cheap labor to increase corporate profits." Recently George W. Bush insulted working Americans by saying that we need eleven million illegal immigrants here in the United States because (in a slightly cleaned-up version of the more blatantly racist comments of Vicente Fox) there are some jobs that "American's won't do." As the modern-day Sago miners, and the 1950s Ed Norton character Art Carney played on the old Jackie Gleason show (who worked in the sewers of NYC) prove, the reality is that there are virtually no jobs Americans won't do - for an appropriate paycheck. It's really all about breaking the back of the most democratic (and Democratic) of American institutions - the American middle class. One of the tools conservatives have used very successfully over the past 25 years to drive down wages, bust unions, and increase CEO salaries has been to encourage illegal immigrant labor in the US. Their technique is transparently simple. Conservatives well understand supply and demand. If there's more of something, its price goes down. If it becomes scarce, its price goes up. They also understand that this applies just as readily to labor as it does to houses, cars, soybeans, or oil. While the history of much of the progressive movement in the United States has been to control the supply of labor (mostly through pushing for maximum-hour, right-to-strike, and child-labor laws) to thus be able to bargain decent wages for working people, the history of conservative America has, from its earliest days grounded in slavery and indentured workers from Europe, been to increase the supply of labor and drive down its cost. In the 1980s, for example, the increasing supply of labor (both from Reagan-allowed consolidations eliminating redundant jobs, and from illegal immigration, which was around 3 million illegals by the time Reagan left office) fed massive union-busting in industry sectors from those directly hit with illegal immigrant labor (like construction and agriculture) to those who only felt its fallout but nonetheless were pressed (like coal mining). In part, because of these national downward pressures on organized labor, the miners who died in the International Coal Group's Sago Mine didn't have union protection. Indeed, as the International Coal Group's June 2005 form S-A/1 filing notes about one of their other recent mine acquisitions: ".assets are high quality reserves strategically located in Appalachia and the Illinois Basin, are union free, have limited reclamation liabilities and are substantially free of other legacy liabilities." Similarly, it's estimated that the construction industry enhanced their profits last year by over a billion dollars because the availability of illegal immigrant labor has so significantly pushed down the price of construction labor. "Union free" is good for the CEOs and stockholders of giant corporations. Reagan helped make it possible by reducing enforcement of the Sherman Anti-Trust and similar acts, by making the Labor Department hostile to labor, and by thus producing an environment into which illegal immigrant labor could step. He busted PATCO and popularized anti-union rhetoric, at a time when union membership was one of the primary boundaries that keep illegal labor out of the marketplace. Today, this fundamental economic rule of labor supply and demand is most conspicuous in the conservative reluctance to stop illegal immigration into the United States. All those extra (illegal) workers, after all, drive up the supply - and thus drive down the cost - of labor. Even in areas where there are not high populations of illegal immigrants, their presence elsewhere in the American workforce drives down overall the cost of labor nationwide. And when the cost of labor goes down, there's more money left over for CEOs and stockholder dividends. Conservatives can't just come out and say that they are pleased with the estimated eleven million illegal workers in the United States driving down wages. They can't brag that, behind oil revenue, Mexico's second largest source of income is money sent home from illegal "cheap labor" workers in the United States. They can't point out that before Reagan declared war on working people in 1981 we didn't "need a fence" to keep out illegal immigrants from the south, in large part because the high rate of unionization in America at that time, and enforcement of laws against hiring illegal immigrants, served as barriers to the entry of illegals into the workforce. They won't acknowledge the corporate benefits of a workforce whose healthcare is paid for by taxpayers but whose productivity belongs to their corporate masters. But conservative strategists have noticed that the workers - and the voters - of the United States are getting nervous about nearly 10 percent of our workforce being both illegal and cheap. This has led conservative commentators and politicians to resort to classic "wedge issue" rhetoric, exploiting Americans' fears -- while working to keep conditions relatively the same as they are today. They talk about building fences. They worry out loud about brown-skinned Middle Eastern terrorists slipping in amongst the brown-skinned South- and Central Americans. They warn us of all the social security money we'll lose if illegals have to leave the country and stop paying into a system from which they'll never be able to collect. They even find themselves obligated - catering to both working-class fears and to the bigots among us - to promote the idea of giant fences around the country to keep illegals out. (A fence that would, no doubt, tremendously profit their big contractor friends.) At the same time, catering to compassionate Americans who don't realize this is all about driving up corporate profits and driving down workers' wages, cons like Arlen Specter are promoting legislation that would decriminalize the illegals currently in the United States, thus making legal our increased workforce. As Rachel L. Swarns reported in The New York Times on February 25, 2006: "Advocates for immigrants said the [Bush/Specter] plan failed to protect the rights of immigrant workers, who they argue deserve a clear path to citizenship. And the AFL-CIO warned that a guest worker program of unlimited scale would depress wages and working conditions while creating a perpetual underclass of foreign workers." None of the various con proposals - from a fence to amnesty - address the fundamental truth of the situation: Conservatives and the businesses they represent want to maintain a large, illegal or marginally legal, and thus powerless workforce in the United States, to keep down the price of labor and help them finally destroy the union movement - and, thus, that politically pesky middle class. The reason for all these lies and obfuscations is simple, and found in the core notions of conservatism, articulated from Burke in the late 1700s to Kirk in 1953 and Greenspan over the past two decades. It's all about power, and since wealth equals power, about the control of wealth in society. Conservatives believe that what John Adams called "the rabble" - you and me - can't really be trusted with governance, and therefore that job should be kept to an elite few. The big difference between the old-line Burke conservatives and modern conservatives is that Burke and the cons of his day felt that an hereditary ruling class was desirable (because it would inculcate rulers with a sense of "noblesse oblige"), whereas modern cons like Adams, McKinley, Kirk, and Bush believe that the ruling class should be more of a meritocracy - rule by the "best." And - in the finest tradition of John Calvin (who suggested that wealth was a sign of God's blessing) - what better indication of "best" could there be than "richest"? They believe there should be a thin veneer of democracy on these old conservative notions of aristocracy in order to placate the masses, but are quite certain that it would be a disaster should the rabble ever actually have a strong say in running the country. This is, at its core, why conservatives embrace the idea of eliminating the American middle class and replacing it with a Dickensian "working poor" class, and are working so hard to use illegal immigrant labor as the lever to bring this about. As the '60's and '70's showed - during the height of the American middle class's economic and political power - a strong middle class will challenge corporate power and assert itself economically and politically. This represents a very real threat to conservative ruling elites. "The people" may even suggest that the most elite of the elites should pay stiffer taxes on the top end of their income, so that money can be used to provide the economically most disadvantaged with an opportunity to become socially and economically mobile. It would reduce the most massive of the wealth and the power of the most elite of our conservative elites. Offshoring, union-busting, and nurturing a huge population of illegal workers (while pretending to be frantic about it and bleating about building fences, fielding vigilantes, or offering "amnesty") are the core ways to destroy an economic middle class, thus ensuring the ongoing political power of the conservative elite takeover that began with the so-called "Reagan revolution" and continues to this day. This is why conservatives who complain about illegal immigration in front of the cameras won't lift a finger in the halls of congress to pass legislation that would put employers of illegals into jail. (They may support "tough fines," just so long as they're high enough to sound like a lot of money to the average working stiff but low enough to be a "cost of business" for a corporation that gets caught.) If Congress were to pass a law that said, quite simply, that the CEO of any business that was caught employing illegal immigrants went to jail for a year - no exceptions - then within a month there would be ten million (more or less) people lined up at the Mexican border trying to get out of the United States. The US unemployment rate would drop close to zero, and wages would begin to rise. The American middle class would begin to return to viability, as would the union movement in this nation. Legal immigration is a good and healthy thing for a nation, because it is done at a rate and in a way that allows a country to collectively decide what sort of labor/jobs ratios it wants to maintain. Limitless illegal immigration, however, leads to the modern-day equivalent of slavery, benefiting only the conservative corporate elites. Thus, progressives need to begin a new dialogue about immigration in the United States. (Similar discussions are already underway in many of the countries of Western Europe.) Issues include:
* To what extent should the United States bleed its middle class because Mexico is a corrupt oligarchy run by a corrupt former Coca-Cola executive? As the anguished mining families in West Virginia show, Bush was wrong when he said there were jobs Americans "won't do." But in the face of massive illegal immigration and the union-busting and wage deflation it spawns, there are increasingly jobs that Americans "can't do" and still maintain a viable lifestyle. While some geographically-specific industries (like coal mining) don't appear overwhelmed by illegal immigrant labor, its impact on the nation as a whole has made it easier for union-busting to take place from the construction industry in New Mexico to the coal mines of West Virginia. Directly or indirectly, illegal immigration affects all working Americans. Condemning the frightened working-class white guys organizing citizens' militias along our southern border, or vilifying those who listen to Limbaugh and are convinced that "liberals" are in some sort of collective plot to undermine America may feel good, but it doesn't address the real problem. Progressives will be most effective when we reach across the divides created by Bush, Specter, et al, and point out how this is really all about corporate conservative efforts to replace the American middle class with a workforce of "working poor" Americans and powerless illegal immigrants (or powerless "amnestied" workers) - all so CEOs can fatten their paychecks and further reward the "conservative" investor class.
Only then will Mexico and other countries to our south have an incentive to get their own houses in order, and will our middle class begin to recover decent bargaining power and the living wages that accompany it.
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Whom To Vote For? By Uri Avnery I BELIEVE this must be about the 15th time that I am writing an article like this one. On the eve of every national election I set out my doubts and hesitations. I do not tell people how to vote. What I am trying to do is help voters (including myself) to organize their thoughts and reach a logical conclusion, each according to his own conscience and understanding. I know, of course, that none of us makes this choice solely on the basis of logic. Many factors influence a voter on the way to the ballot box, some conscious, some unconscious. Loyalty to family or rebellion against it, loyalty to a party, sympathy with one leader or dislike of another, membership of a group or community, the views of people around us - all have an impact. But rational and self-aware people will try, in spite of all that, to let logic, too, have its say. My considerations can help only people whose views are similar, more or less, to mine. That means people who believe that the achievement of Israeli-Palestinian peace is essential to the future of Israel, that ignoring morality and justice cannot be in the national interest in the long run, that the continuation of the occupation is a calamity for us too, that peace can be achieved by negotiations with the Palestinian leadership, that it must be based on mutual recognition and respect between the State of Israel and the future State of Palestine, that the border between them must be based on the Green Line, that Jerusalem must be the capital of the two states. With these views, who should one vote for? AHEAD OF all considerations, there stands a categorical imperative: Everybody must vote! It is easy and tempting to say: There is nobody to vote for. They are all corrupt hypocrites. There is no real difference between them. So why take the trouble? Why dirty oneself? Why be a party to this? This assumes that abstaining from voting strengthens the convictions of the abstainer and hurts their opponents. Or that this protest is registered somewhere and thus influences somebody. That's a great mistake. A total logical fallacy. This is how it goes: when a person votes, he supports a certain election list. If he votes for list X, 100% of his vote goes to list X. If he does not vote, or posts a blank ballot, he lets the other voters determine the outcome. He does not use his ability to change the balance. Effectively, he confirms the choice made by others. It is as if he divides his vote between right, center and left, according to the distribution of votes among the general electorate. I hope that nobody who supports peace will be tempted to take this ineffective course. AFTER HAVING decided to vote, we must determine the main consideration that will guide us. In these elections, as in almost all previous ones, we are facing a dilemma: the list closest to our convictions is not necessarily the one that can contribute the most to realizing them in practice. If this is so, what is more important? Shall I tell myself: I must give my only, precious vote to a list that is closest to the things I believe in, even if its chance to influence the decision in the next few years is minimal, or shall I vote for a list that is less close to my opinions, but may be able to influence events in practice? What is more moral - to voice my credo and to vote for a party that will remain outside the decision-making circle, or make a compromise about the principles and vote for a party that has a chance of realizing at least a part of the things that I believe in? In short, to vote for the desirable or for the practical? This is a real dilemma, and let nobody belittle it. I do not intend to advise anybody on his choice. Everybody must consider for himself and decide for himself. If I can help at all, it is in clarifying the meaning of each choice. THE LIST closest to the approach that I outlined at the beginning is Hadash, with the Communist Party at its center. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, many misgivings that I had in the past about this party have become irrelevant. Neither Marxist ideology nor memories of Stalin play a role any longer. The problem with Hadash is another altogether: that it is fixed in the public mind as one of the "Arab parties". In the outgoing Knesset, it did not have a single Jewish member. In the next Knesset, it will probably have one: Dov Hinin, a lawyer, Nr. 3 on the list, a talented, decent and active person. But the party will not easily shed the image of an "Arab party". The overwhelming majority of its voters will be Arab, and its election campaign is being waged almost entirely in the Arab street. That should not prevent any progressive Israeli from voting for it. We want a state in which all citizens are equal, irrespective of their origin. But it will have a decisive impact on the party's ability to influence the policy of the state. After all, our main aim is to change the opinion of the Jewish majority in Israel, since only such a change can transform the country's policy. Right from the foundation of Israel, the Arab citizens have been excluded from the decision-making process. That is a shameful situation, and we must struggle with all our strength to put an end to it. But there is no chance at all that this will happen during the term of the 17th Knesset. The Hadash faction will be on the sidelines. The majority of the public will try to ignore it. So here we have the first decision to make: should one vote for an isolated opposition party close to one's views, or for a party that is less close but that can - either in government or in opposition - influence the majority? The first alternative leads to Hadash, the second to Meretz or Labor. SHOULD WE vote for Meretz? Among the "Jewish" parties, it is certainly closest to the views I set out earlier. Its leader, Yossi Beilin, launched the Geneva Initiative some years ago, which serves as the unofficial program of Meretz. Meretz makes no secret of its ardent desire to be a partner in the next government, if it is headed by Ehud Olmert. That is a problematic position. Olmert aims openly at the annexation of large chunks of the West Bank. Since he does not draw a definite map, this annexation may be minimal (say 15%) or maximal (perhaps 55%) of the West Bank. It may include all the Jordan Valley and the "Settlement Blocs" - a term coined, curiously enough, by Beilin himself. The blocs may be larger or smaller. If Meretz joins the government, there will be no leftist opposition at all in the Knesset, apart from the "Arab" parties. On the other hand, Meretz can argue that its presence in the cabinet may help to moderate the extent of the annexation. One of my problems with Meretz concerns Beilin personally. Recently he had a much publicized breakfast with Avigdor Lieberman, one of the worst racists around. After sharing "juicy herrings" with him, he announced that Lieberman, the man who is not prepared to tolerate any Arabs in Israel, is really a good and nice guy, a wise and capable fellow. The beginning of a beautiful friendship. I am sure that the herrings were tasty. But it's very difficult for me to vote for a leader who is able to keep company with a rabid racist. And, worse, to accord him public legitimacy, and on the eve of elections, at that. MY MOST serious hesitation concerns the Labor party. The election of Amir Peretz as party leader made my very happy. It was much more than just a change of personnel. It was a qualitative change in Israeli society. For dozens of years, we were painfully aware of the fact that more than half of the Jewish population in Israel, the "oriental" public, was overwhelmingly estranged and disconnected from the peace camp, which should have been its natural home. I have always believed that the resolution of this paradox is our most important and most difficult task. And now a Morocco-born leader has been elected to head the Labor party. That breaks all established patterns in the political arena. It will have far-reaching consequences, if not this time, then the next. I don't know Peretz from close up. But he impresses me as a concerned, intelligent and strong leader, with solid principles, not only on social matters (which are important enough by themselves) but also about peace. He has a lot of experience as a negotiator, and he understands the importance of negotiating with the Palestinian leadership. I am sorry that this part of his message has been subdued, and almost silenced, by the marketing experts who now run Labor's campaign. If one wants to give one's vote to a party that has the best chance of influencing the decisions of the next government, one can vote for Peretz. The larger the Labor faction, compared to Kadima, the larger will be its part in the government and in the decision-making process. And, also, the stronger Peretz' own hold on his party will be, as against the remnants of the Peres-Barak era. There is one more consideration that speaks for Peretz. On our way to the ballot box for the 17th Knesset, we must already be thinking about the 18th. In Israel, political-psychological processes move slowly. (The Yom Kippur war, for example, aroused a huge wave of anger against Labor's leaders, especially Golda Meir and Moshe Dayan. But the big change did not happen in the elections held immediately after the war, but four years later). I can imagine that, if Peretz gains enough seats, he will become an important minister in the next cabinet, acquire experience at government level, free his party from the old team and introduce a new spirit. Then he will be a very strong candidate for Prime Minister in the next elections, which may take place in as little as one or two years time. That is not certain, but certainly possible. On the other hand, if he does not win enough votes, we cannot be sure that Labor will indeed stay true to his course. Perhaps it will appear in the end that a vote for Labor really reinforces Olmert's Sharonist program. After all, Labor's program does not even call for changing the path of the Wall. IT SEEMS then that in elections - in contradistinction to other political events - the choice is between remaining clean and correct and giving up the opportunity we have once in four years - or using the opportunity to tip the balance in our country and bring peace a little bit closer.
A hard choice.
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What If We Don't? By Mary Pitt Sometimes in life, when deciding what decision to make, it is helpful to reverse the problem and look at it from the bottom up, so to speak. There is much talk among the populace about whether it would be possible or advisable to launch impeachment procedures against President Bush so close to the end of his second, and last, term. It would likely leave us with Dick Cheney as president for two years, which many find a distasteful result. It would leave the nation "vulnerable" and "leaderless" in a "dangerous world," which is an argument that the chicken-hawks prefer to use. However, what may happen if Mr. Bush is allowed to continue on his present course? First, we recognize the recent rumblings of rumors about the intent of Iran to pursue the goal of atomic weapons as being the same song, different tune, that we heard before the invasion of Iraq. Mr. Bush's continued residence in the White House almost assures that yet another nation will experience "shock and awe," leading to greater losses of both our military and our credibility, more fear and resentment from other nations, and the further increase in our national debt. True, Dick Cheney has the same goals of world conquest and corporatocracy, but the shake-up of changing executives would take enough time that, perhaps, he would not have time enough to cause a lot of damage before the next election? We have seen the disrespect which Mr. Bush has shown for all the traditional guidelines of our democracy. He has assumed for himself the unbridled power to over-ride the authority of both Congress and the Courts, he has instituted secret "military tribunals" to which not only foreign enemies and "prisoners of war" but also American citizens are subjected, and he has been quoted as referring to the Constitution as a "Goddamned piece of paper." He has vetoed no bills that have been passed by Congress but signs them all with a notation of "executive exception," literally placing himself above the law. The impeachment of President Clinton was said to deliver a massage that "even the president is not above the law". It seems that this president is desperately in need of the same lesson. However, if he is not impeached, what lesson do we send to his successor or a long line of presidents extending into the future? We may as well tear up the Constitution and prepare for a long future of living under an absolute dictatorship. Impeachment, however, would bring a new president who would be well aware of just what happens to aspirants to total power over the United States. Impeach or not, the next American president will inherit a Herculean task in trying to restore the United States to the condition of being a vital nation with a firm footing, economically and domestically, and with credibility and respectability in the eyes of other nations. It will take years to restore the trust that was once held by the rest of the world for a nation that used to be noted for compassion, for assistance to developing nations in attaining a civilized and gratifying society, in helping to advance peace among the nations and good will among men. Without demonstrating our disdain for the overly-ambitious plans of the Neo-Con cabal, we can expect nothing but more of the same, pre-emptive invasions of other occupants of our planet, destruction of societies, including our own, and being, as a nation, despised by all who yearn for freedom and the right to choose their own government and to live within their own culture. Failure to act now would also virtually guarantee that we would continue for years in a state of war as our unwarranted aggression would further aggravate the distrust of those who feel injured by our recent actions. The number of "terrorists" grows exponentially with each imposition of our will upon other nations. The more this hatred is fed by further injustices, the more quickly we will certainly find ourselves "fighting them here." We are vulnerable on many fronts as our ports, airlines, and the borders themselves are unprotected as we pour all our funds into the foreign war effort and the pockets of the wealthy and their corporations. We learned with the advent of Katrina that our government has not the resources to effectively assist our own citizens in a national emergency. How much worse will it be if there is a real attack of great magnitude? We have suffered for five years under the foot of rampant capitalism, crony-ism, and corruption. The security of the American citizens, for which we struggled so long and so hard, has become a thing of the past, health care has been irrevocably placed in the greedy hands of the insurance companies and "big pharma" while our children risk permanent damage from the very vaccines which are supposed to protect them. Our elderly are reduced to abject poverty, and our best jobs have been exported in pursuit of the proverbial bottom line. Our national parks and forests have been put up for sale to the highest bidder, our infrastructure is falling apart from neglect as our "super-highways" have been peddled to other nations, the futures of our children have been mortgaged forever, yet we are told that the economy is booming! We all know that, if it is, it is all in the accounts of the "friends of George". Nothing pleasant is "trickling" our way.
So, the result of this view is really quite simple. What happens if we do not impeach George Bush? Do you really want to find out?
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That's how I felt when I saw Sen. Russ Feingold of Wisconsin proudly standing against George W. Bush's secret, illegal, and unconstitutional program of spying on the American people. In the politically desolate environment of the U.S. Senate - where the members blend together in shades of lifeless brown and bend so easily to the autocratic winds of the Bush/Cheney imperial presidency - it is a delight to see a flower of integrity and senatorial strength. When he introduced his resolution to censure Bush, Feingold dared to speak the simple and honest truth: "The president has violated the law. Congress must respond." He noted that, "The founders anticipated abuses of executive power by creating a balance of powers in the Constitution. We must meet a serious transgression by the president with a serious response. The American people look to us to take action. In our system of government, no one, not even the president, is above the law." Feingold was standing for the rule of law. Yet only two other Democrats have stood with him; the rest ran for the bushes (so to speak). Republican Senators were worse, fulminating against Feingold for actually trying to be what senators are supposed to be: A check and balance. Republican leader Bill Frist was especially despicable, charging that Feingold was giving comfort to terrorists by suggesting "that there is in any way a lack of support for our commander-in-chief who is leading us with a bold vision." Apparently Frist is so blinded by the glare of executive power that he doesn't know more than two thirds of Americans - and 72 percent of the troops in Iraq - do not support Bush's "bold vision." This is Jim Hightower saying... Let's show a little support for the flower of the senate. Say thanks to Russ Feingold by calling 202-224-5323. (c) 2006 Jim Hightower's latest book, "If The Gods Had Meant Us To Vote They Would Have Given Us Candidates," is available in a fully revised and updated paperback edition. |
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Here is your must-read for the month. Here is your oh-my-God-I'm-sending-this-piece-to-every-smart-person-I-know hunk of outstanding, distressing, disquieting media bliss.
Here it is: an absolutely exceptional inside scoop on the white-hot world of Sept. 11 conspiracy theories, writ large and smart by Mark Jacobson over at New York magazine, and it's mandatory reading for anyone and everyone who's ever entertained the nagging thought that something -- or rather, far more than one something -- is deeply wrong with the official line on what actually happened on Sept. 11.
See, it is very likely that you already know that Sept. 11 will go down in the conspiracy history books as a far more sinister affair than, say, the murky swirl of the Kennedy assassination. You probably already know that much of what exactly happened on Sept. 11 remains deeply unsettling and largely unsolved -- or to put another way, if you don't know all of this and if you fully and blithely accept the official Sept. 11 story, well, you haven't been paying close enough attention.
But on this, the third anniversary of the launch of Bush's illegal invasion of Iraq by way of whoring the tragedy of Sept. 11 for his cronies' appalling gain, what you might not know, what gets so easily forgotten in the mists of time and via the endless repetition of the orthodox Sept. 11 tale, is the sheer volume, the staggering array of unanswered questions about just about every single aspect of Sept. 11 -- the planes, the WTC towers, the Pentagon, the fires, the passengers and the cell phone calls and the firefighters and, well, just about everything. It is, when you look closely, all merely a matter of how far down the rabbit hole you are willing to go.
Verily, Jacobson, in his New York mag piece, encounters crackpots and fringe nutballs and those who think Sept. 11 was connected to aliens and electromagnetic fields and the Illuminati. It can, unfortunately, get a little crazy. But there is also a very smart, grounded, intelligent and surprisingly large faction -- which includes eyewitnesses, Sept. 11 widows, former generals, pilots, professors, engineers, WTC maintenance workers and many, many more -- who point to a rather shocking pile of evidence that says there is simply no way 19 fanatics with box cutters sent by some bearded lunatic in a cave could have pulled off the most perfectly orchestrated air attack of the century. Not without serious help, anyway.
Whose help? This, of course, is the biggest question of all, one which many of the more well-researched theories go a surprisingly long way toward answering.
You have to sift and sort. There are disturbing questions about collapse speeds and controlled demolitions and why the towers fell when the all-steel infrastructure was designed to easily withstand the temperatures of any sort of fire, even burning jet fuel. There are questions of the mysterious, media-documented blasts deep in the WTC towers that took place after the planes hit. There are questions of why there was such a short-selling spree on shares of American Airlines and United Air Lines the day before the attack, huge doubts about the failures of NORAD and the FAA, the bizarre case of the missing plane in the Pentagon crash, and also the downing of Flight 93 where, according to the coroner, no blood or major plane wreckage was actually found. There is, ultimately, the stunning failure of the entire multi-trillion-dollar American air-defense system. Just for starters.
There is also the very big question of what happened to 7 WTC, the only building not hit by anything at all, but which collapsed anyway, in a perfect controlled-demolition sort of way, for no reason anyone can sufficiently explain. But which just so happened to contain vital offices for the IRS, the Department of Defense, the CIA, the Secret Service, the Securities and Exchange Commission and more.
But perhaps Jacobson's article is insufficient for you. Perhaps you have heard much of it before, or you're more of the visceral type and need to actually see the proofs in order to delve deeper, have them laid out like gruesome body parts in a mesmerizing autopsy. Fair enough.
For you, we have the surprisingly compelling indie documentary "9/11 Loose Change" (Google it), freely available on the Internet and produced by three very astute and very young and very strong-willed dudes who managed to cobble together a truly astounding array of proofs and interviews and evidence, a full 1 hour and 20 minutes' worth of mesmerizing footage you will not be able to easily forget.
Or maybe you should peruse one of the countless Sept. 11 conspiracy sites, many of which link to relevant video and one of which -- scholarsfor911truth.org -- claims to be "a non-partisan association of faculty, students, and scholars, in fields as diverse as history, science, military affairs, psychology, and philosophy, dedicated to exposing falsehoods and to revealing truths behind 9/11." Start there.
Now, it's very true that some of the more specious conspiracy claims have been largely discredited and proved false. Some of the more radical "evidence" gathered by theorists is quite suspect and easily placed in the category of no-way-in-hell. This is valid. This is as it should be. You have to chew through a lot of skin and gristle to get to the real meat.
But oh the meat. The overwhelming quantity, the bloody, deadly stench of it. Fact is, it is quite impossible to watch the entire "Loose Change" documentary and not come away just a little shaken, a little awed by the sheer number of perversely interrelated facts and aberrant coincidences-that-aren't-coincidences, shaking your head at how it all seems to irrefutably prove there is far, far more to the Sept. 11 tragedy than just crazy Osama and his band of zealots, as you begin to sink into a sighing morass of rage and frustration and suspicion and mistrust. You almost can't help it.
Of course, there is another option. There is another way out. You may, as is the standard cultural default, simply ignore it all, scoff and roll your eyes and shrug it all off because it's just too bleak and distasteful to entertain the idea that the dark Sept. 11 thread winds all the way through the NSA and the FBI and the White House and the Project for the New American Century and Dick Cheney's mangled soul and God only knows where else.
But then again, no. You have to look. You have to try. Knowledge is power, and while the truth may be spurious and slippery and messy and deep, the pursuit of it is just about the only thing we have left. Give that up, and all that's left is spiritual numbness, emotional stasis and death. So what are you waiting for?
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The causes underlying any civil war are always complex, confused, even contradictory -- as one would expect in an outbreak of madness. But those seeking to discover some of the key precipitating factors behind Iraq's furious plunge into chaos and disintegration might find one of them in the records of an obscure Congressional committee meeting on August 10, 2004.
At that meeting, then Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, General Peter Pace (now head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff) and General Bryan Brown, head of Special Operations Command, appeared before the House Armed Services Committee. In a long session larded with the usual rhetorical posturing, mutual backscratching with the committee's rubberstamp Republican majority - and a couple of polite queries from the timid Democratic minority - Wolfowitz announced the Pentagon's plan to give money, arms and training to a network of local militias in trouble spots around the world. These irregular forces - "not just armies," Wolfowitz emphasized - would be used to "counter terrorism and insurgencies," provide greater internal security" in regions of American interest and "deny sanctuary" to America's designated enemies, according to Pentagon transcripts of the testimony.
General Brown said the use of militas was part of the "unconventional warfare" being waged by the Bush Administration across the globe, "whereby special forces accomplishes our national objectives through, by and with surrogate forces." General Pace gave the legislators a view of the scope of such operations, mentioning "Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Libya, Georgia, Paraguay, Colombia, Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, North Korea, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Iran" and of course Iraq, which he mentioned twice. Wolfowitz told the Congressman that Bush wanted $500 million to set up this network - his own personal Janjaweed.
Writing in September 2004, I described the session this way:
Making copious citations from Bush's 2002 "National Security Strategy" of unprovoked aggressive war against "potential" enemies, [Wolfowitz] proposed expanding the definition of "terrorist sanctuary" to any nation that allows clerics and other rabble-rousers to offer even verbal encouragement to America's designated enemies du jour.
Any rogue state that countenances such freedom of speech within its borders will become a prime target for "the path of action," said Wolf, quoting Bush's most ringing Hitlerian phrase from the 2002 manifesto. To relieve the overstretched U.S. military, the "action" will be carried out largely by Bush's new hired guns: religious and ethnic militias, tribal forces, mercenaries, cultists, insurrectionists, druglords, pirates - basically anyone willing to slit throats and terrorize populations at the order of the Oval One.
Two months after this Congressional meeting, Bush duly signed a measure giving Special Operations Command the authority to provide "support to foreign forces, irregular forces, groups or individuals," the Los Angeles Times reports. This was for the Pentagon side of the scheme; any money for militias funneled through the CIA would of course be cloaked in the "black budget." The Special Ops deal marked the first time that the Pentagon had been given such powers, which previously had been reserved for the CIA. The significance of this "liberation"of Special Forces became clear in the following months, when, after securing another four years in power, Bush signed a series of executive orders "authorizing secret commando groups and other Special Forces units to conduct covert operations" in "as many as 10 nations in the Middle East and South Asia," as Seymour Hersh reported in the New Yorker last year. The orders turned the world into "a global free-fire zone," a top Pentagon advisor told Hersh.
In January 2005, I tied the revelations in Hersh's article to those unearthed back in October 2002 by William Arkin, then writing for the Los Angeles Times, which I had featured in a subsequent column. From the January 2005 piece:
More than two years ago, we wrote here of a secret Pentagon plan to foment terrorism: sending covert agents to infiltrate terrorist groups and goad them into action - i.e., committing acts of murder and destruction. The purpose was two-fold: first, to bring the terrorist groups into the open, where they could be counterattacked; and second, to justify U.S. military attacks on the countries where the terrorists were operating - attacks which, in the Pentagon's words, would put those nations' "sovereignty at risk." It was a plan that countenanced - indeed, encouraged - the deliberate murder of innocent people and the imposition of U.S. military rule anywhere in the world that American leaders desired.
This plan is now being activated.
In fact, it's being expanded, as the New Yorker's Seymour Hersh revealed last week. Not only will U.S.-directed agents infiltrate existing terrorist groups and provoke them into action; the Pentagon itself will create its own terrorist groups and "death squads." After establishing their terrorist "credentials" through various atrocities and crimes, these American-run groups will then be able to ally with - and ultimately undermine - existing terrorist groups.
Top-level officials in the Pentagon, the U.S. intelligence services and the Bush administration confirmed to Hersh that the plan is going forward, under the direction of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld - just as we noted here in November 2002. Through a series of secret executive orders, George W. Bush has given Rumsfeld the authority to turn the entire world into "a global free-fire zone," a top Pentagon adviser says. These secret operations will be carried out with virtually no oversight; in many cases, even the top military commanders in the affected regions will not be told about them. The American people, of course, will never know what's being done in their name.
The covert units - including the Pentagon-funded terrorist groups and hit squads - will be operating outside all constraints of law and morality. "We're going to be riding with the bad boys," one insider told Hersh. Another likened it to the palmy days of the Reagan-Bush years: "Do you remember the right-wing execution squads in El Salvador? We founded them and we financed them. The objective now is to recruit locals in any area we want. And we aren't going to tell Congress about it." Indeed, we reported here last summer that Bush has already budgeted $500 million to fund local paramilitaries and guerrilla groups in the most volatile areas of the world, a measure guaranteed to produce needless bloodshed, destruction and suffering for innocent people already ravaged by conflict.
Bush's executive orders also enabled the Pentagon "to run the operations off the books, free from legal restrictions imposed on the CIA," Hersh noted. The orders signed by Bush after the election in 2004 seem to bring the 2002 plan to fruition.
In January 2005, Pentagon plans to implement such operations in Iraq were leaked to Newsweek. The talk, again, was of the "Salvador Option" and also references to Britain's brutal and bloody repression of anti-colonial insurgencies in the years after World War II. The Iraq plans called for using Shiite and Kurdish militias to target Sunni insurgents - and civilians. "The Sunni population is paying no price for the support it is giving to the terrorists," a top Pentagon official told Newsweek. "We have to change that equation."
All observers agree that the "equation" has now definitely changed in recent months. The howling chaos of civil war has taken a quantum leap in Iraq since the bombing of the Shiite's venerated al-Askari shrine in Samarra - an operation of unusual planning and dexterity. As Mike Whitney noted in Information Clearing-House, drawing on AFP reports:
AFP is reporting that the bombing of the Golden Domed Mosque "was the work of specialists" and that the "placing of explosives must have taken at least 12 hours."
Construction Minister Jassem Mohammed Jaafar said, "Holes were dug into the mausoleum's four main pillars and packed with explosives. Then charges were connected together and linked to another charge placed just under the dome. The wires were then linked to a detonator which was triggered at a distance."
Clearly, the bombing was not carried out by rogue elements in the disparate Iraqi resistance. This is the work of highly-trained saboteurs and bomb-experts who were executing a precision-demolition to incite sectarian violence.
Now Iraq is being devoured in a maelstrom of carnage and fear. Reports of the horror are pouring in from all sides: mass beheadings, unspeakable tortures, the abandonment of vast swathes of Baghdad and other cities to warring militias, the evident complicity of the Iraqi government in many of the atrocities coupled with its obvious inability to stop any of them - and, apparently, a beserker rage infecting American forces, as attested in story after story of civilian massacres.
Yet none of this actually does any real harm to the true war aims behind Bush's illegal war. I will be taking up this theme in a Moscow Times column that will be posted here in a couple of days, but here is an excerpt from that piece, describing the Bush Faction's genuine war goals:
The reality clearly shows that Bush had three primary objectives in launching the invasion. First and foremost was the transfer of large portions of the national wealth of Iraq - and the United States - into the coffers of his political cronies, corporate backers and family members. Second was the frantic acceleration of the long-running, bipartisan militarization of America, which is now almost wholly dependent on war and rumors of war to keep its heavily-mortgaged economy afloat. Third was planting a permanent military presence in Iraq to "project dominance" over the strategic oil lands and serve as staging areas for further operations in regime change and political extortion as needed. ("Nice little country you got there, Abdul; too bad if something, like, happened to it - you savvy? Now howzabout signing that free trade agreement already?")
Yes, the myriad causes underlying the madness of civil war are always complex and confused. Once loosed, it is a whirlwind that rages in all directions; no one can control it. But it is obvious that certain groups would benefit the most from civil war, and thus would have the most to gain from trying to channel its fury to their own advantage. Ironically, these primary feasters on chaos are the same two gangs that have prospered the most from the global "War on Terror": the Bush Faction and al Qaeda.
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Your Tax Dollars At Work By Ted Rall NEW YORK--The case of the Afghan man who faced execution for converting to Christianity illustrates the conundrum of "regime change." OK, so your army has just rolled into a foreign capital. You can do whatever you want. However, if you interfere with the internal affairs of a liberated country, and you tell them what to do--you haven't liberated them at all. But if you can't change anything, what's the point? From a column I wrote over four years ago upon my return from Afghanistan, in February of 2002: "Nothing has changed in Afghanistan, simply because there has been no meaningful attempt to de-Talibanize. Well-known figures like Mullah Omar may be in hiding, but today's Northern Alliance-dominated regime is almost entirely comprised of Taliban defectors. So while prime minister Hamid Karzai cuts a dashing figure with his green Tajik robe and impeccable English, the heavily-armed men ordinary Afghans come into contact with on the streets are merely gussied-up Talibs. Some liberation." A couple of months earlier Ahamat Ullha Zarif, a top Afghan judge for the new U.S.-backed government, explained the differences between the old and new justice systems. "The Taliban used to hang the victim's body in public for four days," he recalled. Not anymore. "We will only hang the body for a short time, say 15 minutes." Adulterers were stoned to death under the Taliban legal system, which was based on strict Sharia, or Islamic law. They still would be, Judge Zarif explained, "But we will use only small stones." Supporters of the post-9/11 war against Afghanistan dismissed my worries that nothing would change as alarmist. "Exaggeration, inaccuracy and outright lies," neoconservative writer John Giuffo called them. In fact, they proved deadly accurate. At least two women have been stoned to death for adultery in one district alone. The following Reuters wire service story, confirmed by the BBC, came out in 2005: "According to eyewitnesses, the 29-year old, named only as Amina, was dragged out of her parents' house in Urgu District, Badakhshan province by her husband and local officials before being publicly stoned to death. The man accused of committing adultery with her is alleged to have been whipped 100 times and freed." Badakhshan, a stronghold of the American-backed Northern Alliance throughout the 1996-2001 civil war, is not under the control of some rogue warlord. It is run by the central government in Kabul, which is wholly owned and operated by you, the American taxpayer. Afghanistan's top law-enforcement official is Abdul Rahim Karimi. As justice minister he reports directly to Hamid Karzai, who was installed as president by the Bush Administration in December 2001. From the beginning, Karimi insisted that the Afghan version of Sharia--the same legal system that condemned thieves to amputation in front of jeering crowds in soccer stadiums--would remain in full force in the "new" Afghanistan. "People would not understand if we got rid of it," he said. So they didn't. The Taliban didn't have a Constitution. They used Sharia, Islamic law interpreted directly from the Koran, instead. U.S.-occupied Afghanistan has a 2004 Constitution that includes a key sentence: "No law can be contrary to the sacred religion of Islam." There's more paperwork, but nothing new: Sharia is still the law of the land. The man who faced death for apostasy was freed as a result of political pressure brought upon Karzai by his American masters. "For the sake of the national interest of 25 million Afghans, the president is trying to solve the [Abdul Rahman] issue," his spokesman said before arranging the Afghan Christian's exile in Italy. But the law hasn't changed. Sharia lives. From the viewpoint of the citizens of the most religiously fundamentalist country in the Muslim world, caving in to interference by Western infidels, including the pope, is the ultimate humiliation. "Abdul Rahman must be killed. Islam demands it," said senior cleric Fayez Mohammed. "The Christian foreigners occupying Afghanistan are attacking our religion." It's a widely held view. Releasing and exiling Rahman will inspire outrage, since "an overwhelming number of ordinary Afghans appear to believe Mr. Rahman has erred and deserves to be executed," the BBC reports. The neoconservative theorists who dreamed up America's regime change policy point to post-World War II Germany and Japan as successful precedents. But we didn't create democracy in Germany from scratch. Before Hitler there was the vibrant Weimar republic; removing him from power merely restored the prewar system. Japan had no such tradition, and it shows: one-party rule has been the norm for decades. Liberation works best when you kick a foreign army out of a country that had liberal values before its occupation. Eisenhower didn't have to worry about stonings in France. After it came into possession of Afghanistan, with its long history of justice based on brutality and vengeance, the U.S. faced a choice between the harsh totalitarian Soviet and the hands-off "we liberated you, it's all yours" approaches. The Soviets sent girls to school and university, banned the burqa and prohibited the enforcement of Sharia law. We chose laissez-faire liberation, and spread theocracy instead of democracy.
P.S. Article 2(1)(a) of Iraq's new U.S.-backed constitution reads: "No law may be passed that contradicts the immutable rulings of Islam."
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Time To Talk War Crimes By Robert Parry In a world where might did not make right, George W. Bush, Tony Blair and their key enablers would be in shackles before a war crimes tribunal at the Hague, rather than sitting in the White House, 10 Downing Street or some other comfortable environs in Washington and London. The latest evidence of their war crimes was revealed in secret British minutes of an Oval Office meeting on Jan. 31, 2003, when Bush, Blair and their top aides chillingly discussed their determination to invade Iraq, though still hoping to provoke the Iraqis into some violent act that would serve as political cover. Bush, who has publicly told Americans that it was Saddam Hussein who "chose war" by refusing to disarm, was, in reality, set on invading Iraq regardless of Hussein's cooperation with United Nations weapons inspectors, according to the five-page memo described in detail by the New York Times. [March 27, 2006] At the same Oval Office meeting, Bush cavalierly dismissed concerns that the U.S. conquest might not go as smoothly as he expected. The President predicted that it was "unlikely there would be internecine warfare between the different religious and ethnic groups," according to the British minutes written by David Manning, then Blair's chief foreign policy adviser. But Bush's judgment would prove tragically wrong, as more than 2,300 U.S. troops have died along with tens of thousands of Iraqis - possibly more than 100,000 - in three years of invasion, occupation and now sectarian violence. Conniving Bush The memo also reveals Bush as conniving to deceive the American people and the world community. At the meeting, Bush floated ideas for how to rally U.N. support for the invasion by engineering a provocation that would portray Hussein as the aggressor. Bush suggested painting a U.S. plane up in U.N. colors and flying it over Iraq with the goal of drawing Iraqi fire, the minutes said. "The U.S. was thinking of flying U2 reconnaissance aircraft with fighter cover over Iraq, painted in U.N. colours," the memo said about Bush's scheme. "If Saddam fired on them, he would be in breach." Regardless of whether any casus belli could be provoked, Bush already had "penciled in" March 10, 2003, as the start of the U.S. bombing of Iraq, according to the memo. "Our diplomatic strategy had to be arranged around the military planning," Manning wrote. At the Oval Office meeting, Bush also discussed possibly assassinating Hussein, according to the memo. (Bush, it should be noted, assured the American people that he would restore "honor and decency" to the Oval Office where Bill Clinton had sexual dalliances with Monica Lewinsky.) According to the British memo, Bush and Blair acknowledged that no weapons of mass destruction had been found in Iraq, nor were they likely to be found in the coming weeks, but that wouldn't get in the way of the U.S.-led invasion. Blair, however, stressed the need for a second resolution from the U.N. Security Council that would authorize the use of force. Bush agreed to try but felt he had the authority to attack Iraq whether the U.N. approved or not. "The U.S. would put its full weight behind efforts to get another resolution and would twist arms and even threaten," the memo said about Bush's plans. "But he had to say that if we ultimately failed, military action would follow anyway." Averted Eyes Parts of the Jan. 31, 2003, meeting memo were disclosed earlier this year by British attorney Philippe Sands, author of the book, Lawless World. But Sands's disclosure received scant attention in the United States, where the major news media also has downplayed other revelations of Bush's duplicity about the Iraq War. In 2005, the U.S. press mostly averted its eyes when a British newspaper disclosed the so-called "Downing Street Memo," which recounted the chief of British intelligence telling Blair in July 2002 that Bush was set on invading Iraq and that "intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy." The major U.S. media also has failed to challenge Bush when he has claimed falsely that Hussein brought the war on himself by barring U.N. inspectors from his country. "We gave him a chance to allow the inspectors in, and he wouldn't let them in," Bush said when he began revising the pre-war history in July 2003, four months after invading Iraq. "And, therefore, after a reasonable request, we decided to remove him from power." Bush has repeated that lie in varying forms dozens of times since, including at a televised news conference on March 21, 2006. [See Consortiumnews.com's "Those Lies, Again."] Nuremberg Precedent Beyond more proof that Bush has lied consistently about Iraq, the Jan. 31, 2003, memo represents striking evidence that Bush, Blair and their top assistants violated the Nuremberg Principles and the U.N. Charter by launching an aggressive war against Iraq. While many Americans think of the Nuremberg trials after World War II as just holding Nazi leaders accountable for genocide, a major charge against Adolf Hitler's henchmen was the crime of aggressive war. Later, that principle was embodied in the United Nations Charter, forbidding armed aggression by one state against another. U.S. Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson, who represented the United States at the Nuremberg Tribunal, made clear that the intent was to establish a precedent against aggressive war. "Our position is that whatever grievances a nation may have, however objectionable it finds the status quo, aggressive warfare is an illegal means for settling those grievances or for altering those conditions," Jackson said, adding that the same rules would apply to the victors in World War II. "Let me make clear that while this law is first applied against German aggressors, the law includes, and if it is to serve a useful purpose, it must condemn aggression by any other nations, including those which sit here now in judgment," Jackson said. "We are able to do away with domestic tyranny and violence and aggression by those in power against the rights of their own people only when we make all men answerable to the law. This trial represents mankind's desperate effort to apply the discipline of the law to statesmen who have used their powers of state to attack the foundations of the world's peace and to commit aggression against the rights of their neighbors." The British memos, combined with public statements by Bush and his senior aides, represent a prima-facie case that Bush, Blair and others violated the Nuremberg Principles and the U.N. Charter, to which the United States was a founding signatory. While Bush has insisted that his invasion of Iraq was "preemptive" - defined as an act of self-defense to thwart an impending attack - his argument is not only laughable in the case of Iraq, but has been contradicted by his own advisers, including Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. Rice's Cultural Engineering In a March 26 interview on NBC's "Meet the Press," Rice offered a different rationale for invading Iraq. She agreed that Hussein was not implicated in the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks nor did she assert that he was conspiring with al-Qaeda on another assault. Instead, Rice justified invading Iraq and ousting Hussein because he was part of the "old Middle East," which she said had engendered hatreds that led indirectly to 9/11. "If you really believe that the only thing that happened on 9/11 was people flew airplanes into buildings, I think you have a very narrow view of what we faced on 9/11," Rice said. "We faced the outcome of an ideology of hatred throughout the Middle East that had to be dealt with. Saddam Hussein was a part of that old Middle East. The new Iraq will be a part of the new Middle East, and we will all be safer." Rice's argument - that Bush has the right to invade any country that he feels is part of a culture that might show hostility toward the United States - represents the most expansive justification to date for launching the Iraq War. It goes well beyond waging "preemptive" or even "predictive" war. Rice is asserting a U.S. right to inflict death and destruction on Muslim countries as part of a social-engineering experiment to eradicate their perceived cultural and political tendencies toward hatred. Despite the extraordinary implications of Rice's declaration, her comment passed almost unnoticed by the U.S. news media, which gave much more attention to her demurring on the possibility of becoming the next National Football League commissioner. Yet Rice's new war rationale, combined with the British memo on Bush's determination to invade Iraq regardless of the facts, should be more than enough evidence to put Bush, Rice, Blair and other U.S. and British officials before a war crimes tribunal.
But that would only happen if Justice Jackson were right about the universal application of the principle against aggressive wars - and if all nations and leaders actually lived by the same rules.
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| Three Years Later, No End In Sight After three years, tens of thousands of lost and ruined lives, hundreds of billions of squandered dollars and incalculable damage to the respect for America around the world, it is strange to look back on the earliest days of the war in Iraq. On this unhappy anniversary, it is worth recalling the triumphal mood of that moment, and how the neoconservative ideologues celebrated the successful culmination of their campaign for war. Holding the authors of the war accountable for their mendacity and stupidity is imperative-in hope that their advice will be ignored in the dangerous days to come. Back then, popping open champagne corks while the carnage unfolded, the neoconservatives gleefully announced that anyone who had questioned this great expedition would be held accountable. Page after page of their punditry from the spring of 2003 was devoted to gloating, along with lengthy blacklists of the bad people who had expressed doubt about the wisdom of going to war. Honors would flow to the wise and courageous proponents of war, while the foolish and pusillanimous opponents would suffer eternal disgrace. And so on. Nobody ranted more loudly in "victory" than the editors of The Weekly Standard, the small but very influential and belligerent magazine sponsored by the right-wing media mogul Rupert Murdoch. The Standard gang could scarcely contain the urge "to run through the streets, laughing hysterically at all the people who were so blinded by hatred of President Bush-or general anti-Americanism, or their own sheer foolishness-that they continued to prophesy doom even after the war had begun and was already being won." Their magazine applied that insulting description indiscriminately to everyone who had opposed the war, from patriotic elders like the retired Gen. Brent Scowcroft to the Congressional Black Caucus, the United Nations, the denizens of "Hollywood" (which magically expanded to include Manhattan and Connecticut), a few prominent journalists, many film stars and numerous members of the liberal clergy. Meanwhile, confident predictions abounded in the conservative media. Democracy would flower, our enemies would wither, and those elusive weapons of mass destruction would be discovered either tomorrow or the next day. In The Weekly Standard, David Brooks, who soon moved on to the Op-Ed page of The New York Times, offered an observation that now may be turned on him. No degree of humiliation, he sighed, would dissuade the war's critics from their folly: "Even if Saddam's remains are found, even if weapons of mass destruction are displayed, even if Iraq starts to move along a winding, muddled path toward normalcy, no day will come when the enemies of this endeavor turn around and say, 'We were wrong. Bush was right.'" Despite the persistence of such rump grumblers, however, he remained cheerful because America is blessed with "a ruling establishment that can conduct wars with incredible competence and skill," as well as "a federal government that can perform its primary task-protecting the American people-magnificently." Young Americans, unlike the generation ruined by the debacle of Vietnam, could not help being impressed by these marvelous leaders. "The ruling class is reasonably candid about the war's progress," he explained. Suffused with a tone of self-congratulation, such columns and editorials provided a choral background for the President's "Mission Accomplished" photo opportunity. It seems most unlikely that the authors of those strutting essays can bear to read them again. Today, Mr. Brooks and his fellow neocons quarrel over the quagmire their movement made, seeking to shift the blame to scapegoats in the Pentagon and the press, and to refurbish themselves as critics of the President they once idolized. What they once considered a political watershed that promised them limitless power and influence has become a political disaster they are scurrying to escape. Very few of these sages are willing to acknowledge their own mistakes even now. How could they have known what nobody else figured out? Nobody knew Saddam Hussein had destroyed his biological and chemical weapons, they say, although that fact was quickly becoming apparent as the U.N. weapons inspectors carried out their task, and had been revealed by Saddam's son-in-law years earlier. Nobody knew that Iraq's nuclear program had collapsed, they say, although the International Atomic Energy Agency had established that basic fact long before the U.S. invasion. Nobody knew that the insurgency would erupt into civil war, they say, even though regional experts had warned of that outcome. As the intellectual cheerleaders for war, the neoconservatives knew perfectly well that there were many reasons to doubt the existence of Saddam's fearsome arsenal and to doubt the rosy scenarios for a postwar Iraq. They angrily dismissed those doubts and beat the war drums louder.
Proven wrong on every count, they insist those arguments no longer matter, but they're wrong about that too. The American people know they have been repeatedly misled, which is why they are turning their backs on this President and his war.
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Blaming The Media For Bad War News By Norman Solomon Top officials in the Bush administration have often complained that news coverage of Iraq focuses on negative events too much and fails to devote enough attention to positive developments. Yet the White House has rarely picked direct fights with U.S. media outlets during this war. For the most part, President Bush leaves it to others to scapegoat the media. Karl Rove's spin strategy is heavily reliant on surrogates. They're likely to escalate blame-the-media efforts as this year goes on. A revealing moment -- dramatizing the pro-war division of labor -- came on March 22, during Bush's nationally televised appearance in Wheeling, West Virginia. On the surface, the format resembled a town hall, but the orchestration was closer to war rally. (According to White House spokesperson Scott McClellan, the local Chamber of Commerce had distributed 2,000 tickets while a newspaper in the community gave out 100.) It fell to a woman who identified herself as being from Columbus, Ohio, to give the Wheeling event an anti-media jolt. Her husband -- who was an Army officer in Iraq, where "his job while serving was as a broadcast journalist" -- "has returned from a 13-month tour in Tikrit," she said. And then came the populist punch: "He has brought back several DVDs full of wonderful footage of reconstruction, of medical things going on. And I ask you this from the bottom of my heart for a solution to this, because it seems that our major media networks don't want to portray the good." She added: "They just want to focus ... on another car bomb or they just want to focus on some more bloodshed or they just want to focus on how they don't agree with you and what you're doing, when they don't even probably know how you're doing what you're doing anyway. But what can we do to get that footage on CNN, on Fox, to get it on Headline News, to get it on the local news?... It portrays the good. And if people could see that, if the American people could see it, there would never be another negative word about this conflict." The audience punctuated the woman's statement with very strong applause and then a standing ovation. But rather than pile on, Bush adopted an air of restraint. "Just got to keep talking," he advised. "Word of mouth, there's blogs, there's Internet, there's all kinds of ways to communicate, which is literally changing the way people are getting their information. And so if you're concerned, I would suggest that you reach out to some of the groups that are supporting the troops, that have gotten Internet sites, and just keep the word moving. And that's one way to deal with an issue without suppressing a free press. We will never do that in America." In effect, Bush is holding the coat of those who go after the news media on his behalf. Many pro-war voices constantly accuse the media of anti-war and anti-Bush biases -- with the accusations routinely amplified in mass-media echo chambers. Cranking up the volume are powerhouse outlets like Fox News, the Wall Street Journal editorial page, the New York Post, the Washington Times, the Weekly Standard, legions of high-profile loyalist pundits, and literally hundreds of radio talk-show hosts across the country who have political outlooks similar to Rush Limbaugh's. With the current war less popular than ever, it's never been more important for war backers to blame the media. During the last several years of the Vietnam War, the Nixon administration went public with a much more heavy-handed approach, deploying Vice President Spiro Agnew to make a series of speeches that denounced critical news coverage. In 1969, Agnew started out by blasting American TV networks (which could be counted on one hand at the time). Television news, he said, came from a "tiny and closed fraternity of privileged men." Then the vice president turned his ire on certain newspapers, especially the New York Times and the Washington Post. He warned against "the trend toward the monopolization of the great public information vehicles and the concentration of power over public opinion in fewer and fewer hands." But Agnew had nothing bad to say about big pro-Nixon newspaper chains like Hearst and Newhouse. Nor did he utter any complaints against the huge-circulation magazines Parade and Reader's Digest, which kept cheering on the war effort. Often using syncopated language, Agnew conflated journalists who were reporting inconvenient facts and protesters who were trying to stop the war. He said that they were "nattering nabobs of negativism," an "effete corps of impudent snobs" and "hopeless, hysterical hypochondriacs of history" -- all worthy of wrath from an administration determined to continue the war in Southeast Asia. Contortions of populism that embrace war, like the kind of sentiments on display during President Bush's travel blitz in recent days, chronically invert the realities of power. While the president and his corporate backers wield enormous media power, they pose as intrepid and besieged underdogs. Unlike progressive media critics, who scarcely have a toehold in mainstream media, the political right has both feet firmly planted inside the dominant corporate media structures. The myth of the liberal media is an umbrella canard that shelters the corollary myth of anti-war media. From the time that the New York Times splashed stories about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction on front pages before the invasion of Iraq, a cross-section of the U.S. media has remained way behind the curve of what could be credibly reported about gaping holes in White House claims. But even a lapdog press corps is apt to start growling when it has been leashed to lies too many times.
With its war policies unraveling in Iraq -- and in the domestic
political arena of the United States -- the administration may
continue to avoid directly attacking the press. But, with winks and
nods from the White House, some of the president's boosters will be
eager to blame news media for Republican difficulties as the midterm
congressional elections loom larger on the horizon.
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Incompetent Design By William Rivers Pitt Last week, George W. Bush got up before a gaggle of reporters and washed his hands of the mess in Iraq. The question of how long an American presence will remain in that country "will be decided by future presidents and future governments of Iraq," said Bush. To be fair, he isn't the only one. The entire administration appears to have become bored with the whole process. Take Daniel Speckhard, for example. Speckhard is Director of the US Iraq Reconstruction Management Office, which is in charge of rebuilding Iraqi infrastructure ravaged by war and depredation lo these last three years. Speckhard is quoted in a report in last week's USA Today: "The Iraqi government can no longer count on U.S. funds and must rely on its own revenues and other foreign aid, particularly from Persian Gulf nations. 'The Iraqi government needs to build up its capability to do its own capital budget investment,' said Speckhard." Really. They have no police or military to speak of, the hospitals are trashed, the lights won't stay on, the flow of potable water is screwed, roads and bridges are bombed out, hundreds of buildings are wrecked, the so-called "elected" government is totally powerless to contain or control the chaos within the country, headless bodies are popping up left and right, a dozen people die every day from bombings and executions, the entire country is careening towards civil war ... and somewhere in all this, Bush and his people expect the Iraqi government to "do its own capital budget investment." I am going to find a china shop somewhere in the city and walk in with a free-swinging baseball bat. My goal, which will be clearly stated, will be to improve upon the place. I will spend the next three years meticulously destroying everything I see inside, from the cash registers to the display cases to the nice Royal Albert tea sets in the corner. Along the way, I will batter the brains out of any poor sod unfortunate enough to get in my way. When I am done, I will claim with as much self-righteousness as I can muster that none of the mess is my responsibility. I will then, of course, refuse to leave. Hey, if the president can do it, it must be legal, right? Unfortunately, the difference between my china shop analogy and what the Bush administration is doing in Iraq is that I won't get anything out of it except an arrest record and a chance to enjoy my state's municipal accommodations. Bush and crew are reaping far better benefits from the mayhem they have caused. Here's the deal, in case anyone is wondering: none of this, not one bit of it, can be or should be chalked up to "incompetence" on the part of Bush or anyone else within his administration. This was not a mishandled situation. Bush and the boys have gotten exactly, precisely what they wanted out of Iraq, and are now looking forward to fobbing it off on the next poor dupe who staggers into the Oval Office. They got what they came for, and have quit. Consider the facts. For two elections in a row, 2002 and 2004, the GOP was able to successfully demagogue the rafters off the roof about supporting the troops and being patriotic, placing anyone who questioned the merits of the invasion squarely into the category of "traitor." Meanwhile, military contractors with umbilical ties to the administration have cashed in to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars. The same goes for the petroleum industries; did you know there are gas lines today in oil-rich Iraq? It's true. The oil infrastructure is fine; indeed, it is the most well-guarded point of pressure in Iraq. There are gas lines because companies like Halliburton are not pumping the oil. They are sitting on it, keeping it as a nice little nest egg. One would think this administration would be worried about the violence and chaos in Iraq. They aren't, because the violence has become the justification for "staying the course." Bush will mouth platitudes about bringing democracy to the region, but that is merely the billboard. What he and his friends from the Project for the New American Century wanted in the first place, and what they have now, is a permanent military presence over there. There was never any consideration of a timetable for withdrawal, because there was never any intention to withdraw. The violence today is a self-perpetuating justification, a perfect circle lubricated by blood, oil and currency. Keeping our attention on Iraq has allowed this administration to do what it came to do under cover of darkness. They have managed to eviscerate dozens of federal regulations designed to make sure our children aren't born with gills or seventeen eyes thanks to the pollution in the air, water and food. The Clean Air Act is pretty much gone now, as are requirements for food safety labeling. GOP "pension reform" means growing old in America amounts to growing poor, just like in the good old days of the Depression. Millions of elderly people have been fed to the wolves by way of the new Medicare Plan D calamity. There are now tens of millions more poor people in America, the middle class is evaporating, but top incomes are up 497% according to the Federal Reserve. The administration has also used Iraq to accomplish a goal the GOP has been pining for since 1934. Since the advent of FDR and the creation of federally-funded safety nets for the neediest Americans, the Goldwater wing of the Republican party has been lusting after an opportunity to savage the government's ability to serve its citizens in this fashion. Their argument has been that it cost too much to do this, required too much taxation, and was harmful to business interests. This fight raged until the very end of the 20th century. When Bill Clinton stood up during his 1998 State of the Union speech and said "Save Social Security first!" he was actually firing a directed salvo at this wing of the GOP. Look, Clinton was saying, we have trillions of dollars in the bank and the economy is going great guns. We can provide for the neediest among us without bankrupting the government or killing business. In short, he was rendering fiscal conservatives obsolete. He won the argument. Remember this, by the way, the next time someone asks you why he was attacked so viciously. The Grover Norquist drown-the-government-in-the-bathtub crew, however, had no interest in going gently into that good night. One busted election gave them the chance to do exactly what they have done with Iraq. They have rendered it almost completely impossible for the federal government to pay for programs designed to care for the poor, the sick, the elderly and the needy. The war, the war, we have to pay for the war, to the tune of what will be one to two trillion dollars before all is said and done. Oh, and tax cuts that go to families making more than $200,000 a year, of course. Bush has also, in the process, managed to put himself even farther above the rule of law. Not long ago, he signed the reauthorization of the Patriot Act. Getting the document to his desk had been a laborious process for Congress; arguments and debates raged across the ideological spectrum as to exactly what kind of firewalls against executive abuse should be put into the bill to protect civil liberties. Among these additions were a number of oversight provisions to keep the FBI from abusing their power to search homes and seize papers without notifying the resident or presenting a warrant. Other provisions required that officials within the Justice Department maintain tight scrutiny over where, when and how the FBI put these powers to use. One new part of the bill required the administration brief Congress now and again on these specific matters. Congress finally came to an agreement, and on March 9th, Bush signed the Patriot Act reauthorization into law with much fanfare. After all the worthies had left the room, however, and after all the cameras had gone, Bush quietly put his signature to a "signing statement" that, basically, says anything in the aforementioned law which applies to the president shall be considered null and void. The Boston Globe reported on March 24 that, "In the statement, Bush said that he did not consider himself bound to tell Congress how the Patriot Act powers were being used. Bush wrote: 'The executive branch shall construe the provisions ... that call for furnishing information to entities outside the executive branch ... in a manner consistent with the president's constitutional authority to supervise the unitary executive branch and to withhold information.'" This was the third time Bush dropped a "signing statement" into an issue of signal importance. When it was revealed that the administration had bypassed the FISA laws in order to conduct surveillance on American citizens, Bush claimed his "wartime powers" gave him the ability to ignore the laws of the land. When Congress passed a law forbidding the torture of any detainee in US custody, Bush issued a signing statement stating that he could bypass the law at his pleasure and torture anyone he damned well pleased. So, to recap, the "incompetence" thing is nonsense. The Bush boys got paid, got an issue to run on in two elections, put themselves completely and totally above the law on picayune issues like torture and the unauthorized surveillance of American citizens, obliterated the central function of the federal government, and ripped up any and all regulations that would keep their corporate friends from dumping mercury into the river so as to save a few precious pennies on the dollar. Can anyone still think this was all by accident? The poll numbers say that nearly 70% of the country believes we are heading in the wrong direction in Iraq and here at home. This is edifying, to say the least. It means that people like me can stop trying to point out all the things that have gone wrong, because at long last a huge majority of the country has come to see things for how they actually are. But it also means that we as a nation are required now to move past what is actually happening, and ask why it is happening. Batting down the "incompetence" argument is easy; all one has to do is see what this administration and its friends have gained in the last five years. The rest of the answer is more difficult, because it has to do with us, with we the people, and the staggering degree to which we take our rights and freedoms for granted. When we hear about our government spying on American citizens without warrants or due process of law, when we hear the president say he does not have to tell Congress anything if he doesn't want to, when we hear the president claim the right to torture, all too often the response is, "Well, I'm not doing anything wrong, so I don't have to worry about it." But we do have to worry about it. Patriots from Lexington to Gettysburg to Bastogne lie cold in their graves because they died to defend the freedoms we would so casually cast aside. Could we stand before the endless ranks of the fallen and say the rights they died to protect have no bearing on us, because we are "not doing anything wrong?" Is that not the most selfish, conceited, lazy answer we could possibly offer in the face of their sacrifice? George W. Bush quit on us last week. He quit because he has accomplished everything he came to do. He will get away with it because, for the most part, the American people have also quit. We take what we have for granted, and assume the difficult tasks will be handled by someone else. Rest assured, they will be. They will be handled by other craven opportunists like Bush, by corporations looking to turn a profit off our indifference, by those among us who couldn't care less about you and yours.
The American people have come to see that things have gone wrong. Imagine what would happen if we decided to do something about it.
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 Heil Bush, Dear propaganda ansager Pickler, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your constant shilling for the Junta and your unending attacks on Democrats, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Media Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Wolf's Lair" formally 'Rancho de Bimbo' on 05-27-2006. We salute you fraulein Pickler, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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AUSTIN -- The Pentagon has once again investigated itself! And -- have a seat, get the smelling salts, hold all hats -- the Pentagon has once again concluded the Pentagon did absolutely nothing wrong and will continue to do so.
In this particularly fascinating case, the Pentagon investigated its own habit of paying people to make up lies about how well the war in Iraq is going, and then paying other people to put those lies in the Iraqi media, thus fooling the Iraqis into thinking everything in their country is tickety-boo. Well, if we can't fool them, whom can we fool?
The case revolves around a contract worth several million dollars given by the U.S. military command in Baghdad to the Lincoln Group, a public relations outfit started by two young entrepreneurs, one British, one American, in 2003 in Iraq. Articles were written by American military personnel from the American point of view about the war, to wit, it's going well. Lincoln Group in turn paid Iraqi journalists, some "on retainer," to print the articles without revealing the source.
Amusingly enough, through other programs, the U.S. government is also spending money trying to teach Iraqis about the importance of a free press in a democracy. According to the Pentagon's investigation of itself, none of the Lincoln Group's actions violate military policies because the Pentagon is just trying to counter the vast amount of anti-American propaganda carried in Middle Eastern papers.
While I think this is the best Pentagon-investigating-itself case of the week, I have to admit it's like the Oscars -- these investigations are so hard to compare to comedy and tragedy, documentary and animated shorts. Also featured this week is the case of the Abu Ghraib dog handler, a 24-year-old sergeant who was convicted for tormenting detainees. The dog was not convicted, on the theory that it was just acting on orders.
Despite the huge international outcry over torture, so far the heavy-hitters in the plot receiving real red, white and blue justice are Lynndie England, a 5-foot-tall, 23-year-old woman with learning disabilities and other non-commissioned officers. They were clearly the mastermind behind the entire international stink fest, from Gitmo to Afghanistan. England was put in prison for three years. Her baby boy will be walking and talking by the time Ms. England finishes doing her time, but no one in the upper ranks is responsible for anything that's happened.
In the unfortunate case of the Black Room reported in The New York Times, we taxpayers seem to have been charged with the cost of refurbishing one of Saddam Hussein's military bases into "a top secret detention center." One former torture chamber is now an "interrogation cell" used by Special Operations forces. "In the windowless, jet-black garage-sized room, some soldiers beat prisoners with rifle butts, yelled and spit in their faces and, in a nearby area, used detainees for target practice in a game of jailer paintball." I say, this time, let's indict the dogs.
Of course, there is always the same depressing coda to new accounts of torture and mistreatment of prisoners by American troops -- no useful information was acquired.
With all these horrifying details surfacing ("No Blood, No Foul" was the slogan at the Special Operations forces' Camp Nama), you may wonder why I return to the case of the chipper newspaper articles. I find them deeply symbolic, certainly paradigmatic and possibly even plangent, a word that's hard to work into a newspaper column. Quite some time after we had invaded Iraq, our government informed us we had done so in order to bring democracy to their nation. Originally, we were told we had to invade their country because there were tons of weapons of mass destruction therein, but they turned out not to be there. So, through a process of masterly media manipulation, we went from Saddam's nuclear program to democracy. It seems to me this is how George W. Bush and Co. govern, period. It's a Karl Rove thing. When reality is unsatisfactory, just manipulate the media.
You can't deny that the process has excellent results. It wins elections, for one thing. It confuses our critics and turns debate away from what we might loosely call "the truth" and into pointless fistfights about whether Iraq has descended, is descending or might descend into civil war.
"HOW DARE YOU CALL IT A CIVIL WAR -- YOU'RE JUST LENDING COMFORT TO OUR ENEMIES."
"LOOKS LIKE A CIVIL WAR TO ME."
"DOES NOT -- WHERE'S LEE, WHERE'S GRANT?"
"DOES SO!"
This is not helpful dialogue -- remember the fight over whether there was an "insurgency" in Iraq or the Mission was still Accomplished, it was just "remnant Baathists and foreign terrorists"? That was a mirror of the arguments we had at home over whether President Bush could be described as a "friend" of Ken Lay's or whether he is "close" to Tom DeLay or "knows" Jack Abramoff. Likewise, entire policy discussions would get subsumed by furious debate over whether Bush's proposals meant "privatization" of Social Security or were merely "personal accounts."
Grabbing reality by the throat and forcing it into a form you find more pleasing than reality itself is not only a great election strategy, it works for a lot of people on a lot of levels in life -- denial is a good game while it lasts.
But as we can all attest, if you ignore reality, sooner or later it will bite you in the ass. I suspect the "tough-minded" (they pride themselves on being tough-minded) members of the Bush administration think they are not ignoring reality, but just persuading other people to ignore it long enough to allow them to change it. This is not an original thought. Many of the great thumb-suckers of D.C. have come to the same conclusion and pondered deeply on the "fatal hubris" of this administration. Fatal jackasses are what we have.
Faced with the unappetizing reality of Iraq, Bush and Rove are relying on that grand old reliable strategy -- attack the media. It doesn't play as well as it used to. Everyone who wants an alternative reality is already watching Fox News. The rest of the country is worried.
Let me hasten to admit that I have no solution -- I have tried to be constructive over the course of this war, but I'm flat out of ideas. I haven't an earthly clue whether it would be better if we up and left or if we sat and stayed. What I am sure of is that none of us will figure that out until we stop pretending, until we take a long, cold hard look at the reality on the ground. Then someone needs to level with us about what it will cost to stay, in lives and dollars and, God help us, goodwill.
In a Washington Monthly book review, I found a suggestion that we copy Cold War tactics on terrorism and practice "containment" rather than this War of Good vs. Evil, Battlestar Galactica bull. But that requires someone who will level with the people. And the more this administration plays games with definitions of democracy and weasel wording about torture, the less they can be believed about anything. Like the boy who cried wolf, someday they're going to tell the truth, and no one will believe them.
Meantime, let us all enjoy the game of Pentagon-investigates-itself.
Just remember, sooner or later, we'll have to indict the dogs.
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Standing on a rooftop, an American soldier recently fired a shot at an Iraqi man walking down the street. As the dying Iraqi grabbed at his wound, he cried out: "What did I do?"
That's for every American to answer.
But right now we will have to make do with President George W. Bush's new flurry of speeches as he seeks to justify claims of progress at the start of the fourth year of the U.S. war in Iraq.
Bush said he "will settle for nothing less than complete victory" but admitted that "more fighting and sacrifice" are needed. He remains optimistic "because slowly but surely our strategy is getting results." He coupled that statement of hope with the warning that the terrorists "will attack us again."
He told a news conference Tuesday that future American presidents and Iraqi governments probably will have to decide when to pull U.S. troops out of Iraq. In other words, we will remain at war in Iraq at least through 2008.
In the run-up to the war, reporters heard almost daily from White House officials trying to make the link between 9/11 and Saddam Hussein, though the president later acknowledged that he knew of no link between the two.
Now Bush claims that the terrorists have made Iraq the "central front" in the war on terrorism. Not so. That designation was first heard in the White House press room when the administration was running out of credible rationales for the war.
Maybe we shouldn't quibble about a little dissembling in wartime.
Last weekend the White House unveiled its National Security Strategy.
It turned out to be the same old premise of preemptive war, which means that we have the right to attack any nation we suspect of terrorism or harboring terrorists. Such reasoning is a violation of international law, but no one seems to care about that.
Vice President Dick Cheney insisted on the veracity of his past statements in an interview on "Face the Nation" last Sunday.
Among those was Cheney's pre-war prediction that "we would be greeted as liberators" in Iraq and the claim last year that the Iraqi insurgency was in its "last throes." He complained that the press was more focused on car bombings than on spotlighting what the U.S. has achieved in Iraq.
In an op-ed article in the Washington Post last week, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld likened the war to World War II and the Cold War, saying to turn "our backs on postwar Iraq" would be the equivalent of "handing Germany back to the Nazis."
The desperation and defensiveness of those statements speaks volumes.
I hark back to the Vietnam War when President Lyndon B. Johnson called the war's detractors "nervous nellies" and, like Bush, denounced those who would "cut and run."
Johnson agonized over the war's casualties, a sadness that was aggravated by his realization that we were losing the war. I covered him when he waited on the tarmac for planes bringing home the wounded soldiers from Vietnam.
Johnson did not hesitate to let the reporters know that he was on an emotional roller coaster and undecided on what was best for the country. He had to face thousands of protesters -- not every few months, but every day as they marched in front of the White House.
In the hiatus between Vietnam and Iraq, the Pentagon learned its lessons well about how to bolster public support for war: No gruesome photos, no reports of body bags, no official count on Iraqi dead. Just don't upset people.
Before the Iraq invasion, the president was warned of a possible civil war by experts who knew that Saddam Hussein was holding together the rival religious factions with an iron hand while maintaining a secular government.
Former Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi said in a weekend BBC interview that Iraq is in a civil war and nearing "a point of no return." At least 50 to 60 Iraqis are killed every day.
But U.S. leaders, from Bush to Gen. George W. Casey Jr, the senior American commander in Iraq, disagreed.
The Iraqis, meantime, aren't going anywhere. It's their country and they have no alternative.
And speaking of Vietnam, does anyone see a light at the end of the tunnel?
... Mark Cohen ...  |
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Almost cut my hair
But I didn't and I wonder why
Must be because I had the flu' for Christmas
But I'm not giving in an inch to fear
When I finally get myself together
And I'll find a place inside to laugh
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Parting Shots...
 Here is my problem with the ten commandments- why exactly are there 10? You simply do not need ten. The list of ten commandments was artificially and deliberately inflated to get it up to ten. Here's what happened: About 5,000 years ago a bunch of religious and political hustlers got together to try to figure out how to control people and keep them in line. They knew people were basically stupid and would believe anything they were told, so they announced that God had given them some commandments, up on a mountain, when no one was around. Well let me ask you this- when they were making this shit up, why did they pick 10? Why not 9 or 11? I'll tell you why- because 10 sound official. Ten sounds important! Ten is the basis for the decimal system, it's a decade, it's a psychologically satisfying number (the top ten, the ten most wanted, the ten best dressed). So having ten commandments was really a marketing decision! It is clearly a bullshit list. It's a political document artificially inflated to sell better. I will now show you how you can reduce the number of commandments and come up with a list that's a little more workable and logical. I am going to use the Roman Catholic version because those were the ones I was taught as a little boy. Let's start with the first three: I AM THE LORD THY GOD THOU SHALT NOT HAVE STRANGE GODS BEFORE ME THOU SHALT NOT TAKE THE NAME OF THE LORD THY GOD IN VAIN THOU SHALT KEEP HOLY THE SABBATH Right off the bat the first three are pure bullshit. Sabbath day? Lord's name? Strange gods? Spooky language! Designed to scare and control primitive people. In no way does superstitious nonsense like this apply to the lives of intelligent civilized humans in the 21st century. So now we're down to 7. Next: HONOR THY FATHER AND MOTHER Obedience, respect for authority. Just another name for controlling people. The truth is that obedience and respect shouldn't be automatic. They should be earned and based on the parent's performance. Some parents deserve respect, but most of them don't, period. You're down to six. Now in the interest of logic, something religion is very uncomfortable with, we're going to jump around the list a little bit. THOU SHALT NOT STEAL THOU SHALT NOT BEAR FALSE WITNESS Stealing and lying. Well actually, these two both prohibit the same kind of behavior- dishonesty. So you don't really need two you combine them and call the commandment "thou shalt not be dishonest". And suddenly you're down to 5. And as long as we're combining I have two others that belong together: THOU SHALT NOT COMMIT ADULTERY THOU SHALT NOT COVET THY NEIGHBOR'S WIFE Once again, these two prohibit the same type of behavior. In this case it is marital infidelity. The difference is- coveting takes place in the mind. But I don't think you should outlaw fantasizing about someone else's wife because what is a guy gonna think about when he's waxing his carrot? But, marital infidelity is a good idea so we're gonna keep this one and call it "thou shalt not be unfaithful". And suddenly we're down to four. But when you think about it, honesty and infidelity are really part of the same overall value so, in truth, you could combine the two honesty commandments with the two fidelity commandments and give them simpler language, positive language instead of negative language and call the whole thing "thou shalt always be honest and faithful" and we're down to 3. THOU SHALT NOT COVET THY NEIGHBOR'S GOODS This one is just plain fuckin' stupid. Coveting your neighbor's goods is what keeps the economy going! Your neighbor gets a vibrator that plays "o come o ye faithful", and you want one too! Coveting creates jobs, so leave it alone. You throw out coveting and you're down to 2 now- the big honesty and fidelity commandment and the one we haven't talked about yet: THOU SHALT NOT KILL Murder. But when you think about it, religion has never really had a big problem with murder. More people have been killed in the name of god than for any other reason. All you have to do is look at Northern Ireland, Kashmir, the Inquisition, the Crusades, and the World Trade Center to see how seriously the religious folks take thou shalt not kill. The more devout they are, the more they see murder as being negotiable. It depends on who's doing the killin' and who's gettin' killed. So, with all of this in mind, I give you my revised list of the two commandments: Thou shalt always be honest and faithful to the provider of thy nookie. & Thou shalt try real hard not to kill anyone, unless of course they pray to a different invisible man than you. Two is all you need; Moses could have carried them down the hill in his fuckin' pocket. I wouldn't mind those folks in Alabama posting them on the courthouse wall, as long as they provided one additional commandment:
Thou shalt keep thy religion to thyself.
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Issues & Alibis Vol 6 # 13 (c) 03/31/2006
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In This Edition
Patrice Greanville says, "It's High Time The GOP Was Confined To The Dustbin Of History."
Uri Avnery wonders, "What The Hell Has Happened?"
Mary Pitt explains, "Compassionate Immigration Reform."
Jim Hightower is, "Turning Cookies Into Armor."
Sheila Samples reports on the cover-up, "9/11 -- Eliminating The Impossible."
Chris Floyd covers, "The War Crimes Confession Of Condi Rice."
W. David Jenkins III reviews, "9/11: The Ultimate WMD."
Robert Parry follows, "Condi, War Crimes & The Press."
Joe Conason asks, "So Who Put The Temper In Judicial Temperament?"
Norman Solomon charges, "When War Crimes Are Impossible."
William Rivers Pitt laments, "He's Gone."
US District Judge John Bates wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award.'
Molly Ivins sees a, "Panic Time For Global Warming."
Bob Barr puts tongue in cheek for, "Cynthia McKinney: She Proves The Value Of Pre-emptive Arrest."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department Will Durst explains 'The immigration wedge issue' in "Welcome! Kneel!"
but first Uncle Ernie explores, "Pentagoons."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of John Darkow with additional cartoons from Derf City, Micah Wright, Buck Fush.Com, Internet Weekly.Org, American Idle.Net, Mindfully.Org, Chuckman and Ward Sutton.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Coming soon...
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Pentagoons By Ernest Stewart
Just like witches at black masses. War Pigs --- Black Sabbath
I'm very good at integral and differential calculus
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral
Also deep in the bowels of the Pentagon is the Army's office of the "Chief for Acquisition." These are the folks that have traditionally killed more of our troops than has the enemy. At Valley Forge they failed to supply winter clothing and shelter for the troops in the worst winter on record which decimated the Continental Army under Washington. While his men froze to death, George; who by the way was the richest man in America, spent a warm cozy winter, full of fine wine and concerts with Martha and the boys. You'd think they'd learn but the same group of genius sent our troops off to fight the Japanese in the Aleutian Islands with summer clothing. Many more troops died or were crippled by the elements than were killed by the enemy. This same group of officers and gentlemen sent our troops to be blown to tiny bits in armor less humvees and without even flack jackets in Iraq and Afghanistan. Their spokesgoon Major General Jeffrey Sorenson, the Army's deputy chief for acquisition declared that all soldiers who have had armor sent to them by mom or had bought some of their own must take their body armor off or face discipline. Say what mother f-----? Have you lost your f------ mind? Jeffy didn't say that they'd get any approved armor but just that their armor wasn't approved and therefore must be taken off. After Jeffy's speech other Pentagon spokesgoons said that they would be given new approved armor. However if that was true they wouldn't be threatening the troops as anyone with a brains of duck would be happy to upgrade their body armor for better equipment. So regardless of what the pentagoons claimed I smell a rat, don't you? If what they said was true then there wouldn't be any problem, would there? I remember when I was in the army I met a candidate for cannon fodder and bemoaned the fact to him that inside my howitzer I was only protected by 2 1/2 inches of alumaplate armor which probably wouldn't stand too many 50 caliber rounds against it. He laughed out loud and pulled on his t-shirt with his finger showing me his armor, I got the point, pity Jeffy and his pals didn't! Jeffy is just the tip of the iceberg. All the honest leaders in the Pentagon have long since retired or were fired. We've been treated to heavy thinkers like Lieutenant General William G. Boykin who said, "I knew my god was bigger than his. I knew that my god was a real god and his was an idol." Folks this guy is a three star and didn't know that the Muslims worship the very same myth that he as a Christian does. Gives ya strength, don't it? And when the generals view came to the attention of the press Von Rumsfeld and the Fuhrer gave Billie a promotion! Then there is our favorite four star; Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Marine General Peter Pace who's in charge of this traveling circus. Petey never met an order he didn't like and is Von Rumsfeld's willing puppet, whatever Karl or ole Dead-eye want they get in spades. Petey has no problem with lying his ass off about the wonderful conditions in Iraq. So America, it's "Damn the icebergs, full speed ahead" on the good ship USS Titanic! At ease, smoke'em if ya got'em! In Other News Like rats from a sinking ship, former White House chief of staff Andy Card has jumped over board and headed for the hills. Andy who was once sent out by Bush to get everybody some cheese-burgers joins former Bush Junta criminals, Richard Clarke, Paul O'Neill, Christie Todd Whitman and Colin Powell in scurrying out of the spot light and into the dark; hoping no doubt, to avoid the treason and sedition trials to come. You'll remember Andy from that famous 911 photograph of him interrupting Bush from reading "My Pet Goat?" You know the one where Andy is whispering in Bush's ear: "Everything is going according to the plan, mein fuhrer!" Now here's some more happy news. I see where "der Exterminator" has been squashed and won't be returning to camp next year. Tom Delay says he won't be seeking re-election; what with his upcoming trials, prison sentence and all. Like Henry Kissinger who was the inspiration for the character "Doctor Strangelove," Tommy was said to inspire the character of "Bill Lee" in David Cronenberg's movie of the William S. Burroughs (novel) "The Naked Lunch." Imagine if Tommy was really a bug poison snorter way back when someone calling him "the exterminator" had a whole different meaning! Wouldn't that explain a lot of the Con-gressman's bizarre actions in and out of Con-gress? Wouldn't it? It could also be a defense plea that Tommy might want to look into? Keep the faith y'all!
We'd like to welcome Patrice Greanville to our little band of merry pranksters! Patrice joins us of his own free will! * We welcome your wit and wisdom! ********************************************
We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
So how do you like the 2nd coup d'etat so far?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
 It's High Time The GOP Was Confined To The Dustbin Of History SHOW ME A GOP supporter AND I'LL SHOW YOU A COLD-HEARTED CYNIC OR A DELUDED CITIZEN. By Patrice Greanville For many years I have argued that the GOP is a party representing the worst values in American society, the vilest impulses in a human being, and that it exists, indeed it thrives in this country, solely because of the dilapidated state of political knowledge possessed by so many of our fellow citizens. This is a party that, far from thriving and winning elections, should be a footnote in the political debate in the US, or simply extinct. I say this with full understanding that its "alternative"--the Democrats--are no prize either. But, at least the Democrats pretend to have a more decent agenda, some of which they are compelled to honor on occasion (albeit without too much enthusiasm), just to remain in business. And, in all fairness, most of the Dems' rank and file are genuinely decent, well-meaning folk if badly crippled by an utterly dishonest leadership. (The party's base also suffers from a generalized malady some political taxonomists have now accurately diagnosed as "electoral superstition," stemming from a rather incurable extremism of the center, but that's another story.) The point is, fellow citizens of this new Rome, I didn't come here to damn the Democrats with faint praise, but to talk about the uncanny ability of the GOP to survive and prosper against all rational odds, today's GOP, not the GOP of Lincoln days. How does it get away with it? Perhaps one of the things that is most illuminating about the GOP and its triumphs, which speaks volumes about the overall balance of social propaganda in the US, a gross inbalance, actually, and one jealously guarded by the ruling circles, is that even with frequent front-page exposes in leading newspapers, the American public still can't make up its mind to get rid of this certifiable pestilence. Just consider the introductory paragraph of this piece filed with the New York Times (10.5.04) on the effort by the usual suspects to protect tax shelters, which obviously the overwhelming majority of real, working-class Americans would oppose. I quote EDMUND L. ANDREWS: Despite widespread agreement that abusive tax shelters are costing the federal government billions of dollars a year, House Republicans are working to eliminate or dilute provisions in a new corporate tax bill aimed at cracking down on illegal shelters. The provisions, opposed by a range of business lobbyists and tax lawyers, are part of a larger battle in Congress over how hard to attack the rapidly expanding use of complex transactions that turn real-world profits into tax-world losses. The issue is coming to a boil in a House-Senate conference committee that Monday night resumed considering a corporate tax bill that would provide up to $170 billion in tax breaks. Well, there it is. It couldn't be clearer. The article points without obfuscation to the culprits. It says that some GOP representatives were openly engaged in what was essentially not only immoral but illegal as well: they were trying to defend not just any shelter, but illegal shelters. In a true, exemplary working democracy, as America is invariably depicted by its professional boosters, revelations of this sort should lead directly to swift removal and retaliation. There should be hell to pay-at least politically. We might sensibly expect calls for immediate remedial action, a storm of irate letters to the editor, a rejection at the polls at the earliest possible date, and certainly (from any self-respecting party), swift disciplinary action in the form of expulsion. The actual reaction to this case of deliberate intervention against the public interest met none of these reasonable expectations. Politically morose America decided that doing NOTHING was the most appropriate response. Except from audible yawns in some jaded quarters, the polity as a whole simply shrugged the whole thing off and the spat over the improper tax allowances soon blew over. This despite the fact that the Times was not the only paper to run the story. As a result-or non-result, rather-nothing stirred to disturb the "comfort zone" of the inside players, and no punitive lessons were recorded. Why you may ask? The answer doesn't require rocket science to figure, even if its implementation remains difficult. The real reason for this astounding passivity, this hyperbovine tolerance to political affront, lies in the central fact underscoring the bankruptcy of American politics: the lack of a vehicle, dare I say it, party, to carry essential questions such as the elimination of political corruption, the attainment of universal health insurance, an honest and truly ethical foreign policy, the problem of unemployment, the vanishing environment, and a clear and progressive tax system, to the front of the nation's agenda, where they belong. Hard to believe it, but in 2005, and despite the posturings by both parties, all these issues remain orphans in the political sphere, while, thanks to the wily maneuvers of Republican strategists, we continue to be mired in unending, often fanatical, debates over the fate of fetuses and the marital status of gay citizens, both of which should be settled matters under the Constitution. Thus, if only because the GOP has no qualms in exploiting the most backward passions in our population, we're poised to reenact in our 21st century the colossal imbecility embodied in the so-called "Wars of Religion" that tore Europe asunder almost five hundred years ago. An unusual case, you say GOP apologists explain occurrences of the sort mentioned above as bizarre deviations from an otherwise sound system and a vigorous party with an honorable platform. Toss the few rotten apples, they say, and you save the barrel. But the article by Andrews documenting the betrayal of public trust in the highest spheres of government by the GOP is no isolated case. It's just one instance among thousands furnished down the years by the GOP (and much too frequently by the Democrats, too) afflicting all sectors of public policy-from tax legislation to matters of health, employment, war and peace, and the environment. Sadly, far from being a deviation from the norm, such behavior is the norm. They reflect the GOP's modus operandi; its unwritten, hypocritical and mean-spirited upper-class agenda, and its single-minded pursuit of advantage for the privileged (whose interests, by the way, are now global) at every suitable turn. Ronald Reagan, of course, did more for the fortunes of the GOP, quite literally, than any other charlatan to occupy the Corporate White House in decades. His presidency, one of the most astonishing instances of political fraudulence in history, brought conservatism back into the mainstream, and helped to establish the current advanced model of rule by manipulated consent, by public relations, a rule that requires deliberate deceit at the highest levels of government, and the necessity to develop a parallel hidden government tasked with implementing the real agenda of the class in power. Such a model is in effect a sort of slow-motion self-inflicted coup d'etat, a coup with a presidential facade that deliberately eviscerates the public will from within, leaving behind only a facsimile of the real thing to insure public pacification. Liberals are still neurotically obsessed with Nixon, thinking him the gravest peril that the Republic has faced since the Civil War, but their aim is way off the mark. When it comes to coupmeisters of this sort , no one can hold a candle to Ronald Reagan and his team-no one, of course, except George W. Bush. It's not surprising, then, that in the subsequent reigns of Clinton and the two Bushes, with Bush II cheerfully rehabilitating the criminal Reagan cabal, the steady trickle of executive and legal malfeasance and outright lying has become a torrent. In fact, the Reagan regime, recently suitably rewrapped and resold to the American public via hagiographic effusions upon Ronnie's passing, and supposedly the object of enthusiastic admiration by our establishment courtiers and pundits, was also an administration that broke records for general lawbreaking: more than 100 Reaganauts were indicted, forced to resign, or served jail terms for various offenses, while Irangate showed those who could see that the Republicans find the remaining strictures of democracy a mere formality not worthy of serious consideration when "serious" matters like carrying out class-driven agendas are at hand. As for the current reign of George W. Bush, the disgraceful record is already eloquent: wars under false pretexts; horrible mismanagement of a national disaster, complete disregard for the preservation of our environment, generous giveaways to his natural base, the plutocracy that spawned him, on and on ad nauseam-in short, all the symptoms of an aggressive form of crony capitalism, except that in this case we're not talking about a Third World nation, but of today's only superpower. Where's the backlash? In the fantasy land that we call American democracy we all hope for the Hollywood happy ending: the crooks and villains get their comeuppance. In other words, Mr. Smith-Mr. Everybody-as visualized by Frank Capra, not only goes to Washington but he triumphs. But in the real-life movie scripts circulated in Washington and in every single seat of traditional class power in America, from Chicago's mercantile and meatpacking fortunes to Texas oilfields and New York's financial centers, the outcomes are different. Here the villains prosper. They get rich. They win elections (or buy them, which is even better). In time, like mafia dons who have become elder statesmen, they gain social respect, even gravitas. They give rise to crime families with elaborate national and international connections. The media applaud their achievements. Soon enough they get to fool half of the country all of the time, or all of the country, too much of the time. At the pinnacle, they can sit back and enjoy the fact that in this most forgiving of nations, they have succeeded in laundering their ascent to power by less than admirable means. This is the true American way. Mario Puzo's claim to fame via The Godfather saga rests precisely on this: Don Vito Corleone's ruthless ascent is a great metaphor for the rise and rise (they're still rising) of the great American power clans. Puzo's fiction had ample base in reality, in American history. His narrative issued as much from humble but ambitious Italian immigrants as from the story of the Mellons, the Bushes, the Pews, the Fricks, the Rockefellers, the Vanderbilts, etc. It's just that these gents don't have vowels in their last names, and generations of apologists have efficiently whitewashed their long-buried misdeeds. So where do we stand? In the absence of authentic democratic processes, this cynical farandula can go on indefinitely and it will. Class systems, no matter how corrupt and decrepit, don't collapse of their own accord like biological entities, and neither do parties entrusted with their defense. You wish they did. It follows that, in the democratic vacuum we inhabit, the poisonous weeds of a completely decadent bourgeois democracy (the technical name for this farce) will go on replicating themselves throughout the nation's body as if impelled by some malignant DNA, weakening or defeating every single social policy conceived to help humans, beasts, or the environment, within or beyond our borders, for as long as we can see...until checked by a countervailing force. As for the "insider" types, these fellows denounced in the press who literally embody a noxious establishment, well, they'll simply keep enjoying the fruits of their labors. They'll go on buying their trips around the world, enjoying more vacations that you can pack in any calendar year, their yachts and Mercedeses, and their opulent Macmansions in the lily-white suburbs, while their accomplices in malefaction and partners in class, the GOP congress guys (backed by the requisite sellout Democrats) will continue performing a well-rehearsed script carefully crafted to convince the terminally naive that this is indeed the best of all possible worlds. (Incidentally, don't think for a moment that the game of these mountebanks is just confined to Washington; the disease is systemic, so similar shenanigans can and will be seen in practically all regional and state assemblies throughout this great republic.) Wishful thinking Sometimes one wonders what this country could be like if its media were at the service of the people. If instead of feeding us mountains of manure and misinformation each day, those who own and control the content of the media suddenly "saw the light" and began to use this obscenely squandered social resource to focus honest attention on the basic issues that confront American society and the world. But of course we know the answer to that. They won't be doing that any time soon because to make the media into truly dedicated and objective observers of reality would be tantamount to unravelling their own system, cutting their own throats, for the truth and the objectively defined interests of the world's population are almost always on the side of the left. Hence, the media's role in the corporate system-as most of you know so well-can never be to inform impartially, or even entertain us well, but to bolster the system's credibility at all times...through a careful filtering of news and opinion according to well understood "professional" rules supportive of the status quo. That, and to fulfill their commercial mission: to deliver audiences to their real publics, the advertising community. Lies and the sale of Coca-Cola and the latest SUV, that pretty much describes the function of the media in this kind of society. Summation
As previously argued, the GOP's record is an abomination. There is not a single area of public policy in which widely beneficial and even urgent initiatives have not been thwarted or defeated by GOP operatives, from the President on down, all working stealthily and nonstop to twist or nullify the best and more enlightened impulses of the American nation and the international community. This sleight of hand has been accomplished on the backs of two powerful accomplices, the corporate media's quasi-total blackout of meaningful information, and the clever manipulation of the conservative temperament, a topic to be explored in a companion piece in the weeks to come. Meanwhile, as things stand, it looks like the GOP will go on escaping the judgment of history for a while longer. |
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What The Hell Has Happened? By Uri Avnery THE MOST dramatic and the most boring election campaign in our history has mercifully come to an end. Israel looks in the mirror and asks itself: What the hell has happened? On the way to the ballot box, in the center of Tel-Aviv, I could not detect the slightest sign that this was election day. Generally, elections in Israel are a passionate affair. Posters everywhere, thousands of slogan-covered cars rushing around ferrying voters to the ballot stations, a lot of noise. This time - nothing. An eerie silence. Less than two thirds of the registered citizens did actually take the trouble to vote. Politicians of all stripes are detested, democracy despised among the young, whole sectors estranged. Those who decided not to vote, but at the last moment relented, voted for the Pensioners' List, which jumped from nothing to an astonishing seven seats. This was a real protest vote. Even young people told themselves: Instead of throwing our vote away, let's do them a favor. Old people, sick people (including the terminally ill), handicapped people and the entire health and education systems were the victims of the Thatcherite economic policies of Netanyahu, backed by Sharon, which Shimon Peres (of all people) called "swinish". That vote was a curiosity. But what happened in the main arena? AT THE beginning of the campaign I wrote that the whole of the political system was moving to the left. Many thought that that was wishful thinking, sadly removed from reality. Now it has actually happened. The main result of these elections is that the hold of the nationalistic-religious bloc, which has dominated Israel for more than a generation, has been broken. All those who announced that the Left is dead and that Israel is condemned to right-wing rule for a long, long time have been proved wrong. All the right-wing parties together won 32 seats, the religious parties 18. With 50 of the 120 seats in the Knesset, the rightist-religious wing cannot block all moves towards peace any more. This is a turning point. The dream of a Greater Israel, stretching from the Mediterranean Sea to the Jordan River, is dead. Significantly, the "National Union", the party that is completely identified with the settlers, has won only 9 seats - more or less like last time. After all the heart-rending drama of the destruction of the Gaza settlements, the settlers remain as unpopular as ever. They have lost the decisive battle for public opinion. Netanyahu declared that the elections were going to be a "national referendum" on the withdrawal from the West Bank. Well. It was - and the public overwhelmingly voted "Yes". The main victim is Netanyahu himself. The Likud has collapsed. For the first time since its founding by Ariel Sharon in 1973, it has been subjected to the humiliation of being the fifth (!) party in the Knesset. The heartfelt joy about this rout of the Right is tempered by a very dangerous development: the rise of Avigdor Lieberman's "Israel our Home" party, a mutation of the Right with openly fascist tendencies. Lieberman, an immigrant from the former Soviet Union and himself a settler, draws his main strength from the "Russian" community, which is almost uniformly extremely nationalistic. He calls for the expulsion of all Arabs (a fifth of Israel's population), ostensibly in a swap of territories, but the message is clear. There are also the usual hallmarks of such a party: the cult of the Leader, a call for "law and order", intense hatred for "the enemy" both within and without. This man got 11 seats. His main slogan "Da Lieberman" ("Yes Lieberman" in Russian) reminds one of similar historical salutes. For those who are interested: the fascist group that called for my murder as part of their election program has failed to attain the 2% necessary to gain entry into the Knesset. But, of course, an assassin does not need 2% to follow such a call. (I would like to use this occasion to express my heartfelt thanks to all those around the world who expressed their solidarity.) THE JOYFUL scenes at the Labor Party's Headquarters may seem at first glance exaggerated. After all, the party got only 20 seats, as against 19 last time (to which must be added the three of the small party led by Amir Peretz at the time). But the numbers do not tell the whole story. First of all, the political implications are far-reaching. In parliament, it is not only the raw numbers which count, but also their location on the political map. In the next Knesset, any coalition without the Labor Party has become impractical, if not completely impossible. Amir Peretz is going to be the most important person in the next cabinet, after Ehud Olmert. But there is more to it than that. Peretz, the first "oriental" Jewish leader of any major Israeli party, has overcome the historic rejection of Labor by the immigrants from Muslim countries and their offspring. He has destroyed the established equation of Oriental = poor = Right as against Ashkenazi = well-to-do = Left. This has not yet found its full expression in the voting. The increase in Oriental voters for Labor has been only incremental. But no one who has seen how Peretz was received in the open markets, until now fortresses of the Likud, can have any doubt that something fundamental has changed. And most important, when Peretz arrived on the scene, hardly three months ago, Labor was a walking corpse. Now it is alive, vibrant, hungry for action. It's called leadership, and it's there. Peretz is on his way to being a viable candidate for Prime Minister in the next elections. Until then, he certainly will have a major impact both on social affairs and the peace process. THAT IS, of course, the main question: Can the next government bring us closer to peace? Kadima has won the elections, but is not happy. When it was founded by Sharon, it expected 45 seats. The sky was the limit. Now it has to be satisfied with a measly 29 seats, enough to head the government but not enough to dictate policy. In his victory speech, Olmert called on Mahmoud Abbas to make peace. But this is an empty gesture. No Palestinian could possibly accept the terms Olmert has in mind. So, if the Palestinians don't show that they are "partners", Olmert wants to "establish Israel's permanent borders unilaterally", meaning that he wants to annex something between 15% and 50% of the West Bank. It is doubtful whether Peretz can impose another policy. Possibly, the whole question will be postponed, under the pretext that the social crisis has to be addressed first. In the meantime, the fight against the Palestinians will go on.
It is up to the peace movement to change this. The elections show that Israeli public opinion wants an end to the conflict, that it rejects the dreams of the settlers and their allies, that it seeks a solution. We have contributed to this change. Now it is our job to show that Olmert's unilateral peace is no peace at all and will not lead to a solution.
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Compassionate Immigration Reform By Mary Pitt As our nation is being inundated by the stream of illegal immigrants crossing our southern borders, flooding our factories and fields with potential employees who are willing to work at extremely low wages, and overwhelming our already-stressed hospitals and welfare systems, Americans are being split yet again over how to handle the problem. There are those who cry for compassion in caring for these desperate people marching in determined opposition to those who are concerned about national security and the durability of our economic condition. Surely, in this country which prides itself on our ability to reach reasonable answers based on our concept of humanitarian equality, there is some answer which would be acceptable to both sides. But there appears to be no consensus on the matter. The Republicans in Congress are proposing contradicting laws on which there is not, and is not likely to be, any agreement, while the Democrats just sit back and enjoy the show. Any sentient being would realize that most of the proposals are for the same thing that was passed in 1984, and that didn't work over the long haul. Why not? Because it was never enforced! The humanity continued to pour over the border and farmers and large corporations continued to hire them "under the table" with impunity. Most of us fully expect that Congress will merely "labor mightily and bring forth a gnat." There is no effort to develop a comprehensive plan that is enforceable, practical, and humane. There is no doubt that, included in the numbers of illegal border-crossers, there may be those who mean us harm. We know that some are known gangsters with no intent to engage in productive work, but only to take advantage of richer "pickings" for their chosen occupations as thieves and murderers. Others could be "terrorists" with an agenda of creating desperate attacks upon our super-structure and our lives. Aside from those undesirables, the very number of the ones who truly expect to find a better life in a land of abundance are taxing our ability to serve them. While most of the dialogue deals with "the workers" and whether they are essential to a healthy commerce, little is said about the fact that there is a larger problem than the effect of the "workers" on our society. The number is said to stand at twenty million illegal immigrants among us now, but there has been no attempt to count the number of their children who have been born since the migration of their parents and, being "native-born," must be counted as citizens and thus are not included in that total. Yes, something must be done! But what? First, we must consider the fact that not all of these people are those whom we consider to be "workers". Those who are in search of work also bring their families, and it is these families who become the taxpayers' burdens. Pregnant women make the journey, risking not only themselves but their unborn children in the arduous trek. They know that. once here, their children may be born in American hospitals without charge and will be citizens and, thus, the anchor for their entire family to claim the right to stay in the United States due to a relationship to a citizen. These children become entitled to health care, education, and social benefits for their own future families. However, they also strain the ability of the American taxpayer to provide the services which they need. Those who are available and eager to work are willing to work for much less than are Americans because, contrasted with their accustomed standard of living, they consider the meager pay an improvement. They are willing to live in six-family homes and to subsist on a diet which would be totally unacceptable to American families, foraging for food and other necessities in very inventive ways until they can become established in jobs and be able to care for their own needs. Of course, their employers are happy to have them! They work very hard and make every effort to keep their job, sending a substitute to do their work if they have to be absent. They are constantly aware that offending their employers could lead to to their deportation. They are usually paid in cash, "under the table", and so do not bear the burden of paying taxes or even having Social Security deducted from their wages. This is not necessarily a benefit to them, but to their employers who save the money that should be contributed to the Social Security Administration as matching funds. First, no problem that has been so neglected for so long can be corrected quickly, and so the details must be worked out on a gradual basis over a period of time, and it should be done with great care. The most urgent concern at this time is the problem of "border security". The dramatic increase in the number of illegal and uncontrolled residents in the nation is a definite threat to our security. Illegal immigration must be stopped immediately while those who are already here should be checked carefully as to nation of origin and the purpose for which they came. We have seen that the Border Patrol, even if fully utilized, (which it has not been), cannot totally control every footpath across the border. A giant and expensive "fence" as a barrier smacks too much of the Berlin Wall and the one which is being built by Israel to imprison the Palestinians. Perhaps we should consider, instead, a trench the length of the border, too wide to jump, too deep to scale or to tunnel under, and lacking sufficient water to dive into and swim. This could be done for a much smaller expenditure than a wall and could be more easily monitored by an increased Border Patrol and well-installed electronic monitors. (The earth which would be removed could even be trucked across the "horn" of Texas to raise the level of New Orleans, build a higher seawall, and restore the delta, another neglected national problem!) This would stop the in-flow of both people and drugs, defeating both the "coyotes" and the drug gangs. A limited number of bridges could be more easily monitored at inspection stations while there would be a better chance of controlling the dangerous and illegal acticivities of the trans-national gangs. The President wants an "amnesty" program because the employers of the nation need "guest workers", but this was attempted in 1974 and it didn't work! Employers ignored the law with impunity as there was little or no enforcement and it did nothing to stem the tide. If the employers are truly unable to find crews to harvest their crops or to slaughter and butcher their animals, they should be able to apply for them and to have them delegated to them by an official office that would be responsible for checking the qualifications and abilities of the applicant. These offices could be set up in embassies in Latin nations and be certified to issue the necessary temporary work visas which would entitle the applicant to work for that employer for a specific amount of time. These visas should be available only from American embassies in their home country and the employers would be responsible for withholding all pertinent taxes as well as for the lawful behavior of the employees and their prompt return to their home countries at the end of their assignment. Eligibility for Social Security should be a matter to be considered by the law-makers. Such legal "guest workers" should understand that they alone are responsible for carrying insurance for themselves and their families or paying any medical bills incurred on pain of losing their work visa prematurely. As for the illegal immigrants who are already here, we will need time and compassionate debate. Perhaps, rather than criminalizing them immediately, a time limit should be set. If, for instance, within three or five years, they were to find their way back to their native country, they would be eligible to register to return for another period as a guest worker or for permanent residency as a potential citizen.. At the end of that time, those who remain here illegally could be located, deported and lose their privilege of return. Of course, many of them will have children who are were born here and are entitled to citizenship, and decisions must be made about them. The parents could be given alternatives. The President of the United States says that we all should be required to make choices and they should be allowed to make a choice between taking their children back with them with the proviso that the children could return at will to take up residency or to leave the children with friends or in foster homes while they are reared and educated as befits a citizen of the United States. Despite all the vitriol on both sides of the issue, whether to throw open our borders to one and all without restriction or to secure our borders against potentially deadly interlopers, the problem is not insoluble. It only requires the patience to put our prejudices and partisanship aside and to act as loyal citizens of these United States to develop a workable plan that will satisfy both the need for security and any possible need for guest workers without ripping up the Constitution or the principles on which our nation was founded and has prospered. While our current illegal inhabitants will object, there will also be advantages for them. No longer will they have to work for years to repay the money which was paid to smugglers for guiding them here, no longer will they risk a miserable death in an over-crowded coyote van or from extreme thirst in the desert, no longer will their wives and daughters be sold into prostitution and drug smuggling on pain of exposure, and they can enjoy all the benefits of living in this wonderful land without the fear and blackmail which now plagues their very existence.
The "mainstream" political parties are split up the middle as to whether an "open borders" aspect would be desirable or whether a strict "law and order" posture would be better and, so far, we see no consensus on the proper way to handle the problem. Meanwhile, both the safety of the citizens of the United States and the ambitions of the migrant workers are hinging on whether the power-brokers in Washington would recognize the validity of the arguments on both sides and work to reconcile them. However, they first have to want to do so, and that appears to be the sticking point. Whether they can put aside their greed for virtual slave labor in the interest of national security is the question. It is well past time for them to stop playing politics with the question and to put up or shut up.
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George "Flimflam" Bush is back with his traveling medicine show, trying yet again to sell us that old elixir he calls the "National Strategy for Victory in Iraq." In his current sales pitch, Bush insists that America must not lose its nerve in Iraq. However, this war is not about nerve - it's about people dying for a pack of lies. Of course, no one in Bush's family has their lives at risk in George's war, but other families are not so fortunate, with their loved ones facing bombs, bullets, and death everyday. They want to know how Bush has the nerve to talk about staying the course when he still - still! - has not provided all of our troops with the armor needed to help them stay alive. One angry family member is Tammara Rosenleaf, who has launched a grassroots campaign called, "Bake Sales for Body Armor." Tammara's husband, Sean, is fighting in Iraq, and she was both shocked and outraged to learn that he had been deployed without adequate armor. He finally got properly outfitted, but Tammara wanted to make sure that all soldiers are protected. "[The Bake Sale Project] is what I decided to do about it," she says. Backed by Veterans for Peace, Rosenleaf and a hardy crew of volunteers are literally holding bake sales around the country, offering cookies, cakes, and other goodies. They also hold virtual "bake sales" online. All of the money they raise is spent on body armor, medical supplies, and other gear that they then ship to soldiers. Bush's Pentagon has not been nice about Tammara's group, assailing them as "ludicrous," and mockingly saying that their shipments to Iraq troops are only helping puff up the profits of the U.S. post office. This is Jim Hightower saying... What's truly ridiculous, is that our $500-billion-a-year Pentagon has to be supplemented by bake sales. To learn how you can hold a bake sale, make a donation, or sign up a soldier to receive gear, go to www.bakesalesforbodyarmor.org.
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I said I'd never do it -- say what I think about that terrible morning of September 11, 2001. I've seen what happens to those who question the elaborate, tangled explanations the Bush administration offers about what happened, how it happened, who did it, and why they did it. It doesn't matter if those who dare speak truth to the lies are professors, investigative reporters, eyewitnesses, scientists -- "conspiracy theorist" is immediately tattooed on their foreheads. They are jeered at, ridiculed, spat upon and swift-boated right out of the room. They are banished to the outskirts of civilized society. But my friend Bernie says we're way beyond asking questions about 9-11 and, since nobody listens to me anyway, I might as well get it off my chest. "Besides," Bernie said, "George Bush never shuts up about 9-11. He's obsessed with it. No matter what anybody asks him, he spouts September the 11th. Bush never says September 11; he never says 9-11," Bernie groaned, "he just keeps chanting over and over -- September the 11th, September the 11th, September the 11th, Sep--" "I get the picture!" I interrupted, shuddering at the loathsome image of Bush cavorting around September "the" 11th, pointing to it in every public appearance with masturbatory delight, reveling in the knowledge that "history will show" they got away with it. "You know, Bernie," I sighed, "it's like he's bragging about a grand accomplishment. You'd almost think it was an inside job." "Of course it was an inside job," Bernie snorted. "Anyone who can connect even two dots without ramming one up his nose and the other into his forehead knows that. And anyone who's ever flown a Cessna 172 is roaring with laughter at the thought of those Muslim guys Bush fingered emerging from a dusty Florida airport, climbing into the cockpit of a Boeing 757, looking at the flashing lights, bells and whistles on its control panel, and know which button to push to even talk to the passengers, let alone get that 100-ton beast in the air. HAW HAW... "We know they did it," Bernie said, suddenly sober. "Every single one of us. We know it now -- and we knew it then." He rose and started toward the door -- "All you gotta remember is...if something is something, it can't be anything else but that something. No matter how they dress it up, no matter how much lipstick they smear on it, it's still that something. It ain't never something else. Everything that's happened in the last five years, and everything that'll happen in the next five," Bernie said, "is a result of that one day Bush keeps throwing in our faces -- September the 11th." I sat there, trying to wrap my mind around Bernie's string of "somethings," when it suddenly occurred to me. Of course! Bernie instinctively hit upon the universal law called dharma, a simple principle that brings order to chaos -- things are what they are, and a thing cannot be other than what it is. Universal laws cannot be broken, even by the genocidal warmongers running rampant within this administration, no matter how hard they try. Knowing Bernie, however, I suspect he was channeling Sherlock Holmes who skillfully used the critical dharma tool Sir Arthur Conan Doyle gave him to solve crime -- "When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth." For four and a half years, questions about 9-11 have swirled through the Internet with tornadic force, yet caused scarcely a breeze within the mainstream media. The sheer number of heroic questioners helped to keep the door of truth open just a crack in spite of a relentless effort of the Bush men, the media and the Congress to force it shut. It hasn't been easy. Americans' psyches were shattered on 9-11 when, with no warning, they suddenly came face-to-face with raw, fiendish evil. They were incapable of handling the truth. Americans are waking up. They have been told one -- or one hundred -- too many lies. They instinctively know there are only three areas of questions about 9-11 whose answers, however improbable, reveal the truth. One -- Who, or what, flew the four hijacked planes on 9-11? Certainly not the inexperienced, box-cutter-armed bunch of rag-tag Saudis -- most of whom are still alive -- whose photographs the FBI plastered on our TV screens and in our minds immediately after the attack. There were no Arabs in the air on the morning of 9-11, performing astonishing feats of acrobatic maneuvering -- spinning and snap-rolling and pulling 180's (scroll down to see flight paths) into the World Trade Center and Pentagon -- nor were any listed on the manifests of the four flights. The only proof of their presence is the passport of one Salem Suqami that fluttered through the chaos of explosions, a raging inferno and collapse of buildings and landed, undamaged, on the sidewalk below. Actually, we need go no further into the 9-11 morass than the planes. What we witnessed on that ghastly morning was a carefully planned, perfectly orchestrated PSYOPS attack on a citizenry by its own government. The first victim of this brutal assault was possibly the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), which was juggling a minimum of five training exercises that morning and, at any one time its radar screens showed up to 22 hijacked aircraft. Much has been written about NORAD "standing down" on 9-11. I don't buy that for one minute. But NORAD is guilty. It is guilty of assuming the mass confusion was a result of multiple war games it was playing that morning of crashing planes into buildings. It is guilty of trying to cover its ass when it realized the destruction was real-world. According to an in-depth report by retired theologian Dr. David Ray Griffin, who also wrote "The New Pearl Harbor" and "The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions," both General Richard Myers, then acting chair of the Joint Chiefs, and Mike Snyder, NORAD spokesman, reported that "no military jets were sent up until after the strike on the Pentagon." Griffin says when this admission started raising eyebrows, a second story appeared on Sept. 14 that "contrary to early reports, jets were scrambled while the attacks were underway, but they arrived too late to prevent them." Four days later, NORAD released a timeline so jumbled it failed to pass muster in any venue. Finally, unable to get out of the hole, both the FAA and NORAD stopped digging. The FAA destroyed the tapes of activity that morning, to include conversations between the hijacked planes and air traffic control personnel, said, "oopsie, sorry about that," then just shut up and took its licks. Two -- Nothing reveals the truth of 9-11 as clearly as the in-your-face controlled demolition of the World Trade Center's twin towers and building 7. They all fell down. According to a NYC fireman on the scene, they fell -- "just like that -- boom-boom-boom-boom-boom-boom-boom" -- In 10 seconds flat. Well, that's not exactly true, because it took the 47-story No. 7 only 6.6 seconds to pancake into its own footprints. But if ever there was a classic case of "don't believe your lying eyes," it is the deliberate destruction of these three WTC buildings. Nothing reveals the truth as clearly as the breathless, on-the-scene initial reaction by network and cable TV -- "There are explosions going off everywhere!" ... "We just heard another huge explosion!" ... "A huge explosion, raining debris on all of us...we need to get out of here!" ... "This almost looks like a -- a controlled demolition..." CNN's Pentagon correspondent, Jamie McEntyre, blurted this "Breaking News" item -- "There's no evidence that a plane crashed into the Pentagon or anywhere near it and in fact, the only pieces left were small enough that you could pick them up in your hands --and no large sections -- tail sections, fuselage sections..." By the next morning, the media monkeys had come to their senses and were dutifully droning administration talking points while ominously reminding Americans that questioning what happened was nothing short of criticism of the president, or how unpatriotic can we be at a time when we all need to hang together. However, defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld apparently agreed with McEntyre and conspiracy theorists when he told Parade Magazine on Oct. 13, "Here we're talking about plastic knives, and using an American Airlines flight filled with our citizens, and the missile to damage this building, and similar (inaudible) that damaged the WTC." Nothing reveals the truth more clearly than the implosion of No. 7, which was not hit by a plane. WTC owner Larry Silverstein publicly acknowledged that they "pulled" No. 7 and, although he made out like a bandit on the whole 9-11 holocaust, he did not explain nor did the media ask him when the explosives needed to "pull" the 47 stories were put in place. Interestingly, the 9-11 Commission did not think it important enough to question either Silverstein or the fire department about the No. 7 collapse, nor did it even mention the building in its bogus report. Three -- The truth is what it is. As Bernie says, it ain't never something else. A search for the truth about 9-11 is much easier if all that cannot be true is tossed out. Why waste time considering the impossible? For example, if you're reading Michael Chertoff's massive May 2002 FEMA investigation into 9-11, "World Trade Center Building Performance Study," you need go no further into its 262 pages than this conclusion -- "...as each aircraft impacted a building, jet fuel on board ignited. Part of this fuel immediately burned off in the large fireballs that erupted at the impact floors. Remaining fuel flowed across the floors and down elevator and utility shafts, igniting intense fires throughout upper portions of the buildings. As these fires spread, they further weakened the steel-framed structures, eventually leading to total collapse." Toss it, as well as the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) report, which uses its 292 pages to "describe how the aircraft impacts and subsequent fires led to the collapses (sic) of the towers after terrorists flew jet fuel laden commercial airliners into the buildings..." While you're at it, you can trash the March 2005 Popular Mechanics hit piece -- a regurgitation of FEMA's fantastical explanation, to wit --"Once each tower began to collapse, the weight of all the floors above the collapsed zone bore down with pulverizing force on the highest intact floor. Unable to absorb the massive energy, that floor would fail, transmitting the forces to the floor below, allowing the collapse to progress downward through the building in a chain reaction." And the Pentagon? PM had that all figured out too. It quotes Mete Sozen, a professor of structural engineering at Purdue University as shrugging aside the nagging conspiracy that a Boeing 757 did not hit the Pentagon, ". . .one wing hit the ground; the other was sheared off by the force of the impact with the Pentagon's load-bearing columns," Sozen said. "What was left of the plane flowed into the structure in a state closer to a liquid than a solid mass." I could be wrong, but I doubt even the zany, fun-loving Rumsfeld would try to run THAT one by us. The PM piece is little more than an attack on those who question the events of that dreadful morning, and is replete with unattributed "facts." It is the work of Michael Chertoff's cousin, 25-year-old Benjamin Chertoff, who was given free reign after a shock-and-awe coup at the magazine wherein PM editor-in-chief Joe Oldham was given 90 minutes to clean out his desk. Other staff members, including the creative director, were also fired. The 9-11 Commission Report should be discarded as well. And set afire. It differs from the above attempts to cover up a government's attack on its own people only in length and breadth. Thomas Kean and Lee Hamilton entered into a "contract" with the American people; they swore to get to the bottom of the tragedy; inventory its causes and put the blame where it rightfully belonged. They betrayed us. And they charged us only ten bucks a copy. In his hard-hitting article in Harper's Magazine, Benjamin DeMott writes that the Report is "a shrewdly conceived and sustained equity-of-blame argument that becomes the fulcrum of the entire document and has a single principle at its center -- any blame that might be apportioned to the behavior of the sitting administration is easily counterbalanced by the behavior of preceding authorities -- and by historical 'fact' as interpreted in accordance with current presidential and commissarial need." Bush made clear that his "presidential need" was to not have a Commission blaming him for what happened. When an investigation was forced on him, Bush undercut it, underfunded it and agreed to meet with Commission members only in the Oval Office, only if Dick Cheney was there, only if he was not under oath, only if his remarks were not recorded and only if no notes were taken. DeMott tells us that the more than 600-page document was nothing more than "a weapon in a major domestic conflict: the war on incisive, sometimes rudely disruptive thought -- thought that distinguishes the democratic citizen from the idolatrous fool, the sucker, the clueless consumer, the ad person's delight." Rather than tell the people the truth as promised about 9-11, Kean and Hamilton used their Report as a PSYOPS weapon against them. Bill Clinton is to blame. With the FAA riding shotgun. Shut up and move on. Homework assignment After eliminating the impossible, we are left with ghastly images of death and suffering. With brutal malice aforethought, on 9-11 this administration murdered 2,823 human beings. Only 1,102 victims have been identified, although 19,500 body parts were "collected." More than 100 Americans were pulverized in the explosions, their remains mingling with tons and tons of cement into fine dust, and just disappeared into the air, perhaps into the lungs of those working feverishly at Ground Zero to save them. Each of us with any connection to reality knows that the only explanation for 9-11 is that the entire holocaust was a deliberately planned, orchestrated, controlled demolition of our way of life. If you want to know what happened on 9-11, watch Korey Rove, Dylan Avery and Jason Bermas' critical film, "Loose Change, 2nd Edition." Surely the Truth is worth 1 hour, 21 minutes and 50 seconds of our lives.. If you want to know why 9-11 happened, read the Project for the New American Century (PNAC)2000 report, Rebuilding America's Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources For a New Century," which calls for a "new Pearl Harbor" to establish US military preeminence throughout the world as well as unending war to seize and control the world's resources. It's only 90 pages, and should take even less than 1 hour, 21 minutes and 50 seconds to peruse. If you want to know the truth about the attack on this country, watch and read the above as if your life depended upon it. Because it does. We have the crime. We have the criminals. The time has come to indict them. Try them. Convict them. Punish them. Then, and only then, can we move on.
That's what I think
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The incomparable Robert Parry puts Condi Rice clearly in the frame for war crimes after her extraordinary confessions during her trip to the UK last week -- confessions that have been entirely ignored by the US press. While there was a brief flurry over her casual remark about "thousands of tactical mistakes" in Iraq, no one but Parry caught her admission -- nay, her boast -- that the Bush Regime's policy in Iraq was an open, deliberate, carefully considered violation of the Nuremberg-based laws against aggressive war: principles articulated most forcefully by America's own representative to that international tribunal, and which were later incorporated into the UN Charter.
As Parry notes, Rice confessed that the Bush Administration launched an unprovoked invasion and occupation of Iraq to effect a unilateral "regime change" for political and ideological purposes -- the same crime for which the Hitler Administration was justly condemned at Nuremberg. This action was and is illegal under the Nuremberg principles, the UN Charter and United States law.
The implications of all this are unavoidable. Americans are now living under a criminal regime, a rogue junta that no longer feels the need to disguise its criminality. Hence Rice's confession; hence Bush's confession about illegal wiretapping of American citizens; hence the Administration's bold protestations in open court that the president cannot be bound by any act of Congress or judicial ruling in carrying out his "inherent" powers as Commander-in-Chief; hence the Supreme Court's craven kowtowing to this presidential dictatorship in its ruling in the Padilla case, when the Justices simply refused to address the issue of Padilla's years-long "indefinite detention without any formal charges or, for 20 months, any contact with the outside world.
But worse than all this is the sickening, despairing fact that the American Establishment -- Democrats and Republicans, media barons and financial chieftains, military officers and academic leaders, the courts and Congress -- all have countenanced and embraced this open tyranny. There are simply no institutional forces with any power willing to stand up against the dictatorship. Nor have the American people moved in sufficient mass to present a credible challenge to the enemies of liberty.
These are in many ways the darkest days in American history. Even in the Civil War, there was no real question that the Republic itself would survive -- even if in a reduced territory, had the slaveholding aristocracy that drove the Southern succession triumphed in the war. But now it seems that the Republic is well and truly dead, in every state of the Union, from sea to shining sea.
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 9/11: The Ultimate WMD By W. David Jenkins III
"The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed." --- Steve Biko
The poll I mentioned asked if people agreed that there was a government cover-up regarding the events of 9/11. Out of almost fifty four thousand participants, eighty three percent said "yes." Now I realize that on line polls can be less than accurate or "cyber bombed" by web users from opposing views, but a Zogby poll from October 2004 showed that half of the people in NYC and almost half (41%) of all New Yorkers felt that some federal officials ''knew in advance that attacks were planned on or around September 11, 2001, and that they consciously failed to act.'' Then there was New York magazine's Mark Jacobson's article The Ground Zero Grassy Knoll and SF Gate's Mark Morford's Long Live the 9/11 Conspiracy which brought up the subject of those of us who just don't buy the "official version" of 9/11. Both of these pieces not only point to the various "conspiracy theories" we've all heard, but they also make the argument that there are many, many Americans who justly believed from the beginning that the 9/11 Commission didn't tell the whole story. We desperately need to find a way back to 9/11 and open the whole thing back up again. We need to stop being so afraid of asking some questions which should have been asked years ago. We need to remember that when it comes to the events of that day, the only "conspiracy theorists" who are engaging any form of disrespect to the victims of that day are those who desperately cling to the official story. We need to reopen not only the dialogue, but a real investigation into that fateful day. Only by achieving a loud voice demanding answers from a wide range of culprits will we deny the use of 9/11 as a weapon, conveniently welded against the people of this country and the rest of the world. We have heard the old excuse ad nauseum for over four years now. Anytime a misguided patri-idiot (including various leaders in D.C.) fears that they may be losing an argument regarding Iraq, domestic spying or the flat tire they had that morning, they run willy-nilly to that good old stand by; "We're at war!" And just to make sure they aren't questioned any further, they will proceed to add into their argument that those poor victims in the World Trade Center probably wished that we had (insert constitutional violation here) many years ago. End of discussion! That's 9/11 as a weapon - and a very effective weapon which is designed to not only end any discussion or dissent, but also to instill a sense of shame into anyone who would dare question those in authority. Subsequently, these same 9/11 gunslingers have been able to break any law they see fit in their depraved quest for imperial power and 9/11 has become the cornerstone of their whole foundation. But the strength of that foundation is strictly dependent upon the American peoples' fear of divorcing themselves from that horrible imagery long enough to realize that they have not only been deceived, but that that deception has caused them to embrace those who violate them. Like children who are molested by their own parents, many Americans just cannot bring themselves to believe that those figures who are supposed to nurture and protect them would ever do them harm. As an example of this mindset, I need only to point to my own father. I introduced him to two of David Ray Griffin's works, A New Pearl Harbor and The 9/11 Commission Report; Lies and Omissions this last summer. Now, I need to point out that both of my parents were among those who thought there was little difference between Gore and Bush back in 2000. But after traveling across the country over the last few years, they've related to me the things people have been saying about the administration and they've wanted to know what else is going on. What else hasn't the media told them? So, I figured my father was ready for Griffin 's books. For those of you who haven't read Griffin 's work, his approach to the events of 9/11 isn't a "this is what happened" argument but more of an in-depth analysis of the official story and why it just doesn't add up. After he had finished both books, I could see my father had been unnerved by what he had read and he summed up perfectly the collective mindset of the rest of the country. "I just can't believe my government would do such a thing!" I told him that it wasn't "his government," it was these people (PNAC group) who would do such a thing. There are folks who think that these people either made it happen or let it happen and it's difficult to prove either theory. However, what is easy to prove is that this country did not get the whole story, let alone an accurate story, of what really happened that day. Griffin 's work along with numerous web sites, most notably Paul Thompson's remarkable 9/11 Timeline, provide a more carefully researched and thorough picture of that day in our history than the official 9/11 Commission dared to even contemplate. But people need to not only want to look at that picture but they also must not be afraid to believe what they will see. When one steps back and looks at the make up and conduct of the 9/11 Commission, one quickly realizes that it was little more than a White House led undertaking to do nothing more than "prove" the official version. Few people realize that the decisions regarding what would be the focus of the commission were made by Philip Zelikow, a member of Bush's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board. Under the leadership of Zelikow, the 9/11 Commission either omitted or refused to hear testimony from first responders who were at the WTC, intelligence officials like Sibel Edmonds who testified that the "war on terror" was corrupt in its execution or any other testimony or blatantly obvious facts which contradicted the official version. Go ahead and ask people, even those who think Bush is hiding something about 9/11, and witness how little is actually known about the events of that day or the farcical "investigation" that resulted after years of delays, under funding and barefaced stone-walling committed by the Bush administration. Go ahead and point out the obvious contradictions in the official version to some people and see how long it takes you to either be labeled a "conspiracy theorist" or even worse, be told "don't go there." But if we are to have any chance at stopping this Bush driven American freefall recklessly descending into something America was never meant to become, then we must go there - and we must go there over and over with loud voices until we can drown out the rhetoric and the fear mongering. There have been some recent developments and additional articles that point back to 9/11 and the real need to reopen that wound in order to allow it to finally heal. Robert Steinback of the Miami Herald recently did a piece titled Avoiding the Hard Questions which moved me to examine further many of the points he makes regarding people's fear of not wanting to look too closely at 9/11. There is also a relatively new group called Scholars for 9/11 Truth who has begun to make waves on the Internet regarding the inconsistencies of the official version of events and I highly recommend folks check these out if you haven't already. There is something folks need to remember and I think this is very important. There is a huge difference between being a "conspiracy theorist" and having reasonable doubts. Anyone who has taken the time to explore the government's case relating to 9/11 knows that it would fall apart in a court of law much as it seems to be falling apart in the court of public opinion. You have to wonder if some people are more fearful of learning the truth than they are of the "terrorists." What if it became known that we really don't need more security in our ports or airports? What if it became known that illegal wire taps or the invasion of countries was not necessary in order to keep the country safe? What if the answer to preventing another 9/11 was simply insuring that certain people never achieved the highest positions of power in our government? 9/11 needs to be given a decent burial instead of being used as the basis for the policies of the most corrupt administration in American history. The victims who perished that day and their families deserve more than respect and prayers - they deserve justice. And until 9/11's use as a weapon is ended, those victims and their families will be denied those very things.
And so will the rest of us.
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Condi, War Crimes & The Press By Robert Parry During the three years of carnage in Iraq, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has shifted away from her now-discredited warning about a "mushroom cloud" to assert a strategic rationale for the invasion that puts her squarely in violation of the Nuremberg principle against aggressive war. On March 31 in remarks to a group of British foreign policy experts, Rice justified the U.S.-led invasion by saying that otherwise Iraqi President Saddam Hussein "wasn't going anywhere" and "you were not going to have a different Middle East with Saddam Hussein at the center of it." [Washington Post, April 1, 2006] Rice's comments in Blackburn, England, followed similar remarks during a March 26 interview on NBC's "Meet the Press" in which she defended the invasion of Iraq as necessary for the eradication of the "old Middle East" where a supposed culture of hatred indirectly contributed to the terror attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. "If you really believe that the only thing that happened on 9/11 was people flew airplanes into buildings, I think you have a very narrow view of what we faced on 9/11," Rice said. "We faced the outcome of an ideology of hatred throughout the Middle East that had to be dealt with. Saddam Hussein was a part of that old Middle East. The new Iraq will be a part of the new Middle East, and we will all be safer." But this doctrine - that the Bush administration has the right to invade other nations for reasons as vague as social engineering - represents a repudiation of the Nuremberg Principles and the United Nations Charter's ban on aggressive war, both formulated largely by American leaders six decades ago. Outlawing aggressive wars was at the center of the Nuremberg Tribunal after World War II, a conflagration that began in 1939 when Germany's Adolf Hitler trumped up an excuse to attack neighboring Poland. Before World War II ended six years later, more than 60 million people were dead. U.S. Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson, who represented the United States at Nuremberg, made clear that the role of Hitler's henchmen in launching the aggressive war against Poland was sufficient to justify their executions - and that the principle would apply to all nations in the future. "Our position is that whatever grievances a nation may have, however objectionable it finds the status quo, aggressive warfare is an illegal means for settling those grievances or for altering those conditions," Jackson said. "Let me make clear that while this law is first applied against German aggressors, the law includes, and if it is to serve a useful purpose, it must condemn aggression by any other nations, including those which sit here now in judgment," Jackson said. With the strong support of the United States, this Nuremberg principle was then incorporated into the U.N. Charter, which bars military attacks unless in self-defense or unless authorized by the U.N. Security Council. Nervous Blair This fundamental principle of international behavior explains why British Prime Minister Tony Blair was so set on a Security Council vote to authorize the invasion of Iraq or at least indisputable evidence that Iraq remained a serious military threat to other countries. Based on internal British legal opinions, Blair knew the invasion would be illegal. This concern led the Bush administration to hype evidence of Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction, which included Rice's famous declaration that she didn't want the "smoking gun" evidence of Hussein's WMD to be "a mushroom cloud." Bush even considered staging his own casus belli by tricking Iraq into firing on a U-2 reconnaissance plane painted with U.N. colors to win U.N. backing for attacking Iraq, according to minutes of a Jan. 31, 2003, meeting in the Oval Office that involved Bush, Blair and senior aides, including then-national security adviser Rice. Despite Bush's promise at that meeting to "twist arms and even threaten" other nations, the United States couldn't bully a majority of the U.N. Security Council into supporting an invasion, especially with Iraq giving U.N. weapons inspectors free rein to search suspected WMD sites and with nothing found. On March 19, 2003, Bush chose to press ahead with the invasion anyway, ousting Hussein's government three weeks later but then stumbling into a bloody insurgency that has now pushed the nation to the brink of civil war. Tens of thousands of Iraqis - possibly more than 100,000 - have died, along with more than 2,300 U.S. troops. U.S. arms inspectors also failed to find any caches of WMD. Other allegations about Hussein's supposed collaboration with al-Qaeda also proved unfounded. Gradually, Rice and other senior Bush aides shifted their rationale from Hussein's WMD to a strategic justification, that is, politically transforming the Middle East. This new rationale - essentially an assertion of a special U.S. right to invade and occupy any country that is perceived as an obstacle to U.S. goals in the world - is a spin-off of the neoconservative Project for a New American Century of the 1990s. "In neoconservative eyes, the Iraq war was not about terrorism; it was about the pivotal relationship between Saddam Hussein and the assertion of American power," Stefan Halper and Jonathan Clarke observed in their book, America Alone. "Hussein provided, in effect, the opportunity to clarify American global objectives and moral obligations." The PNAC architects saw Hussein as a blot on American global dominance because he had survived standoffs with the first Bush administration and the Clinton administration. His removal would demonstrate that overt resistance to America's permanent status as the world's uni-polar power had dire consequences. Hesitant Nation But the American public was less eager to support, either in treasure or blood, such an open declaration of imperial designs. So, the invasion of Iraq was repackaged as defensive, to protect the American people from even a more devastating 9/11 attack. In late 2002 and early 2003, the Bush administration and its media allies also demonstrated their dominance of the domestic political scene, unleashing a war fever inside the United States in support of Bush's Iraq War claims. The few voices of political dissent, such as former Vice President Al Gore, were drowned out in ridicule or under accusations of treason. When a singer in Dixie Chicks dared criticize Bush, trucks were driven over the group's CDs. Cautionary advice from longtime allies, such as France and Germany, was greeted with fury, too. "French fries" were renamed "freedom fries," and Bush enthusiasts poured French wine into gutters. The U.S. national press corps also bent under these waves of jingoism. The New York Times and the Washington Post put stories supporting Bush's Iraq War claims on the front page while burying or killing articles that questioned the case for war. MSNBC's Phil Donahue was fired for allowing too many war critics on his show. Even when Bush's pre-war WMD claims proved false, the U.S. news media played down disclosures that put Bush in a negative light. In 2005, major news outlets shunned revelations in the so-called Downing Street Memo, which quoted the chief of British intelligence as saying in July 2002 that the pro-war intelligence was being "fixed." Similarly, in early 2006, the big U.S. newspapers were slow to react to another leaked British memo of the Jan. 31, 2003, Oval Office meeting at which Bush plotted ways to trick and bully the world into supporting the Iraq invasion. The memo, which appeared in the British press in early February 2006, finally reached the New York Times' front page almost two months later, on March 27, 2006. Rice Infatuation Now, the U.S. news media is turning a blind eye to Rice's revamped war rationale. There has been virtually no commentary in the mainstream press about the extraordinary assertion by a Secretary of State that the United States has the right to invade other countries as a means to eradicate something as vague as "an ideology of hate."
Far more press attention is paid to Rice's stylish clothing and her future job prospects, from her professed interest in becoming National Football League commissioner to speculation that she will be part of the next Republican presidential ticket.
For instance, Washington Post editorial page editor Fred Hiatt, who beat the drum often for the Iraq War, penned an opinion piece criticizing congressional Democrats for not embracing Bush's vision of striking out preemptively as part of "a long struggle" against "a new totalitarian ideology" in the Islamic world.
"The Democrats implicitly reject almost everything the Bush administration says about how Sept. 11 changed the world, or our perception of it," Hiatt wrote in an article entitled "Democrats' Narrow Vision." [Washington Post, April 3, 2006]
Yet implicit in the U.S. news media's non-coverage of Rice's new rationale for war is that there is nothing objectionable or alarming about the Bush administration turning its back on principles of civilized behavior promulgated by U.S. statesmen at the Nuremberg Tribunal six decades ago.
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| So Who Put The Temper In Judicial Temperament? Antonin Scalia, the loudest mouth on the highest bench, has indulged himself again. The idol of the far right has provoked fresh doubts about his temperament-and this time, unfortunately, the rest of the world is likely to notice. Surely as brilliant as his admirers claim, Justice Scalia's intellect is too often overshadowed by aggressive bluster and rigid ideology. He suffers from an uncontrollable impulse to give insult and an insufficient respect for the opinions of others. Widely advertised as exceptionally smart, he sometimes does and says things that are extraordinarily stupid. On March 26, after receiving communion at a special mass for politicians and lawyers in Boston's Cathedral of the Holy Cross, Justice Scalia answered a reporter's question with a rude hand gesture. Asked whether some Americans doubt his impartiality, he replied, "You know what I say to those people?" and then flicked his fingers under his chin, adding, "That's Sicilian." The conservative Boston Herald noted that this incident occurred "just feet from the Mother Church's altar" and described it as "conduct unbecoming a 20-year veteran of the country's highest court." After two decades, Justice Scalia should have learned to speak with a measure of decorum and responsibility. Yet the 70-year-old jurist seems more erratic as the years go by-and his Sicilian sign-language clowning is certainly his lesser offense this month. A few weeks earlier, he visited the University of Fribourg in Switzerland to deliver a talk on his "originalist" approach to the Constitution. Following his lecture, the combative justice engaged in discussion with the audience-and reacted emotionally to questions about the prisoners incarcerated in military custody at Guantnamo Bay. As first reported in Newsweek, he bristled at implied criticism of the imprisonment of hundreds of men at the Gitmo facility over the past four years, which he denounced as "hypocritical." Brushing aside the notion that those detainees should be entitled to any rights guaranteed by the Constitution and by the Geneva Conventions, he was quoted as saying: "War is war, and it has never been the case that when you captured a combatant you have to give them a jury trial in your civil courts. Give me a break." He reportedly went on to deny that such persons possess any rights under international treaties. "If [a prisoner] was captured by my army on a battlefield, that is where he belongs," he said, and went on to mention gratuitously that one of his sons served as an officer in Iraq. "I had a son on that battlefield and they were shooting at my son and I'm not about to give this man who was captured in a war a full jury trial," he said. "I mean it's crazy." He failed to restrain himself, knowing that the Supreme Court would soon be hearing the case captioned Hamdan v. Rumsfeld. In that matter, lawyers representing Salid Ahmed Hamdan, a Gitmo prisoner who once served as a driver for Osama bin Laden, have filed a petition protesting the Bush administration's decision to try their client in a military tribunal without the rights guaranteed by international treaties. Like Mr. Hamdan's lawyers, the Swiss students argued that the Geneva Conventions we ratified long ago mean what they say. Like our other European friends and allies, they think that democratic values are best served by fair and decent treatment of our enemies. That perspective is shared by several courageous American flag officers and generals, who filed a friend-of-the-court brief endorsing the Hamdan petition. They worry that by depriving our enemies of the "judicial guarantees that are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples," as described in Article 3 of the 1949 Geneva Convention, the Bush administration places our own soldiers, sailors and Marines in jeopardy of similar treatment. They also believe that the White House's wanton violation of the best American military traditions in the name of the war on terror sabotages our struggle against totalitarians and extremists. After hearing about Justice Scalia's remarks in Fribourg, the military officers sent him a letter suggesting that he should recuse himself from the Hamdan case. His rant had clearly violated the simple standard for recusal, which is whether a justice's "impartiality might reasonably be questioned." Back in 2004, after Justice Scalia foolishly denounced the separation of church and state at a Knights of Columbus rally, he recused himself from the argument over removing the phrase "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance. In that case, he knew his vote wouldn't matter. He refused to recuse himself from the government-secrecy case involving Vice President Dick Cheney's energy task force, despite their notorious duck-hunting junket.
In the Hamdan case, Justice Scalia's vote could be crucial. So he showed up for the oral argument on March 28 and openly displayed his support for the government's position. He thus brought America's global reputation into further disrepute, when that is what we can afford least.
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When War Crimes Are Impossible By Norman Solomon Is President Bush guilty of war crimes? To even ask the question is to go far beyond the boundaries of mainstream U.S. media. A few weeks ago, when a class of seniors at Parsippany High School in New Jersey prepared for a mock trial to assess whether Bush has committed war crimes, a media tempest ensued. Typical was the response from MSNBC host Tucker Carlson, who found the very idea of such accusations against Bush to be unfathomable. The classroom exercise "implies people are accusing him of a crime against humanity," Carlson said. "It's ludicrous." In Tennessee, the Chattanooga Times Free Press thundered in an editorial: "That some American 'educators' would have students 'try' our American president for 'war crimes' during time of war tells us that our problems are not only with terrorists abroad." The standard way for media to refer to Bush and war crimes in the same breath is along the lines of this lead-in to a news report on CNN's "American Morning" in late March: "The Supreme Court's about to consider a landmark case and one that could have far-reaching implications. At issue is President Bush's powers to create war crimes tribunals for Guantanamo prisoners." In medialand, when the subject is war crimes, the president of the United States points the finger at others. Any suggestion that Bush should face such a charge is assumed to be oxymoronic. But a few journalists, outside the corporate media structures, are seriously probing Bush's culpability for war crimes. One of them is Robert Parry. During the 1980s, Parry covered U.S. foreign policy for Associated Press and Newsweek; in the process he broke many stories related to the Iran-Contra scandal. Now he's the editor of the 10-year-old website Consortiumnews.com, an outlet he founded that has little use for the narrow journalistic path along Pennsylvania Avenue. "In a world where might did not make right," Parry wrote in a recent piece, "George W. Bush, Tony Blair and their key enablers would be in shackles before a war crimes tribunal at the Hague, rather than sitting in the White House, 10 Downing Street or some other comfortable environs in Washington and London." Over the top? I don't think so. In fact, Parry's evidence and analysis seem much more cogent -- and relevant to our true situation -- than the prodigious output of countless liberal-minded pundits who won't go beyond complaining about Bush's deceptions, miscalculations and tactical errors in connection with the Iraq war. Is Congress ready to consider the possibility that the commander in chief has committed war crimes during the past few years? Of course not. But the role of journalists shouldn't be to snuggle within the mental confines of Capitol Hill. We need the news media to fearlessly address matters of truth, not cravenly adhere to limits of expediency. When top officials in Lyndon Johnson's administration said that North Vietnam had launched two unprovoked attacks on U.S. vessels in the Gulf of Tonkin, the press corps took their word for it. When top officials in George W. Bush's administration said that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, the press corps took their word for it. We haven't yet seen any noticeable part of the Washington press corps raise the matter of war crimes by the president. Very few dare to come near the terrain that Parry explored in his March 28 article "Time to Talk War Crimes." That article cites key statements by the U.S. representative to the Nuremberg Tribunal immediately after the Second World War. "Our position," declared Robert Jackson, a U.S. Supreme Court justice, "is that whatever grievances a nation may have, however objectionable it finds the status quo, aggressive warfare is an illegal means for settling those grievances or for altering those conditions." During a March 26 appearance on the NBC program "Meet the Press," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice tried to justify the invasion of Iraq this way: "We faced the outcome of an ideology of hatred throughout the Middle East that had to be dealt with. Saddam Hussein was a part of that old Middle East. The new Iraq will be a part of the new Middle East, and we will all be safer." But, in a new essay on April 3, Parry points out that "this doctrine -- that the Bush administration has the right to invade other nations for reasons as vague as social engineering -- represents a repudiation of the Nuremberg Principles and the United Nations Charter's ban on aggressive war, both formulated largely by American leaders six decades ago." Parry flags the core of the administration's maneuver: "Gradually, Rice and other senior Bush aides shifted their rationale from Hussein's WMD to a strategic justification, that is, politically transforming the Middle East." He concludes that "implicit in the U.S. news media's non-coverage of Rice's new rationale for war is that there is nothing objectionable or alarming about the Bush administration turning its back on principles of civilized behavior promulgated by U.S. statesmen at the Nuremberg Tribunal six decades ago."
Although the evidence is ample that President Bush led the way to
aggressive warfare against Iraq, the mainstream U.S. news media keep
proceeding on the assumption that -- when the subject is war crimes -- he's
well cast as an accuser but should never be viewed as an appropriate
defendant.
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He's Gone By William Rivers Pitt
Caught on a limb, You know better But I know him. Like I told you, What I said, Steal your face Right off your head. Now he's gone, gone, Lord he's gone, he's gone. Like a steam locomotive, Rollin' down the track He's gone, gone, Nothing's gonna bring him back. He's gone. He's Gone --- The Grateful Dead
"I'm going to announce tomorrow that I'm not running for reelection and that I'm going to leave Congress," said DeLay on Monday. "I'm very much at peace with it." Never thought I'd live to see the day. In 1988, DeLay gave a press conference in Texas to defend the military record of Dan Quayle, who had been tapped to accompany George H. W. Bush on the Republican presidential ticket. Quayle was under fire for having allegedly used family influence to secure him a safe spot in the Indiana National Guard, thus keeping him out of Vietnam. DeLay argued that Quayle's failure to serve in Vietnam was not his fault; he wanted to go, but minorities had taken all the available slots. Seriously, he said that. This is the man who once said, in a debate about the minimum wage, "Emotional appeals about working families trying to get by on $4.25 an hour are hard to resist. Fortunately, such families do not exist." This is the man who once said, in a speech to bankers delivered eight days before the 2003 invasion of Iraq, "Nothing is more important in the face of a war than cutting taxes." This is the man who once said, to a government employee who was trying to stop him from smoking on government property, "I am the federal government." This man is gone now. After being indicted in Texas for campaign finance violations arising from his redistricting scheme, after surviving a tight primary challenge while staring down the barrel of a well-financed Democratic challenger, after watching his press secretary Michael Scanlon and his deputy chief of staff Tony Rudy cop pleas in the Jack Abramoff scandal investigation, after watching Rudy specifically accuse his chief of staff Ed Buckham of being neck-deep in the scandal in his plea confession, after sitting up nights wondering if the Abramoff scandal was going to land him in prison, DeLay decided enough was enough. Time Magazine, which carried one of the first reports of his decision to step down, has DeLay adamantly denying any wrongdoing. "Asked if he had done anything illegal or immoral in public office," read the report by Mike Allen, "DeLay replied curtly, 'No.' Asked if he'd done anything immoral, he said with a laugh, 'We're all sinners.'" It was the Democratic party that did this to him, of course. Wait, sorry. It was the "Democrat" party. "I guarantee you," continued DeLay in the report, "if other offices were under the scrutiny I've been under in the last 10 years, with the Democrat Party announcing that they're going to destroy me, destroy my reputation, and that's how they're going to get rid of me, I guarantee you you're going to find, out of hundreds of people, somebody that's probably done something wrong." That's right, Tom. It was the Democrat party, that awesome juggernaut of competence, which has shown time and again lo these past few years its Zeus-like ability to hurl devastating political lightning bolts from its lofty position, that took you down. They can stand up next to a mountain, so I hear, and chop it down with the edge of their hand. Or maybe, Tom, just maybe, all this happened because you are the living embodiment of absolutely everything wrong in American politics. Forget your ideology, and your hateful divisiveness, and your shameless canoodling with the Taliban wing of fundamentalist Christianity. One cannot swing a cat by the tail in Washington DC these days without smacking someone who thinks the way you do. This doesn't make you unique, sadly. No, your criminal misuse of the campaign funding laws, your outright disdain for the rules if they keep you from assuming absolute control, your almost Zen-like ability to operate beyond the confines of conscience and dignity, is why your presence has been a cancer on the body politic since the day you put down your bug extermination gear and tried a power tie on for size, and is why you're finished now. How deeply were you in the pocket of your contributors? You took an R.J. Reynolds corporate jet to get to your arraignment. There has to be some kind of award somewhere for behavior so brazenly craven.
It is hard to avoid a sense that something like justice, true justice, real justice, has been well served by the manner in which Tom DeLay has been laid low. Politics is a little cleaner today. Not a lot, maybe not even enough for folks to notice, but it is indeed just a little bit cleaner, now that he's gone.
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 Heil Bush, Dear Bezirk Ricter Bates, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your coverup of our energy meetings where we planned the theft and permanent storage of Iraqi oil, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Judicial Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Wolf's Lair" formally 'Rancho de Bimbo' on 05-27-2006. We salute you herr Bates, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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AUSTIN, Texas -- On the premise that spring is too beautiful for a depressing topic like Iraq, I thought I'd take up a fun subject -- global warming.
Time magazine warns us to "Be Worried. Be Very Worried." On the other hand, my sister is on the Global Warming Committee of the Unitarian Church in Albuquerque, N.M. They go around replacing old light bulbs with more energy-efficient models. My money's on my sis.
It's a good thing the phrase "the tipping point" became a cliche just in time to help us describe global warming. Just a few years ago, we were more or less cruising along on global warming, with maybe 50 years or so to Do Something about it. Suddenly, the only question is how soon to push the panic button, and 10 minutes ago appears to be the right answer.
People in journalism are the worst criers of "Wolf!" imaginable. We are always setting off alarms about Ebola, or avian flu, or the impending water shortage, or the Social Security crisis, or killer bees, or the pine bark beetle, or anorexia among teenagers (surpassed only by obesity among teenagers). Boy, if we can't sell you a scare with a few headlines and some mashed facts, no one can.
Naturally, having listened to the media set off endless alarms, the public is inclined to discount them, not to mention that global climate catastrophe is not an inviting topic. We're somewhere between "Don't Panic Yet" and "Panic Now!" -- edging toward "Now!"
What is happening is not just what climatologists told us would happen, but global warming turns out to reinforce itself by a number of feedback mechanisms. For example, when the polar icecaps start melting, there's less blinding bright ice to reflect heat back into the atmosphere -- over 90 percent of sunlight simply bounces off ice and back into space. Whereas the dark water left behind by melted ice does the opposite, pulling in more warmth and accelerating the process.
The political fight over global warming is over, except for the Bush administration, which has some weird problem with science in general. I'm still not sure what's behind that: I recall Rush Limbaugh and the radio right taking great glee in pooh-poohing the Kyoto treaty and the whole idea of global warming. Maybe they associated global warming with Canadians or something equally awful.
You might think some premise like, "The whole world is getting hotter, and disastrous consequences will ensue," would be more persuasive than, "I don't like Canadians, they're wusses," but I suspect part of the fun of being Rush Limbaugh is never having to say the word "responsible."
The shame for journalism is that it has always been so easy to expose those few "scientific" voices claiming there is nothing to global warming. When the money for "scientific research" on such a subject comes from oil companies, skepticism is required.
Instead, many "journalists" let the bullies on the right cow us with the "liberal media" nonsense and reported there was "a debate" over global warming. There was no debate. The only question is how fast it's happening. And the answer that keeps coming up is "faster than we thought. And still faster."
Time magazine, in its warm and fuzzy way, proposes that capitalism can solve much of the problem of global warming -- Henry Luce would be so proud. Can't you see it now? Boy, I'll bet those titans can hardly wait to cut into next quarter's profits. The insurance industry, for obvious reasons of its own, has long taken global warming seriously. By simply refusing to insure housing or enterprises near low shores, insurance can make quite a difference.
It's true the United States could make a good thing out of specializing in green energy and green technology -- but we are still living with an administration that subsidizes the oil industry. The question is where the political leadership is going to come from before we reach the Panic Point, before Miami Beach sinks underwater, before Wall Street needs a seawall.
Al Gore is all we've got, and the right wing is still prepared to dismiss him with contempt and ridicule, not because he's wrong but because they'd rather talk about the time he was supposedly advised to wear earth tones.
As the Earth drifts toward crisis, our president does not yet seem capable of grasping even the First Rule of Holes. We're in one, and it is time to quit digging.
At the very least, it is time to replace those old light bulbs. Get busy, team.
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The case against U.S. Rep. Cynthia McKinney remains unresolved, but continues to unfold. The Capitol Hill Police force and the U.S. attorney's office for the District of Columbia continue to gather evidence of last week's incident in which Georgia's somewhat-redundantly-self-described "female, black Congresswoman" allegedly slugged a police officer for failing to immediately recognize her as she circumvented a Capitol Hill metal detector. Whether McKinney is arrested and ultimately prosecuted is an open question; but regardless, the incident has sparked a nasty controversy into which the potential defendant has --- true to form --- injected charges of racism.
To avoid such messiness in the future, the Capitol Hill Police Department might want to take a page from their law enforcement counterparts in Texas. Authorities in the Lone Star State appear to be implementing a program emulating 2002's hit movie "Minority Report," in which future cop Tom Cruise arrests still-law-abiding citizens who have been previously fingered by oracles known as "pre-cogs" to be persons who will commit crimes in the future.
The doctrine of pre-emptive arrests, which has already found currency in the Bush administration national security policy of pre-emptive war, makes for a much tidier law enforcement agenda than the current situation in which prosecutors and police have to spend sometimes extensive resources actually proving a crime has occurred and that a particular person is guilty of criminal actions.
Texas law enforcement apparently has found a solution to such time-consuming and bothersome requirements as proof of a crime having been committed beyond a reasonable doubt. Led by that elite and internationally acclaimed law enforcement unit, the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission, authorities in the nation's second-largest state have embarked on an aggressive program of arresting citizens who appear intoxicated inside bars.
Eschewing the traditional, but time-consuming notion that citizens are to be arrested for actions that pose an actual danger to fellow citizens --- like driving under the influence of alcohol --- Texas' valiant booze police are mounting undercover operations in bars across the state, on the lookout for patrons exhibiting signs of intoxication, and arresting them before "they become dangerous" or "could" pose a danger. Already, Texas' finest have arrested thousands of folks who mistakenly thought it was actually not against the law in Texas to enter a business establishment that invited them to enter for the express purpose of consuming alcoholic beverages, and actually do so.
Whether the pre-emptive arrest program in Texas will withstand legal and constitutional challenge remains to be seen. (A similar program launched in late 2002 by the police in Fairfax County, Va., apparently was abandoned after it attracted unwanted publicity.) But consider for a moment how application of the doctrine of pre-emptive police action might make the job of Capitol Hill Police officers --- and others all across this great land --- so much easier.
No longer would the officers protecting the persons and public buildings of the nation's Capitol have to wait to be assaulted by an angry and defiant congresswoman before taking action. Nor would they have to spend precious time accumulating evidence to prove their case. They would simply be able to apprehend the soon-to-be-problematic official before the altercation takes place.
In the case at hand involving McKinney, for example, her disdain for the police force on Capitol Hill is well-known and previously exhibited; and on a particular day in which she is harried, busy speaking on a cellphone and clearly having a bad hair day, it would be obvious that she was a time bomb waiting to explode at the nearest person wearing a badge. Pre-emptive arrest would be not only advisable, but essential to protect her, all police officers within her arm's reach, and the surrounding public. Open and shut case.
Such a program would pay obvious dividends in other areas of Washington as well. I mean, look at how long it has taken the feds to convict Jack Abramoff and a couple of others for engaging in a lengthy and --- to many --- obvious pattern of public corruption. Think how much that investigation has already cost in terms of hours, dollars and effort; and it's not over yet. How much simpler it would have been to simply arrest Abramoff the first time he was spotted plying the halls of Congress in a black trench coat and equally black fedora. Who but a purveyor of corruption would so brazenly wear such an obviously corrupt (and corrupting) outfit in Washington? ... John Darkow ...  |
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DAD:
I'm a Roman Catholic,
You don't have to be a six-footer.
Because...
Every sperm is sacred.
CHILDREN:
GIRL:
CHILDREN:
MUM:
MEN:
WOMEN:
CHILDREN:
PRIEST:
BRIDE and GROOM:
NANNIES:
CARDINALS:
CHILDREN:
FUNERAL CORTEGE:
MOURNER #1:
MOURNER #2:
CORPSE:
NUN:
HOLY STATUES:
EVERYONE:
Every sperm is sacred.
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Parting Shots...
 By Will Durst Like a Doberman with a chew toy, the Republican Party loves to wave their bloody new divisive social issues in front of the electorate accomplishing the dual mission of energizing their base and placing Democrats on the defensive. And they got themselves a doozy this time. An issue guaranteed to drive a stake deeper into the American consciousness than a six state wide red white and green backhoe. The only problem is this particular division is so effective its starting to get stuck in the hearts of fellow Republicans as well. Its called immigration. And to witness the wailing and the flailing, it has reached a state of crisis. A situation building since 1492. "Can't let those damn immigrants in, they'll ruin everything." A popular modern refrain taken from the original Iroquois. And as it turns out, the Iroquois were right. Counting the President, who is trying to shepherd through his own plan, there are approximately 536 separate immigration bills running around Capitol Hill these days. Bush's plan includes a provision for "guest workers" which is a political shorthand for: "Think of it as a five year slumber party, and when it's over, everybody calls their parents and gets a ride home in their jammies." You ask me, the term "guest worker" is a bit of an oxymoron. Another way of saying: "Welcome! Kneel!" Senator Doctor Indian Chief Bill Frist has floated the most draconian proposal; his is the moral equivalent of corralling immigrants onto meat farms to be ground up and served as frozen enchilada filling. Never mind the fact that U.S. undercover agents announced they were able to use fake documents to sneak in the makings of a dirty bomb across our border. All we can talk about is the wanton lawlessness of the people picking our vegetables and vacuuming our office cubicles. Besides, how exactly do you plan to build a 2,000 mile long, 15 high fence along the Mexican border without using Mexican labor? What's the plan here? To draft housewives from La Jolla? I got to be honest. I fail to understand the fear here. "You let all these Mexicans in, they're going to take all those fruit picking jobs I've dreamed of all my life. Working outdoors, sleeping in my car, fighting with dogs for food. Just like camping, only different." I do understand this is an emotional subject, not always rooted in what you call your logic. A couple of years ago, I was in Billings, Montana, and actually saw rednecks hassle some Native Americans: "Go back to where you came from." Talk about unclear on the concept.
"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses, yearning to breathe free." That's not just an archaic inscription on a big green lady, that's a philosophical summons to heroism. The United States of America that we know and love. A country in which we're all immigrants. And when you look at the big picture, with California as a former part of Mexico, in essence, they are going back to where they came from. Maybe its we Anglos who should be carrying the green cards. Who wouldn't just love to take a bullhorn into the Capitol Rotunda, yell "Migra," and watch Congress scatter? Okay. Just me. |
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In This Edition
Noam Chomsky wonders about, "The Israel Lobby?"
Uri Avnery sees, "The Big Wink."
Greg Palast follows a, "Gangster Government."
Jim Hightower examines, "The Corporate Pentagon."
Sheila Samples reveals why, "Thompson's Dog Won't Hunt."
Chris Floyd explores, "The Slander That Launched Don Rumsfeld's Career."
Paul Krugman says, "Yes He Would."
Robert Parry with a must read, "America's Matrix, Revisited."
Joe Conason concludes, "The Culture Of Corruption Will Outlast Tom DeLay."
Ray McGovern is, "Blowing Cheney's Cover."
William Rivers Pitt wants to know, "How Crazy Are They?"
Neal Boortz wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award.'
Molly Ivins watches Con-gress poison us for a buck in, "Campaign Money Taints Food."
Seymour Hersh goes over, "The Iran Plans."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department 'The Landover Baptist Church' reports, "Easter Bunny Bludgeoned To Death Before Cheering Crowd Of Christian Children" but first Uncle Ernie asks, "Is Everything Zen America?"
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Matt Davies with additional cartoons from Tom Tomorrow, Micah Wright, Matson, Jim Morin, Internet Weekly.Org, Dubya's World.Com, Sozen, Blood For Oil.Org and The Whitehouse.Org.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Is Everything Zen America? I don't think so! By Ernest Stewart
A million dollars a steak As you search for your demi-god And you fake with a saint There's no sex in your violence There's no sex in your violence There's no sex in your violence There's no sex in your violence Everything Zen --- Bush
"If there is a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is. And if the person has violated the law the person will be taken care of." --- September 30, 2003 Don't even get me started on what he meant by "the person will be taken care of!" Then a month later he said... "I'd like to know if somebody in my White House did leak sensitive information. As you know, I've been outspoken on leaks. And whether they happen in the White House, or happened in the administration, or happened on Capitol Hill, it is a --- they can be very damaging. --- October 28, 2003 And there you have it straight from the monkey's mouth! And how can you tell when the Fuhrer is lying? All together now... wait for it... wait for it... HIS LIPS ARE MOVING! From my understanding of the law what Fredo did was treason, pure and simple, not to mention abuse of powers; which again is Impeachable. All to cover up lying us into a war, which is, guess what, Impeachable! And like so many, many before him we find out that Herr Libby was only following ze orders, right from the monkey's mouth! So the Crime Family Bush's treason is no mere liberal, paranoid, nightmare, but sworn under oath testimony from one of their "made men." The outing of a honorable American hero by the Junta in order to send a message, which put not only Valerie Plame's life in danger but everyone connected to her. I wonder how many in her undercover network died because of this? And all of this begs the question... How did the gang that (literally) couldn't shoot straight become the most powerful criminals on the planet? How did these rank amateurs pull it off? How did they managed to take control of the Republican party (a leisure service of the Halliburton Corp)? I wonder don't you? I don't suppose it was through the auspices of the planetary corpo-rat crime syndicate, do you? Hmmm? Ah yep, that would be my guess! From the same folks that sanctioned Papa's hit on JFK. You long time readers of Issues & Alibis will remember Kris Millegan's eleven part series "The Order of Skull and Bones" that ran from August 13 --- October 22, 2004. Which chronicled not only the 160 years of political mischief caused by the boners oops bonesmen but also that of the Illuminati who have no doubt already planned our disappearance and shipment off to a new "Happy Camp!" Still it is encouraging to see more exposure of these criminals and a slow awaking of our Matrixed brothers and sisters. Perhaps they won't need a H-bomb blast or a trip to a death camp to rouse them out of their stupor? But nobody ever lost a bet, betting on the stupidity of the American Sheeple! In other news... I see where the Vermont legislature has joined four other states in calling for the Impeachment of the chimp. Vermont joins the state legislatures of, New Mexico, Nevada, North Carolina and Wisconsin. These wise folks realize that Impeachment is not just for blow jobs any more! How about raising hell with your state legislature about joining in the fun? Perhaps if enough join in, their Con-gress reps and Sin-ators will get the message? ******************************************** The new Election 2006 section is open. There are just a few candidates listed right now but the site will be updated constantly. If you know of someone running for a national office that we should know about just email the info and we'll help spread the word. Write "Election 2006" in the subject line.
We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
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The Israel Lobby? By Noam Chomsky I've received many requests to comment on the article by John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt (henceforth M-W), published in the London Review of Books, which has been circulating extensively on the internet and has elicited a storm of controversy. A few thoughts on the matter follow. It was, as noted, published in the London Review of Books, which is far more open to discussion on these issues than US journals -- a matter of relevance (to which I'll return) to the alleged influence of what M-W call "the Lobby." An article in the Jewish journal Forward quotes M as saying that the article was commissioned by a US journal, but rejected, and that "the pro-Israel lobby is so powerful that he and co-author Stephen Walt would never have been able to place their report in a American-based scientific publication." But despite the fact that it appeared in England, the M-W article aroused the anticipated hysterical reaction from the usual supporters of state violence here, from the Wall St Journal to Alan Dershowitz, sometimes in ways that would instantly expose the authors to ridicule if they were not lining up (as usual) with power. M-W deserve credit for taking a position that is sure to elicit tantrums and fanatical lies and denunciations, but it's worth noting that there is nothing unusual about that. Take any topic that has risen to the level of Holy Writ among "the herd of independent minds" (to borrow Harold Rosenberg's famous description of intellectuals): for example, anything having to do with the Balkan wars, which played a huge role in the extraordinary campaigns of self-adulation that disfigured intellectual discourse towards the end of the millennium, going well beyond even historical precedents, which are ugly enough. Naturally, it is of extraordinary importance to the herd to protect that self-image, much of it based on deceit and fabrication. Therefore, any attempt even to bring up plain (undisputed, surely relevant) facts is either ignored (M-W can't be ignored), or sets off most impressive tantrums, slanders, fabrications and deceit, and the other standard reactions. Very easy to demonstrate, and by no means limited to these cases. Those without experience in critical analysis of conventional doctrine can be very seriously misled by the particular case of the Middle East(ME). But recognizing that M-W took a courageous stand, which merits praise, we still have to ask how convincing their thesis is. Not very, in my opinion. I've reviewed elsewhere what the record (historical and documentary) seems to me to show about the main sources of US ME policy, in books and articles for the past 40 years, and can't try to repeat here. M-W make as good a case as one can, I suppose, for the power of the Lobby, but I don't think it provides any reason to modify what has always seemed to me a more plausible interpretation. Notice incidentally that what is at stake is a rather subtle matter: weighing the impact of several factors which (all agree) interact in determining state policy: in particular, (A) strategic-economic interests of concentrations of domestic power in the tight state-corporate linkage, and (B) the Lobby. The M-W thesis is that (B) overwhelmingly predominates. To evaluate the thesis, we have to distinguish between two quite different matters, which they tend to conflate: (1) the alleged failures of US ME policy; (2) the role of The Lobby in bringing about these consequences. Insofar as the stands of the Lobby conform to (A), the two factors are very difficult to disentagle. And there is plenty of conformity. Let's look at (1), and ask the obvious question: for whom has policy been a failure for the past 60 years? The energy corporations? Hardly. They have made "profits beyond the dreams of avarice" (quoting John Blair, who directed the most important government inquiries into the industry, in the '70s), and still do, and the ME is their leading cash cow. Has it been a failure for US grand strategy based on control of what the State Department described 60 years ago as the "stupendous source of strategic power" of ME oil and the immense wealth from this unparalleled "material prize"? Hardly. The US has substantially maintained control -- and the significant reverses, such as the overthrow of the Shah, were not the result of the initiatives of the Lobby. And as noted, the energy corporations prospered. Furthermore, those extraordinary successes had to overcome plenty of barriers: primarily, as elsewhere in the world, what internal documents call "radical nationalism," meaning independent nationalism. As elsewhere in the world, it's been convenient to phrase these concerns in terms of "defense against the USSR," but the pretext usually collapses quickly on inquiry, in the ME as elsewhere. And in fact the claim was conceded to be false, officially, shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall, when Bush's National Security Strategy (1990) called for maintaining the forces aimed at the ME, where the serious "threats to our interests... could not be laid at the Kremlin's door" -- now lost as a pretext for pursuing about the same policies as before. And the same was true pretty much throughout the world. That at once raises another question about the M-W thesis. What were "the Lobbies" that led to pursuing very similar policies throughout the world? Consider the year 1958, a very critical year in world affairs. In 1958, the Eisenhower administration identified the three leading challenges to the US as the ME, North Africa, and Indonesia -- all oil producers, all Islamic. North Africa was taken care of by Algerian (formal) independence. Indonesia and the were taken care of by Suharto's murderous slaughter (1965) and Israel's destruction of Arab secular nationalism (Nasser, 1967). In the ME, that established the close US-Israeli alliance and confirmed the judgment of US intelligence in 1958 that a "logical corollary" of opposition to "radical nationalism" (meaning, secular independent nationalism) is "support for Israel" as the one reliable US base in the region (along with Turkey, which entered into close relations with Israel in the same year). Suharto's coup aroused virtual euphoria, and he remained "our kind of guy" (as the Clinton administration called him) until he could no longer keep control in 1998, through a hideous record that compares well with Saddam Hussein -- who was also "our kind of guy" until he disobeyed orders in 1990. What was the Indonesia Lobby? The Saddam Lobby? And the question generalizes around the world. Unless these questions are faced, the issue (1) cannot be seriously addressed. When we do investigate (1), we find that US policies in the ME are quite similar to those pursued elsewhere in the world, and have been a remarkable success, in the face of many difficulties: 60 years is a long time for planning success. It's true that Bush II has weakened the US position, not only in the ME, but that's an entirely separate matter. That leads to (2). As noted, the US-Israeli alliance was firmed up precisely when Israel performed a huge service to the US-Saudis-Energy corporations by smashing secular Arab nationalism, which threatened to divert resources to domestic needs. That's also when the Lobby takes off (apart from the Christian evangelical component, by far the most numerous and arguably the most influential part, but that's mostly the 90s). And it's also when the intellectual-political class began their love affair with Israel, previously of little interest to them. They are a very influential part of the Lobby because of their role in media, scholarship, etc. From that point on it's hard to distinguish "national interest" (in the usual perverse sense of the phrase) from the effects of the Lobby. I've run through the record of Israeli services to the US, to the present, elsewhere, and won't review it again here. M-W focus on AIPAC and the evangelicals, but they recognize that the Lobby includes most of the political-intellectual class -- at which point the thesis loses much of its content. They also have a highly selective use of evidence (and much of the evidence is assertion). Take, as one example, arms sales to China, which they bring up as undercutting US interests. But they fail to mention that when the US objected, Israel was compelled to back down: under Clinton in 2000, and again in 2005, in this case with the Washington neocon regime going out of its way to humiliate Israel. Without a peep from The Lobby, in either case, though it was a serious blow to Israel. There's a lot more like that. Take the worst crime in Israel's history, its invasion of Lebanon in 1982 with the goal of destroying the secular nationalist PLO and ending its embarrassing calls for political settlement, and imposing a client Maronite regime. The Reagan administration strongly supported the invasion through its worst atrocities, but a few months later (August), when the atrocities were becoming so severe that even NYT Beirut correspondent Thomas Friedman was complaining about them, and they were beginning to harm the US "national interest," Reagan ordered Israel to call off the invasion, then entered to complete the removal of the PLO from Lebanon, an outcome very welcome to both Israel and the US (and consistent with general US opposition to independent nationalism). The outcome was not entirely what the US-Israel wanted, but the relevant observation here is that the Reaganites supported the aggression and atrocities when that stand was conducive to the "national interest," and terminated them when it no longer was (then entering to finish the main job). That's pretty normal. Another problem that M-W do not address is the role of the energy corporations. They are hardly marginal in US political life -- transparently in the Bush administration, but in fact always. How can they be so impotent in the face of the Lobby? As ME scholar Stephen Zunes has rightly pointed out, "there are far more powerful interests that have a stake in what happens in the Persian Gulf region than does AIPAC [or the Lobby generally], such as the oil companies, the arms industry and other special interests whose lobbying influence and campaign contributions far surpass that of the much-vaunted Zionist lobby and its allied donors to congressional races." Do the energy corporations fail to understand their interests, or are they part of the Lobby too? By now, what's the distinction between (1) and (2), apart from the margins? Also to be explained, again, is why US ME policy is so similar to its policies elsewhere -- to which, incidentally, Israel has made important contributions, e.g., in helping the executive branch to evade congressional barriers to carrying out massive terror in Central America, to evade embargoes against South Africa and Rhodesia, and much else. All of which again makes it even more difficult to separate (2) from (1) -- the latter, pretty much uniform, in essentials, throughout the world. I won't run through the other arguments, but I don't feel that they have much force, on examination.
The thesis M-W propose does however have plenty of appeal. The reason, I think, is that it leaves the US government untouched on its high pinnacle of nobility, "Wilsonian idealism," etc., merely in the grip of an all-powerful force that it cannot escape. It's rather like attributing the crimes of the past 60 years to "exaggerated Cold War illusions," etc. Convenient, but not too convincing. In either case.
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The Big Wink By Uri Avnery "Advance and be recognized!" the recruit on sentry duty calls out when he hears somebody approaching. "Sergeant Johns!" comes the answer. "Advance and be recognized!" the sentry calls again. "I told you already, I'm Sergeant Johns!" comes the answer. "Advance and be recognized!" the sentry calls for the third time. "What do you think you are doing, you idiot!" the sergeant shouts. "Those are my orders," the recruit replies, "To call 'advance and be recognized' three times and then to shoot." This is an old British army joke. It also happens to be the program of the government that is being formed in Israel. Every Israeli government must have "Basic Guidelines". True, they are not binding. All our governments have violated their Basic Guidelines on many occasions. But tradition and good manners demand that there be Basic Guidelines and that they be put on the table of the Knesset, together with the coalition agreements that set out the division of the spoils, the really important bit. The true aim of the Basic Guidelines is to attract those whom the Prime Minister wants to have in his government, and to repel all others. A true leader will want to set up a coalition that will enable him to realize his vision. But a Prime Minister who is a politician - and nothing but a politician - is simply interested in a coalition that makes life easier for himself. Ehud Olmert is of the second kind. He wants to lie in the middle of the bed, between a rightist partner and a leftist one, preferably of roughly equal size. That will provide him with a stable government. When promoting a "leftist" cause, his party's ministers, together with the leftist ministers, will have a majority in the cabinet without their rightist colleagues; when promoting a "rightist' agenda, he will have a majority without the leftists. Simple logic. At present, it's an easy matter. The leftist partner will be Labor (probably with 6 ministers), the rightist will be composed of Shas, the Orthodox and the Lieberman party (probably 7 ministers together). The Pensioners (probably 2 ministers) will be in the middle. The Kadima ministers (probably 10) will always be able to construct a majority for the government, sometimes with the rightists, sometimes with the leftists. Olmert hopes that this will make life easy for him for the entire period of the new Knesset, until November 2010. The Basic Guidelines will reflect this goal. They must make it possible for Amir Peretz, Eli Yishai and Avigdor Liebermann to join a government that will include real leftists, extreme religious fundamentalists and complete fascists. Even the prophet Isaiah did not dare to dream of that. His ambitions were satisfied by the wolf lying down with the lamb. Isaiah knew that this vision could come true only after the appearance of the Messiah. Olmert, far from being a Messiah, is only a clever politician. He has to do without divine intervention. Lieberman wants Israel to be free of Arabs - Araber-rein in German. For this end he is ready to relinquish whole areas of Israel which are inhabited by Arab citizens, annexing, in return, large stretches of the West Bank. Amir Peretz, in contrast, wants to accord full equality to Israel's Arab citizens. Peretz wants to conduct negotiations with the Palestinian authority, Lieberman wants to destroy it. The Orthodox demand that the state pay forever for the upkeep of tens of thousands of Yeshiva (religious seminary) students, who do not want to work at all. Labor wants to raise the wages of productive workers. And so on, infinitely. And Olmert himself wants, of course, to realize his "Convergence Plan", which means that Israel will "unilaterally" fix its "permanent borders", without agreement and partnership with the Palestinians. What to do? One has to stitch together Basic Guidelines that everyone can agree to. Impossible? On the contrary. Nothing easier. One needs only a good Jewish lawyer - and we have plenty of these. In the Basic Guidelines, no mention of the "Convergence Plan" will be made, neither will the word "unilaterally" occur. They will say only that the government will act according to the speech made by Olmert after the closing of the ballots on election day. That is supposed to satisfy everyone. There are now three camps in Israel: (a) Those who want real negotiations with the Palestinians in order to realize the Two-States solution. (b) Those who want a "unilateral" withdrawal, with the intent of annexing parts of the West Bank and leaving what's left to the Palestinians, after removing any settlements there. (c) Those who oppose such a "unilateral" withdrawal, under the pretext that it "gives" the Palestinians territories without getting anything in return. That doesn't mean that they actually want to reach an agreement with the Palestinians, but, on the contrary, that they want to avoid giving up any territory at all. Amir Peretz belongs to the first camp, Olmert to the second, Lieberman and Shas to the third. The Basic Guidelines must satisfy them all. How? The answer lies in the British joke. The Basic Guidelines will say that first of all, Israel will call upon the Palestinians to make peace based on the Two-State Solution. Only after it becomes clear that there is no partner for such a peace, will Israel take its fate in its own hands (meaning: fix its borders unilaterally). In his election day speech, Olmert addressed Mahmoud Abbas directly, with resounding pathos, offering to start peace negotiations. (That reminds me of something: After the 1956 war, a friend of mine interrogated a high-ranking Egyptian prisoner, who told him that they used to listen to David Ben-Gurion's speeches on the radio. Every time Ben-Gurion announced that "We are stretching out our hands for peace", the Egyptians put their forces on high alert. In a way, it's an Israeli inversion of the Roman proverb si vis pacem, para bellum - if you want peace, prepare for war.) Olmert's offer to Mahmoud Abbas is accompanied with a huge wink for the Israeli public. Everybody understands that this is a phase we have to pass through before coming to the real thing. It is a multi-purpose maneuver: to provide Peretz with a fig-leaf when he is asked to support unilateral steps, to satisfy the Americans when they are requested to agree to the annexation of large parts of the West Bank, and also to give Lieberman and Shas a year or two to enjoy themselves in the government, before Olmert starts implementing the Convergence Plan (if that ever happens). Notice: Nobody, but absolutely nobody, is discussing the offer to Mahmoud Abbas, while everybody is talking about the annexation that will come afterwards. Like that British sentry: Call once, twice, a third time - and then shoot. Still, there remains the question: how can Amir Peretz and his colleagues sit in the government together with a person like Lieberman? Lieberman is a man of the extreme-extreme Right. He could give lessons to Jean-Marie Le Pen and Joerg Haider. He is the sole leader of his party, his talk is violent and brutal, his message racist. He openly proclaims that his aim is to get all the Arab citizens out of Israel. Before the elections, Peretz promised that he would not sit in the government with Lieberman. Since then two things have happened: First, the leader of the left-wing Meretz party, Yossi Beilin, invited Lieberman to a well-publicized breakfast at his home, consuming (according to the gleeful reporters) "juicy herrings" and enthusiastically lauding Lieberman's personal qualities. In this way he accorded legitimization to this person, who until then was considered beyond the political pale. Then, after the elections, an even more disgraceful thing happened. Peretz' people declared that he, not Olmert, was going to head the next government. It was to be a "social coalition", without Kadima. Simple arithmetic shows that such a coalition must include not only Shas, but also the National Union, the settlers' party that competes with Lieberman in racism. This ploy conferred legitimacy on the entire racist right. If extremists like Benny Eilon and Effi Eitam are kosher, why not Lieberman? How could this happen to Peretz? It was clearly a hasty reaction to the behavior of Kadima. Immediately after the elections, Olmert should have called Peretz and proclaimed him his favored partner. Instead, Olmert's people started to humiliate Peretz and declare him unfit for the post of Minister of Finance, which he craved. Furious, Peretz started the move in order to get back at Olmert and frighten him. Understandable, but unforgivable. It was a personal response, and one which has caused huge damage. It has legitimized Lieberman as a candidate for membership in the government. It has also infuriated the Arab citizens and created the impression that Peretz may not be such a staunch fighter for peace after all.
All this is worrisome. True, the next government could hardly be worse than the Likud government. The question is whether it will be much better. But surely it will be adept at winking in all directions.
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Gangster Government A leaky President runs afoul of 'Little Rico' By Greg Palast It's a crime. No kidding. But the media has it all wrong. As usual. 'Scooter' Libby finally outed 'Mr. Big,' the perpetrator of the heinous disclosure of the name of secret agent Valerie Plame. It was the President of United States himself -- in conspiracy with his Vice-President. Now the pundits are arguing over whether our war-a-holic President had the legal right to leak this national security information. But, that's a fake debate meant to distract you. OK, let's accept the White House alibi that releasing Plame's identity was no crime. But if that's true, they've committed a BIGGER crime: Bush and Cheney knowingly withheld vital information from a grand jury investigation, a multimillion dollar inquiry the perps themselves authorized. That's akin to calling in a false fire alarm or calling the cops for a burglary that never happened -- but far, far worse. Let's not forget that in the hunt for the perpetrator of this non-crime, reporter Judith Miller went to jail. Think about that. While Miller sat in a prison cell, Bush and Cheney were laughing their sick heads off, knowing the grand jury testimony, the special prosecutor's subpoenas and the FBI's terrorizing newsrooms were nothing but fake props in Bush's elaborate charade, Cheney's Big Con. On February 10, 2004, our not-so-dumb-as-he-sounds President stated, "Listen, I know of nobody -- I don't know of anybody in my administration who leaked classified information. If somebody did leak classified information, I'd like to know it, and we'll take the appropriate action. And this investigation is a good thing. ...And if people have got solid information, please come forward with it." Notice Bush's cleverly crafted words. He says he can't name anyone who leaked this "classified" info -- knowing full well he'd de-classified it. Far from letting Bush off the hook, it worsens the crime. For years, I worked as a government investigator and, let me tell you, Bush and Cheney withholding material information from the grand jury is a felony. Several felonies, actually: abuse of legal process, fraud, racketeering and, that old standby, obstruction of justice. If you or I had manipulated the legal system this way, we'd be breaking rocks on a chain gang. We wouldn't even get a trial -- most judges would consider this a "fraud upon the court" and send us to the slammer in minutes using the bench's power to administer instant punishment for contempt of the judicial system. Why'd they do it? The White House junta did the deed for the most evil of motives: to hoodwink the public during the 2004 election campaign, to pretend that evil anti-Bush elements were undermining the Republic, when it was the Bush element itself at the center of the conspiracy. (Notably, elections trickery also motivated Richard Nixon's "plumbers" to break into the Watergate, then the Democratic Party campaign headquarters.) Let me draft the indictment for you as I would have were I still a government gumshoe: "Perpetrator Lewis Libby (alias, 'Scooter') contacted Miller; while John Doe 1 contacted perpetrators' shill at the Washington Post, Bob Woodward, in furtherance of a scheme directed by George Bush (alias 'The POTUS') and Dick Cheney (alias, 'The Veep') to release intelligence information fraudulently proffered as 'classified,' and thereinafter, knowingly withheld material evidence from a grand jury empanelled to investigate said disclosure. Furthermore, perpetrator 'The POTUS' made material statements designed to deceive investigators and knowingly misrepresent his state of knowledge of the facts." Statements aimed at misleading grand jury investigators are hard-time offenses. It doesn't matter that Bush's too-clever little quip was made to the press and not under oath. I've cited press releases and comments in the New York Times in court as evidence of fraud. By not swearing to his disingenuous statement, Bush gets off the perjury hook, but he committed a crime nonetheless, "deliberate concealment." Here's how the law works (and hopefully, it will). The Bush gang's use of the telephone in this con game constituted wire fraud. Furthermore, while presidents may leak ("declassify") intelligence information, they may not obstruct justice; that is, send a grand jury on a wild goose chase. Under the 'RICO' statute (named after the Edward G. Robinson movie mobster, 'Little Rico'), the combination of these crimes makes the Bush executive branch a "racketeering enterprise." So, book'm, Dan-o. Time to read The POTUS and The Veep their rights. After setting their bail (following the impeachments and removals, of course), a judge will have a more intriguing matter to address. The RICO law requires the Feds to seize all "ill-gotten gains" of a racketeering enterprise, even before trial. Usually we're talking fast cars and diamond bling. But in this case, the conspirators' purloined booty includes a stolen election and a fraudulently obtained authorization for war. I see no reason why a judge could not impound the 82d Airborne as "fruits of the fraud " -- lock, stock and gun barrels -- and bring the boys home.
And if justice is to be done we will will also have to run yellow
tape across the gates at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue -- "CRIME SCENE -
DO NOT ENTER" -- and return the White House to its rightful owners,
the American people, the victims of this gangster government.
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It is not Wal-Mart, Exxon Mobil, or GM - it's the Pentagon. Go to www.defenselink.mil and you'll find "DoD 101: An introductory overview of the department of defense." This official site presents the U.S. military not as a government agency, but as a corporation. The Pentagon puffs itself up like a corporation running an image ad. It brags that the DoD is "the nation's largest employer" with more than two million employees, and that it has the highest level of annual revenues of any company in the country. The site points out that DoD Inc. far outdistances such competitors as Wal-Mart, the number two employer and revenue generator. In a section titled "Who we work for," the Pentagon goes completely corporate: "Our chief executive officer is the President of the United States," it declares. "Congress... acts as our board of directors." And - get this one - "our stockholders are the American people." Excuse me, but in our democratic society government is not a business, it's a government. It has very broad and deep democratic responsibilities that no corporation can achieve. By their very nature, corporations are top-down, hierarchical operations that exist not to serve the public good, but to profit the few. They are anti-democratic, excluding the vast majority of people (including shareholders) from decision-making. They operate in a closed culture of secrecy and are aggressive expansionists, relying on PR, lawyers, and lobbyists to cover up their waste, fraud, corruption, environmental contamination, and abuse of people. This is Jim Hightower saying... The corporate model is anathema to a free, just, democratic society - and it's both telling and damning that the Bushites view the Pentagon as a corporate entity.
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When I first read the March 31 Capitol Hill Blue headline, "9/11 conspiracy theories don't pass the smell test," I thought editor Doug Thompson was pulling an April Fool's joke on us a day early. Buoyed by Thompson's well-deserved reputation for being out there first with "damn the torpedoes -- full speed ahead" -- truth no matter where it takes him, I read avidly to the end of the rant, poised to burst into laughter at his "Gotcha!" punch line. It wasn't there.
"I know my government," Thompson ended lamely, "They're just not good enough to pull off something like this."
That's it, then? Thompson's reason for ridiculing those who question 9/11 is, "it's improbable such a ragtag group" is capable of attacking a vulnerable nation and killing thousands of its people? Man -- in the wake of all that has happened since 9/11, that dog won't hunt.
If Thompson is serious when he says "the many theories surrounding 9/11 come mostly from conspiracy buffs" -- or when he says those whose judgment he trusts "support the facts that Al Qaeda planned and executed the attacks," then his credibility is destroyed on this subject and on all other subjects as well. If he's serious, there's no reason to revisit Capitol Hill Blue or Thompson ever again.
But I'm not convinced Thompson is serious. He's too good at what he does. Like he says -- often -- he's been in journalism "for more than 40 years." He's a hard-hitting reporter whose cognitive and investigative skills are legend; whose "unnamed sources" walk shoulder-to-shoulder throughout the administration; frolic through the halls of Congress. Thompson doesn't just report the news, he breaks it, busts it wide open and takes no prisoners. It is inconceivable that Thompson would back off a story of this magnitude, given his penchant for holding the administration's cloven hooves to the fire, especially those of George Bush and Dick Cheney.
Thompson is the man who wrote on March 20 that "the most dangerous man in the world is not sitting in a jail cell somewhere in Iraq...He is not hiding out in a cave somewhere in Afghanistan...The most dangerous man in the world may well be working out of an oval-shaped office at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, DC."
He is the one who
unearthed a GOP memo less than a year ago suggesting that a "new attack by terrorists on US soil" could reverse the sagging fortunes of Bush as well as the GOP and would "restore his image as a leader of the American people." This strategy, the memo says, would "'validate" the President's war on terror and allow Bush to "unite the country in a time of national shock and sorrow," and would reverse the President's fortunes and "keep the party from losing control of Congress in the 2006 midterm elections."
And, as recently as April 4, Thompson wrote, "America is a bully, an international thug that uses fear, lies and deceit to advance the personal agendas of its leaders. Bullies do not deserve respect. Bullies do not deserve the benefit of the doubt. Bullies are beneath contempt." Thompson continued, "Unfortunately, as long as Americans tolerate the despotic rule of George W. Bush, we share responsibility for the shame our leadership has brought upon a once-great nation called the United States of America."
Why, then, would Thompson say that he "cannot -- and will not" believe any explanation of what happened on 9/11 other than what the most dangerous man in the world tells him -- a despotic leader who's entertaining the "strategery" of murdering even more Americans for no other reason than to advance his political agenda, and who is a vicious liar who doesn't want the US Constitution thrown in his face because "it's nothing but a goddamned piece of paper?
Does Thompson's dog look to you like it's hunting?
It's futile to try to reach a mind so firmly closed. However, Thompson's reasons are more than passing strange. For example, the only investigation that apparently passed his "smell test" was conducted by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) because he says "an engineer he'd known for 25 years" ran a computer simulation of the building collapses for him.
According to Kevin Ryan, formerly of Underwriters Laboratories (UL) which certified the steel used in the WTC buildings, "NIST put together a black box computer model that would spit out the right answers." Ryan said when the parameters did not generate the results they were seeking, they changed the parameters. The final model, according to Ryan, "produced video graphics that would enable anyone to see the buildings collapse without having to follow a train of logic to get there." NIST offered no proof for the dynamics of the amazing free-fall collapse of the only three buildings to do so in history as a result of fire, other than "...once the upper building section began to move downwards...global collapse ensued."
Thompson says he was at the Pentagon on 9/11 where he interviewed "dozens" of witnesses who saw the plane hit. He smelled the burning jet fuel. He says he's flown Boeing 757, 767, and 777 flight simulators, and he can safely assure us "the maneuvers made by the hijackers on September 11 were relatively simple course corrections that are not that difficult in planes equipped with modern navigational computers." Well, I've never flown a simulator, but I once knew a guy who practiced his riding skills on a mechanical bull, but when he hit the rodeo circuit, he got his ass stomped in two seconds flat.
According to a site dedicated solely to Pentagon research, Hani Hanjour, the pilot of Flight 77, was refused the rental of a Cessna 172 just weeks prior to 9/11 because of his sadly lacking maneuvering skills. But after reading a 757 manual on the way to the airport, Hanjour was able to cruise over the unsecured White House, enter Reagan International airspace while performing a 270-degree turn with a 7,000-foot drop in altitude in 2.5 minutes with military precision -- then hit five 25-foot, 293-pound steel lamp poles, a fence, a 39,500-pound generator trailer, two cable spools, two single-wide mobile home construction trailers and a tree -- before slamming into the only wedge in the Pentagon under construction, leaving only a couple pieces of debris small enough to hold in your hands. He left "no tail, no wings, no engines, no horizontal stablizer, no passenger seats, no luggage and no aircraft cargo," and left the lawn in front of the Pentagon untouched.
But it's Thompson's vicious "kill the messenger" ad hominem attack on actor Charlie Sheen for questioning the official scenario that is the most bewildering. Thompson wants to know -- Is Sheen the best we wild-eyed conspiracy nut jobs can do? Is Sheen our new poster child? Thompson sneered at conspiracy freaks for "pinning their credibility on a known drug user, admitted purchaser of the services of prostitutes and an intellectually-challenged misfit who couldn't even graduate from high school..."
Somebody should remind Thompson that Sheen, however randy and hot-headed he may be, is also a concerned American citizen, and he has a dog in this hunt. Sheen has an inherent right -- a duty -- to question his government. He wants to know, as we all do, how 19 amateurs armed with box cutters could take over four commercial airliners and fly around over New York City and Washington DC until they finally hit three of their targets.
Sheen wants to know how the official story of fuel running down elevator shafts could cause the inferno it would take to bring down the world's two tallest and most solidly built buildings. He wants to know about the early eyewitness accounts from the media and bystanders about "huge explosions" in the bowels of the WTC -- and why WTC landlord Larry Silverstein openly admitted the decision to "pull" building 7 before it toppled in 6.6 seconds into its own footprints.
But Thompson will not be moved. He said, "I have yet to get a report from a structural engineer or demolitions expert that support the theories of internal explosions and too many witnesses saw the planes. If an engineer or expert with credentials that could be verified came forward I might be willing to take another look at this but in the absence of such, I'll go with the conclusions of experts I trust."
If Thompson has viewed "Loose Change, 2nd Edition" or perused Brigham Young University Physics Professor Stephen E. Jones' critical paper, "Why Indeed Did the WTC Buildings Collapse"; if he has visited the many 9/11 research sites, and is still determined to cling to administration experts he trusts, so be it.
The hunt for the 9/11 truth will go on -- whether Thompson's dog is in it or not.
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An anecdote from James Carroll's magnificent new book, House of War (which I'll be reviewing here soon) provides a brief but penetrating glimpse at the gutter politics and moral nullity that have marked the entire career of the Pentagon warlord -- and the rest of his cohorts in the Bush gang.
In 1963, John F. Kennedy nominated Paul H. Nitze as Secretary of the Navy. This was actually a demotion for Nitze, who, as Carroll notes, had been at the very heart of American power for almost 20 years by then. He was in fact one of the godfathers of the Cold War, a Wall Street blue-blood turned high-level bureaucrat who served several presidents but was always driven by the same vision: projecting American dominance to the four corners of the earth, using an ever-expanding nuclear arsenal as the tip of the spear. For Nitze, thoroughly marinated in the "paranoid school" of U.S. political thought, no Pentagon budget was ever too big, no policy was ever too aggressive (including first-strike nuclear attacks), no restriction on American liberty was ever sufficient to stave off the demonic, all-powerful "evil empire" of the Soviet Union, which threatened, at every moment, to destroy America and its "way of life."
Nitze was the author of NSC-68, the document that more than any other engineered the militarization of American society and constituted the re-founding of the country as a "National Security State," controlled by the military-industrial complex and driven by a nightmare vision of exaggerated threats, craven fear, secrecy and deception, bellicosity and brinkmanship. This vision has waxed and waned in intensity at various times over the years, but it has never been displaced as the central dynamic of American power. The demonic, all-powerful enemy has now morphed from the Soviet Union to Islamic extremism, but the paranoid rhetoric and "Pentagon uber alles" philosophy of the Cold War has been seamlessly transferred whole cloth to the supposedly transformed "post-9/11 age."
And in the Bush administration, this nightmare Nitzean philosophy has reached its apotheosis in the war-making, liberty-gutting dictatorship of the Commander-in-Chief that George W. Bush proclaims more openly every day. Thus Nitze is one of the Founding Fathers of the new Bushist State, and Rumsfeld is one of his most dutiful sons.
All the more ironic then, that Rumsfeld began his career with a vicious smear of Nitze during his confirmation hearings for the Navy nomination. Rumsfeld was then a rookie Congressman from Illinois looking to make a name for himself. Nitze, who had been one of Kennedy's top advisors, had fallen out of favor with the young president. During two flashpoints that brought the world to the very brink of nuclear war -- in Berlin and Cuba -- Nitze had urged Kennedy to take military action, including nuclear first strikes if necessary. He derided the "morality questions" involved in taking the world to nuclear war, and accused Robert Kennedy (and indirectly the president) of "appeasement" for seeking peaceful solutions. For some reason, Nitze thought all this would win him a much longed-for nomination as Deputy Secretary of Defense -- the same position held much later by Paul Wolfowitz. But Kennedy had other ideas. Nitze was too powerful, too well-connected to jettison outright -- as Carroll's book makes clear, by this time the presidency had become in large part a prisoner of the Pentagon -- so he was palmed off with the Navy job.
And here he came into the crosshairs of young Don Rumsfeld. Any confirmation hearing is a good opportunity for the political opposition to score points off the sitting administration, but what could a hard-right, rampant Cold Warrior like Rumsfeld find to say against one of the chief architects of America's bristling, ever-expanding nuclear arsenal and its policies of aggressive "rollback" that even then beginning to ensnare the United States in the bloody quagmire of Vietnam? Here was a man after Rumsfeld's own cold heart. But the budding Bushist knew just what to do in such a situation: you lie. You come up with the most ludicrous, unsupported, impossible lie that you can think of -- then you launch it in the most public way possible. Yes, it's the old "Big Lie" gambit, consciously perfected by Josef Goebbels in Nazi Germany and now the chief mode of political discourse used by the Bush Administration. And although George W. himself was just a prep school cheerleader at the time, Rumsfeld was already honing the skills he would need to serve the master to come.
Rumsfeld accused Nitze -- of all people -- of being a pinko wimp who supported nuclear disarmament in the face of the implacable Soviet foe. What was the basis of this outrageous charge, which made about as much sense as calling Gandhi a war profiteer? It seems that years before, Nitze had attended a meeting of the National Council of Churches. At this conference, some people had spoken in favor of disarmament; others opposed it. In fact, the keynote speaker at the event was John Foster Dulles, then Secretary of State and one of the most aggressive and military-minded figures ever to hold power at the State Department (until the arrival of Condi Rice). It was, in other words, a very Establishment affair, where the great and good gather to pontificate and eat prime rib; "hardly a gathering of pinkos," Carroll notes. Nitze himself had a copious public record of speaking out against disarmament.
But none of these facts stopped Rumsfeld from publicly slandering Nitze at the hearings as a disarmer, a betrayer of national security, the kind of weakling who would cut and run in the face of the enemy. For Rumsfeld, the merest, fleeting association with any organization that so much as entertained the notion of pursuing peace over domination was enough to taint a nominee. Other Republicans followed the firebrand stripling's Big Lie and pounded Nitze -- one of the greatest champions of war, even genocidal nuclear war, in American history -- as a peacenik unworthy to head the Navy. Nitze survived the assault and won the confirmation vote, barely; but as Carroll writes, "the wound of the insult would never heal." As for Rumsfeld, his particular brand of ideological nastiness was noted -- and approved -- by powerful factions in the Republican Party, and when Richard Nixon brought the party back to power five years later, he found room for the hawkish hatchet man in the White House. Rumsfeld was a made man; he would remain entrenched in the bowels of the military-industrial, and often at the center of government, from that time until today.
And every step of the way, his career has been marked by mendacity, duplicity, smirking chatter and deadly ideological blindness -- for example, in the White House, he was a champion of the infamous "Team B" group that insisted that all of the CIA's intelligence about the Soviet Union's declining economy, its military weakness and its genuine desire to reach a new, peaceful accommodation to the West while reforming its own system was all false; Rumsfeld and his cohorts insisted -- on the basis of false evidence, manipulated evidence and no evidence at all -- that the "evil empire" was developing a whole range of new super-weapons that would be able to destroy the United States at a moment's notice. The fact that the CIA, the NSA, the DIA and the whole phalanx of America's intelligence services couldn't find any evidence for these weapons of mass destruction only proved how devious the Russians were in cloaking them. This group of "outside advisers" was formed by then-CIA Director George H.W. Bush; when he and goofy front-man Ronald Reagan took office in 1981, Rumsfeld and the B-teamers were able to "stovepipe" their twisted non-intelligence directly to the White House, which used it to justify gargantuan increases in military budgets and missile systems.
The Big Lie -- first deployed against his ideological soul-mate, Paul Nitze -- has served Rumsfeld well throughout his long career. And now he may cap this long and dirty record with the greatest irony of all: making Nitze's dream come true by launching nuclear weapons in an unprovoked first strike against a demonized Enemy -- Iran.
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 Yes He Would By Paul Krugman "But he wouldn't do that." That sentiment is what made it possible for President Bush to stampede America into the Iraq war and to fend off hard questions about the reasons for that war until after the 2004 election. Many people just didn't want to believe that an American president would deliberately mislead the nation on matters of war and peace. Now people with contacts in the administration and the military warn that Mr. Bush may be planning another war. The most alarming of the warnings come from Seymour Hersh, the veteran investigative journalist who broke the Abu Ghraib scandal. Writing in The New Yorker, Mr. Hersh suggests that administration officials believe that a bombing campaign could lead to desirable regime change in Iran - and that they refuse to rule out the use of tactical nuclear weapons. "But he wouldn't do that," say people who think they're being sensible. Given what we now know about the origins of the Iraq war, however, discounting the possibility that Mr. Bush will start another ill-conceived and unnecessary war isn't sensible. It's wishful thinking. As it happens, rumors of a new war coincide with the emergence of evidence that appears to confirm our worst suspicions about the war we're already in. First, it's clearer than ever that Mr. Bush, who still claims that war with Iraq was a last resort, was actually spoiling for a fight. The New York Times has confirmed the authenticity of a British government memo reporting on a prewar discussion between Mr. Bush and Tony Blair. In that conversation, Mr. Bush told Mr. Blair that he was determined to invade Iraq even if U.N. inspectors came up empty-handed. Second, it's becoming increasingly clear that Mr. Bush knew that the case he was presenting for war - a case that depended crucially on visions of mushroom clouds - rested on suspect evidence. For example, in the 2003 State of the Union address Mr. Bush cited Iraq's purchase of aluminum tubes as clear evidence that Saddam was trying to acquire a nuclear arsenal. Yet Murray Waas of the National Journal reports that Mr. Bush had been warned that many intelligence analysts disagreed with that assessment. Was the difference between Mr. Bush's public portrayal of the Iraqi threat and the actual intelligence he saw large enough to validate claims that he deliberately misled the nation into war? Karl Rove apparently thought so. According to Mr. Waas, Mr. Rove "cautioned other White House aides in the summer of 2003 that Bush's 2004 re-election prospects would be severely damaged" if the contents of an October 2002 "President's Summary" containing dissents about the significance of the aluminum tubes became public. Now there are rumors of plans to attack Iran. Most strategic analysts think that a bombing campaign would be a disastrous mistake. But that doesn't mean it won't happen: Mr. Bush ignored similar warnings, including those of his own father, about the risks involved in invading Iraq. As Joseph Cirincione of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace recently pointed out, the administration seems to be following exactly the same script on Iran that it used on Iraq: "The vice president of the United States gives a major speech focused on the threat from an oil-rich nation in the Middle East. The U.S. secretary of state tells Congress that the same nation is our most serious global challenge. The secretary of defense calls that nation the leading supporter of global terrorism. The president blames it for attacks on U.S. troops." Why might Mr. Bush want another war? For one thing, Mr. Bush, whose presidency is increasingly defined by the quagmire in Iraq, may believe that he can redeem himself with a new Mission Accomplished moment. And it's not just Mr. Bush's legacy that's at risk. Current polls suggest that the Democrats could take one or both houses of Congress this November, acquiring the ability to launch investigations backed by subpoena power. This could blow the lid off multiple Bush administration scandals. Political analysts openly suggest that an attack on Iran offers Mr. Bush a way to head off this danger, that an appropriately timed military strike could change the domestic political dynamics.
Does this sound far-fetched? It shouldn't. Given the combination of recklessness and dishonesty Mr. Bush displayed in launching the Iraq war, why should we assume that he wouldn't do it again?
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America's Matrix, Revisited By Robert Parry On June 1, 2003, I wrote an article entitled "America's Matrix," questioning claims by the Bush administration that the discovery of two specially equipped train cars was proof that Iraq was secretly manufacturing biological warfare agents. At the time, more than two months after the Iraq invasion, George W. Bush was getting edgy because the promised stockpiles of banned weapons hadn't materialized. So, on May 29, 2003, he hailed the discovery of the supposed mobile "biological laboratories" as conclusive proof that "we have found the weapons of mass destruction," a claim that would be repeated by administration officials for the next several months. But any careful reading of the published intelligence reports about the train cars would have shown Bush's assertion to be just the latest exaggeration of WMD evidence about Iraq. Even the evidence marshaled in a "white paper" by the Central Intelligence Agency and the Defense Intelligence Agency fit much better with the explanation that the train cars were designed to produce hydrogen for battlefield weather balloons. Now, nearly three years later, the Washington Post has published an article revealing that Bush made his flat assertion about the train cars two days after a Pentagon-sponsored mission informed Washington that the trailers had nothing to do with producing biological weapons. Those findings from a nine-member team of U.S. and British scientists and engineers were in a three-page field report -- followed three weeks later by a 122-page final report -- but the contrary information was stamped "secret" and shelved. As senior administration officials, including the President and Secretary of State Colin Powell, continued to make false claims about the "biological laboratories," the nine-member team disbanded. "I went home and fully expected that our findings would be publicly stated," one team member told the Post. "It never happened. And I just had to live with it." [Washington Post, April 12, 2006] Back in spring 2003, however, the readiness of the Bush administration to mislead the American people and the readiness of the U.S. news media -- and many citizens -- to go along led me to compare what was happening in the United States to the false reality of the Matrix movies. (The second film in the trilogy, "The Matrix Reloaded," had just been released.) In a slightly edited form, we are reprinting our June 1, 2003, story below: "Matrix" and its sequels offer a useful analogy for anyone trying to make sense of the chasm that has opened between what's real and what Americans perceive is real. Like the science-fiction world of the trilogy, a false reality is being pulled daily over people's eyes, often through what they see and hear on their TV screens. Facts have lost value. Logic rarely applies. Some living in this "American Matrix" are like the everyday people in the movies, simply oblivious to what's going on beneath the surface, either too busy or too bored to find out. Others appear to know better but behave like Cipher, the character in the original movie who chooses the fake pleasures of the Matrix over what Morpheus calls "the desert of the real." Many Americans so enjoyed the TV-driven nationalism of the Iraq War, for instance, that they didn't want it spoiled by reality. During the conflict, they objected to news outlets showing mangled bodies or wounded children or U.S. POWs. Presenting the ugly face of war was seen as unpatriotic or somehow disloyal to "the troops." Only positive images were welcome and dissent was deemed almost treasonous. Now, even as U.S. forces in Iraq slide closer to the guerrilla-war quagmire that some skeptics predicted, Americans continue to say they trust George W. Bush to handle the situation. Some military analysts close to the Bush administration are beginning to feel differently, however. "We're hanging on by our fingernails," one told me. But Americans still prefer to feel good about the war. They want to believe that the U.S. invasion was just, and that Saddam Hussein really was poised to use weapons of mass destruction. By large majorities, Americans either believe that these weapons have already been found or they don't care that the Bush administration may have misled the world. The Disputed Labs For its part, the U.S. news media - from Fox News to the New York Times - repeatedly trumpeted supposed weapons discoveries, only to play down later stories showing that the original reports were bogus. The only evidence Bush now cites is the discovery of two mobile labs that the CIA and Defense Intelligence Agency insist could be used for producing biological weapons. "Those who say we haven't found the banned manufacturing devices or banned weapons are wrong," Bush declared, referring to the mobile labs. "We found them." Yet, the U.S. intelligence analysis of these labs is more a piece of the American Matrix than a dispassionate examination of the evidence. The report reads like one more example of selective intelligence, which spurns plausible alternatives if they don't fit Bush's political needs. In this case, the Bush administration, which said for months that the Iraqi weapons secrets would be revealed once U.S. forces captured and questioned Iraq's top scientists, now doesn't like what those scientists are saying. When questioned, the captured scientists said the labs were used to produce hydrogen for artillery weather balloons. In the CIA-DIA report, U.S. analysts agreed that hydrogen production was a plausible explanation for the labs. "Some of the features of the trailer - a gas collection system and the presence of a caustic - are consistent with both bio-production and hydrogen production," the CIA-DIA report said. "The plant's design possibly could be used to produce hydrogen using a chemical reaction." The report also noted that "preliminary sample analysis results are negative for five standard BW agents, including bacillus anthracis, and for growth media for those agents." Also missing are companion mobile labs that would be needed "to prepare and sterilize the media and to concentrate and possibly dry the agent, before the agent is ready for introduction into a delivery system, such as bulk-filled munitions," the CIA-DIA report said. In other words, U.S. intelligence analysts found no evidence that these labs had been used to make biological weapons or that the two labs alone could produce weaponized BW agents. But that was obviously the wrong answer. Arguing the Issue So the CIA-DIA analysis veered off into an argumentative direction. The report asserted that the labs would be "inefficient" for producing hydrogen because their capacity is "larger than typical units for hydrogen production for weather balloons." Better systems are "commercially available," said the CIA-DIA report, dated May 28, 2003. But the U.S. analysts don't assess whether those more efficient systems would have been "commercially available" to Iraq, which has faced a decade of trade sanctions. What may be considered "inefficient" to U.S. scientists might be the best home-made option available to Iraqis. Having made the inefficiency argument, the CIA-DIA analysis concluded that hydrogen production must be a "cover story" and that "BW agent production is the only consistent, logical purpose for these vehicles." In the American Matrix, pretty much any argument can work if the guys in charge want it to. Tom Tomorrow's "This Modern World" captured this aspect of what he called "The Republican Matrix" in a cartoon that also uses the analogy of the Matrix movies. In the cartoon's drawings, clueless Americans parrot back Bush administration messages as the cartoon asks, "What is the Republican Matrix? It is an illusion that engulfs us all...a steady barrage of images which obscure reality. It is a world born anew each day...in which there is nothing to be learned from the lessons of the past ...a world where logic holds no sway...where up is down and black is white...where reality itself is a malleable thing...subject to constant revision. In short, it's their world." The cartoon ends with a frame showing Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld in sunglasses like those worn by the anti-human "agents" in the Matrix. "What should we do today, fellas?" Bush asks. "Any damn thing we want, George," answers Cheney. Indeed, Bush and his advisers grasped that they faced few limits on how far they could push their political/media advantage. Protected by an army of media allies, who either shared a conservative ideology or saw financial gain in playing along, Bush learned that he stood little risk no matter how over-the-top his imagery or assertions. Many Americans, too, seemed to enjoy the process of their own manipulation. Top Gun The administration was so confident about this control that Bush dared dress up in a Top Gun outfit for an unnecessary jet flight to a U.S. aircraft carrier on May 1 to declare victory over Iraq. The USS Abraham Lincoln, which had been at sea for 10 months, was within helicopter range but that didn't offer the exciting visuals of a carrier landing and Bush in a flight suit. So, the ship slowed its pace and circled idly in the Pacific Ocean to guarantee favorable camera angles while servicemen and women delayed their homecomings. Though Bush's father made great fun of Democrat Michael Dukakis when he rode in a tank in 1988 and the national news media had a field day in 1993 when President Bill Clinton got a haircut while Air Force One waited at a Los Angeles airport, the tone was different when Bush pulled off his Top Gun performance. "U.S. television coverage ranged from respectful to gushing," observed New York Times columnist Paul Krugman. "Nobody seemed bothered that Mr. Bush, who appears to have skipped more than a year of the National Guard service that kept him out of Vietnam, is now emphasizing his flying experience." [NYT, May 6, 2003] Indeed, the likes of MSNBC's Chris Matthews used the occasion of Bush strutting about the carrier's deck to praise Bush's manliness in contrast to Democratic presidential candidates, including Sen. John Kerry who earned a Silver Star in Vietnam. "Imagine Joe Lieberman in this costume, or even John Kerry," Matthews said on MSNBC on May 1. "Nobody looks right in the role Bush has set for the presidency-commander-in-chief, medium height, medium build, looks good in a jet pilot's costume or uniform, rather has a certain swagger, not too literary, certainly not too verbal, but a guy who speaks plainly and wins wars. I think that job definition is hard to match for the Dems." Mount Rushmore Bush got the images he wanted in his carrier landing while his aides mounted a mini-cover-up of the facts. In the days after the photo op, the White House first lied about the reasons for the jet flight, insisting that it was necessary because the ship was outside helicopter range. That story fell apart when it became clear that the ship was only 30 miles offshore and slowing up to give Bush an excuse to use the jet. A later New York Times article revealed that Bush had personally collaborated on the jet landing idea and that the imagery was choreographed by a White House advance team led by communications specialist Scott Sforza, who arrived on the carrier days earlier. The carrier landing was just one scene in a deliberate pattern of images sought by the White House, the article said. At an economic speech in Indianapolis, people sitting behind Bush were told to take off their ties so they'd look more like ordinary folks, WISH-TV reported. At a speech at Mount Rushmore in South Dakota, cameramen were given a platform that offered up Bush's profile as if he were already carved into the mountain with Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt. [NYT, May 16, 2003] But the TV media and the American people shrugged off concerns about whether Bush had used the USS Abraham Lincoln and its crew as a political prop. A New York Times/CBS News poll found 59 percent of the American people agreeing that use of the carrier was appropriate and saying that Bush was not seeking political gain. So how did the American people reach this point where a majority didn't mind being manipulated no matter how obvious or absurd the trickery? Part of the answer, of course, relates to the trauma of Sept. 11 when the nation felt victimized and concluded that "united we stand" was the right strategy even if that meant giving Bush a blank check to do whatever he wanted, no matter how reckless. The Matrix's Origin But a fuller explanation for this American Matrix goes back much farther - and like the Matrix in the movie - we know some but not all the facts. The American Matrix grew out of Republican anger in the 1970s. That anger followed the leaking of the Pentagon Papers which described the secret the history of the Vietnam War and the revelations about President Richard Nixon's political abuses known as Watergate. Those two disclosures helped force U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam and drove Nixon from office. For leading Republicans, the trauma was extreme as the party was pummeled in congressional elections in 1974 and lost the White House in 1976. An influential core of wealthy conservatives decided that they needed to assert tighter control over what information reached and influenced the people. Led by former Treasury Secretary Bill Simon and enlisting the likes of right-wing philanthropist Richard Mellon Scaife, these Republicans began pouring tens of millions of dollars into building a conservative media infrastructure to challenge the mainstream press, which the conservatives labeled "liberal." [For more background, see Consortiumnews.com's "Democrats' Dilemma."] This political/media strategy gained momentum in the 1980s when President Ronald Reagan's image-savvy team worked closely with the emerging conservative media, such as Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Washington Times which Reagan called his "favorite" newspaper. Meanwhile, a host of conservative attack groups, such as Accuracy in Media, went after journalists who exposed embarrassing facts about Reagan's secret operations, such as the Iran-Contra scandal and drug-trafficking by the Nicaraguan contras, Reagan's beloved "freedom fighters." Conservative activists worked hand-in-glove with Reagan's "public diplomacy" apparatus, which borrowed psychological operations specialists from the U.S. military to conduct what was termed "perception management." Their goal was to manage the perceptions of the American people about key foreign-policy issues, such as Central America and the threat posed by the Soviet Union. "The most critical special operations mission we have ... is to persuade the American people that the communists are out to get us," explained deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force, J. Michael Kelly, at a National Defense University conference. In the 1980s, the Republicans were helped by news executives in mainstream publications who favored Reagan's hard-line foreign policy, including New York Times executive editor Abe Rosenthal. Some of these executives turned their news organizations away from the tough reporting that was needed to expose the foreign policy abuses that were occurring under Reagan. That averting of eyes was one of the key reasons major newspapers, such as the New York Times and the Washington Post, largely missed the Iran-Contra scandal and attacked the reporting of other journalists who uncovered foreign-policy crimes such as cocaine trafficking by Nicaraguan contra forces. A false reality was being created that covered up the ugly side of U.S. foreign policy. [For details, see Robert Parry's Lost History.] Clinton Wars In the 1990s, the interests of the maturing conservative news media and the mainstream news media merged even more fully as both groups found common cause in exaggerating misconduct by President Bill Clinton. Mainstream journalists discovered that they could report sloppily about Clinton and gain the praise - rather than the opprobrium - of the well-financed conservative attack groups. [For details, see The Hunting of the President by Joe Conason and Gene Lyons, or Sidney Blumenthal's The Clinton Wars.] Though many key facts about Clinton's Whitewater investments and other "scandals" were misrepresented by the national press, there were no punishments for the reporters involved, only rewards. By contrast, the few reporters who still had the audacity to dig up evidence of past crimes from the Reagan-Bush era found themselves under attack and their livelihoods threatened. For instance, when San Jose Mercury News reporter Gary Webb revived the contra-drug story in the mid-1990s, he was denounced by the New York Times and other leading newspapers that had pooh-poohed the scandal when it was unfolding in the 1980s. Even when a 1998 CIA report verified that the contras were implicated in the drug trade and that the Reagan-Bush administration had hidden the evidence, the major newspapers continued to concentrate their wrath on Webb, who was driven out of the profession (and committed suicide in December 2004). [See Consortiumnews.com's "America's Debt to Journalist Gary Webb."] The same patterns carried over into the 2000 election in which Democrat Al Gore faced withering attacks on his credibility - often from made-up or exaggerated examples of his supposed lying - while Republican George W. Bush got pretty much a free pass. [For details, see the Consortiumnews.com's "Protecting Bush-Cheney."] Again, the conservative and mainstream media outlets often worked in tandem, with the New York Times joining the Washington Times in misquoting Gore about "inventing" the Internet or claiming that "I was the one that started" the Love Canal toxic-waste cleanup. Again, there were no consequences for reporters who got the facts wrong. [For details, see the Consortiumnews.com's "Al Gore v. the Media."] Terror Attacks The terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, only deepened these tendencies. The following month, for instance, a group of news organizations completed a press recount of all legally cast votes in the pivotal presidential election in Florida. The original purpose of the recount had been simple: to determine which candidate the voters of Florida actually had picked for president based on votes considered legal under Florida law. But the recount's outcome presented a challenge. Regardless of what standard was used for the famous chads - whether perforated, hanging or fully punched through - Al Gore was the winner by a narrow margin. In other words, if the state of Florida had been allowed to count all its legally cast ballots, George W. Bush would not be President. That finding, however, would have certainly drawn the wrath of the administration and many Americans who were rallying around Bush in the wake of Sept. 11. The decision of the news executives was to simply misrepresent the results. For the leads of their stories, the New York Times, CNN and other news organizations arbitrarily ignored the legal Florida ballots in which voters both marked and wrote in their choice, the so-called "over-votes." By claiming, incorrectly, that these ballots would not have been counted in the state-court-ordered recount, which was stopped by Bush's allies on the U.S. Supreme Court, the media outlets kept up the pretense that Bush was the legitimate winner of Florida and thus the White House. Though this manipulation of the vote tally was noted by a few publications at the time, including this Web site, the false reality of Bush's Florida victory has become part of the American Matrix. [For details, see Consortiumnews.com's "So Bush Did Steal the White House."] Iraq's WMD The American Matrix grew, too, with the altering of U.S. intelligence to buttress the case for war against Iraq. As investigative reporter Seymour Hersh discovered, a small group of neo-conservative ideologues, calling themselves the Cabal and stationed at the Pentagon's Office of Special Plans, reworked U.S. intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction to help justify a U.S. invasion. The Cabal was organized by Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, an architect of Bush's policy of pre-emptive attack against perceived American enemies, Hersh wrote in an article for The New Yorker. "Special Plans was created in order to find evidence of what Wolfowitz and his boss, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, believed to be true - that Saddam Hussein had close ties to al-Qaeda, and that Iraq had an enormous arsenal of chemical, biological, and possibly even nuclear weapons that threatened the region and, potentially, the United States," Hersh wrote, citing a Pentagon adviser who supported the Cabal's work. Hersh also quoted a former Bush administration intelligence official as saying he quit because "they were using the intelligence from the CIA and other agencies only when it fit their agenda. They didn't like the intelligence they were getting, and so they brought in people to write the stuff. They were so crazed and so far out and so difficult to reason with - to the point of being bizarre. Dogmatic, as if they were on a mission from God." Hersh found, too, that Wolfowitz and other key neo-conservatives at the Pentagon were disciples of the late political philosopher Leo Strauss, who believed that some deception of the population is necessary in statecraft. "The whole story is complicated by Strauss's idea - actually Plato's - that philosophers need to tell noble lies not only to the people at large but also to powerful politicians," said Stephen Holmes, a law professor at New York University. [The New Yorker, May 12, 2003] While the post-Sept. 11 period was creating these new openings for the Pentagon's Straussians to manipulate the American people, it was also offering enticing opportunities for the U.S. cable news networks to "brand" themselves in red, white and blue. While unapologetic flag-waving journalism on cable news had been pioneered by Rupert Murdoch's conservative Fox News network, third-ranked MSNBC seized the new opportunity with the most obvious zeal. The network, a Microsoft-General Electric collaboration, dumped war critic Phil Donahue, adopted the administration's title for the war - "Operation Iraqi Freedom" - and emblazoned an American flag on the corner of its screens, just like Fox. During the war, MSNBC flooded its programming with sentimental salutes to the troops, including mini-profiles of U.S. soldiers in a feature called "America's Bravest." The network also broadcast Madison Avenue-style promos of the war that featured images of heroic U.S. troops and happy Iraqis, without any blood-stained images of overflowing hospitals, terrified children or grieving mothers. The promos carried messages, such as "Home of the Brave" and "Let Freedom Ring." Reporting about U.S. military reversals during the early days of the war also brought swift reprisals. When veteran war correspondent Peter Arnett observed accurately to an Iraqi TV interviewer that Iraqi military resistance was stiffer than U.S. military planners had expected, he was fired by NBC and kicked off its MSNBC affiliate. Web sites, such as this one, were hit with angry e-mails from readers furious at any suggestion that the war was not a total success or that the Bush administration had colored its war-fighting scenarios with dangerous wishful thinking. Even taking note of obvious facts, such as the failure of the administration's initial "shock and awe" bombing strategy, was controversial. Bush Admission Ironically, while telling these truths real-time could bring reprisals, Bush himself acknowledged their accuracy later. "Shock and awe said to many people that all we've got to do is unleash some might and people will crumble," Bush said in an interview with NBC's Tom Brokaw. "And it turns out the fighters were a lot fiercer than we thought. ...The resistance for our troops moving south and north was significant resistance." [NBC Nightly News interview, released April 25, 2003] As craven as the U.S. media's behavior may have been, flag-waving journalism worked where it counted - in the ratings race. While MSNBC remained in third place among U.S. cable news outlets, it posted the highest ratings growth in the lead-up to war and during the actual fighting, up 124 percent compared with a year earlier. Fox News, the industry leader, racked up a 102 percent gain and No. 2 CNN rose 91 percent. [WSJ, April 21, 2003] Though some Americans switched to BBC or CNN's international channels to find more objective war coverage, large numbers of Americans clearly wanted the "feel-good" nationalism of Fox News and MSNBC. Images of U.S. troops surrounded by smiling Iraqi children were more appealing than knowing the full truth. The full story of the Iraq War demanded unsettling judgments about the slaughter of thousands of Iraqis and the maiming of children, like the 12-year-old boy who lost both his arms and his family to a U.S. bombing attack. Balanced coverage would have recognized that many Iraqis reacted with coldness and hostility to U.S. forces, a harbinger of the Iraqi resistance that was soon killing an average of one or two U.S. soldiers a day. To some foreigners, the uniformity in the U.S. war coverage had the feel of a totalitarian state. "There have been times, living in America of late, when it seemed I was back in the Communist Moscow I left a dozen years ago," wrote Rupert Cornwell in the London-based Independent. "Switch to cable TV and reporters breathlessly relay the latest wisdom from the usual unnamed 'senior administration officials,' keeping us on the straight and narrow. Everyone, it seems, is on-side and on-message. Just like it used to be when the hammer and sickle flew over the Kremlin." Cornwell traced this lock-step U.S. coverage to the influence of Fox News, which "has taken its cue from George Bush's view of the universe post-11 September - either you're with us or against us. Fox, most emphatically, is with him, and it's paid off at the box office. Not for Fox to dwell on uncomfortable realities like collateral damage, Iraqi casualties, or the failure of the U.S. troops to protect libraries and museums." [Independent, April 23, 2003] Punishing Dissent But the U.S. cable news networks and talk radio went beyond simply boosting the war. They often served as the Bush administration's public enforcers, seeking out and destroying Americans who disagreed with the war policy. Because one of the Dixie Chicks criticized Bush, the music group faced an organized campaign to boycott their music and destroy their careers. MSNBC offered up a program hosted by Republican commentator Joe Scarborough asking why actors Sean Penn and Tim Robbins, who criticized the war, were whining about retaliation. "Sean Penn is fired from an acting job and finds out that actions bring about consequences. Whoa, dude!" chortled Scarborough. As justification for depriving Penn of work, Scarborough cited a comment that Penn made while on a pre-war trip to Iraq. Penn said, "I cannot conceive of any reason why the American people and the world would not have shared with them the evidence that they [Bush administration officials] claim to have of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq." [MSNBC, May 18, 2003] As it turned out, Penn's pre-war comments were equally valid after the invasion, as the U.S. and Great Britain desperately sought confirmation of their WMD claims. Many news executives might argue that their jobs go beyond simply telling the American people the truth. They also are concerned about national unity, especially at a time of crisis. And they don't want to be accused of undercutting U.S. troops at war. Yet, there is a grave danger to both troops and civilians when the news media sanitizes war. By keeping unpleasant images from the American people, the news media feeds the illusion that war is painless, even fun, something to be engaged in easily over slight or imagined provocation. This sort of lazy thinking gets people killed and can squander the wealth of the most powerful nations. Truth Delayed Among U.S. politicians, Sen. Robert C. Byrd, D-W.Va., was the most forceful in addressing the dangers to democracy and to U.S. troops that comes from pervasive government lying. "No matter to what lengths we humans may go to obfuscate facts or delude our fellows, truth has a way of squeezing out through the cracks, eventually," Byrd said on the Senate floor on May 21. "But the danger is that at some point it may no longer matter. The danger is that damage is done before the truth is widely realized. The reality is that, sometimes, it is easier to ignore uncomfortable facts and go along with whatever distortion is currently in vogue." Byrd continued, "Regarding the situation in Iraq, it appears to this senator that the American people may have been lured into accepting the unprovoked invasion of a sovereign nation, in violation of long-standing international law, under false pretenses. ...The run-up to our invasion of Iraq featured the president and members of his Cabinet invoking every frightening image they could conjure, from mushroom clouds, to buried caches of germ warfare, to drones poised to deliver germ-laden death in our major cities. ... "The tactic was guaranteed to provoke a sure reaction from a nation still suffering from a combination of post traumatic stress and justifiable anger after the attacks of 9-11. It was the exploitation of fear. It was a placebo for the anger. ... "Presently our loyal military personnel continue their mission of diligently searching for WMD. They have so far turned up only fertilizer, vacuum cleaners, conventional weapons and the occasional buried swimming pool. They are misused on such a mission and they continue to be at grave risk," Byrd said. "But the Bush team's extensive hype of WMD in Iraq as justification for a pre-emptive invasion has become more than embarrassing," the aging West Virginia senator continued. "It has raised serious questions about prevarication and the reckless use of power. Were our troops needlessly put at risk? Were countless Iraqi civilians killed and maimed when war was not really necessary? Was the American public deliberately misled? Was the world?" In May 2003, a far more vigorous examination of these questions was underway in Europe, where leading politicians and journalists questioned the pre-war claims of Bush and British Prime Minster Tony Blair. "We were told that Saddam had weapons ready for use within 45 minutes," declared former British Foreign Minister Robin Cook, who resigned over Blair's pro-war policies. "It's now 45 days since the war has finished and we have still not found anything." Paul Keetch, defense spokesman for a British opposition party, the Liberal Democrats, said, "No weapons means no threat. Without WMD, the case for war falls apart. It would seem either the intelligence was wrong and we should not rely on it, or the politicians overplayed the threat." [Independent, May 29, 2003] The world's press also pounced on admissions by senior U.S. officials conceding that the pre-war WMD claims may have been hyped. In a speech in New York, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld said it is "possible that they [the Iraqis] decided that they would destroy them prior to a conflict and I don't know the answer." In an interview with Vanity Fair, Deputy Defense Secretary Wolfowitz said the WMD allegation was stressed "for bureaucratic reasons" because "it was the one reason everyone could agree on." Lt. Gen. James Conway, who commanded the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, told reporters that "it remains a surprise to me that we have not uncovered (chemical) weapons ... in some of the forward dispersal areas" where U.S. intelligence claimed they were ready for use by Iraq's Republican Guards. "We were simply wrong," Conway said.
As with the Matrix of the movies, the first step toward destroying this American Matrix will be for the people to get a fuller understanding of the truth, even if that truth is difficult and unpleasant. Why that first step has been so difficult, however, is that there exist too few U.S. news outlets that will challenge the powers-that-be.
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| The Culture Of Corruption Will Outlast Tom DeLay Tom DeLay resigned his Congressional seat with all the dignity, discretion and probity that have marked his decades in politics. Leaving office just steps ahead of the law, with prosecutors from the Justice Department's public-integrity section in hot pursuit, he delivered a farewell speech blaming others for his problems and blithering on at length about "morality." He talked about "the enduring strength of our principles and our ideas," which had built a "shining city on a hill," and confided that he'd decided to quit only after constant prayer. His decision reflected his determination to prevent "liberal Democrats" from "stealing" his suburban Houston district. The fact that his former chief of staff, Tony Rudy, pleaded guilty to federal bribery charges on April 1 was merely a coincidence-as was the fact that his close friend, political ally and financial benefactor, lobbyist Jack Abramoff, had pleaded guilty three months ago, along with his former press secretary Michael Scanlon. His former deputy of chief staff, Edwin Buckham, an ordained minister and lobbyist who had also served as Mr. DeLay's spiritual advisor, appears to be next in the line of legal jeopardy-but that, too, is only a coincidence. Or as Mr. DeLay later told reporters: "The Abramoff stuff has nothing to do with me." His explanation is that the superlobbyist and all those former staffers who used his authority to line their own pockets betrayed his trust without his knowledge. He had no idea that his expenses on all those lavish junkets to Scotland, Russia and the Marianas islands had been paid in exchange for legislative favors. He had no idea that his wife Christine-like Mr. Rudy's wife Lisa, who is now a cooperating witness-had been placed on the Buckham firm's lobbying payroll to win such favors. He had no idea that his indicted cronies were operating a criminal conspiracy from the House Majority Leader's suite in the Capitol. He insists that he was perfectly innocent as these boastful felons swarmed around him and misused his good name. If Mr. DeLay actually believed all of his own moralistic speechifying, he might have to ponder the responsibility he bears for the conduct of employees and associates who traded on his power. But in his resignation speech, he declared that he has "no regrets" and "no doubts." Instead, he complained about the "liberal Democrats" and "liberal media" who supposedly ruined him. It is true that both advocates and journalists have inspected his record. But to anyone who has observed these events unfold, his whining sounds utterly ridiculous. The two individuals most responsible for the end of his political career are Senator John McCain, whose committee hearings on Indian gaming drew attention to the Abramoff scandal; and Emily Miller, the press flack who squealed on Mr. Scanlon to the Justice Department after he jilted her for a younger woman. Both happen to be conservative Republicans. In an interview with Time magazine on the eve of his resignation, Mr. DeLay boasts about the virtual monopoly of jobs and contributions that his party enjoys on K Street, where lobbyists routinely purchased "access" to the Capitol by following his dictates. "Nothing illegal about that at all," he says, claiming to have achieved "total domination" of the lobbying industry "legally and ethically." He has forgotten that the House Ethics Committee, a toothless operation run by his fellow Republicans, admonished him on three separate occasions for the smelly appearance of his dealings with lobbyists. With his associates singing, we may soon learn much more. The confession filed by Mr. Rudy in conjunction with his guilty plea includes mention of a certain "Representative #2" who was involved in his misdeeds and is known to be Mr. DeLay. ("Representative #1" is Robert Ney of Ohio, another probable target of the corruption probe.) The Rudy confession ominously notes that its narrative "does not include all of the facts known to me concerning criminal activity in which I or others engaged." Mr. DeLay is not alone in his responsibility for the Congressional culture of criminality that has flourished for the past decade. He has had many enablers, from the Heritage Foundation to the Family Research Council. Last year, long after the character of his leadership became clear, Washington's conservative leadership paid tribute to him and pledged their unconditional support. Unanimously, they pretended to be blind to the spreading stain of corruption because he promoted their legislation. And then there are his House Republican colleagues, who seem to think his resignation magically cleanses them of years of complicity. Bidding a fond farewell to Mr. DeLay, the new House Majority Leader revealed the prevailing attitude toward ethics and standards in his caucus. "He has served our nation with integrity and honor," said John Boehner, "and I'm honored to call him my colleague and friend."
Obviously, we should only expect more of the same.
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Commissioner of the US Bureau of Narcotics 1930 -1962 |
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Blowing Cheney's Cover By Ray McGovern When you invest so much effort into tangling the web - in this case, corrupting intelligence analysis in the 2002 National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq - it becomes hard to know when to stop. Vice President Dick Cheney went to inordinate lengths, including 10 visits to CIA headquarters, to ensure that that crucial NIE on weapons of mass destruction was alarmist enough to scare Congress into authorizing war. And when the evidence turned out to be flimsy, Cheney had a back-up plan: The CIA made me do it. Ever since their exaggerated claims about Iraq's possession of WMD turned out to be baseless, the Bush administration's defense has rested on blaming the government's intelligence analysts. But one of the great revelations from Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's court filing last week is more evidence that the White House - not the CIA - distorted intelligence on Iraq. It was then-chief of staff I. Lewis Libby, acting on orders from Cheney, who presented evidence of Iraq seeking nuclear weapons material to reporters as a "key judgment" from the NIE, when in fact it was a subject of debate in the intelligence community. The White House plan to scapegoat the intelligence community about Iraq - aided by eager-to-please CIA Director George Tenet - worked beautifully. But only for a while. The plan faltered once it became clear there were no WMD and former Ambassador Joseph Wilson blew the whistle on the centerpiece report used to deceive Congress and conjure up the specter of a mushroom cloud. That report conveyed the cockamamie story about Iraq seeking uranium in the African country of Niger, in which Cheney took uncommon interest. Cockamamie? Easy to say in retrospect, you say. No, it was easy to say from the outset. And that is why CIA analysts in early 2002 threw it into the circular file, where it deserved to be - for several good reasons. For starters, the government of Niger does not control the uranium mined there. Rather, it is tightly controlled and monitored by an international consortium led by the French. CIA analysts all agreed that the notion that Baghdad could somehow siphon off some of that uranium and spirit it back to Iraq was preposterous. The Pentagon's own intelligence-gathering unit - the Defense Intelligence Agency - however, immediately recognized the report for its huge potential to please Vice President Cheney, not to mention its direct boss, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, and wrote it up in a DIA publication. The various investigations of intelligence performance on Iraq show that Cheney took a real shine to the report. Never mind its dubious provenance, or that it could be shown to be false on its face; it served his goal of portraying Iraq as a threat. The DIA report was on Cheney's desk one morning in February 2002, when the CIA briefer arrived with the the president's Daily Brief. I'll bet Cheney rues that day, for he made the mistake of asking the briefer to find out what CIA analysts thought of the Iraq-Niger report. CIA managers decided to send Joe Wilson to Niger to seek more information on the report. Who better? Wilson, fluent in French, had served in Niger, and had been our last acting ambassador in Baghdad. And he had been asked by the CIA to perform similar special assignments since his retirement from the Department of State. Wilson went to Niger, found the story baseless - as had previous investigations by the U.S. embassy in Niger and a U.S. general dispatched from Heidelberg - and reported this promptly to the CIA officials who had sent him, who in turn advised the office of the vice president. No matter. Cheney and Libby put the report on life support and eventually insisted that it be included in the (in)famous NIE prepared in the fall of 2002. The malleable Tenet acquiesced to leaving the DIA-crafted language in the NIE that he signed and released on Oct. 1, 2002. Yet, a day or two later, Tenet seems to have had a pang of conscience; he successfully pleaded with the White House to excise the Iraq-Niger story from a key presidential speech - but the train had left the station. On Oct. 7, President Bush warned the nation that the first sign that Iraq has a nuclear weapon "could come in the form of a mushroom cloud" - a formula repeated by Condoleezza Rice on Oct. 8 and then-Pentagon spokesperson Victoria Clark on Oct. 9. On Oct. 10 and 11, the Senate and House voted for war. Fast forward to January 2003, when President Bush's State of the Union address pulled out all stops in beating the drums for war. As Joe Wilson watched the speech, he found it puzzling to hear the president repeat the story about Iraq seeking uranium from Africa. There must be new intelligence on this, thought Wilson, but he quickly learned it was the same sorry story. He quietly sought to persuade the White House to issue a correction, but was given the brush off. Wilson persisted, and in the end warned then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice that, as a matter of conscience, he would be forced to tell the American people that the uranium story was bogus. The reply, through a Rice intermediary: "Go ahead! Who will believe you?" Six months later, in early July 2003 - more than three months into the war in Iraq - the administration's claims of "Mission Accomplished" proved to be premature. And, worse still, no WMD were anywhere to be found. Even the domesticated U.S. press that led the cheerleading for war seemed a bit unnerved at the discovery that there were no discoveries. (This was before outrage fatigue set in.) Things at the White House were growing very tense. It is now abundantly clear - thanks to the release of Fitzgerald's court papers - how the White House chose to counter Wilson's charge that the administration had "twisted" intelligence to justify war. Adding insult to injury, not only did Wilson author the July 6 New York Times op-ed titled "What I Did Not Find in Africa;" he also chose to forgo diplomatic parlance in telling Washington Post reporters, "This begs the question regarding what else they are lying about." Wilson had thrown down the gauntlet. In something of a panic, Cheney picked it up. First, he and Libby tried to get the CIA to support the story about Iraq and Niger. The answer was no. So the administration conceded publicly on July 7 that the information should not have been included in the State Of The Union address. On July 8, Cheney's counteroffensive began. According to Libby, he was dispatched to Bush administration darling Judy Miller of The New York Times to explain why Wilson's charges were wrong. The White House did not twist the intelligence to justify invading Iraq: "The CIA made us do it." Toward this end, Libby claims he was given permission by Cheney and Bush to release information from the NIE, which, as noted above, had already been cooked to Cheney's recipe. The passage chosen for highlighting? A paragraph buried on page 24 of the 90-page NIE: "Iraq also began vigorously trying to procure uranium ore and yellowcake. ... A foreign government service reported that as of early 2001, Niger planned to send several tons of 'pure uranium' (probably yellowcake) to Iraq." I can safely assume that Libby did not tell Miller of the official position of state department intelligence analysts that the uranium allegation was "highly dubious." For once, then-Secretary of State Colin Powell listened to them and faced down Libby. Indeed, Powell deliberately excluded this particular canard in preparing his Feb. 5, 2003, UN speech, into which he threw everything else but the kitchen sink. That's how bad it was. With the help of this "declassified" passage, Libby could show Judy Miller that the White House had been badly misled. The blame was placed on the intelligence gatherers, not on the White House. In mid-February 2003, when the International Atomic Energy Agency was given the documents upon which the Iraq-Niger story was based, they were immediately found to be forgeries. Congressman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., wrote a blistering letter to President Bush before the attack on Iraq, claiming that he had been deceived into voting for war on the basis of forged documents. Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts, R-Kan., refused to ask the FBI to investigate who was responsible.
Special Prosecutor Fitzgerald, however, has an independent bent - plus the authority to look at these aspects of the litany of leaks. I'll bet he has a good idea of who orchestrated the forgery. Indeed, I will not be surprised if the operation is eventually traced back to the office of the vice president.
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How Crazy Are They? By William Rivers Pitt I had a debate with my boss last night about Sy Hersh's terrifying New Yorker article The Iran Plans describing Bush administration plans to attack Iran, potentially with nuclear weapons. After reading the Hersh piece, my boss was understandably worried, describing his reaction to the article in road-to-Damascus-revelation terms. They're going to do this, he said. I told my boss that I couldn't believe it was possible the Bush administration would do this. I ran through all the reasons why an attack on Iran, especially with any kind of nuclear weaponry, would be the height of folly. Iran, unlike Iraq, has a formidable military. They own the high ground over the Persian Gulf and have deployed missile batteries all throughout the mountains along the shore. Those missile batteries, I told him, include the Sunburn missile, which can travel in excess of Mach 2 and can spoof Aegis radar systems. Every American warship in the Gulf, including the carrier group currently deployed there, would be ducks on the pond. The blowback in Iraq would be immediate and catastrophic, I reminded him. The Shi'ite majority that enjoys an alliance with Iran would go indiscriminately crazy and attack anyone and anything flying the stars and stripes. Syria, which has inked a mutual defense pact with Iran and is believed to have significant chemical and biological weapons capabilities, would get into the game. China, which has recently established a multi-billion dollar petroleum relationship with Iran, might step into the fray if it sees its new oil source at risk. Russia, which has stapled itself to the idea that Iran's nuclear ambitions are for peaceful purposes, would likewise get pulled in. Blair and Britain want nothing to do with an attack on Iran, Berlusconi appears to have lost his job in Italy, and Spain's Aznar is already gone. If the Bush administration does this, I told my boss, they'd instantly find themselves in a cold and lonely place. The nuclear option, I told my boss, brings even more nightmarish possibilities. The reaction to an attack on Iran with conventional weapons would be bad enough. If we drop a nuke, that reaction will be worse by orders of magnitude and puts on the table the ultimate nightmare scenario: a region-wide conflagration that would reach all the way to Pakistan, where Pervez Musharraf is fending off the fundamentalists with both hands. If the US drops a nuke on Iran, it is possible that the Taliban-allied fundamentalists in Pakistan would rise up and overthrow Musharraf, thus gaining control of Pakistan's own arsenal of nuclear weapons. All of a sudden, those nukes would be loose, and India would lose its collective mind. It was a cogent argument I made, filled with common sense. My boss seemed mollified, and we bid each other goodnight. Ten minutes later, I had an email from my boss in my Inbox. He'd sent me Paul Krugman's latest editorial from the New York Times, titled "Yes He Would." Krugman's piece opens this way: "But he wouldn't do that." That sentiment is what made it possible for President Bush to stampede America into the Iraq war and to fend off hard questions about the reasons for that war until after the 2004 election. Many people just didn't want to believe that an American president would deliberately mislead the nation on matters of war and peace. "But he wouldn't do that," say people who think they're being sensible. Given what we now know about the origins of the Iraq war, however, discounting the possibility that Mr. Bush will start another ill-conceived and unnecessary war isn't sensible. It's wishful thinking. Great. Things have come to a pretty pass in the United States of America when the first question you have to ask yourself on matters of war and death is, "Just how crazy are these people?" Every cogent estimate sees Iran's nuclear capabilities not becoming any kind of reality for another ten years, leaving open a dozen diplomatic and economic options for dealing with the situation. There is no good reason for attacking that country, but there are a few bad reasons to be found. The worst of the bad reasons, of course, is that an attack on Iran would change the conversation in Washington as the 2006 midterm elections loom. Bush and his congressional allies are about as popular as scabies right now, according to every available poll. If the current trend is not altered or disrupted, January 2007 may come with Democratic Rep. John Conyers Jr. sitting as Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee with subpoena powers in hand. "As Joseph Cirincione of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace recently pointed out," continued Krugman in his editorial, "the administration seems to be following exactly the same script on Iran that it used on Iraq: 'The vice president of the United States gives a major speech focused on the threat from an oil-rich nation in the Middle East. The US secretary of state tells Congress that the same nation is our most serious global challenge. The secretary of defense calls that nation the leading supporter of global terrorism. The president blames it for attacks on US troops.'" For the moment, one significant departure from the Iraq script has been the Bush administration vehemently denying that an attack on Iran, particularly with nuclear weapons, is an option being considered at this time. Bush himself called the Hersh article "wild speculation," and White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan bluntly stated that the US is committed to diplomacy. Gary Sick, an Iran expert quoted by columnist Jim Lobe in a recent article, seems to think the reputation for irrational and dangerous actions enjoyed by the Bush administration is being used as a psychological lever. "That is their record," said Sick, "so they have no need to invent it. If they can use that reputation to keep Iran - and everybody else - off balance, so much the better." Then why this cold feeling in the pit of my stomach? Julian Borger, writing for the UK Guardian, has some added insight. "Vincent Cannistraro," writes Borger, "a former CIA counter-terrorism operations chief, said Mr. Bush had not yet made up his mind about the use of direct military action against Iran. 'There is a battle for Bush's soul over that,' he said, adding that Karl Rove, the president's chief political adviser is adamantly opposed to a war. However, Mr. Cannistraro said covert military action, in the form of special forces troops identifying targets and aiding dissident groups, is already under way. 'It's been authorized, and it's going on to the extent that there is some lethality to it. Some people have been killed.'" A battle for Bush's soul? Some people have been killed? It's a wild day here in Bizarro World when I find myself in total agreement with Karl Rove. It is the uncertainty in all this that makes the situation truly terrifying. No sane person would undertake an action so fraught with peril, but if we have learned anything in the last few years, it is that sanity takes a back seat in this administration's hayride. I bought a coffee this morning at the excellent caf around the corner, which is run by a wonderful Iranian woman. I asked her point-blank what would happen in her home country if we did attack. She dismissed the possibility out of hand. "I read that Krugman article," she said, "but there's no way they would do this. They'd have to be crazy."
Indeed. Too bad that hasn't stopped them yet.
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 Heil Bush, Dear Propaganda Ansager Boortz, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your constant attacks on that uppity Cindy McKinney and other uncowered liberals, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Media Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Wolf's Lair" formally 'Rancho de Bimbo' on 05-27-2006. We salute you herr Boortz, Sieg Heil!
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AUSTIN, Texas -- We need to keep up with the daily drip, that endless succession of special favors for special interests performed by Congress, or we'll never figure out how we got so far behind the eight ball. While the top Bushies lunge about test-driving new wars (great idea -- the one we're having is a bummer, so let's start another!), Congress just keeps right on cranking out those corporate goodies.
Earlier this month, the House effectively repealed more than 200 state food safety and public health protections. Say, when was the last time you enjoyed a little touch of food poisoning? Coming soon to a stomach near you. What was really impressive about H.R. 4167, the "National Uniformity for Food Act," is that it was passed without a public hearing.
"The House is trampling crucial health safeguards in every state without so much as a single public hearing," said Erik Olson, attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council. "This just proves the old adage, 'Money talks.' The food industry spared no expense to ensure passage."
Thirty-nine attorneys general, plus health, consumer and environmental groups, are opposing the law. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, the food industry has spent more than $81 million on campaign contributions to members of Congress since 2000.
The bill would automatically override any state measure that is stronger than federal law, the opposite of what a sensible law would do. The NRDC says state laws protecting consumers from chemical additives, bacteria and ingredients that can trigger allergic reactions would be barred, and that includes alerts about chemical contamination in fish, health protection standards for milk and eggs, and warnings about chemicals or toxins such as arsenic, mercury and lead. Happy eating, all.
Here's another little gem, one of those "it was after midnight and everyone wanted to go home" deals. Just a no-cost sweetener to encourage oil and gas companies to drill in the Gulf of Mexico -- and who needs more encouragement these days than the oil companies? The poor things are making hardly any money at all. Just have the federal government waive the royalty rights for drilling in the publicly owned waters. Turns out this waiver will cost the government at least $7 billion over the next five years.
I roared with laughter upon reading that Texas Rep. Joe Barton had assured his colleagues the provision of energy bill was "so non-controversial" that senior House and Senate negotiators had not even discussed it. That's one of the oldest ploys in the Texas handbook of sneaky tricks and has been successfully used to pass many a sweet deal for the oil industry.
"The big lie about this whole program is that it doesn't cost anything," Massachusetts Rep. Edward Markey told The New York Times. "Taxpayers are being asked to provide huge subsidies to oil companies to produce oil -- it's like subsidizing a fish to swim."
Then there are daily drips so strange it's hard to tell if members of Congress are clear on what they're doing. You may have heard that more and more corporations are backing out of their pension obligations and dumping the responsibility on an under-funded federal agency.
So the push is on to get companies to pony up for the pension agency. According to the Financial Times: "Employers will be able to slash their contributions to under-funded pension schemes by tens of billions of dollars over the next five years under proposed legislation before Congress that was expected to have the opposite effect. The legislation was proposed by the White House last year to lessen the risk of a taxpayer bailout of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., a federal safety net for pension schemes."
Brilliant. Anyone know how the White House went from protecting the Benefit Guaranty Corp. to slashing corporate contributions by tens of billions? Did they send Michael "Brownie" Brown to do the job?
Long ago, Abraham Lincoln wrote, "Corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money-power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in few hands and the republic is destroyed."
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The Bush Administration, while publicly advocating diplomacy in order to stop Iran from pursuing a nuclear weapon, has increased clandestine activities inside Iran and intensified planning for a possible major air attack. Current and former American military and intelligence officials said that Air Force planning groups are drawing up lists of targets, and teams of American combat troops have been ordered into Iran, under cover, to collect targeting data and to establish contact with anti-government ethnic-minority groups. The officials say that President Bush is determined to deny the Iranian regime the opportunity to begin a pilot program, planned for this spring, to enrich uranium.
American and European intelligence agencies, and the International Atomic Energy Agency (I.A.E.A.), agree that Iran is intent on developing the capability to produce nuclear weapons. But there are widely differing estimates of how long that will take, and whether diplomacy, sanctions, or military action is the best way to prevent it. Iran insists that its research is for peaceful use only, in keeping with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, and that it will not be delayed or deterred.
There is a growing conviction among members of the United States military, and in the international community, that President Bush's ultimate goal in the nuclear confrontation with Iran is regime change. Iran's President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has challenged the reality of the Holocaust and said that Israel must be "wiped off the map." Bush and others in the White House view him as a potential Adolf Hitler, a former senior intelligence official said. "That's the name they're using. They say, 'Will Iran get a strategic weapon and threaten another world war?' "
A government consultant with close ties to the civilian leadership in the Pentagon said that Bush was "absolutely convinced that Iran is going to get the bomb" if it is not stopped. He said that the President believes that he must do "what no Democrat or Republican, if elected in the future, would have the courage to do," and "that saving Iran is going to be his legacy."
One former defense official, who still deals with sensitive issues for the Bush Administration, told me that the military planning was premised on a belief that "a sustained bombing campaign in Iran will humiliate the religious leadership and lead the public to rise up and overthrow the government." He added, "I was shocked when I heard it, and asked myself, 'What are they smoking?' "
The rationale for regime change was articulated in early March by Patrick Clawson, an Iran expert who is the deputy director for research at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and who has been a supporter of President Bush. "So long as Iran has an Islamic republic, it will have a nuclear-weapons program, at least clandestinely," Clawson told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on March 2nd. "The key issue, therefore, is: How long will the present Iranian regime last?"
When I spoke to Clawson, he emphasized that "this Administration is putting a lot of effort into diplomacy." However, he added, Iran had no choice other than to accede to America's demands or face a military attack. Clawson said that he fears that Ahmadinejad "sees the West as wimps and thinks we will eventually cave in. We have to be ready to deal with Iran if the crisis escalates." Clawson said that he would prefer to rely on sabotage and other clandestine activities, such as "industrial accidents." But, he said, it would be prudent to prepare for a wider war, "given the way the Iranians are acting. This is not like planning to invade Quebec."
One military planner told me that White House criticisms of Iran and the high tempo of planning and clandestine activities amount to a campaign of "coercion" aimed at Iran. "You have to be ready to go, and we'll see how they respond," the officer said. "You have to really show a threat in order to get Ahmadinejad to back down." He added, "People think Bush has been focussed on Saddam Hussein since 9/11," but, "in my view, if you had to name one nation that was his focus all the way along, it was Iran." (In response to detailed requests for comment, the White House said that it would not comment on military planning but added, "As the President has indicated, we are pursuing a diplomatic solution"; the Defense Department also said that Iran was being dealt with through "diplomatic channels" but wouldn't elaborate on that; the C.I.A. said that there were "inaccuracies" in this account but would not specify them.)
"This is much more than a nuclear issue," one high-ranking diplomat told me in Vienna. "That's just a rallying point, and there is still time to fix it. But the Administration believes it cannot be fixed unless they control the hearts and minds of Iran. The real issue is who is going to control the Middle East and its oil in the next ten years."
A senior Pentagon adviser on the war on terror expressed a similar view. "This White House believes that the only way to solve the problem is to change the power structure in Iran, and that means war," he said. The danger, he said, was that "it also reinforces the belief inside Iran that the only way to defend the country is to have a nuclear capability." A military conflict that destabilized the region could also increase the risk of terror: "Hezbollah comes into play," the adviser said, referring to the terror group that is considered one of the world's most successful, and which is now a Lebanese political party with strong ties to Iran. "And here comes Al Qaeda."
In recent weeks, the President has quietly initiated a series of talks on plans for Iran with a few key senators and members of Congress, including at least one Democrat. A senior member of the House Appropriations Committee, who did not take part in the meetings but has discussed their content with his colleagues, told me that there had been "no formal briefings," because "they're reluctant to brief the minority. They're doing the Senate, somewhat selectively."
The House member said that no one in the meetings "is really objecting" to the talk of war. "The people they're briefing are the same ones who led the charge on Iraq. At most, questions are raised: How are you going to hit all the sites at once? How are you going to get deep enough?" (Iran is building facilities underground.) "There's no pressure from Congress" not to take military action, the House member added. "The only political pressure is from the guys who want to do it." Speaking of President Bush, the House member said, "The most worrisome thing is that this guy has a messianic vision."
Some operations, apparently aimed in part at intimidating Iran, are already under way. American Naval tactical aircraft, operating from carriers in the Arabian Sea, have been flying simulated nuclear-weapons delivery missions-rapid ascending maneuvers known as "over the shoulder" bombing-since last summer, the former official said, within range of Iranian coastal radars.
Last month, in a paper given at a conference on Middle East security in Berlin, Colonel Sam Gardiner, a military analyst who taught at the National War College before retiring from the Air Force, in 1987, provided an estimate of what would be needed to destroy Iran's nuclear program. Working from satellite photographs of the known facilities, Gardiner estimated that at least four hundred targets would have to be hit. He added:
I don't think a U.S. military planner would want to stop there. Iran probably has two chemical-production plants. We would hit those. We would want to hit the medium-range ballistic missiles that have just recently been moved closer to Iraq. There are fourteen airfields with sheltered aircraft. . . . We'd want to get rid of that threat. We would want to hit the assets that could be used to threaten Gulf shipping. That means targeting the cruise-missile sites and the Iranian diesel submarines. . . . Some of the facilities may be too difficult to target even with penetrating weapons. The U.S. will have to use Special Operations units.
One of the military's initial option plans, as presented to the White House by the Pentagon this winter, calls for the use of a bunker-buster tactical nuclear weapon, such as the B61-11, against underground nuclear sites. One target is Iran's main centrifuge plant, at Natanz, nearly two hundred miles south of Tehran. Natanz, which is no longer under I.A.E.A. safeguards, reportedly has underground floor space to hold fifty thousand centrifuges, and laboratories and workspaces buried approximately seventy-five feet beneath the surface. That number of centrifuges could provide enough enriched uranium for about twenty nuclear warheads a year. (Iran has acknowledged that it initially kept the existence of its enrichment program hidden from I.A.E.A. inspectors, but claims that none of its current activity is barred by the Non-Proliferation Treaty.) The elimination of Natanz would be a major setback for Iran's nuclear ambitions, but the conventional weapons in the American arsenal could not insure the destruction of facilities under seventy-five feet of earth and rock, especially if they are reinforced with concrete.
There is a Cold War precedent for targeting deep underground bunkers with nuclear weapons. In the early nineteen-eighties, the American intelligence community watched as the Soviet government began digging a huge underground complex outside Moscow. Analysts concluded that the underground facility was designed for "continuity of government"-for the political and military leadership to survive a nuclear war. (There are similar facilities, in Virginia and Pennsylvania, for the American leadership.) The Soviet facility still exists, and much of what the U.S. knows about it remains classified. "The 'tell' "-the giveaway-"was the ventilator shafts, some of which were disguised," the former senior intelligence official told me. At the time, he said, it was determined that "only nukes" could destroy the bunker. He added that some American intelligence analysts believe that the Russians helped the Iranians design their underground facility. "We see a similarity of design," specifically in the ventilator shafts, he said.
A former high-level Defense Department official told me that, in his view, even limited bombing would allow the U.S. to "go in there and do enough damage to slow down the nuclear infrastructure-it's feasible." The former defense official said, "The Iranians don't have friends, and we can tell them that, if necessary, we'll keep knocking back their infrastructure. The United States should act like we're ready to go." He added, "We don't have to knock down all of their air defenses. Our stealth bombers and standoff missiles really work, and we can blow fixed things up. We can do things on the ground, too, but it's difficult and very dangerous-put bad stuff in ventilator shafts and put them to sleep."
But those who are familiar with the Soviet bunker, according to the former senior intelligence official, "say 'No way.' You've got to know what's underneath-to know which ventilator feeds people, or diesel generators, or which are false. And there's a lot that we don't know." The lack of reliable intelligence leaves military planners, given the goal of totally destroying the sites, little choice but to consider the use of tactical nuclear weapons. "Every other option, in the view of the nuclear weaponeers, would leave a gap," the former senior intelligence official said. " 'Decisive' is the key word of the Air Force's planning. It's a tough decision. But we made it in Japan."
He went on, "Nuclear planners go through extensive training and learn the technical details of damage and fallout-we're talking about mushroom clouds, radiation, mass casualties, and contamination over years. This is not an underground nuclear test, where all you see is the earth raised a little bit. These politicians don't have a clue, and whenever anybody tries to get it out"-remove the nuclear option-"they're shouted down."
The attention given to the nuclear option has created serious misgivings inside the offices of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, he added, and some officers have talked about resigning. Late this winter, the Joint Chiefs of Staff sought to remove the nuclear option from the evolving war plans for Iran-without success, the former intelligence official said. "The White House said, 'Why are you challenging this? The option came from you.' "
The Pentagon adviser on the war on terror confirmed that some in the Administration were looking seriously at this option, which he linked to a resurgence of interest in tactical nuclear weapons among Pentagon civilians and in policy circles. He called it "a juggernaut that has to be stopped." He also confirmed that some senior officers and officials were considering resigning over the issue. "There are very strong sentiments within the military against brandishing nuclear weapons against other countries," the adviser told me. "This goes to high levels." The matter may soon reach a decisive point, he said, because the Joint Chiefs had agreed to give President Bush a formal recommendation stating that they are strongly opposed to considering the nuclear option for Iran. "The internal debate on this has hardened in recent weeks," the adviser said. "And, if senior Pentagon officers express their opposition to the use of offensive nuclear weapons, then it will never happen."
The adviser added, however, that the idea of using tactical nuclear weapons in such situations has gained support from the Defense Science Board, an advisory panel whose members are selected by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. "They're telling the Pentagon that we can build the B61 with more blast and less radiation," he said.
The chairman of the Defense Science Board is William Schneider, Jr., an Under-Secretary of State in the Reagan Administration. In January, 2001, as President Bush prepared to take office, Schneider served on an ad-hoc panel on nuclear forces sponsored by the National Institute for Public Policy, a conservative think tank. The panel's report recommended treating tactical nuclear weapons as an essential part of the U.S. arsenal and noted their suitability "for those occasions when the certain and prompt destruction of high priority targets is essential and beyond the promise of conventional weapons." Several signers of the report are now prominent members of the Bush Administration, including Stephen Hadley, the national-security adviser; Stephen Cambone, the Under-Secretary of Defense for Intelligence; and Robert Joseph, the Under-Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security.
The Pentagon adviser questioned the value of air strikes. "The Iranians have distributed their nuclear activity very well, and we have no clue where some of the key stuff is. It could even be out of the country," he said. He warned, as did many others, that bombing Iran could provoke "a chain reaction" of attacks on American facilities and citizens throughout the world: "What will 1.2 billion Muslims think the day we attack Iran?"
With or without the nuclear option, the list of targets may inevitably expand. One recently retired high-level Bush Administration official, who is also an expert on war planning, told me that he would have vigorously argued against an air attack on Iran, because "Iran is a much tougher target" than Iraq. But, he added, "If you're going to do any bombing to stop the nukes, you might as well improve your lie across the board. Maybe hit some training camps, and clear up a lot of other problems."
The Pentagon adviser said that, in the event of an attack, the Air Force intended to strike many hundreds of targets in Iran but that "ninety-nine per cent of them have nothing to do with proliferation. There are people who believe it's the way to operate"-that the Administration can achieve its policy goals in Iran with a bombing campaign, an idea that has been supported by neoconservatives.
If the order were to be given for an attack, the American combat troops now operating in Iran would be in position to mark the critical targets with laser beams, to insure bombing accuracy and to minimize civilian casualties. As of early winter, I was told by the government consultant with close ties to civilians in the Pentagon, the units were also working with minority groups in Iran, including the Azeris, in the north, the Baluchis, in the southeast, and the Kurds, in the northeast. The troops "are studying the terrain, and giving away walking-around money to ethnic tribes, and recruiting scouts from local tribes and shepherds," the consultant said. One goal is to get "eyes on the ground"-quoting a line from "Othello," he said, "Give me the ocular proof." The broader aim, the consultant said, is to "encourage ethnic tensions" and undermine the regime.
The new mission for the combat troops is a product of Defense Secretary Rumsfeld's long-standing interest in expanding the role of the military in covert operations, which was made official policy in the Pentagon's Quadrennial Defense Review, published in February. Such activities, if conducted by C.I.A. operatives, would need a Presidential Finding and would have to be reported to key members of Congress.
" 'Force protection' is the new buzzword," the former senior intelligence official told me. He was referring to the Pentagon's position that clandestine activities that can be broadly classified as preparing the battlefield or protecting troops are military, not intelligence, operations, and are therefore not subject to congressional oversight. "The guys in the Joint Chiefs of Staff say there are a lot of uncertainties in Iran," he said. "We need to have more than what we had in Iraq. Now we have the green light to do everything we want." ,P>
The President's deep distrust of Ahmadinejad has strengthened his determination to confront Iran. This view has been reinforced by allegations that Ahmadinejad, who joined a special-forces brigade of the Revolutionary Guards in 1986, may have been involved in terrorist activities in the late eighties. (There are gaps in Ahmadinejad's official biography in this period.) Ahmadinejad has reportedly been connected to Imad Mughniyeh, a terrorist who has been implicated in the deadly bombings of the U.S. Embassy and the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut, in 1983. Mughniyeh was then the security chief of Hezbollah; he remains on the F.B.I.'s list of most-wanted terrorists.
Robert Baer, who was a C.I.A. officer in the Middle East and elsewhere for two decades, told me that Ahmadinejad and his Revolutionary Guard colleagues in the Iranian government "are capable of making a bomb, hiding it, and launching it at Israel. They're apocalyptic Shiites. If you're sitting in Tel Aviv and you believe they've got nukes and missiles-you've got to take them out. These guys are nuts, and there's no reason to back off."
Under Ahmadinejad, the Revolutionary Guards have expanded their power base throughout the Iranian bureaucracy; by the end of January, they had replaced thousands of civil servants with their own members. One former senior United Nations official, who has extensive experience with Iran, depicted the turnover as "a white coup," with ominous implications for the West. "Professionals in the Foreign Ministry are out; others are waiting to be kicked out," he said. "We may be too late. These guys now believe that they are stronger than ever since the revolution." He said that, particularly in consideration of China's emergence as a superpower, Iran's attitude was "To hell with the West. You can do as much as you like."
Iran's supreme religious leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, is considered by many experts to be in a stronger position than Ahmadinejad. "Ahmadinejad is not in control," one European diplomat told me. "Power is diffuse in Iran. The Revolutionary Guards are among the key backers of the nuclear program, but, ultimately, I don't think they are in charge of it. The Supreme Leader has the casting vote on the nuclear program, and the Guards will not take action without his approval."
The Pentagon adviser on the war on terror said that "allowing Iran to have the bomb is not on the table. We cannot have nukes being sent downstream to a terror network. It's just too dangerous." He added, "The whole internal debate is on which way to go"-in terms of stopping the Iranian program. It is possible, the adviser said, that Iran will unilaterally renounce its nuclear plans-and forestall the American action. "God may smile on us, but I don't think so. The bottom line is that Iran cannot become a nuclear-weapons state. The problem is that the Iranians realize that only by becoming a nuclear state can they defend themselves against the U.S. Something bad is going to happen."
While almost no one disputes Iran's nuclear ambitions, there is intense debate over how soon it could get the bomb, and what to do about that. Robert Gallucci, a former government expert on nonproliferation who is now the dean of the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown, told me, "Based on what I know, Iran could be eight to ten years away" from developing a deliverable nuclear weapon. Gallucci added, "If they had a covert nuclear program and we could prove it, and we could not stop it by negotiation, diplomacy, or the threat of sanctions, I'd be in favor of taking it out. But if you do it"-bomb Iran-"without being able to show there's a secret program, you're in trouble."
Meir Dagan, the head of Mossad, Israel's intelligence agency, told the Knesset last December that "Iran is one to two years away, at the latest, from having enriched uranium. From that point, the completion of their nuclear weapon is simply a technical matter." In a conversation with me, a senior Israeli intelligence official talked about what he said was Iran's duplicity: "There are two parallel nuclear programs" inside Iran-the program declared to the I.A.E.A. and a separate operation, run by the military and the Revolutionary Guards. Israeli officials have repeatedly made this argument, but Israel has not produced public evidence to support it. Richard Armitage, the Deputy Secretary of State in Bush's first term, told me, "I think Iran has a secret nuclear-weapons program-I believe it, but I don't know it."
In recent months, the Pakistani government has given the U.S. new access to A. Q. Khan, the so-called father of the Pakistani atomic bomb. Khan, who is now living under house arrest in Islamabad, is accused of setting up a black market in nuclear materials; he made at least one clandestine visit to Tehran in the late nineteen-eighties. In the most recent interrogations, Khan has provided information on Iran's weapons design and its time line for building a bomb. "The picture is of 'unquestionable danger,' " the former senior intelligence official said. (The Pentagon adviser also confirmed that Khan has been "singing like a canary.") The concern, the former senior official said, is that "Khan has credibility problems. He is suggestible, and he's telling the neoconservatives what they want to hear"-or what might be useful to Pakistan's President, Pervez Musharraf, who is under pressure to assist Washington in the war on terror.
"I think Khan's leading us on," the former intelligence official said. "I don't know anybody who says, 'Here's the smoking gun.' But lights are beginning to blink. He's feeding us information on the time line, and targeting information is coming in from our own sources- sensors and the covert teams. The C.I.A., which was so burned by Iraqi W.M.D., is going to the Pentagon and the Vice-President's office saying, 'It's all new stuff.' People in the Administration are saying, 'We've got enough.' "
The Administration's case against Iran is compromised by its history of promoting false intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. In a recent essay on the Foreign Policy Web site, entitled "Fool Me Twice," Joseph Cirincione, the director for nonproliferation at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, wrote, "The unfolding administration strategy appears to be an effort to repeat its successful campaign for the Iraq war." He noted several parallels:
The vice president of the United States gives a major speech focused on the threat from an oil-rich nation in the Middle East. The U.S. Secretary of State tells Congress that the same nation is our most serious global challenge. The Secretary of Defense calls that nation the leading supporter of global terrorism.
Cirincione called some of the Administration's claims about Iran "questionable" or lacking in evidence. When I spoke to him, he asked, "What do we know? What is the threat? The question is: How urgent is all this?" The answer, he said, "is in the intelligence community and the I.A.E.A." (In August, the Washington Post reported that the most recent comprehensive National Intelligence Estimate predicted that Iran was a decade away from being a nuclear power.)
Last year, the Bush Administration briefed I.A.E.A. officials on what it said was new and alarming information about Iran's weapons program which had been retrieved from an Iranian's laptop. The new data included more than a thousand pages of technical drawings of weapons systems. The Washington Post reported that there were also designs for a small facility that could be used in the uranium-enrichment process. Leaks about the laptop became the focal point of stories in the Times and elsewhere. The stories were generally careful to note that the materials could have been fabricated, but also quoted senior American officials as saying that they appeared to be legitimate. The headline in the Times' account read, "RELYING ON COMPUTER, U.S. SEEKS TO PROVE IRAN'S NUCLEAR AIMS."
I was told in interviews with American and European intelligence officials, however, that the laptop was more suspect and less revelatory than it had been depicted. The Iranian who owned the laptop had initially been recruited by German and American intelligence operatives, working together. The Americans eventually lost interest in him. The Germans kept on, but the Iranian was seized by the Iranian counter-intelligence force. It is not known where he is today. Some family members managed to leave Iran with his laptop and handed it over at a U.S. embassy, apparently in Europe. It was a classic "walk-in."
A European intelligence official said, "There was some hesitation on our side" about what the materials really proved, "and we are still not convinced." The drawings were not meticulous, as newspaper accounts suggested, "but had the character of sketches," the European official said. "It was not a slam-dunk smoking gun."
The threat of American military action has created dismay at the headquarters of the I.A.E.A., in Vienna. The agency's officials believe that Iran wants to be able to make a nuclear weapon, but "nobody has presented an inch of evidence of a parallel nuclear-weapons program in Iran," the high-ranking diplomat told me. The I.A.E.A.'s best estimate is that the Iranians are five years away from building a nuclear bomb. "But, if the United States does anything militarily, they will make the development of a bomb a matter of Iranian national pride," the diplomat said. "The whole issue is America's risk assessment of Iran's future intentions, and they don't trust the regime. Iran is a menace to American policy."
In Vienna, I was told of an exceedingly testy meeting earlier this year between Mohamed ElBaradei, the I.A.E.A.'s director-general, who won the Nobel Peace Prize last year, and Robert Joseph, the Under-Secretary of State for Arms Control. Joseph's message was blunt, one diplomat recalled: "We cannot have a single centrifuge spinning in Iran. Iran is a direct threat to the national security of the United States and our allies, and we will not tolerate it. We want you to give us an understanding that you will not say anything publicly that will undermine us. "
Joseph's heavy-handedness was unnecessary, the diplomat said, since the I.A.E.A. already had been inclined to take a hard stand against Iran. "All of the inspectors are angry at being misled by the Iranians, and some think the Iranian leadership are nutcases-one hundred per cent totally certified nuts," the diplomat said. He added that ElBaradei's overriding concern is that the Iranian leaders "want confrontation, just like the neocons on the other side"-in Washington. "At the end of the day, it will work only if the United States agrees to talk to the Iranians."
The central question-whether Iran will be able to proceed with its plans to enrich uranium-is now before the United Nations, with the Russians and the Chinese reluctant to impose sanctions on Tehran. A discouraged former I.A.E.A. official told me in late March that, at this point, "there's nothing the Iranians could do that would result in a positive outcome. American diplomacy does not allow for it. Even if they announce a stoppage of enrichment, nobody will believe them. It's a dead end."
Another diplomat in Vienna asked me, "Why would the West take the risk of going to war against that kind of target without giving it to the I.A.E.A. to verify? We're low-cost, and we can create a program that will force Iran to put its cards on the table." A Western Ambassador in Vienna expressed similar distress at the White House's dismissal of the I.A.E.A. He said, "If you don't believe that the I.A.E.A. can establish an inspection system-if you don't trust them-you can only bomb."
There is little sympathy for the I.A.E.A. in the Bush Administration or among its European allies. "We're quite frustrated with the director-general," the European diplomat told me. "His basic approach has been to describe this as a dispute between two sides with equal weight. It's not. We're the good guys! ElBaradei has been pushing the idea of letting Iran have a small nuclear-enrichment program, which is ludicrous. It's not his job to push ideas that pose a serious proliferation risk."
The Europeans are rattled, however, by their growing perception that President Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney believe a bombing campaign will be needed, and that their real goal is regime change. "Everyone is on the same page about the Iranian bomb, but the United States wants regime change," a European diplomatic adviser told me. He added, "The Europeans have a role to play as long as they don't have to choose between going along with the Russians and the Chinese or going along with Washington on something they don't want. Their policy is to keep the Americans engaged in something the Europeans can live with. It may be untenable."
"The Brits think this is a very bad idea," Flynt Leverett, a former National Security Council staff member who is now a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution's Saban Center, told me, "but they're really worried we're going to do it." The European diplomatic adviser acknowledged that the British Foreign Office was aware of war planning in Washington but that, "short of a smoking gun, it's going to be very difficult to line up the Europeans on Iran." He said that the British "are jumpy about the Americans going full bore on the Iranians, with no compromise."
The European diplomat said that he was skeptical that Iran, given its record, had admitted to everything it was doing, but "to the best of our knowledge the Iranian capability is not at the point where they could successfully run centrifuges" to enrich uranium in quantity. One reason for pursuing diplomacy was, he said, Iran's essential pragmatism. "The regime acts in its best interests," he said. Iran's leaders "take a hard-line approach on the nuclear issue and they want to call the American bluff," believing that "the tougher they are the more likely the West will fold." But, he said, "From what we've seen with Iran, they will appear superconfident until the moment they back off."
The diplomat went on, "You never reward bad behavior, and this is not the time to offer concessions. We need to find ways to impose sufficient costs to bring the regime to its senses. It's going to be a close call, but I think if there is unity in opposition and the price imposed"-in sanctions-"is sufficient, they may back down. It's too early to give up on the U.N. route." He added, "If the diplomatic process doesn't work, there is no military 'solution.' There may be a military option, but the impact could be catastrophic."
Tony Blair, the British Prime Minister, was George Bush's most dependable ally in the year leading up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. But he and his party have been racked by a series of financial scandals, and his popularity is at a low point. Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, said last year that military action against Iran was "inconceivable." Blair has been more circumspect, saying publicly that one should never take options off the table.
Other European officials expressed similar skepticism about the value of an American bombing campaign. "The Iranian economy is in bad shape, and Ahmadinejad is in bad shape politically," the European intelligence official told me. "He will benefit politically from American bombing. You can do it, but the results will be worse." An American attack, he said, would alienate ordinary Iranians, including those who might be sympathetic to the U.S. "Iran is no longer living in the Stone Age, and the young people there have access to U.S. movies and books, and they love it," he said. "If there was a charm offensive with Iran, the mullahs would be in trouble in the long run."
Another European official told me that he was aware that many in Washington wanted action. "It's always the same guys," he said, with a resigned shrug. "There is a belief that diplomacy is doomed to fail. The timetable is short."
A key ally with an important voice in the debate is Israel, whose leadership has warned for years that it viewed any attempt by Iran to begin enriching uranium as a point of no return. I was told by several officials that the White House's interest in preventing an Israeli attack on a Muslim country, which would provoke a backlash across the region, was a factor in its decision to begin the current operational planning. In a speech in Cleveland on March 20th, President Bush depicted Ahmadinejad's hostility toward Israel as a "serious threat. It's a threat to world peace." He added, "I made it clear, I'll make it clear again, that we will use military might to protect our ally Israel."
Any American bombing attack, Richard Armitage told me, would have to consider the following questions: "What will happen in the other Islamic countries? What ability does Iran have to reach us and touch us globally-that is, terrorism? Will Syria and Lebanon up the pressure on Israel? What does the attack do to our already diminished international standing? And what does this mean for Russia, China, and the U.N. Security Council?"
Iran, which now produces nearly four million barrels of oil a day, would not have to cut off production to disrupt the world's oil markets. It could blockade or mine the Strait of Hormuz, the thirty-four-mile-wide passage through which Middle Eastern oil reaches the Indian Ocean. Nonetheless, the recently retired defense official dismissed the strategic consequences of such actions. He told me that the U.S. Navy could keep shipping open by conducting salvage missions and putting mine- sweepers to work. "It's impossible to block passage," he said. The government consultant with ties to the Pentagon also said he believed that the oil problem could be managed, pointing out that the U.S. has enough in its strategic reserves to keep America running for sixty days. However, those in the oil business I spoke to were less optimistic; one industry expert estimated that the price per barrel would immediately spike, to anywhere from ninety to a hundred dollars per barrel, and could go higher, depending on the duration and scope of the conflict.
Michel Samaha, a veteran Lebanese Christian politician and former cabinet minister in Beirut, told me that the Iranian retaliation might be focussed on exposed oil and gas fields in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, and the United Arab Emirates. "They would be at risk," he said, "and this could begin the real jihad of Iran versus the West. You will have a messy world."
Iran could also initiate a wave of terror attacks in Iraq and elsewhere, with the help of Hezbollah. On April 2nd, the Washington Post reported that the planning to counter such attacks "is consuming a lot of time" at U.S. intelligence agencies. "The best terror network in the world has remained neutral in the terror war for the past several years," the Pentagon adviser on the war on terror said of Hezbollah. "This will mobilize them and put us up against the group that drove Israel out of southern Lebanon. If we move against Iran, Hezbollah will not sit on the sidelines. Unless the Israelis take them out, they will mobilize against us." (When I asked the government consultant about that possibility, he said that, if Hezbollah fired rockets into northern Israel, "Israel and the new Lebanese government will finish them off.")
The adviser went on, "If we go, the southern half of Iraq will light up like a candle." The American, British, and other coalition forces in Iraq would be at greater risk of attack from Iranian troops or from Shiite militias operating on instructions from Iran. (Iran, which is predominantly Shiite, has close ties to the leading Shiite parties in Iraq.) A retired four-star general told me that, despite the eight thousand British troops in the region, "the Iranians could take Basra with ten mullahs and one sound truck."
"If you attack," the high-ranking diplomat told me in Vienna, "Ahmadinejad will be the new Saddam Hussein of the Arab world, but with more credibility and more power. You must bite the bullet and sit down with the Iranians."
The diplomat went on, "There are people in Washington who would be unhappy if we found a solution. They are still banking on isolation and regime change. This is wishful thinking." He added, "The window of opportunity is now."
... Matt Davies ...  |
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I am reminded at this point of a fellow I used to know who's name was Henry, only to give you an idea of what an individualist he was he spelt it HEN3RY. The 3 was silent, you see. Henry was financially independent having inherited his father's tar-and-feather business and was therefore able to devote his full time to such intellectual pursuits as writing. I particularly remember a heart-warming novel of his about a young necropheliac who finally achieved his boy-hood ambition by becoming coroner.
The rest of you can look it up when you get home. In addition to writing he indulged in a good deal of philosophizing. Like so many contemporary philosophers he especially enjoyed giving helpful advice to people who were happier than he was. One particular bit of advice which I recall, which is the reason I bring up this whole, dreary story is something he said once before they took him away to the Massachussetts state home for the bewilderd. He said: "Life is like a sewer: what you get out of it depends on what you put into it." It's always seems to me that this is precisely the sort of dynamic, positive thinking that we so desperately need in these trying times of crisis and universal broo-ha-ha, and so with this in mind I have here a modern positive dynamic uplifting song in the tradition of the great old revival hymns. This one might more accurately be termed a survival hymn.
When you attend a funeral,
And we will all go together when we go.
We will all go together when we go.
Oh we will all fry together when we fry.
Down by the old maelstrom,
And we will all bake together when we bake.
Oh we will all char together when we char.
Oh we will all burn together when we burn.
You will all go directly to your respective Valhallas.
And we will all go together when we go.
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Parting Shots...
 Satanic Substitutes for Christ Easter Bunny Bludgeoned To Death Before Cheering Crowd Of Christian Children Freehold, Iowa - The Dillard Henderson family were in the middle of a lovely Stouffer's Sunday dinner last week when a sin posse of twenty church Deacons burst into their kitchen armed with shotguns and several dozen gallons of gasoline. There was a great commotion as the Deacons demanded to know where 12-year-old Stewart Henderson was hiding his bunny rabbit, "Mr.Cottonelle Tail." As new church members, not even officially recognized as "Truly Saved(tm)," the Henderson family had only settled their lovely Christian estate in Exodus Acres two weeks before they were visited by the church's Salvation Squad. The fact that the Henderson's made their initial down payment for church membership * did not absolve the probationary-Christian family from their responsibility to completely familiarize themselves with church regulations. So when little Stewart Henderson's Sunday school teacher overheard the boy talking to another child about having a bunny rabbit, she immediately took up the cross of Jesus Christ and alerted church authorities. The Deacons on call discussed the matter and raised the religious threat level from dark orange to honeysuckle. They then shattered the glass rifle cases in the church lobby, armed themselves to the teeth, and hopped into the Salvation Glory Bus. They arrived at the Henderson estate in under 10-minutes. NATIONAL NEWS! ASSOCIATED PRESS UPDATE: True Christians(tm) across America are imitating Landover Baptist by joining us in our centuries old battle against the Easter Bunny. Click a link below to read more!
CLICK HERE TO READ THIS REPORT ON MSNBC.COM. The Hendersons, once they realized that Deacon Tomkins was not holding a Granny Smith apple, but a plump hand grenade, were cooperative and directed the Deacons to a shed in the back yard where they found not just one, but two dozen little furry white bunny rabbits! Deacon Wilkins phoned Pastor Deacon Fred at that point and within one hour Pastor's smaller helicopter landed in the cul-de-sac at the end of Second King's Way. Over one hundred curious Christian neighbors had already gathered there enjoying convivial speculation about the Hendersons' unlikely salvation, as well as fried chicken and prayer. The crowd followed Pastor as he made his way, Bible and church regulation book in hand, to the Henderson family's backyard. By the time Pastor arrived, the rabbits had already had their lovely pelts ripped from their fornicating bodies with pairs of pliers and been dipped in gasoline. Some bunnies died in the earmuff-fur extraction process; some drowned in the Rubbermaid containers holding the Amoco unleaded; "but a few were still hopping about," said Pastor. "No doubt, obsessed with grabbing another piece of moist, furry rabbit crotch, as those licentious creatures are wont to do." Pastor noticed that there was a large white rabbit in the corner who appeared to be unaffected. "Bring me the big one, and set fire to this prayer shed!" yelled Pastor. When Pastor had the large rabbit in his hands, he held it by its extended ears and stared directly into its eyes. "I know you're in there Lucifer... you can't fool a man of God! Usually you hide in cute little stray pussies, but now you are hiding in this adorable little bunny," Pastor muttered. As the rabbit's left ear gave way, Pastor cleared his throat and spit a wad of bilious phlegm into the rabbit's face. It was of sufficient viscosity that it stuck like a piece of lint to Velcro. "You dirty old fuzzy demon!" Pastor yelled. He then held the rabbit by its hind legs and swung it against the wall of the now burning shed, thrashing its head repeatedly. After another eight minutes of crazed swirling and imprecatory invective, to ensure that the beast was dead, Pastor tore the right back leg off of the bunny with his teeth and handed it to little Stewart Henderson. "Since you mock Jesus by believing superstitions that aren't Christian, why don't you hang on to this? It's supposed to bring good luck to you people. Until you get to Hell, that is! You rebellious little sissy!" The neighbors present at the scene then burst into a joyful song of praise and hymns, contributing both buckshot and gasoline. Many were screaming in the delirium of the righteous, "We're clearing the Temple!" as they moved through the Henderson's property. The Henderson family and Deacons joined them in a celebration of songs, scripture reading and praise, right there in the Henderson's backyard until the last embers from the prayer shed and all of its ungodly contents had burnt out. It was also God's Will that the east wing and the prayer-solarium of the Hendersons' 13,450 square-foot middle-class home was taken in a blaze of righteous glory. While watching the Hendersons' Colonial home serve as kindling to the Lord's displeasure, Pastor took the entire family aside during the celebration to pray, read scriptures and ask just how long it takes for their out-of-state bank to clear a cotton-picking check. He also took the time to familiarize them with the following passages from the Landover Baptist Book of Rules and Regulations: Landover Baptist Book of Rules and Regulations | Chapter 83 | Holidays | Section 4: April | Subsection R - Easter | Page 723-724 | Paragraphs 4 and 5: The Easter Bunny: Banned Easter Symbol From the Year of Our Lord 1923 - Until Jesus Tells Us Different Paragraph 4 Of all the Pagan symbols created by Satan to steal the True Christian History(tm) of religious holidays, none, save Santa Claus is more dangerous than the Easter Bunny. Painted pagan eggs, Easter baskets, and yellow marshmallow chickens don't hold a candle to this furry four legged demonic spawn, forged in the fires of Hell by Lucifer himself, for the sole purpose of distracting innocent little snow white children from the true meaning behind Easter Sunday. As the former angel of light, the Devil is an expert in trickery! This has been evident from 1923 to present time in modern churches where so-called "Christians" display the Easter bunny or pictures of bunnies in their Easter Sunday service programs. Sadly, many pastors have been seduced by the Devil's seemingly innocent long eared, hopping hellion. But do not be mistaken! Underneath that silky soft white coat of hair lay the tight red skin and pulsing veins of a miniature demon. And there are millions of them! Have you ever heard the term, "breed like rabbits?" Well, the Devil is laughing right at YOU! If you don't understand that Satan's job is breeding minions and the bunny rabbit is the ultimate symbol of minion breeding, then please close this book now and find another place of worship, for you are not welcome here. Paragraph 5 Since 1923, Church authorities have not permitted the presence of rabbits on the Landover Baptist Church campus. Any family found possessing or breeding rabbits will have the rabbits terminated and suffer public humiliation. In addition, they will receive immediate counseling from a Deacon or Pastor (fine accrual not to exceed $2,800). [AMENDMENT - 1957 - Church members found to be watching television programs where rabbits are depicted, including the popular pornographic cartoon, Bugs Bunny, where the rabbit is made to appear human in nature (i.e.: walking on two hind legs) and unclothed are subject to severe discipline at the Pastor's whim, and fines not to exceed $4,300]. [AMENDMENT: 1962 - Pastor has reviewed the popular film, Harvey, starring Christian actor, James Stewart, and deemed the material inappropriate for Landover Baptist Church members (as are any picture house films). See Chapter 42 | Motion Pictures | Section 43 | Pages 305-450 for extensive details on discipline and monetary fines]. [AMENDMENT: 1974 - No church member is permitted to consume or digest the product, "Trix." With the slogan, "Silly Rabbit, Trix are for kids! Satan has revealed himself to the blind world of unsaved morons, but still they refuse to believe! (See Chapter 42 | Motion Pictures | Section 43 | Pages 305-450 for extensive details on discipline and monetary fines)]. [AMENDMENT - 1984 - Pastor has viewed the film, Roger Rabbit and has instructed that no further edicts be made to this section - any and all forms of rabbits in any form of media or reality are unacceptable until Armageddon (See Chapter 42 | Motion Pictures | Section 43 | Pages 305-450 for extensive details on discipline and monetary fines)].
* The Henderson's initial check for church membership drew suspicion because it was made with a too-colorful, coy secular check that failed to depict Jesus being tortured on a cross. It was drawn from a bank Landover does not normally do business with in accordance with a confidential out-of-court settlement of a credit card fraud matter that Landover Baptist was 100% innocent of -- in spite of the deranged ramblings of demon-stacked grand juries in several states. |
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In This Edition
John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt explain, "The Israel Lobby."
Uri Avnery says, "The Trees Went Forth..."
Greg Palast sees the beginning of the end in, "Desert Rats Leave The Sinking Ship."
Jim Hightower smells a rat in, "Tom's Gone But The Stench Remains."
Mark Morford foretells our doom, "Iran, You Ran, Let's Bomb Iran."
Chris Floyd considers, "Dead Cities: The Fallujah Option In Iraq?"
Ted Rall watches as, "A Maniacal Messianic Prepares To Fulfill His Destiny."
Robert Parry compares fantasy and reality in, "'Jack Bauer' Bush & Rummy."
Joe Conason concludes, "Post Scandal Reflects The Murdoch Method."
Norman Solomon asks, "How Long Will MoveOn.Org Fail To Oppose Bombing Iran?"
William Rivers Pitt is, "Setting The Record Straight."
Sean Hannity wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award.'
Molly Ivins gives us, "The Latest On Mobile Weapons Labs."
Stephen Gyllenhaal reviews, "Bush's Nuclear Option."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department Joseph Cannon explores, "George W. Bush, Barbara Bush, And Aleister Crowley" but first Uncle Ernie goes over, "Our Continuing Holy Crusade."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Bill Day with additional cartoons from Walt Kelly, Micah Wright, Bruce Yurgil, Jack Ohman, Rico Dog, Mechapixel.Com, The Whitehouse.Org and Internet Weekly.Org.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Our Continuing Holy Crusade By Ernest Stewart
I see where citizen Richard B. Myers crawled out from under the rock where he's been hiding since last October to come to the aid of his master Von Rumsfeld's disastrous handling of the quagmire that is Iraq. Richard you may remember was the Joint Chiefs of Staff leader that helped Rummy and Bush plan and talk us into going after Saddam instead of Osama. The last time Richard spoke up was just before he took the money and ran last September when he said of his planned disaster,
"Defeating the Iraqi insurgency is as important to the United States as winning World War II was 60 years ago."
As you can see Richard's a couple bricks short of a load! However this time around Richard said,
"We gave him our best advice, and that's what we're obligated to do. If we don't do that we should be shot!"
And if that's the advice you gave him I couldn't agree more with you Richard, you should be shot!
Ever since Papa Smirk failed to win the first oil war back in 1991 the neo-fascists have been licking their lips over all the lovely oil they failed to get their slimy paws on. And after the debacle of Clinton throwing Papa out of office they spent the next eight years planning and plotting to rule the world just as soon as they could steal the White House. They managed to put their plans into what they called PNAC or Project for the New American Century . The group of traitors and "deep thinkers" that came up with this new "Mein Kampf" included, Elliott Abrams, Gary Bauer, William J. Bennett, Jeb Bush, Dick Cheney, Eliot A. Cohen, Midge Decter, Paula Dobriansky, Steve Forbes, Aaron Friedberg, Francis Fukuyama, Frank Gaffney, Fred C. Ikle, Donald Kagan, Zalmay Khalilzad, I. Lewis Libby, Norman Podhoretz, Dan Quayle, Peter W. Rodman, Stephen P. Rosen, Henry S. Rowen, Donald Rumsfeld, Vin Weber, George Weigel and Paul Wolfowitz, a virtual "Who's Who" of the far right, reactionary's all.
Their goal all along was for America to literally rule the world. America Uber Alles! Does that ring any bells? Unfortunately they chose Papa's idiot son Fredo to be their puppet who almost gave it away when he said the crusade quote above. Born again George was easily manipulated by the Israeli lobby and his fundy Christian supporters into PNAC's plans and pretty soon George was hearing god tell him to start this holy crusade, strange what alcohol and cocaine can do to your brain, eh?
I'm sure he thought he was doing a good thing when he allowed those airliners to crash. There is no doubt about that last statement. Issues & Alibis found 7 countries that warned us what was coming. When Bush's ass was on the line at the G8 summit in Italy that spring he took a missile battery with him as the Italians had stopped a similar plan to crash an airliner into the summit building. You'll remember that in June of 2001 Bush stopped the decades old practice first begun by JFK of allowing airline pilots to carry guns into the cockpit and that also in June they announced that Junta members would no longer fly commercial airlines but would hence forth only fly in military jets. It was only after the war began that Robin Cook; the former Blair cabinet minister who resigned as the Labour Party's parliamentary chief in protest over the invasion of Iraq, said that he knew that we had been warned by 11 countries including Saudi Arabia and Israel of the coming attacks, which explains why there was no Israelis in the WTC and the sudden trading of airline stocks on Wall Street a few days before. Also funny thing how Robin died of a "heart attack" while out by himself walking, eh? As PNAC stated we'd need a Pearl Harbor to happen before they could pull it off and who better to arrange this than the decades old family friends of the Crime Family Bush, the Bin Ladens. Through the CIA financed and controlled terrorist group Al-Qaida which number one son Osama ran for Langley. Treason and sedition is an old, old Crime Family Bush tradition, as is using the CIA for their nefarious goals, ask JFK how that works!
So regardless of what the American people want, or what Con-gress wants; for that matter, we will be going into Iran shortly regardless whether they enrich uranium or not. Whatever Iran does really has nothing to do with it, what's important is the control of the oil, striking fear into the world and shoring up our political pals in Jerusalem. It's not really a matter of Christianity vrs Islam; although that certainly figures into it, what's important is world domination. Unless we put a stop to this we are on a never ending quest to rule the world and when the world realizes it, it will mean our doom!
In Other News... Another rat leaving the sinking ship USS Bush is Scotty McClellan of whom Michael Wolff said in the latest issue of Vanity Fair. "He's a knucklehead Socrates, low-wattage, a pawn, not the brightest bulb, a helpless and irresistible target, strikingly out of his depth, and then derides him for "verbal haplessness, ham-handedness and lack of verbal acumen," and compares him to Squealer from "Animal Farm" and Piggy from the "Lord of the Flies." I can only add "lying traitor" to Mike's assessment! A must see in this week's magazine is the Union of Concerned Scientists, "Nuclear Bunker Buster" in our Have You Seen This... department. It's what I've been on about for the last year, the start of WW III! A must hear is this weeks song from our To End On A Happy Note... department "I Am The Decider" by one of my favorite actors and singers Paul Hipp. Just click on the title and it will take you to where you can hear it, considering Bush just made that statement Tuesday that's amazing! And finally my dear friend Maggie wrote in to say... "Hey Ernie, I think it's time to demand a good 'impeaching' for King George and his sidekick, ole Dead Eye Dick, so I have started this petition at the Care2 site. It's brand new and I am aiming for the stars... One million signatures! LOL.... hey you never know if you never try! Any help you can give to get the impeachment under way would be greatly appreciated. Maggie" http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/806547876 Y'all take 5 minutes out of your busy day and put your John Hancock where it will do some good! ********************************************
We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
  The Israel Lobby By John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt For the past several decades, and especially since the Six-Day War in 1967, the centrepiece of US Middle Eastern policy has been its relationship with Israel. The combination of unwavering support for Israel and the related effort to spread 'democracy' throughout the region has inflamed Arab and Islamic opinion and jeopardised not only US security but that of much of the rest of the world. This situation has no equal in American political history. Why has the US been willing to set aside its own security and that of many of its allies in order to advance the interests of another state? One might assume that the bond between the two countries was based on shared strategic interests or compelling moral imperatives, but neither explanation can account for the remarkable level of material and diplomatic support that the US provides. Instead, the thrust of US policy in the region derives almost entirely from domestic politics, and especially the activities of the 'Israel Lobby'. Other special-interest groups have managed to skew foreign policy, but no lobby has managed to divert it as far from what the national interest would suggest, while simultaneously convincing Americans that US interests and those of the other country - in this case, Israel - are essentially identical. Since the October War in 1973, Washington has provided Israel with a level of support dwarfing that given to any other state. It has been the largest annual recipient of direct economic and military assistance since 1976, and is the largest recipient in total since World War Two, to the tune of well over $140 billion (in 2004 dollars). Israel receives about $3 billion in direct assistance each year, roughly one-fifth of the foreign aid budget, and worth about $500 a year for every Israeli. This largesse is especially striking since Israel is now a wealthy industrial state with a per capita income roughly equal to that of South Korea or Spain. Other recipients get their money in quarterly installments, but Israel receives its entire appropriation at the beginning of each fiscal year and can thus earn interest on it. Most recipients of aid given for military purposes are required to spend all of it in the US, but Israel is allowed to use roughly 25 per cent of its allocation to subsidise its own defence industry. It is the only recipient that does not have to account for how the aid is spent, which makes it virtually impossible to prevent the money from being used for purposes the US opposes, such as building settlements on the West Bank. Moreover, the US has provided Israel with nearly $3 billion to develop weapons systems, and given it access to such top-drawer weaponry as Blackhawk helicopters and F-16 jets. Finally, the US gives Israel access to intelligence it denies to its Nato allies and has turned a blind eye to Israel's acquisition of nuclear weapons. Washington also provides Israel with consistent diplomatic support. Since 1982, the US has vetoed 32 Security Council resolutions critical of Israel, more than the total number of vetoes cast by all the other Security Council members. It blocks the efforts of Arab states to put Israel's nuclear arsenal on the IAEA's agenda. The US comes to the rescue in wartime and takes Israel's side when negotiating peace. The Nixon administration protected it from the threat of Soviet intervention and resupplied it during the October War. Washington was deeply involved in the negotiations that ended that war, as well as in the lengthy 'step-by-step' process that followed, just as it played a key role in the negotiations that preceded and followed the 1993 Oslo Accords. In each case there was occasional friction between US and Israeli officials, but the US consistently supported the Israeli position. One American participant at Camp David in 2000 later said: 'Far too often, we functioned . . . as Israel's lawyer.' Finally, the Bush administration's ambition to transform the Middle East is at least partly aimed at improving Israel's strategic situation. This extraordinary generosity might be understandable if Israel were a vital strategic asset or if there were a compelling moral case for US backing. But neither explanation is convincing. One might argue that Israel was an asset during the Cold War. By serving as America's proxy after 1967, it helped contain Soviet expansion in the region and inflicted humiliating defeats on Soviet clients like Egypt and Syria. It occasionally helped protect other US allies (like King Hussein of Jordan) and its military prowess forced Moscow to spend more on backing its own client states. It also provided useful intelligence about Soviet capabilities. Backing Israel was not cheap, however, and it complicated America's relations with the Arab world. For example, the decision to give $2.2 billion in emergency military aid during the October War triggered an Opec oil embargo that inflicted considerable damage on Western economies. For all that, Israel's armed forces were not in a position to protect US interests in the region. The US could not, for example, rely on Israel when the Iranian Revolution in 1979 raised concerns about the security of oil supplies, and had to create its own Rapid Deployment Force instead. The first Gulf War revealed the extent to which Israel was becoming a strategic burden. The US could not use Israeli bases without rupturing the anti-Iraq coalition, and had to divert resources (e.g. Patriot missile batteries) to prevent Tel Aviv doing anything that might harm the alliance against Saddam Hussein. History repeated itself in 2003: although Israel was eager for the US to attack Iraq, Bush could not ask it to help without triggering Arab opposition. So Israel stayed on the sidelines once again. Beginning in the 1990s, and even more after 9/11, US support has been justified by the claim that both states are threatened by terrorist groups originating in the Arab and Muslim world, and by 'rogue states' that back these groups and seek weapons of mass destruction. This is taken to mean not only that Washington should give Israel a free hand in dealing with the Palestinians and not press it to make concessions until all Palestinian terrorists are imprisoned or dead, but that the US should go after countries like Iran and Syria. Israel is thus seen as a crucial ally in the war on terror, because its enemies are America's enemies. In fact, Israel is a liability in the war on terror and the broader effort to deal with rogue states. 'Terrorism' is not a single adversary, but a tactic employed by a wide array of political groups. The terrorist organisations that threaten Israel do not threaten the United States, except when it intervenes against them (as in Lebanon in 1982). Moreover, Palestinian terrorism is not random violence directed against Israel or 'the West'; it is largely a response to Israel's prolonged campaign to colonise the West Bank and Gaza Strip. More important, saying that Israel and the US are united by a shared terrorist threat has the causal relationship backwards: the US has a terrorism problem in good part because it is so closely allied with Israel, not the other way around. Support for Israel is not the only source of anti-American terrorism, but it is an important one, and it makes winning the war on terror more difficult. There is no question that many al-Qaida leaders, including Osama bin Laden, are motivated by Israel's presence in Jerusalem and the plight of the Palestinians. Unconditional support for Israel makes it easier for extremists to rally popular support and to attract recruits. As for so-called rogue states in the Middle East, they are not a dire threat to vital US interests, except inasmuch as they are a threat to Israel. Even if these states acquire nuclear weapons - which is obviously undesirable - neither America nor Israel could be blackmailed, because the blackmailer could not carry out the threat without suffering overwhelming retaliation. The danger of a nuclear handover to terrorists is equally remote, because a rogue state could not be sure the transfer would go undetected or that it would not be blamed and punished afterwards. The relationship with Israel actually makes it harder for the US to deal with these states. Israel's nuclear arsenal is one reason some of its neighbours want nuclear weapons, and threatening them with regime change merely increases that desire. A final reason to question Israel's strategic value is that it does not behave like a loyal ally. Israeli officials frequently ignore US requests and renege on promises (including pledges to stop building settlements and to refrain from 'targeted assassinations' of Palestinian leaders). Israel has provided sensitive military technology to potential rivals like China, in what the State Department inspector-general called 'a systematic and growing pattern of unauthorised transfers'. According to the General Accounting Office, Israel also 'conducts the most aggressive espionage operations against the US of any ally'. In addition to the case of Jonathan Pollard, who gave Israel large quantities of classified material in the early 1980s (which it reportedly passed on to the Soviet Union in return for more exit visas for Soviet Jews), a new controversy erupted in 2004 when it was revealed that a key Pentagon official called Larry Franklin had passed classified information to an Israeli diplomat. Israel is hardly the only country that spies on the US, but its willingness to spy on its principal patron casts further doubt on its strategic value. Israel's strategic value isn't the only issue. Its backers also argue that it deserves unqualified support because it is weak and surrounded by enemies; it is a democracy; the Jewish people have suffered from past crimes and therefore deserve special treatment; and Israel's conduct has been morally superior to that of its adversaries. On close inspection, none of these arguments is persuasive. There is a strong moral case for supporting Israel's existence, but that is not in jeopardy. Viewed objectively, its past and present conduct offers no moral basis for privileging it over the Palestinians. Israel is often portrayed as David confronted by Goliath, but the converse is closer to the truth. Contrary to popular belief, the Zionists had larger, better equipped and better led forces during the 1947-49 War of Independence, and the Israel Defence Forces won quick and easy victories against Egypt in 1956 and against Egypt, Jordan and Syria in 1967 - all of this before large-scale US aid began flowing. Today, Israel is the strongest military power in the Middle East. Its conventional forces are far superior to those of its neighbours and it is the only state in the region with nuclear weapons. Egypt and Jordan have signed peace treaties with it, and Saudi Arabia has offered to do so. Syria has lost its Soviet patron, Iraq has been devastated by three disastrous wars and Iran is hundreds of miles away. The Palestinians barely have an effective police force, let alone an army that could pose a threat to Israel. According to a 2005 assessment by Tel Aviv University's Jaffee Centre for Strategic Studies, 'the strategic balance decidedly favours Israel, which has continued to widen the qualitative gap between its own military capability and deterrence powers and those of its neighbours.' If backing the underdog were a compelling motive, the United States would be supporting Israel's opponents. That Israel is a fellow democracy surrounded by hostile dictatorships cannot account for the current level of aid: there are many democracies around the world, but none receives the same lavish support. The US has overthrown democratic governments in the past and supported dictators when this was thought to advance its interests - it has good relations with a number of dictatorships today. Some aspects of Israeli democracy are at odds with core American values. Unlike the US, where people are supposed to enjoy equal rights irrespective of race, religion or ethnicity, Israel was explicitly founded as a Jewish state and citizenship is based on the principle of blood kinship. Given this, it is not surprising that its 1.3 million Arabs are treated as second-class citizens, or that a recent Israeli government commission found that Israel behaves in a 'neglectful and discriminatory' manner towards them. Its democratic status is also undermined by its refusal to grant the Palestinians a viable state of their own or full political rights. A third justification is the history of Jewish suffering in the Christian West, especially during the Holocaust. Because Jews were persecuted for centuries and could feel safe only in a Jewish homeland, many people now believe that Israel deserves special treatment from the United States. The country's creation was undoubtedly an appropriate response to the long record of crimes against Jews, but it also brought about fresh crimes against a largely innocent third party: the Palestinians. This was well understood by Israel's early leaders. David Ben-Gurion told Nahum Goldmann, the president of the World Jewish Congress: If I were an Arab leader I would never make terms with Israel. That is natural: we have taken their country . . . We come from Israel, but two thousand years ago, and what is that to them? There has been anti-semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They only see one thing: we have come here and stolen their country. Why should they accept that? Since then, Israeli leaders have repeatedly sought to deny the Palestinians' national ambitions. When she was prime minister, Golda Meir famously remarked that 'there is no such thing as a Palestinian.' Pressure from extremist violence and Palestinian population growth has forced subsequent Israeli leaders to disengage from the Gaza Strip and consider other territorial compromises, but not even Yitzhak Rabin was willing to offer the Palestinians a viable state. Ehud Barak's purportedly generous offer at Camp David would have given them only a disarmed set of Bantustans under de facto Israeli control. The tragic history of the Jewish people does not obligate the US to help Israel today no matter what it does. Israel's backers also portray it as a country that has sought peace at every turn and shown great restraint even when provoked. The Arabs, by contrast, are said to have acted with great wickedness. Yet on the ground, Israel's record is not distinguishable from that of its opponents. Ben-Gurion acknowledged that the early Zionists were far from benevolent towards the Palestinian Arabs, who resisted their encroachments - which is hardly surprising, given that the Zionists were trying to create their own state on Arab land. In the same way, the creation of Israel in 1947-48 involved acts of ethnic cleansing, including executions, massacres and rapes by Jews, and Israel's subsequent conduct has often been brutal, belying any claim to moral superiority. Between 1949 and 1956, for example, Israeli security forces killed between 2700 and 5000 Arab infiltrators, the overwhelming majority of them unarmed. The IDF murdered hundreds of Egyptian prisoners of war in both the 1956 and 1967 wars, while in 1967, it expelled between 100,000 and 260,000 Palestinians from the newly conquered West Bank, and drove 80,000 Syrians from the Golan Heights. During the first intifada, the IDF distributed truncheons to its troops and encouraged them to break the bones of Palestinian protesters. The Swedish branch of Save the Children estimated that '23,600 to 29,900 children required medical treatment for their beating injuries in the first two years of the intifada.' Nearly a third of them were aged ten or under. The response to the second intifada has been even more violent, leading Ha'aretz to declare that 'the IDF . . . is turning into a killing machine whose efficiency is awe-inspiring, yet shocking.' The IDF fired one million bullets in the first days of the uprising. Since then, for every Israeli lost, Israel has killed 3.4 Palestinians, the majority of whom have been innocent bystanders; the ratio of Palestinian to Israeli children killed is even higher (5.7:1). It is also worth bearing in mind that the Zionists relied on terrorist bombs to drive the British from Palestine, and that Yitzhak Shamir, once a terrorist and later prime minister, declared that 'neither Jewish ethics nor Jewish tradition can disqualify terrorism as a means of combat.' The Palestinian resort to terrorism is wrong but it isn't surprising. The Palestinians believe they have no other way to force Israeli concessions. As Ehud Barak once admitted, had he been born a Palestinian, he 'would have joined a terrorist organisation'. So if neither strategic nor moral arguments can account for America's support for Israel, how are we to explain it? The explanation is the unmatched power of the Israel Lobby. We use 'the Lobby' as shorthand for the loose coalition of individuals and organisations who actively work to steer US foreign policy in a pro-Israel direction. This is not meant to suggest that 'the Lobby' is a unified movement with a central leadership, or that individuals within it do not disagree on certain issues. Not all Jewish Americans are part of the Lobby, because Israel is not a salient issue for many of them. In a 2004 survey, for example, roughly 36 per cent of American Jews said they were either 'not very' or 'not at all' emotionally attached to Israel. Jewish Americans also differ on specific Israeli policies. Many of the key organisations in the Lobby, such as the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organisations, are run by hardliners who generally support the Likud Party's expansionist policies, including its hostility to the Oslo peace process. The bulk of US Jewry, meanwhile, is more inclined to make concessions to the Palestinians, and a few groups - such as Jewish Voice for Peace - strongly advocate such steps. Despite these differences, moderates and hardliners both favour giving steadfast support to Israel. Not surprisingly, American Jewish leaders often consult Israeli officials, to make sure that their actions advance Israeli goals. As one activist from a major Jewish organisation wrote, 'it is routine for us to say: "This is our policy on a certain issue, but we must check what the Israelis think." We as a community do it all the time.' There is a strong prejudice against criticising Israeli policy, and putting pressure on Israel is considered out of order. Edgar Bronfman Sr, the president of the World Jewish Congress, was accused of 'perfidy' when he wrote a letter to President Bush in mid-2003 urging him to persuade Israel to curb construction of its controversial 'security fence'. His critics said that 'it would be obscene at any time for the president of the World Jewish Congress to lobby the president of the United States to resist policies being promoted by the government of Israel.' Similarly, when the president of the Israel Policy Forum, Seymour Reich, advised Condoleezza Rice in November 2005 to ask Israel to reopen a critical border crossing in the Gaza Strip, his action was denounced as 'irresponsible': 'There is,' his critics said, 'absolutely no room in the Jewish mainstream for actively canvassing against the security-related policies . . . of Israel.' Recoiling from these attacks, Reich announced that 'the word "pressure" is not in my vocabulary when it comes to Israel.' Jewish Americans have set up an impressive array of organisations to influence American foreign policy, of which AIPAC is the most powerful and best known. In 1997, Fortune magazine asked members of Congress and their staffs to list the most powerful lobbies in Washington. AIPAC was ranked second behind the American Association of Retired People, but ahead of the AFL-CIO and the National Rifle Association. A National Journal study in March 2005 reached a similar conclusion, placing AIPAC in second place (tied with AARP) in the Washington 'muscle rankings'. The Lobby also includes prominent Christian evangelicals like Gary Bauer, Jerry Falwell, Ralph Reed and Pat Robertson, as well as Dick Armey and Tom DeLay, former majority leaders in the House of Representatives, all of whom believe Israel's rebirth is the fulfilment of biblical prophecy and support its expansionist agenda; to do otherwise, they believe, would be contrary to God's will. Neo-conservative gentiles such as John Bolton; Robert Bartley, the former Wall Street Journal editor; William Bennett, the former secretary of education; Jeane Kirkpatrick, the former UN ambassador; and the influential columnist George Will are also steadfast supporters. The US form of government offers activists many ways of influencing the policy process. Interest groups can lobby elected representatives and members of the executive branch, make campaign contributions, vote in elections, try to mould public opinion etc. They enjoy a disproportionate amount of influence when they are committed to an issue to which the bulk of the population is indifferent. Policymakers will tend to accommodate those who care about the issue, even if their numbers are small, confident that the rest of the population will not penalise them for doing so. In its basic operations, the Israel Lobby is no different from the farm lobby, steel or textile workers' unions, or other ethnic lobbies. There is nothing improper about American Jews and their Christian allies attempting to sway US policy: the Lobby's activities are not a conspiracy of the sort depicted in tracts like the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. For the most part, the individuals and groups that comprise it are only doing what other special interest groups do, but doing it very much better. By contrast, pro-Arab interest groups, in so far as they exist at all, are weak, which makes the Israel Lobby's task even easier. The Lobby pursues two broad strategies. First, it wields its significant influence in Washington, pressuring both Congress and the executive branch. Whatever an individual lawmaker or policymaker's own views may be, the Lobby tries to make supporting Israel the 'smart' choice. Second, it strives to ensure that public discourse portrays Israel in a positive light, by repeating myths about its founding and by promoting its point of view in policy debates. The goal is to prevent critical comments from getting a fair hearing in the political arena. Controlling the debate is essential to guaranteeing US support, because a candid discussion of US-Israeli relations might lead Americans to favour a different policy. A key pillar of the Lobby's effectiveness is its influence in Congress, where Israel is virtually immune from criticism. This in itself is remarkable, because Congress rarely shies away from contentious issues. Where Israel is concerned, however, potential critics fall silent. One reason is that some key members are Christian Zionists like Dick Armey, who said in September 2002: 'My No. 1 priority in foreign policy is to protect Israel.' One might think that the No. 1 priority for any congressman would be to protect America. There are also Jewish senators and congressmen who work to ensure that US foreign policy supports Israel's interests. Another source of the Lobby's power is its use of pro-Israel congressional staffers. As Morris Amitay, a former head of AIPAC, once admitted, 'there are a lot of guys at the working level up here' - on Capitol Hill - 'who happen to be Jewish, who are willing . . . to look at certain issues in terms of their Jewishness . . . These are all guys who are in a position to make the decision in these areas for those senators . . . You can get an awful lot done just at the staff level.' AIPAC itself, however, forms the core of the Lobby's influence in Congress. Its success is due to its ability to reward legislators and congressional candidates who support its agenda, and to punish those who challenge it. Money is critical to US elections (as the scandal over the lobbyist Jack Abramoff's shady dealings reminds us), and AIPAC makes sure that its friends get strong financial support from the many pro-Israel political action committees. Anyone who is seen as hostile to Israel can be sure that AIPAC will direct campaign contributions to his or her political opponents. AIPAC also organises letter-writing campaigns and encourages newspaper editors to endorse pro-Israel candidates. There is no doubt about the efficacy of these tactics. Here is one example: in the 1984 elections, AIPAC helped defeat Senator Charles Percy from Illinois, who, according to a prominent Lobby figure, had 'displayed insensitivity and even hostility to our concerns'. Thomas Dine, the head of AIPAC at the time, explained what happened: 'All the Jews in America, from coast to coast, gathered to oust Percy. And the American politicians - those who hold public positions now, and those who aspire - got the message.' AIPAC's influence on Capitol Hill goes even further. According to Douglas Bloomfield, a former AIPAC staff member, 'it is common for members of Congress and their staffs to turn to AIPAC first when they need information, before calling the Library of Congress, the Congressional Research Service, committee staff or administration experts.' More important, he notes that AIPAC is 'often called on to draft speeches, work on legislation, advise on tactics, perform research, collect co-sponsors and marshal votes'. The bottom line is that AIPAC, a de facto agent for a foreign government, has a stranglehold on Congress, with the result that US policy towards Israel is not debated there, even though that policy has important consequences for the entire world. In other words, one of the three main branches of the government is firmly committed to supporting Israel. As one former Democratic senator, Ernest Hollings, noted on leaving office, 'you can't have an Israeli policy other than what AIPAC gives you around here.' Or as Ariel Sharon once told an American audience, 'when people ask me how they can help Israel, I tell them: "Help AIPAC."' Thanks in part to the influence Jewish voters have on presidential elections, the Lobby also has significant leverage over the executive branch. Although they make up fewer than 3 per cent of the population, they make large campaign donations to candidates from both parties. The Washington Post once estimated that Democratic presidential candidates 'depend on Jewish supporters to supply as much as 60 per cent of the money'. And because Jewish voters have high turn-out rates and are concentrated in key states like California, Florida, Illinois, New York and Pennsylvania, presidential candidates go to great lengths not to antagonise them. Key organisations in the Lobby make it their business to ensure that critics of Israel do not get important foreign policy jobs. Jimmy Carter wanted to make George Ball his first secretary of state, but knew that Ball was seen as critical of Israel and that the Lobby would oppose the appointment. In this way any aspiring policymaker is encouraged to become an overt supporter of Israel, which is why public critics of Israeli policy have become an endangered species in the foreign policy establishment. When Howard Dean called for the United States to take a more 'even-handed role' in the Arab-Israeli conflict, Senator Joseph Lieberman accused him of selling Israel down the river and said his statement was 'irresponsible'. Virtually all the top Democrats in the House signed a letter criticising Dean's remarks, and the Chicago Jewish Star reported that 'anonymous attackers . . . are clogging the email inboxes of Jewish leaders around the country, warning - without much evidence - that Dean would somehow be bad for Israel.' This worry was absurd; Dean is in fact quite hawkish on Israel: his campaign co-chair was a former AIPAC president, and Dean said his own views on the Middle East more closely reflected those of AIPAC than those of the more moderate Americans for Peace Now. He had merely suggested that to 'bring the sides together', Washington should act as an honest broker. This is hardly a radical idea, but the Lobby doesn't tolerate even-handedness. During the Clinton administration, Middle Eastern policy was largely shaped by officials with close ties to Israel or to prominent pro-Israel organisations; among them, Martin Indyk, the former deputy director of research at AIPAC and co-founder of the pro-Israel Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP); Dennis Ross, who joined WINEP after leaving government in 2001; and Aaron Miller, who has lived in Israel and often visits the country. These men were among Clinton's closest advisers at the Camp David summit in July 2000. Although all three supported the Oslo peace process and favoured the creation of a Palestinian state, they did so only within the limits of what would be acceptable to Israel. The American delegation took its cues from Ehud Barak, co-ordinated its negotiating positions with Israel in advance, and did not offer independent proposals. Not surprisingly, Palestinian negotiators complained that they were 'negotiating with two Israeli teams - one displaying an Israeli flag, and one an American flag'. The situation is even more pronounced in the Bush administration, whose ranks have included such fervent advocates of the Israeli cause as Elliot Abrams, John Bolton, Douglas Feith, I. Lewis ('Scooter') Libby, Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz and David Wurmser. As we shall see, these officials have consistently pushed for policies favoured by Israel and backed by organisations in the Lobby. The Lobby doesn't want an open debate, of course, because that might lead Americans to question the level of support they provide. Accordingly, pro-Israel organisations work hard to influence the institutions that do most to shape popular opinion. The Lobby's perspective prevails in the mainstream media: the debate among Middle East pundits, the journalist Eric Alterman writes, is 'dominated by people who cannot imagine criticising Israel'. He lists 61 'columnists and commentators who can be counted on to support Israel reflexively and without qualification'. Conversely, he found just five pundits who consistently criticise Israeli actions or endorse Arab positions. Newspapers occasionally publish guest op-eds challenging Israeli policy, but the balance of opinion clearly favours the other side. It is hard to imagine any mainstream media outlet in the United States publishing a piece like this one. 'Shamir, Sharon, Bibi - whatever those guys want is pretty much fine by me,' Robert Bartley once remarked. Not surprisingly, his newspaper, the Wall Street Journal, along with other prominent papers like the Chicago Sun-Times and the Washington Times, regularly runs editorials that strongly support Israel. Magazines like Commentary, the New Republic and the Weekly Standard defend Israel at every turn. Editorial bias is also found in papers like the New York Times, which occasionally criticises Israeli policies and sometimes concedes that the Palestinians have legitimate grievances, but is not even-handed. In his memoirs the paper's former executive editor Max Frankel acknowledges the impact his own attitude had on his editorial decisions: 'I was much more deeply devoted to Israel than I dared to assert . . . Fortified by my knowledge of Israel and my friendships there, I myself wrote most of our Middle East commentaries. As more Arab than Jewish readers recognised, I wrote them from a pro-Israel perspective.' News reports are more even-handed, in part because reporters strive to be objective, but also because it is difficult to cover events in the Occupied Territories without acknowledging Israel's actions on the ground. To discourage unfavourable reporting, the Lobby organises letter-writing campaigns, demonstrations and boycotts of news outlets whose content it considers anti-Israel. One CNN executive has said that he sometimes gets 6000 email messages in a single day complaining about a story. In May 2003, the pro-Israel Committee for Accurate Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA) organised demonstrations outside National Public Radio stations in 33 cities; it also tried to persuade contributors to withhold support from NPR until its Middle East coverage becomes more sympathetic to Israel. Boston's NPR station, WBUR, reportedly lost more than $1 million in contributions as a result of these efforts. Further pressure on NPR has come from Israel's friends in Congress, who have asked for an internal audit of its Middle East coverage as well as more oversight. The Israeli side also dominates the think tanks which play an important role in shaping public debate as well as actual policy. The Lobby created its own think tank in 1985, when Martin Indyk helped to found WINEP. Although WINEP plays down its links to Israel, claiming instead to provide a 'balanced and realistic' perspective on Middle East issues, it is funded and run by individuals deeply committed to advancing Israel's agenda. The Lobby's influence extends well beyond WINEP, however. Over the past 25 years, pro-Israel forces have established a commanding presence at the American Enterprise Institute, the Brookings Institution, the Center for Security Policy, the Foreign Policy Research Institute, the Heritage Foundation, the Hudson Institute, the Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis and the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA). These think tanks employ few, if any, critics of US support for Israel. Take the Brookings Institution. For many years, its senior expert on the Middle East was William Quandt, a former NSC official with a well-deserved reputation for even-handedness. Today, Brookings's coverage is conducted through the Saban Center for Middle East Studies, which is financed by Haim Saban, an Israeli-American businessman and ardent Zionist. The centre's director is the ubiquitous Martin Indyk. What was once a non-partisan policy institute is now part of the pro-Israel chorus. Where the Lobby has had the most difficulty is in stifling debate on university campuses. In the 1990s, when the Oslo peace process was underway, there was only mild criticism of Israel, but it grew stronger with Oslo's collapse and Sharon's access to power, becoming quite vociferous when the IDF reoccupied the West Bank in spring 2002 and employed massive force to subdue the second intifada. The Lobby moved immediately to 'take back the campuses'. New groups sprang up, like the Caravan for Democracy, which brought Israeli speakers to US colleges. Established groups like the Jewish Council for Public Affairs and Hillel joined in, and a new group, the Israel on Campus Coalition, was formed to co-ordinate the many bodies that now sought to put Israel's case. Finally, AIPAC more than tripled its spending on programmes to monitor university activities and to train young advocates, in order to 'vastly expand the number of students involved on campus . . . in the national pro-Israel effort'. The Lobby also monitors what professors write and teach. In September 2002, Martin Kramer and Daniel Pipes, two passionately pro-Israel neo-conservatives, established a website (Campus Watch) that posted dossiers on suspect academics and encouraged students to report remarks or behaviour that might be considered hostile to Israel. This transparent attempt to blacklist and intimidate scholars provoked a harsh reaction and Pipes and Kramer later removed the dossiers, but the website still invites students to report 'anti-Israel' activity. Groups within the Lobby put pressure on particular academics and universities. Columbia has been a frequent target, no doubt because of the presence of the late Edward Said on its faculty. 'One can be sure that any public statement in support of the Palestinian people by the pre-eminent literary critic Edward Said will elicit hundreds of emails, letters and journalistic accounts that call on us to denounce Said and to either sanction or fire him,' Jonathan Cole, its former provost, reported. When Columbia recruited the historian Rashid Khalidi from Chicago, the same thing happened. It was a problem Princeton also faced a few years later when it considered wooing Khalidi away from Columbia. A classic illustration of the effort to police academia occurred towards the end of 2004, when the David Project produced a film alleging that faculty members of Columbia's Middle East Studies programme were anti-semitic and were intimidating Jewish students who stood up for Israel. Columbia was hauled over the coals, but a faculty committee which was assigned to investigate the charges found no evidence of anti-semitism and the only incident possibly worth noting was that one professor had 'responded heatedly' to a student's question. The committee also discovered that the academics in question had themselves been the target of an overt campaign of intimidation. Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of all this is the efforts Jewish groups have made to push Congress into establishing mechanisms to monitor what professors say. If they manage to get this passed, universities judged to have an anti-Israel bias would be denied federal funding. Their efforts have not yet succeeded, but they are an indication of the importance placed on controlling debate. A number of Jewish philanthropists have recently established Israel Studies programmes (in addition to the roughly 130 Jewish Studies programmes already in existence) so as to increase the number of Israel-friendly scholars on campus. In May 2003, NYU announced the establishment of the Taub Center for Israel Studies; similar programmes have been set up at Berkeley, Brandeis and Emory. Academic administrators emphasise their pedagogical value, but the truth is that they are intended in large part to promote Israel's image. Fred Laffer, the head of the Taub Foundation, makes it clear that his foundation funded the NYU centre to help counter the 'Arabic [sic] point of view' that he thinks is prevalent in NYU's Middle East programmes. No discussion of the Lobby would be complete without an examination of one of its most powerful weapons: the charge of anti-semitism. Anyone who criticises Israel's actions or argues that pro-Israel groups have significant influence over US Middle Eastern policy - an influence AIPAC celebrates - stands a good chance of being labelled an anti-semite. Indeed, anyone who merely claims that there is an Israel Lobby runs the risk of being charged with anti-semitism, even though the Israeli media refer to America's 'Jewish Lobby'. In other words, the Lobby first boasts of its influence and then attacks anyone who calls attention to it. It's a very effective tactic: anti-semitism is something no one wants to be accused of. Europeans have been more willing than Americans to criticise Israeli policy, which some people attribute to a resurgence of anti-semitism in Europe. We are 'getting to a point', the US ambassador to the EU said in early 2004, 'where it is as bad as it was in the 1930s'. Measuring anti-semitism is a complicated matter, but the weight of evidence points in the opposite direction. In the spring of 2004, when accusations of European anti-semitism filled the air in America, separate surveys of European public opinion conducted by the US-based Anti-Defamation League and the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press found that it was in fact declining. In the 1930s, by contrast, anti-semitism was not only widespread among Europeans of all classes but considered quite acceptable. The Lobby and its friends often portray France as the most anti-semitic country in Europe. But in 2003, the head of the French Jewish community said that 'France is not more anti-semitic than America.' According to a recent article in Ha'aretz, the French police have reported that anti-semitic incidents declined by almost 50 per cent in 2005; and this even though France has the largest Muslim population of any European country. Finally, when a French Jew was murdered in Paris last month by a Muslim gang, tens of thousands of demonstrators poured into the streets to condemn anti-semitism. Jacques Chirac and Dominique de Villepin both attended the victim's memorial service to show their solidarity. No one would deny that there is anti-semitism among European Muslims, some of it provoked by Israel's conduct towards the Palestinians and some of it straightforwardly racist. But this is a separate matter with little bearing on whether or not Europe today is like Europe in the 1930s. Nor would anyone deny that there are still some virulent autochthonous anti-semites in Europe (as there are in the United States) but their numbers are small and their views are rejected by the vast majority of Europeans. Israel's advocates, when pressed to go beyond mere assertion, claim that there is a 'new anti-semitism', which they equate with criticism of Israel. In other words, criticise Israeli policy and you are by definition an anti-semite. When the synod of the Church of England recently voted to divest from Caterpillar Inc on the grounds that it manufactures the bulldozers used by the Israelis to demolish Palestinian homes, the Chief Rabbi complained that this would 'have the most adverse repercussions on . . . Jewish-Christian relations in Britain', while Rabbi Tony Bayfield, the head of the Reform movement, said: 'There is a clear problem of anti-Zionist - verging on anti-semitic - attitudes emerging in the grass-roots, and even in the middle ranks of the Church.' But the Church was guilty merely of protesting against Israeli government policy. Critics are also accused of holding Israel to an unfair standard or questioning its right to exist. But these are bogus charges too. Western critics of Israel hardly ever question its right to exist: they question its behaviour towards the Palestinians, as do Israelis themselves. Nor is Israel being judged unfairly. Israeli treatment of the Palestinians elicits criticism because it is contrary to widely accepted notions of human rights, to international law and to the principle of national self-determination. And it is hardly the only state that has faced sharp criticism on these grounds. In the autumn of 2001, and especially in the spring of 2002, the Bush administration tried to reduce anti-American sentiment in the Arab world and undermine support for terrorist groups like al-Qaida by halting Israel's expansionist policies in the Occupied Territories and advocating the creation of a Palestinian state. Bush had very significant means of persuasion at his disposal. He could have threatened to reduce economic and diplomatic support for Israel, and the American people would almost certainly have supported him. A May 2003 poll reported that more than 60 per cent of Americans were willing to withhold aid if Israel resisted US pressure to settle the conflict, and that number rose to 70 per cent among the 'politically active'. Indeed, 73 per cent said that the United States should not favour either side. Yet the administration failed to change Israeli policy, and Washington ended up backing it. Over time, the administration also adopted Israel's own justifications of its position, so that US rhetoric began to mimic Israeli rhetoric. By February 2003, a Washington Post headline summarised the situation: 'Bush and Sharon Nearly Identical on Mideast Policy.' The main reason for this switch was the Lobby. The story begins in late September 2001, when Bush began urging Sharon to show restraint in the Occupied Territories. He also pressed him to allow Israel's foreign minister, Shimon Peres, to meet with Yasser Arafat, even though he (Bush) was highly critical of Arafat's leadership. Bush even said publicly that he supported the creation of a Palestinian state. Alarmed, Sharon accused him of trying 'to appease the Arabs at our expense', warning that Israel 'will not be Czechoslovakia'. Bush was reportedly furious at being compared to Chamberlain, and the White House press secretary called Sharon's remarks 'unacceptable'. Sharon offered a pro forma apology, but quickly joined forces with the Lobby to persuade the administration and the American people that the United States and Israel faced a common threat from terrorism. Israeli officials and Lobby representatives insisted that there was no real difference between Arafat and Osama bin Laden: the United States and Israel, they said, should isolate the Palestinians' elected leader and have nothing to do with him. The Lobby also went to work in Congress. On 16 November, 89 senators sent Bush a letter praising him for refusing to meet with Arafat, but also demanding that the US not restrain Israel from retaliating against the Palestinians; the administration, they wrote, must state publicly that it stood behind Israel. According to the New York Times, the letter 'stemmed' from a meeting two weeks before between 'leaders of the American Jewish community and key senators', adding that AIPAC was 'particularly active in providing advice on the letter'. By late November, relations between Tel Aviv and Washington had improved considerably. This was thanks in part to the Lobby's efforts, but also to America's initial victory in Afghanistan, which reduced the perceived need for Arab support in dealing with al-Qaida. Sharon visited the White House in early December and had a friendly meeting with Bush. In April 2002 trouble erupted again, after the IDF launched Operation Defensive Shield and resumed control of virtually all the major Palestinian areas on the West Bank. Bush knew that Israel's actions would damage America's image in the Islamic world and undermine the war on terrorism, so he demanded that Sharon 'halt the incursions and begin withdrawal'. He underscored this message two days later, saying he wanted Israel to 'withdraw without delay'. On 7 April, Condoleezza Rice, then Bush's national security adviser, told reporters: '"Without delay" means without delay. It means now.' That same day Colin Powell set out for the Middle East to persuade all sides to stop fighting and start negotiating. Israel and the Lobby swung into action. Pro-Israel officials in the vice-president's office and the Pentagon, as well as neo-conservative pundits like Robert Kagan and William Kristol, put the heat on Powell. They even accused him of having 'virtually obliterated the distinction between terrorists and those fighting terrorists'. Bush himself was being pressed by Jewish leaders and Christian evangelicals. Tom DeLay and Dick Armey were especially outspoken about the need to support Israel, and DeLay and the Senate minority leader, Trent Lott, visited the White House and warned Bush to back off. The first sign that Bush was caving in came on 11 April - a week after he told Sharon to withdraw his forces - when the White House press secretary said that the president believed Sharon was 'a man of peace'. Bush repeated this statement publicly on Powell's return from his abortive mission, and told reporters that Sharon had responded satisfactorily to his call for a full and immediate withdrawal. Sharon had done no such thing, but Bush was no longer willing to make an issue of it. Meanwhile, Congress was also moving to back Sharon. On 2 May, it overrode the administration's objections and passed two resolutions reaffirming support for Israel. (The Senate vote was 94 to 2; the House of Representatives version passed 352 to 21.) Both resolutions held that the United States 'stands in solidarity with Israel' and that the two countries were, to quote the House resolution, 'now engaged in a common struggle against terrorism'. The House version also condemned 'the ongoing support and co-ordination of terror by Yasser Arafat', who was portrayed as a central part of the terrorism problem. Both resolutions were drawn up with the help of the Lobby. A few days later, a bipartisan congressional delegation on a fact-finding mission to Israel stated that Sharon should resist US pressure to negotiate with Arafat. On 9 May, a House appropriations subcommittee met to consider giving Israel an extra $200 million to fight terrorism. Powell opposed the package, but the Lobby backed it and Powell lost. In short, Sharon and the Lobby took on the president of the United States and triumphed. Hemi Shalev, a journalist on the Israeli newspaper Ma'ariv, reported that Sharon's aides 'could not hide their satisfaction in view of Powell's failure. Sharon saw the whites of President Bush's eyes, they bragged, and the president blinked first.' But it was Israel's champions in the United States, not Sharon or Israel, that played the key role in defeating Bush. The situation has changed little since then. The Bush administration refused ever again to have dealings with Arafat. After his death, it embraced the new Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, but has done little to help him. Sharon continued to develop his plan to impose a unilateral settlement on the Palestinians, based on 'disengagement' from Gaza coupled with continued expansion on the West Bank. By refusing to negotiate with Abbas and making it impossible for him to deliver tangible benefits to the Palestinian people, Sharon's strategy contributed directly to Hamas's electoral victory. With Hamas in power, however, Israel has another excuse not to negotiate. The US administration has supported Sharon's actions (and those of his successor, Ehud Olmert). Bush has even endorsed unilateral Israeli annexations in the Occupied Territories, reversing the stated policy of every president since Lyndon Johnson. US officials have offered mild criticisms of a few Israeli actions, but have done little to help create a viable Palestinian state. Sharon has Bush 'wrapped around his little finger', the former national security adviser Brent Scowcroft said in October 2004. If Bush tries to distance the US from Israel, or even criticises Israeli actions in the Occupied Territories, he is certain to face the wrath of the Lobby and its supporters in Congress. Democratic presidential candidates understand that these are facts of life, which is the reason John Kerry went to great lengths to display unalloyed support for Israel in 2004, and why Hillary Clinton is doing the same thing today. Maintaining US support for Israel's policies against the Palestinians is essential as far as the Lobby is concerned, but its ambitions do not stop there. It also wants America to help Israel remain the dominant regional power. The Israeli government and pro-Israel groups in the United States have worked together to shape the administration's policy towards Iraq, Syria and Iran, as well as its grand scheme for reordering the Middle East. Pressure from Israel and the Lobby was not the only factor behind the decision to attack Iraq in March 2003, but it was critical. Some Americans believe that this was a war for oil, but there is hardly any direct evidence to support this claim. Instead, the war was motivated in good part by a desire to make Israel more secure. According to Philip Zelikow, a former member of the president's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, the executive director of the 9/11 Commission, and now a counsellor to Condoleezza Rice, the 'real threat' from Iraq was not a threat to the United States. The 'unstated threat' was the 'threat against Israel', Zelikow told an audience at the University of Virginia in September 2002. 'The American government,' he added, 'doesn't want to lean too hard on it rhetorically, because it is not a popular sell.' On 16 August 2002, 11 days before Dick Cheney kicked off the campaign for war with a hardline speech to the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the Washington Post reported that 'Israel is urging US officials not to delay a military strike against Iraq's Saddam Hussein.' By this point, according to Sharon, strategic co-ordination between Israel and the US had reached 'unprecedented dimensions', and Israeli intelligence officials had given Washington a variety of alarming reports about Iraq's WMD programmes. As one retired Israeli general later put it, 'Israeli intelligence was a full partner to the picture presented by American and British intelligence regarding Iraq's non-conventional capabilities.' Israeli leaders were deeply distressed when Bush decided to seek Security Council authorisation for war, and even more worried when Saddam agreed to let UN inspectors back in. 'The campaign against Saddam Hussein is a must,' Shimon Peres told reporters in September 2002. 'Inspections and inspectors are good for decent people, but dishonest people can overcome easily inspections and inspectors.' At the same time, Ehud Barak wrote a New York Times op-ed warning that 'the greatest risk now lies in inaction.' His predecessor as prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, published a similar piece in the Wall Street Journal, entitled: 'The Case for Toppling Saddam'. 'Today nothing less than dismantling his regime will do,' he declared. 'I believe I speak for the overwhelming majority of Israelis in supporting a pre-emptive strike against Saddam's regime.' Or as Ha'aretz reported in February 2003, 'the military and political leadership yearns for war in Iraq.' As Netanyahu suggested, however, the desire for war was not confined to Israel's leaders. Apart from Kuwait, which Saddam invaded in 1990, Israel was the only country in the world where both politicians and public favoured war. As the journalist Gideon Levy observed at the time, 'Israel is the only country in the West whose leaders support the war unreservedly and where no alternative opinion is voiced.' In fact, Israelis were so gung-ho that their allies in America told them to damp down their rhetoric, or it would look as if the war would be fought on Israel's behalf. Within the US, the main driving force behind the war was a small band of neo-conservatives, many with ties to Likud. But leaders of the Lobby's major organisations lent their voices to the campaign. 'As President Bush attempted to sell the . . . war in Iraq,' the Forward reported, 'America's most important Jewish organisations rallied as one to his defence. In statement after statement community leaders stressed the need to rid the world of Saddam Hussein and his weapons of mass destruction.' The editorial goes on to say that 'concern for Israel's safety rightfully factored into the deliberations of the main Jewish groups.' Although neo-conservatives and other Lobby leaders were eager to invade Iraq, the broader American Jewish community was not. Just after the war started, Samuel Freedman reported that 'a compilation of nationwide opinion polls by the Pew Research Center shows that Jews are less supportive of the Iraq war than the population at large, 52 per cent to 62 per cent.' Clearly, it would be wrong to blame the war in Iraq on 'Jewish influence'. Rather, it was due in large part to the Lobby's influence, especially that of the neo-conservatives within it. The neo-conservatives had been determined to topple Saddam even before Bush became president. They caused a stir early in 1998 by publishing two open letters to Clinton, calling for Saddam's removal from power. The signatories, many of whom had close ties to pro-Israel groups like JINSA or WINEP, and who included Elliot Abrams, John Bolton, Douglas Feith, William Kristol, Bernard Lewis, Donald Rumsfeld, Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz, had little trouble persuading the Clinton administration to adopt the general goal of ousting Saddam. But they were unable to sell a war to achieve that objective. They were no more able to generate enthusiasm for invading Iraq in the early months of the Bush administration. They needed help to achieve their aim. That help arrived with 9/11. Specifically, the events of that day led Bush and Cheney to reverse course and become strong proponents of a preventive war. At a key meeting with Bush at Camp David on 15 September, Wolfowitz advocated attacking Iraq before Afghanistan, even though there was no evidence that Saddam was involved in the attacks on the US and bin Laden was known to be in Afghanistan. Bush rejected his advice and chose to go after Afghanistan instead, but war with Iraq was now regarded as a serious possibility and on 21 November the president charged military planners with developing concrete plans for an invasion. Other neo-conservatives were meanwhile at work in the corridors of power. We don't have the full story yet, but scholars like Bernard Lewis of Princeton and Fouad Ajami of Johns Hopkins reportedly played important roles in persuading Cheney that war was the best option, though neo-conservatives on his staff - Eric Edelman, John Hannah and Scooter Libby, Cheney's chief of staff and one of the most powerful individuals in the administration - also played their part. By early 2002 Cheney had persuaded Bush; and with Bush and Cheney on board, war was inevitable. Outside the administration, neo-conservative pundits lost no time in making the case that invading Iraq was essential to winning the war on terrorism. Their efforts were designed partly to keep up the pressure on Bush, and partly to overcome opposition to the war inside and outside the government. On 20 September, a group of prominent neo-conservatives and their allies published another open letter: 'Even if evidence does not link Iraq directly to the attack,' it read, 'any strategy aiming at the eradication of terrorism and its sponsors must include a determined effort to remove Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq.' The letter also reminded Bush that 'Israel has been and remains America's staunchest ally against international terrorism.' In the 1 October issue of the Weekly Standard, Robert Kagan and William Kristol called for regime change in Iraq as soon as the Taliban was defeated. That same day, Charles Krauthammer argued in the Washington Post that after the US was done with Afghanistan, Syria should be next, followed by Iran and Iraq: 'The war on terrorism will conclude in Baghdad,' when we finish off 'the most dangerous terrorist regime in the world'. This was the beginning of an unrelenting public relations campaign to win support for an invasion of Iraq, a crucial part of which was the manipulation of intelligence in such a way as to make it seem as if Saddam posed an imminent threat. For example, Libby pressured CIA analysts to find evidence supporting the case for war and helped prepare Colin Powell's now discredited briefing to the UN Security Council. Within the Pentagon, the Policy Counterterrorism Evaluation Group was charged with finding links between al-Qaida and Iraq that the intelligence community had supposedly missed. Its two key members were David Wurmser, a hard-core neo-conservative, and Michael Maloof, a Lebanese-American with close ties to Perle. Another Pentagon group, the so-called Office of Special Plans, was given the task of uncovering evidence that could be used to sell the war. It was headed by Abram Shulsky, a neo-conservative with long-standing ties to Wolfowitz, and its ranks included recruits from pro-Israel think tanks. Both these organisations were created after 9/11 and reported directly to Douglas Feith. Like virtually all the neo-conservatives, Feith is deeply committed to Israel; he also has long-term ties to Likud. He wrote articles in the 1990s supporting the settlements and arguing that Israel should retain the Occupied Territories. More important, along with Perle and Wurmser, he wrote the famous 'Clean Break' report in June 1996 for Netanyahu, who had just become prime minister. Among other things, it recommended that Netanyahu 'focus on removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq - an important Israeli strategic objective in its own right'. It also called for Israel to take steps to reorder the entire Middle East. Netanyahu did not follow their advice, but Feith, Perle and Wurmser were soon urging the Bush administration to pursue those same goals. The Ha'aretz columnist Akiva Eldar warned that Feith and Perle 'are walking a fine line between their loyalty to American governments . . . and Israeli interests'. Wolfowitz is equally committed to Israel. The Forward once described him as 'the most hawkishly pro-Israel voice in the administration', and selected him in 2002 as first among 50 notables who 'have consciously pursued Jewish activism'. At about the same time, JINSA gave Wolfowitz its Henry M. Jackson Distinguished Service Award for promoting a strong partnership between Israel and the United States; and the Jerusalem Post, describing him as 'devoutly pro-Israel', named him 'Man of the Year' in 2003. Finally, a brief word is in order about the neo-conservatives' prewar support of Ahmed Chalabi, the unscrupulous Iraqi exile who headed the Iraqi National Congress. They backed Chalabi because he had established close ties with Jewish-American groups and had pledged to foster good relations with Israel once he gained power. This was precisely what pro-Israel proponents of regime change wanted to hear. Matthew Berger laid out the essence of the bargain in the Jewish Journal: 'The INC saw improved relations as a way to tap Jewish influence in Washington and Jerusalem and to drum up increased support for its cause. For their part, the Jewish groups saw an opportunity to pave the way for better relations between Israel and Iraq, if and when the INC is involved in replacing Saddam Hussein's regime.' Given the neo-conservatives' devotion to Israel, their obsession with Iraq, and their influence in the Bush administration, it isn't surprising that many Americans suspected that the war was designed to further Israeli interests. Last March, Barry Jacobs of the American Jewish Committee acknowledged that the belief that Israel and the neo-conservatives had conspired to get the US into a war in Iraq was 'pervasive' in the intelligence community. Yet few people would say so publicly, and most of those who did - including Senator Ernest Hollings and Representative James Moran - were condemned for raising the issue. Michael Kinsley wrote in late 2002 that 'the lack of public discussion about the role of Israel . . . is the proverbial elephant in the room.' The reason for the reluctance to talk about it, he observed, was fear of being labelled an anti-semite. There is little doubt that Israel and the Lobby were key factors in the decision to go to war. It's a decision the US would have been far less likely to take without their efforts. And the war itself was intended to be only the first step. A front-page headline in the Wall Street Journal shortly after the war began says it all: 'President's Dream: Changing Not Just Regime but a Region: A Pro-US, Democratic Area Is a Goal that Has Israeli and Neo-Conservative Roots.' Pro-Israel forces have long been interested in getting the US military more directly involved in the Middle East. But they had limited success during the Cold War, because America acted as an 'off-shore balancer' in the region. Most forces designated for the Middle East, like the Rapid Deployment Force, were kept 'over the horizon' and out of harm's way. The idea was to play local powers off against each other - which is why the Reagan administration supported Saddam against revolutionary Iran during the Iran-Iraq War - in order to maintain a balance favourable to the US. This policy changed after the first Gulf War, when the Clinton administration adopted a strategy of 'dual containment'. Substantial US forces would be stationed in the region in order to contain both Iran and Iraq, instead of one being used to check the other. The father of dual containment was none other than Martin Indyk, who first outlined the strategy in May 1993 at WINEP and then implemented it as director for Near East and South Asian Affairs at the National Security Council. By the mid-1990s there was considerable dissatisfaction with dual containment, because it made the United States the mortal enemy of two countries that hated each other, and forced Washington to bear the burden of containing both. But it was a strategy the Lobby favoured and worked actively in Congress to preserve. Pressed by AIPAC and other pro-Israel forces, Clinton toughened up the policy in the spring of 1995 by imposing an economic embargo on Iran. But AIPAC and the others wanted more. The result was the 1996 Iran and Libya Sanctions Act, which imposed sanctions on any foreign companies investing more than $40 million to develop petroleum resources in Iran or Libya. As Ze'ev Schiff, the military correspondent of Ha'aretz, noted at the time, 'Israel is but a tiny element in the big scheme, but one should not conclude that it cannot influence those within the Beltway.' By the late 1990s, however, the neo-conservatives were arguing that dual containment was not enough and that regime change in Iraq was essential. By toppling Saddam and turning Iraq into a vibrant democracy, they argued, the US would trigger a far-reaching process of change throughout the Middle East. The same line of thinking was evident in the 'Clean Break' study the neo-conservatives wrote for Netanyahu. By 2002, when an invasion of Iraq was on the front-burner, regional transformation was an article of faith in neo-conservative circles. Charles Krauthammer describes this grand scheme as the brainchild of Natan Sharansky, but Israelis across the political spectrum believed that toppling Saddam would alter the Middle East to Israel's advantage. Aluf Benn reported in Ha'aretz (17 February 2003): Senior IDF officers and those close to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, such as National Security Adviser Ephraim Halevy, paint a rosy picture of the wonderful future Israel can expect after the war. They envision a domino effect, with the fall of Saddam Hussein followed by that of Israel's other enemies . . . Along with these leaders will disappear terror and weapons of mass destruction. Once Baghdad fell in mid-April 2003, Sharon and his lieutenants began urging Washington to target Damascus. On 16 April, Sharon, interviewed in Yedioth Ahronoth, called for the United States to put 'very heavy' pressure on Syria, while Shaul Mofaz, his defence minister, interviewed in Ma'ariv, said: 'We have a long list of issues that we are thinking of demanding of the Syrians and it is appropriate that it should be done through the Americans.' Ephraim Halevy told a WINEP audience that it was now important for the US to get rough with Syria, and the Washington Post reported that Israel was 'fuelling the campaign' against Syria by feeding the US intelligence reports about the actions of Bashar Assad, the Syrian president. Prominent members of the Lobby made the same arguments. Wolfowitz declared that 'there has got to be regime change in Syria,' and Richard Perle told a journalist that 'a short message, a two-worded message' could be delivered to other hostile regimes in the Middle East: 'You're next.' In early April, WINEP released a bipartisan report stating that Syria 'should not miss the message that countries that pursue Saddam's reckless, irresponsible and defiant behaviour could end up sharing his fate'. On 15 April, Yossi Klein Halevi wrote a piece in the Los Angeles Times entitled 'Next, Turn the Screws on Syria', while the following day Zev Chafets wrote an article for the New York Daily News entitled 'Terror-Friendly Syria Needs a Change, Too'. Not to be outdone, Lawrence Kaplan wrote in the New Republic on 21 April that Assad was a serious threat to America. Back on Capitol Hill, Congressman Eliot Engel had reintroduced the Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act. It threatened sanctions against Syria if it did not withdraw from Lebanon, give up its WMD and stop supporting terrorism, and it also called for Syria and Lebanon to take concrete steps to make peace with Israel. This legislation was strongly endorsed by the Lobby - by AIPAC especially - and 'framed', according to the Jewish Telegraph Agency, 'by some of Israel's best friends in Congress'. The Bush administration had little enthusiasm for it, but the anti-Syrian act passed overwhelmingly (398 to 4 in the House; 89 to 4 in the Senate), and Bush signed it into law on 12 December 2003. The administration itself was still divided about the wisdom of targeting Syria. Although the neo-conservatives were eager to pick a fight with Damascus, the CIA and the State Department were opposed to the idea. And even after Bush signed the new law, he emphasised that he would go slowly in implementing it. His ambivalence is understandable. First, the Syrian government had not only been providing important intelligence about al-Qaida since 9/11: it had also warned Washington about a planned terrorist attack in the Gulf and given CIA interrogators access to Mohammed Zammar, the alleged recruiter of some of the 9/11 hijackers. Targeting the Assad regime would jeopardise these valuable connections, and thereby undermine the larger war on terrorism. Second, Syria had not been on bad terms with Washington before the Iraq war (it had even voted for UN Resolution 1441), and was itself no threat to the United States. Playing hardball with it would make the US look like a bully with an insatiable appetite for beating up Arab states. Third, putting Syria on the hit list would give Damascus a powerful incentive to cause trouble in Iraq. Even if one wanted to bring pressure to bear, it made good sense to finish the job in Iraq first. Yet Congress insisted on putting the screws on Damascus, largely in response to pressure from Israeli officials and groups like AIPAC. If there were no Lobby, there would have been no Syria Accountability Act, and US policy towards Damascus would have been more in line with the national interest. Israelis tend to describe every threat in the starkest terms, but Iran is widely seen as their most dangerous enemy because it is the most likely to acquire nuclear weapons. Virtually all Israelis regard an Islamic country in the Middle East with nuclear weapons as a threat to their existence. 'Iraq is a problem . . . But you should understand, if you ask me, today Iran is more dangerous than Iraq,' the defence minister, Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, remarked a month before the Iraq war. Sharon began pushing the US to confront Iran in November 2002, in an interview in the Times. Describing Iran as the 'centre of world terror', and bent on acquiring nuclear weapons, he declared that the Bush administration should put the strong arm on Iran 'the day after' it conquered Iraq. In late April 2003, Ha'aretz reported that the Israeli ambassador in Washington was calling for regime change in Iran. The overthrow of Saddam, he noted, was 'not enough'. In his words, America 'has to follow through. We still have great threats of that magnitude coming from Syria, coming from Iran.' The neo-conservatives, too, lost no time in making the case for regime change in Tehran. On 6 May, the AEI co-sponsored an all-day conference on Iran with the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies and the Hudson Institute, both champions of Israel. The speakers were all strongly pro-Israel, and many called for the US to replace the Iranian regime with a democracy. As usual, a bevy of articles by prominent neo-conservatives made the case for going after Iran. 'The liberation of Iraq was the first great battle for the future of the Middle East . . . But the next great battle - not, we hope, a military battle - will be for Iran,' William Kristol wrote in the Weekly Standard on 12 May. The administration has responded to the Lobby's pressure by working overtime to shut down Iran's nuclear programme. But Washington has had little success, and Iran seems determined to create a nuclear arsenal. As a result, the Lobby has intensified its pressure. Op-eds and other articles now warn of imminent dangers from a nuclear Iran, caution against any appeasement of a 'terrorist' regime, and hint darkly of preventive action should diplomacy fail. The Lobby is pushing Congress to approve the Iran Freedom Support Act, which would expand existing sanctions. Israeli officials also warn they may take pre-emptive action should Iran continue down the nuclear road, threats partly intended to keep Washington's attention on the issue. One might argue that Israel and the Lobby have not had much influence on policy towards Iran, because the US has its own reasons for keeping Iran from going nuclear. There is some truth in this, but Iran's nuclear ambitions do not pose a direct threat to the US. If Washington could live with a nuclear Soviet Union, a nuclear China or even a nuclear North Korea, it can live with a nuclear Iran. And that is why the Lobby must keep up constant pressure on politicians to confront Tehran. Iran and the US would hardly be allies if the Lobby did not exist, but US policy would be more temperate and preventive war would not be a serious option. It is not surprising that Israel and its American supporters want the US to deal with any and all threats to Israel's security. If their efforts to shape US policy succeed, Israel's enemies will be weakened or overthrown, Israel will get a free hand with the Palestinians, and the US will do most of the fighting, dying, rebuilding and paying. But even if the US fails to transform the Middle East and finds itself in conflict with an increasingly radicalised Arab and Islamic world, Israel will end up protected by the world's only superpower. This is not a perfect outcome from the Lobby's point of view, but it is obviously preferable to Washington distancing itself, or using its leverage to force Israel to make peace with the Palestinians. Can the Lobby's power be curtailed? One would like to think so, given the Iraq debacle, the obvious need to rebuild America's image in the Arab and Islamic world, and the recent revelations about AIPAC officials passing US government secrets to Israel. One might also think that Arafat's death and the election of the more moderate Mahmoud Abbas would cause Washington to press vigorously and even-handedly for a peace agreement. In short, there are ample grounds for leaders to distance themselves from the Lobby and adopt a Middle East policy more consistent with broader US interests. In particular, using American power to achieve a just peace between Israel and the Palestinians would help advance the cause of democracy in the region. But that is not going to happen - not soon anyway. AIPAC and its allies (including Christian Zionists) have no serious opponents in the lobbying world. They know it has become more difficult to make Israel's case today, and they are responding by taking on staff and expanding their activities. Besides, American politicians remain acutely sensitive to campaign contributions and other forms of political pressure, and major media outlets are likely to remain sympathetic to Israel no matter what it does. The Lobby's influence causes trouble on several fronts. It increases the terrorist danger that all states face - including America's European allies. It has made it impossible to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a situation that gives extremists a powerful recruiting tool, increases the pool of potential terrorists and sympathisers, and contributes to Islamic radicalism in Europe and Asia. Equally worrying, the Lobby's campaign for regime change in Iran and Syria could lead the US to attack those countries, with potentially disastrous effects. We don't need another Iraq. At a minimum, the Lobby's hostility towards Syria and Iran makes it almost impossible for Washington to enlist them in the struggle against al-Qaida and the Iraqi insurgency, where their help is badly needed. There is a moral dimension here as well. Thanks to the Lobby, the United States has become the de facto enabler of Israeli expansion in the Occupied Territories, making it complicit in the crimes perpetrated against the Palestinians. This situation undercuts Washington's efforts to promote democracy abroad and makes it look hypocritical when it presses other states to respect human rights. US efforts to limit nuclear proliferation appear equally hypocritical given its willingness to accept Israel's nuclear arsenal, which only encourages Iran and others to seek a similar capability. Besides, the Lobby's campaign to quash debate about Israel is unhealthy for democracy. Silencing sceptics by organising blacklists and boycotts - or by suggesting that critics are anti-semites - violates the principle of open debate on which democracy depends. The inability of Congress to conduct a genuine debate on these important issues paralyses the entire process of democratic deliberation. Israel's backers should be free to make their case and to challenge those who disagree with them, but efforts to stifle debate by intimidation must be roundly condemned. Finally, the Lobby's influence has been bad for Israel. Its ability to persuade Washington to support an expansionist agenda has discouraged Israel from seizing opportunities - including a peace treaty with Syria and a prompt and full implementation of the Oslo Accords - that would have saved Israeli lives and shrunk the ranks of Palestinian extremists. Denying the Palestinians their legitimate political rights certainly has not made Israel more secure, and the long campaign to kill or marginalise a generation of Palestinian leaders has empowered extremist groups like Hamas, and reduced the number of Palestinian leaders who would be willing to accept a fair settlement and able to make it work. Israel itself would probably be better off if the Lobby were less powerful and US policy more even-handed.
There is a ray of hope, however. Although the Lobby remains a powerful force, the adverse effects of its influence are increasingly difficult to hide. Powerful states can maintain flawed policies for quite some time, but reality cannot be ignored for ever. What is needed is a candid discussion of the Lobby's influence and a more open debate about US interests in this vital region. Israel's well-being is one of those interests, but its continued occupation of the West Bank and its broader regional agenda are not. Open debate will expose the limits of the strategic and moral case for one-sided US support and could move the US to a position more consistent with its own national interest, with the interests of the other states in the region, and with Israel's long-term interests as well. |
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"The Trees Went Forth..." By Uri Avnery TODAY, EHUD Olmert has become the Prime minister of Israel. No longer just a "Deputy Prime Minister", but now a real one. One hundred days after Ariel Sharon sank into a coma, the job and the title were taken away from him, as the law demands. Olmert is now the acting prime minister of the transitional government, and in a few weeks hence, with the establishment of the new coalition, he will become the head of a regular government. All this is happening without any real debate about Olmert. The man, who has been a public figure all his life, is really unknown to most citizens. For the public, it suffices that he is the "Heir of Sharon". Yet it is difficult to imagine a bigger difference between two people than that between Sharon and Olmert. It's the difference between a lion and a fox, between the king of the animals and the most cunning (according to the fables). Sharon is an extraordinary person, an adventurer, a leader of armies, a man of war, the originator of grandiose designs (generally with weak foundations), a creative, strong, dangerous and charismatic leader. Olmert is a politician is a politician is a politician. THE PERFECT description of a politician was written more than two thousand years ago, about a person who lived (according to legend) almost a thousand years before that: Abimelech king of Shechem (today's Nablus). As described in the Book of Judges (Chapter 9), Abimelech was the son of a great leader. After the death of his father, he killed his 70 brothers "upon one stone" and became dictator. Only Jotham, the youngest brother, escaped the massacre. He came and stood on the top of mount Gerizim, which overlooks the city, and recited to the men of Shechem in beautiful Hebrew an immortal fable, that starts with the words: "The trees went forth to anoint a king over them..." They approached their fellow trees, one after another, and offered them the crown. When they came to the olive tree, it refused the offer with contempt: "Shall I leave my fatness, wherewith by me they honor God and man, and go to be promoted over the trees?" The proud fig tree, too, declined: "Should I forsake my sweetness, and my good fruit, and go to be promoted over the trees?" And so, each in its turn, the trees preferred to do useful things rather than going into politics. Only the bramble, which has no fruit, no fragrance and no shadow, agreed to rule, on one condition: "If in truth ye anoint me king over you, then come and put your trust in my shadow - and if not, let fire come out of the bramble and devour the cedars of Lebanon." The biblical story-teller meant that the ordinary politician is a useless fellow, and everyone who has a creative talent should stay away from this profession. That is now a widespread view in Israel and the world at large. But that suggests a simple question: If so, who will do the job? Because politics is a necessary profession - somebody has to attain wide agreement for fulfilling tasks, enact laws and administer society. And if the olive and the fig trees do not deign to volunteer for the job, it is left to the bramble. That's to say, one whose most outstanding trait is the hunger for power. AS IS known from his biography, Olmert suffered in his childhood from much deprivation. A group of old-time Revisionists (members of the most right-wing Zionist movement, the antecedent of the Herut party), built themselves a neighborhood on the edge of Binyamina, south of Haifa, whose veteran inhabitants treated them with contempt. This may be what instilled in the boy Ehud the urge to stand out, to attain public recognition and also to get rich. I met him first in the 60s, when I was a Member of the Knesset. The young Olmert was the apprentice and servant (literally) of another Member: Shmuel Tamir. One could learn a lot from Tamir. He was a talented egomaniac, who believed that providence had marked him from birth to be Prime Minister. He had a gift for attracting people, turning them into his devoted slaves, using them as much as possible and then throwing them away like squeezed lemons. He had much personal charm and was a genius in public relations. There was always a bunch of journalists ready to serve him. Almost all of them later became his enemies. His political life was a crazy zigzag between various parties, splits and unions, dovish and hawkish positions, until he reached the post of Minister of Justice and got no further. On the way he also succeeded in getting rich. ,P> That was the example that Olmert had before his eyes when he started his political career. His path looks like a river that snakes its way left and right, and sometimes back, but does not rest for a moment in its quest to reach the sea - supreme power. It may have taken decades, but now he has arrived. Tamir, a former member of the Irgun, started his political career in the Herut party, left it, joined it again, tried to unseat Menachem Begin, failed, and was compelled to leave. So he set up a small party called the "Free Center". Olmert, a Revisionist from birth, believed that Tamir, who was much younger than Begin, was more promising, and joined his unsuccessful rebellion. He found himself a junior functionary in a small party. Tamir promoted the youngster. Too late did he understand that his pupil was more talented than he had bargained for: he did unto Tamir what Tamir had done unto Begin. He caused a split between Tamir and his partner, the veteran right-wing politician Eliezer Shostak, left the party and founded another one with Shostak. Then he overthrew Shostak and took over the leadership of the splinter group himself. The affair caused some smiles when Olmert (literally) ran away with the party's rubber stamp in order to take it over. In 1973, Ariel Sharon united the right-wing in a new bloc called Likud ("Unification"). Apart from the Herut and Liberal parties, which were already united in a joint faction, he added two tiny groups: Tamir's Free Center and the State List, a remnant of Ben-Gurion's devotees. (When I asked him, at the time, what was the use of these two, which had no votes to speak of, he told me: "It's important to create the impression that the entire Right is uniting. So I could not leave anyone out.") In the elections that took place on the last day of 1973, the Likud, led by Menachem Begin, appeared as a united bloc. Sharon was No. 6 on the list, Olmert No. 36. Since then he worked tirelessly, with innumerable ploys, to edge closer to the leadership. He rose to No. 26 (1981), No. 24 (1984), No. 22 (1988), No. 13 (1991) and No. 10 (1995). Then he decided on a shortcut: he became the Likud candidate for mayor of Jerusalem and defeated the old Teddy Kollek. As mayor, he worked on two fronts: oppressing the Arab population and pampering the Orthodox. The annexed Arab quarters were systematically neglected. He pushed Prime Minster Binyamin Netanyahu into opening a tunnel near the Muslim shrines, causing riots that resulted in dozens killed. He encouraged American Jewish right-wing millionaires to build Jewish settlements in the middle of Arab neighborhoods, and campaigned for turning the beautiful Abu-Ghneim hill into the fortified Jewish settlement Har-Homa. In the end, he pushed for the building of the Separation Wall that cuts up the Arab neighborhoods. With the Orthodox, on the other side, he maintained an alliance that kept him in power, and in the end handed them the keys of the city. The secular Jewish population escaped from the city in droves. All this did not help him. When he decided to enter the Knesset again, the 3000 members of the willful Likud Central Committee bounced him back almost to square one: No. 32 on the election list. But Sharon, now leader of the party, decided that is was worthwhile to acquire the loyalty of this frustrated, ambitious politician. When he set up his government, he tried to hand him the powerful Finance Ministry. This proved impossible, because Netanyahu, No. 2 on the list, could not be pushed away. The solution was to give Olmert a second-rank ministry, Industry and Trade, coupled with a consolation prize: the prestigious but empty title of "Deputy Prime Minister". The sole prerogative of the holder of this title was to preside over cabinet meetings when the Prime Minister was abroad. Sharon did not travel much. And then two things happened: Sharon, spurred on by Olmert, split the Likud, and then sank into a coma. The "Deputy" became quite naturally his temporary heir, and the temporary heir became his permanent successor. After forty years of snaking around, the river had reached the sea. HOW WILL Olmert develop as Prime Minister? Will the fox turn into a lion, the mere-politician into a statesman? The first steps do not bode well. Though Olmert made no serious mistakes, the election results were dismal: instead of the 45 seats promised Sharon by the polls, he won only 29 at the ballot. Since then he has been playing the arrogant leader, especially vis--vis the Labor Party, his indispensable coalition partner. He is trying to include in his cabinet the racist party of Avigdor Lieberman, treats Mahmoud Abbas with open contempt, boycotts the elected Palestinian leadership ("the "Hamas Government") and allows Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz free rein to shell and starve the Palestinians. In order to demonstrate his independence, he has given a new name ("Convergence") to Sharon's old separation plan. He speaks about it in vague terms, without maps and time-tables. It might serve the annexation of large areas ("without Arabs"), or turn out to be a hallucinatory plan that will never be implemented. Clearly, his wish for a wide and comfortable coalition is more important to him than the realization of a plan that demands a narrow, resolute and tightly focused cabinet. It is too early to foresee where he will go. History has known small politicians who stepped out of the shadow of great leaders and surprised the world. Such a one was Harry Truman, who succeeded Franklin Delano Roosevelt and made his own mark as president. Another was Anwar Sadat, the successor of the charismatic Gamal Abd-al-Nasser. But it is also true that counter-examples are legion.
It has been said that a politician thinks about the next elections, a statesman about the next generation.
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Desert Rats Leave The Sinking Ship Why Rumsfeld Should Not Resign By Greg Palast Well, here they come: the wannabe Rommels, the gaggle of generals, safely retired, to lay siege to Donald Rumsfeld. This week, six of them have called for the Secretary of Defense's resignation. Well, according to my watch, they're about four years too late -- and they still don't get it. I know that most of my readers will be tickled pink that the bemedalled boys in crew cuts are finally ready to kick Rummy in the rump, in public. But to me, it just shows me that these boys still can't shoot straight. It wasn't Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld who stood up in front of the UN and identified two mobile latrines as biological weapons labs, was it, General Powell? It wasn't Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld who told us our next warning from Saddam could be a mushroom cloud, was it Condoleezza? It wasn't Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld who declared that Al Qaeda and Saddam were going steady, was it, Mr. Cheney? Yes, Rumsfeld is a swaggering bag of mendacious arrogance, a duplicitous chicken-hawk, yellow-bellied bully-boy and Tinker-Toy Napoleon -- but he didn't appoint himself Secretary of Defense. Let me tell you a story about the Secretary of Defense you didn't read in the New York Times, related to me by General Jay Garner, the man our president placed in Baghdad as the US' first post-invasion viceroy. Garner arrived in Kuwait City in March 2003 working under the mistaken notion that when George Bush called for democracy in Iraq, the President meant the Iraqis could choose their own government. Misunderstanding the President's true mission, General Garner called for Iraqis to hold elections within 90 days and for the U.S. to quickly pull troops out of the cities to a desert base. "It's their country," the General told me of the Iraqis. "And," he added, most ominously, "their oil." Let's not forget: it's all about the oil. I showed Garner a 101-page plan for Iraq's economy drafted secretly by neo-cons at the State Department, Treasury and the Pentagon, calling for "privatization" (i.e. the sale) of "all state assets ... especially in the oil and oil-supporting industries." The General knew of the plans and he intended to shove it where the Iraqi sun don't shine. Garner planned what he called a "Big Tent" meeting of Iraqi tribal leaders to plan elections. By helping Iraqis establish their own multi-ethnic government -- and this was back when Sunnis, Shias and Kurds were on talking terms -- knew he could get the nation on its feet peacefully before a welcomed "liberation" turned into a hated "occupation." But, Garner knew, a freely chosen coalition government would mean the death-knell for the neo-con oil-and-assets privatization grab. On April 21, 2003, three years ago this month, the very night General Garner arrived in Baghdad, he got a call from Washington. It was Rumsfeld on the line. He told Garner, in so many words, "Don't unpack, Jack, you're fired." Rummy replaced Garner, a man with years of on-the-ground experience in Iraq, with green-boots Paul Bremer, the Managing Director of Kissinger Associates. Bremer cancelled the Big Tent meeting of Iraqis and postponed elections for a year; then he issued 100 orders, like some tin-pot pasha, selling off Iraq's economy to U.S. and foreign operators, just as Rumsfeld's neo-con clique had desired. Reading this, it sounds like I should applaud the six generals' call for Rumfeld's ouster. Forget it. For a bunch of military hotshots, they sure can't shoot straight. They're wasting all their bullets on the decoy. They've gunned down the puppet instead of the puppeteers. There's no way that Rumsfeld could have yanked General Garner from Baghdad without the word from The Bunker. Nothing moves or breathes or spits in the Bush Administration without Darth Cheney's growl of approval. And ultimately, it's the Commander-in-Chief who's chiefly in command. Even the generals' complaint -- that Rumsfeld didn't give them enough troops -- was ultimately a decision of the cowboy from Crawford. (And by the way, the problem was not that we lacked troops -- the problem was that we lacked moral authority to occupy this nation. A million troops would not be enough -- the insurgents would just have more targets.) President Bush is one lucky fella. I can imagine him today on the intercom with Cheney: "Well, pardner, looks like the game's up." And Cheney replies, "Hey, just hang the Rumsfeld dummy out the window until he's taken all their ammo." When Bush and Cheney read about the call for Rumsfeld's resignation today, I can just hear George saying to Dick, "Mission Accomplished."
Generals, let me give you a bit of advice about choosing a target: It's the President, stupid.
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At last, Tom DeLay has succumbed to the scandal of his own making and finally done something positive for the people: Resign from congress. Tom's had a bad spell the last couple of years. He has been cited by his own congressional colleagues three times for ethics violations, he and two top aides have been indicted for money laundering in Texas, he was forced to give up his post as majority leader, he is hopelessly entangled in the criminal deeds of supersleaze lobbyist Jack Abramoff, and the polls showed that even the people in his own congressional district (a district he drew for himself, by the way) were rejecting him for re-election. The only thing worse that could happen to Tom would be for Dick Cheney to invite him to go hunting. DeLay is a man of many nicknames. When in the state legislature in the 1980s, he was called "Hot Tub Tommy," for he was quite the party boy. Then, he got to congress and got serious, becoming known as "The Hammer" for his mafia-like style of demanding that corporate lobbyists put millions of dollars in Republican campaign coffers in exchange for legislative favors. But DeLay might ultimately be remembered for his latest nickname: "Representative #2." That's how he's listed in the legal papers of the multi-agency task force investigating Jack Abramoff's corrupt dealings with congressional leaders. Tom says that God told him to step down from congress. But I suspect that God's way of delivering that message was in the form of DeLay's mounting legal woes. This is Jim Hightower saying... Meanwhile, the corruption that Tom cultivated between lobbyists and lawmakers continues unabated in the congress. Top leaders want us to believe that DeLay's departure clears the air in congress, so there's now no need for serious ethical reforms. But that's like hanging an air freshener on the tail of a hog. Tom's gone, but the source of the stench remains, strong as ever.
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It's just like playing blackjack in Vegas.
Invariably, sitting right next to you is some guy, eyes shifty and body twitchy and making weird sounds with his mouth and smelling vaguely of sawdust and horse manure and dead dreams, with a huge pile of chips he is quickly turning into a very small pile of chips.
He is suffering. He is playing terribly, grumbling, sneering at the dealer, talking to the cards like they were his personal slutty harem ("C'mon you dumb bitches, do me right," etc.), complaining to his very angry God who is apparently no longer coming through for him. He is getting desperate. His pile is diminishing. He is sweating, glancing around, wondering where all his drunk fraternity friends scurried off to.
Soon he is down to his last chips. He makes one final stab, but his final bet tanks. He is out, the pile is gone.
He then does what every miserable, lunkheaded gambler does at this point: In a fit of alcoholic rage and demonic encouragement, he says, "Screw it" -- and digs into his pocket, pulls out his last remaining crumpled $1,000 bill and slaps it down on the table in one big final gesture meant to turn his fortunes around all at once, goddamn the wife at home and screw a decent meal and forget every ironclad rule of gambling because dammit the gods owe him and he's long overdue for a change in fortune. Yes. Right. Sure he is.
The smart players look at him like he's a wart on their elbow. The gods look at him like he's a brown fungal mold they forgot to let evolve. Everyone looks sidelong at him and sighs, waits for the inevitable.
Sure enough, the lug loses his big Hail Mary bet. He is broke. He cannot believe it. He curses the table, curses the whore cards, swears at the dealer for not treating him better, slams the rest of his drink and his face contorts and his hands shake and he stumbles off into the night, railing against his lousy luck, the gods, all of humanity. Same ol' situation, happening all over Vegas. And, of course, Washington, D.C.
Now, here he is, sitting right next to all the other countries at the Big Table, representing America, it's little Dubya Bush, stewing in his own juices, his poll numbers hovering right near Nixon levels during his darkest days, mumbling to himself, smelling vaguely of sawdust and horse manure and dead Social Security overhaul plans.
He is pockmarked by scandal, buffeted by storms of disapproval and infighting and nascent impeachment. He intentionally authorized the leak of security information merely to smear an Iraq war critic, he lied about WMD and lied about Saddam and lied about making the United States safer and lied about, well, just about everything, on top of launching the worst and most violent and most expensive, unwinnable war since Vietnam.
His formerly enormous pile of betting capital is down to a tiny lump, nothing like back when he had the table rigged and all the pit bosses worked for him and the pile was as big as a roomful of Texas cow pies. But now, fortune is frowning. In fact, fortune is white-hot furious at being so viciously molested, spit upon, raped lo these many years. The truth is coming out: Bush has now lost far, far more bets than he ever won.
What's to be done? Why, do what any grumbling, furious, confused, underqualified alcoholic gambler does: reach down deep and say, "Screw the nation and screw the odds and to hell with the rest of the planet," and pull out one more desperate, crumpled war from deep in your pants, slap it on the table and hear the world moan.
But this time, try to make it serious. Do not rule out the use of tactical nuclear weapons. Do not rule out another a massive air strike, ground troops, special forces, a strategy so intense it makes Iraq look like a jog in the park. Think of yourself as creating a masterful legacy, going down in history not as the guy who restored peace in the Middle East but as the guy who made it all far worse -- but who "saved" the world from Iran's nukes while protecting American oil interests. Yes? Can you smell the oily sanctimony in the air? Is God speaking to you again, telling you to damn the torpedoes and kill more Muslims? You are the chosen one, after all.
Sound far fetched? Don't think even Bush could be capable of using nukes to slap Iran? Perish the thought. All reports from underworld White House sources -- most notably by way of Sy Hersh's horrifying report in a recent New Yorker -- indicate that Dubya and his remaining team of war-happy flying monkeys have been secretly laying out plans to attack Iran for months, possibly even using tactical nuclear weapons to get at those deep Iranian bunkers, all because Iran just celebrated its entrance into the world's "nuclear club" by finally enriching some uranium (a critical component of nuclear weapons) for the first time. Cookies all around!
No matter that most analysts say that Iran is far from being a true threat, that a nuclear Iran is at least a good decade away, if not longer. No matter that 10 years is a good long time to work on ways to force Iran out of the game -- via negotiation, diplomacy, sanctions -- without unleashing another river of never-ending violence.
With Bush in power, there is no waiting. There is no thought of avoiding another hideous war at all costs. To the Bush hawks, diplomacy is a failed joke. Negotiation is for intellectuals and tofu pacifists. In the Dubya world view, the planet is a roiling cauldron of nasty threats, crammed with terrorists and hateful Muslims and foreign demons suddenly growling on our doorstep when, curiously, they really weren't there before he stumbled into power. Amazing how that works.
It is now seven months before what could be a radically influential congressional election, a vote that could very well give power back to the Democrats, who will (with any luck) waste no time launching a number of long-overdue investigations into Bush's failed war and the various scandals and lies and fiscal abuses that led us all here.
For Dubya, now is the time. One last, desperate gamble. Slam that last drink, scrunch up your face, screw the rules and let the bombs fly. What, you don't think he could do it? Don't think a nuclear attack on Iran is possible? You haven't looked into the tiny, ink-black eyes of Dick Cheney lately. You haven't seen Rumsfeld's arrogant sneer, seen Bush looking confused and lost, wondering where all his "capital" went, desperately hunting for a legacy and finding only irresponsibility and self-righteousness and death.
But hell, as we already know, that's good enough for him.
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Of all the war crimes that have flowed from the originating war crime of George W. Bush's unprovoked invasion of Iraq, perhaps the most flagrant was the wanton destruction of Fallujah in November 2004. Now, as ignominious defeat looms for Bush's Babylonian folly, some of the key players in fomenting the war are urging that the "Fallujah Option" be applied to an even bigger target: Baghdad.
What these influential warmongers openly call for is the "pacification" of Baghdad: a brutal firestorm by U.S. forces, ravaging both Sunni insurgents and Shiite militias in a "horrific" operation that will inevitably lead to "skyrocketing body counts," as warhawk Reuel Marc Gerecht wrote cheerfully last week in the ever-bloodthirsty editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal. [Via Robert Dreyfus on TomDispatch.com.] Gerecht's war whoop quickly ricocheted around the rightwing media echo chamber and gave public voice to the private counsels emanating from a group whose members now comprise the leadership of the U.S. government: The Project for the New American Century.
As oft noted here, PNAC was founded by Dick Cheney, Don Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Jeb Bush, Zalmay Khalilzad, and the now-indicted Lewis Libby, among others. In September 2000, they publicly called for sending American forces into Iraq - even if Saddam Hussein was already gone - as well as planting new U.S. bases in Central Asia, putting weapons in space, building new nukes and funding a vast militarization of American society. Being such savvy inside players and all, they recognized that this lunatic program of aggression and world domination would not be accepted by the American people - unless, of course, the nation happened to be struck by a "catalyzing event" like "a new Pearl Harbor." Who says dreams don't come true?
Gerecht, an ex-CIA man, is a Senior Fellow at PNAC. He was one of the many munchkins who laid the groundwork for the mass deception that led to the war by constantly undermining any CIA report that failed to conform to the warmongers' highly profitable fantasies of America's imminent destruction by the broken, toothless regime of Saddam Hussein. The intelligence services' many caveats about this bogus threat were placed directly on Bush's desk, as the National Journal reports, but the P-Nackers in the White House tossed them aside. They dreamed of war, and they got it.
But the natives failed to play their part in the imperial masque macabre. As noted here last week, they have churlishly failed to show proper appreciation for being slaughtered, looted, tortured and controlled. Even the Shiites, hailed by the Bushists just a few weeks ago as salt-of-the-earth lovers of moderate democracy, are now denounced as hate-filled sectarians, even worse than the Sunni insurgents - who are suddenly being courted by Bush's man in Baghdad, the P-Nacker Khalilzad, the BBC reports.
Not that the Shiite death squads - backed by the U.S.-backed Iraqi government - have been all bad, mind you. Sure, they've been kidnapping Sunni civilians, drilling holes in their skulls, beheading them then dumping the corpses on city streets or burying them in schoolyards - but all of this been "healthy," says Gerecht, because it has made the Sunnis and Kurds fear "Shiite power." Or something. To be honest, Gerecht's column is filled with so many canards, delusions and logical inconsistencies that it often leaves the plane of rational discourse altogether. But its import is clear: by daring to defy Washington's edicts now and then, the Shiites have gotten too big for their britches and must be brought to heel - along with the rest of the scum who are making the Dear Leader look bad back home.
You think that's a joke, but it's not. One of Gerecht's main reasons for "pacifying" Baghdad in a hydra-headed war on every ethnic faction is because "the U.S. media will never write many optimistic stories about Iraq if journalists fear going outside" the city's fortified Green Zone. There you have the Bushist vision in a nutshell. The war is not actually happening in the real world, where real people are dying by the tens of thousands; no, it's really being fought on the monitors of Fox News, CNN and NBC, in the flimsy pages of the New York Times and Washington Post, and on the overheated airwaves of talk radio. Baghdad must be pacified - like Grozny, like Guernica - so that Americans can see a few more peppy stories on the tube on their way to the ballgame or the mall.
The fate of Fallujah provides a template of the grim fate awaiting Baghdad if Gerecht and the government P-Nackers have their way. Fallujah was encircled in a ring of iron; water, electricity and food supplies were cut off (a flagrant war crime). The city was bombed for eight weeks, then hit by an all-out ground attack with both conventional and chemical weapons - white phosphorous and napalm - which killed thousands of civilians and left more than 200,000 homeless. Among the first targets were Fallujah's hospitals and clinics (another flagrant war crime): some were destroyed, killing doctors and patients alike, others were seized and closed, all in order to prevent any stories about civilian casualties from reaching the Western media, the Pentagon's "information warfare" specialists told the New York Times. Once again, manufactured image trumped blood-stained reality.
Perhaps this cup will pass from Baghdad. Perhaps Bush and his P-Nackers will instead move forward with their frenzied plans for a nuclear strike on Iran, as the New Yorker reported last week. But Gerecht's article is a perfect snapshot of the depraved minds that now rule America. Somewhere, somehow - and soon - another city is going to die.
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A Maniacal Messianic Prepares To Fulfill His Destiny By Ted Rall "I have fulfilled my destiny," the president says manically. He has just entered the nuclear launch codes that will trigger World War III. Seconds later, he emerges from a bunker. The Secretary of State squeezes between two soldiers. "Mr. President!" he shouts. "We have a diplomatic solution!" He smiles. "It's too late," he replies. "The missiles are flying. Alleluia. Alleluia." The above scene, from David Cronenberg's 1983 adaptation of the horror novel "The Dead Zone," is a classic if slightly preposterous nightmare of a world destroyed by a demented demagogue. Now, incredibly, a lunatic out of a Stephen King movie has brought the United States to the brink of Armageddon. Until I read Seymour Hersh's expose in The New Yorker and subsequent follow-up coverage by other journalists about the Bush Administration's plans to start a war against Iran, I had dismissed talk of George W. Bush's messianism as so much Beltway chatter. True, he hears voices, even claiming that God and Jesus Christ talk to him. "I believe God wants me to run for president," he told a friend in Texas. Eschewing mainstream religion, he routinely parrots the apocalyptic ravings of fringe Christianist cults: "And the light [America] has shone in the darkness [the enemies of America], and the darkness will not overcome it [America shall conquer its enemies]," he said during his fevered campaign for war against Iraq. He mimics Old Testament cadences: "God told me to strike at Al Qaeda and I struck them," Bush told the Palestinian prime minister in 2003, "and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam, which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East." Nooor-mal. Despite the man's wacky religiosity, I have been giving Bush the benefit of a small amount of remaining doubt after five years of the most disastrous rule this nation has ever suffered. I believed that he was breathtakingly bigoted, stupid and ignorant. But I didn't think he was out of his mind. Until now. "Current and former American military and intelligence officials" tell Hersh "that President Bush is determined to deny the Iranian regime the opportunity to begin a pilot program, planned for this spring, to enrich uranium." Of course, uranium enrichment for peaceful atomic energy is permitted by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, to which Iran is a signatory. Which is what the Iranians say they're doing. But the Bush Administration, which knows a little about lying, doesn't believe them. Fair enough: One only has to consider the risk of nuclear conflagration between India and Pakistan to see why the fewer countries have nukes, the better. Not every country can be trusted with such terrifying weapons. So how does the trustworthy United States plan to make its stand against nuclear proliferation? By nuking Iran. "One of the military's initial option plans," reports Hersh, "...calls for the use of a bunker-buster tactical nuclear weapon, such as the B61-11, against underground nuclear sites." An intelligence insider says that "Every other option, in the view of the nuclear weaponeers, would leave a gap. 'Decisive' is the key word of the Air Force's planning. It's a tough decision. But we made it in Japan." "We're talking about mushroom clouds, radiation, mass casualties, and contamination over years," he went on. Crazy stuff. But whenever someone inside the Administration opposes the nuclear option, "They're shouted down." The pro-nuke faction, led by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, is responding to internal critics with a "B61 [nuclear bomb] with more blast and less radiation." You may have heard that Bush dismissed Hersh's article as "wild speculation." At first I, like you, responded with a sigh of relief. But I've come to learn that Bush doesn't talk like a human being. His policy pronouncements are carefully lawyered to give him the kind of technical out that Bill Clinton could only have dreamed of. Bushspeak is crafted to ensure that what Mr. Straightshooter says is rarely what he means. Filtering "wild speculation" statement through Bushspeak analysis shows that it's no denial at all. "The doctrine of prevention is to work together to prevent the Iranians from having a nuclear weapon," Bush said. Notice that, despite the disaster in Iraq, he still reserves the right to wage preemptive war. He continued: "I know here in Washington prevention means force. It doesn't mean force necessarily. In this case it means diplomacy." It doesn't mean force necessarily. If and when a reporter reminds Bush of this statement after he attacks Iran, he will say that he never took the military option--including nukes--off the table. Moreover, he'll say, that he told the truth at the time. Thus the present tense: means. Bush has not denied Hersh's article. Therefore, we should accept it as accurate. We already know that Bush is capable of lying about his willingness to use diplomacy instead of war. "We're still in the final stages of diplomacy," he told reporters on March 6, 2003. "I'm spending a lot of time on the phone, talking to fellow leaders about the need for the United Nations Security Council to state the facts, which is Saddam Hussein hasn't disarmed...Iraq is a part of the war on terror. Iraq is a country that has got terrorist ties." Actually, Bush had decided to invade Iraq months--probably years--before. He had moved hundreds of thousands of American troops into the Persian Gulf. Two weeks later, he ordered an assassination attempt on Saddam Hussein and began the saturation bombing of Baghdad. But Bush was still talking as if there were something Saddam could do to avoid war. "Our demands are that Saddam Hussein disarm," he went on. "We hope he does." Sure. Many people have asked me during the last year whether I thought Bush would attack Iran. I said no, because he's out of troops, out of cash and out of political capital. He couldn't so he wouldn't.
Those things are still true. Not to mention that Iran would make Iraq look like a cakewalk. Yet, as Hersh reports, the U.S. may bomb at least 400 cities and towns inside Iran. "Air Force planning groups are drawing up lists of targets, and teams of American combat troops have been ordered into Iran, under cover, to collect targeting data and to establish contact with anti-government ethnic-minority groups." You don't need troops, money or the support of the American people when God talks to you. And when you're insane.
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'Jack Bauer' Bush & Rummy By Robert Parry Like the plot from this year's TV terrorism drama "24," suspicions over who's at fault for a real-life string of U.S. military and political disasters have swirled around top administration officials before settling on the ultimate culprit: an arrogant, self-centered President who has put in motion dangerous forces that he can't control. This season's "24" may not be an intentional case of art imitating life. But there are striking similarities between the fictional President Charles Logan and President George W. Bush - as well as in the dilemma the nation faces containing the damage caused by an in-over-his-head Chief Executive. But there are differences, too. In the "24" plot, counter-terrorism agent Jack Bauer (Kiefer Sutherland) turns over evidence to Defense Secretary James Heller in a bid to thwart President Logan. In real America, a half dozen retired generals call for the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld when the preponderance of blame should land on Bush. The real-life generals fault Rumsfeld for invading Iraq without a coherent strategy for achieving a reasonable result, without sufficient force levels to secure the country, and without enough body armor and protective vehicles for U.S. troops to withstand the favorite insurgent tactic of using improvised explosive devices along roadways. Some of the retired generals also say the stalemate in Iraq - and the anger it has stirred throughout the Middle East - have undermined the global war on terrorism. "I do not believe Secretary Rumsfeld is the right person to fight that war based on his absolute failures in managing the war against Saddam (Hussein) in Iraq," retired Maj. Gen. Charles H. Swannack Jr. told the New York Times. [NYT, April 14, 2006] In seeking Rumsfeld's ouster, Swannack joined five other retired generals who all served in the Bush administration: Maj. Gen. Paul D. Eaton, Lt. Gen. Gregory Newbold, Maj. Gen. John Batiste, Maj. Gen. John Riggs, and Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni. So far, Bush has refused to consider replacing Rumsfeld. The revolt of the generals also reveals broader fears about Bush's proclivity to use the military to resolve tricky diplomatic problems. Bush, who like many of his top advisers avoided military service in Vietnam, tends to see the world in cinematic black-and-white - "good versus evil" - rather than in the subtler grays of real life. In an essay in Time magazine, Gen. Newbold said the decision to invade Iraq, a country peripheral to the War on Terror, "was done with a casualness and swagger that are the special province of those who have never had to execute these missions - or bury the results." Time, dated April 15, 2006. Iran Subtext But beyond the retired generals' disgust over how the Iraq War was waged, their extraordinary complaints have another unstated subtext - the Pentagon's growing alarm over Bush's rapidly advancing plans for attacking Iran. Those plans reportedly include an option for using tactical nuclear weapons. As investigative reporter Seymour Hersh reported in The New Yorker, a number of senior U.S. officers are troubled by administration war planners who believe "bunker-busting" tactical nuclear weapons, known as B61-11s, are the only way to destroy Iran's nuclear facilities buried deep underground. "Every other option, in the view of the nuclear weaponeers, would leave a gap," a former senior intelligence official told Hersh. "'Decisive' is the key word of the Air Force's planning. It's a tough decision. But we made it in Japan." This former official said the White House has refused to remove the nuclear option from the plans despite objections from the Joint Chiefs of Staff. "Whenever anybody tries to get it out, they're shouted down," the ex-official told Hersh. New Yorker, dated April 17, 2006. Indeed, the six retired generals may have demonstrated as much frankness as can be expected in seeking Rumfeld's resignation. In Washington, political scapegoating is a time-honored tradition because demanding that the President take responsibility for national catastrophes is often viewed as too extreme or too disruptive. So, instead of fingering Bush and other policy architects like Vice President Dick Cheney, the retired generals have pointed toward Rumsfeld for removal. Some pundits, such as the Washington Post's David Ignatius, have urged Bush to demonstrate bipartisanship by replacing Rumsfeld with a pro-war Democrat like Sen. Joe Lieberman or a centrist Republican like Sen. Chuck Hagel. But that likelihood appears slim. Some longtime Washington observers believe Bush wouldn't dare put an outsider at the Pentagon now because the newcomer would have to be briefed on too many secrets: about the Iraq War, the torture guidelines, the warrantless spying on Americans, and more. An independent-minded person might blow the whistle. So, Bush may see little choice but to tough it out with his veteran team, hoping to withstand any challenges to his power and the secrecy that surrounds it. Plame-gate While fending off bloody setbacks in Iraq and weighing even greater risks in Iran, Bush also is facing investigations into his own actions. Bush is implicated in what special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald has deemed a "concerted" effort by the White House to "discredit, punish or seek revenge against" former Ambassador Joseph Wilson for criticizing Bush's pre-war deceptions about Iraq seeking enriched uranium from Niger. Bush has acknowledged that he declassified intelligence secrets in June 2003 so they could be leaked to chosen reporters for the purpose of discrediting Wilson. That initiative led to the public disclosure that Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, was a CIA officer who had been working undercover on projects to prevent the spread of unconventional weapons. While Bush has not been directly implicated in leaking Plame's identity, he did join the cover-up when the Plame case exploded into a scandal in September 2003. Though Bush knew a great deal about how the anti-Wilson scheme got started - since he was involved in starting it - he uttered misleading public statements to conceal the White House role. "If there is a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is," Bush said on Sept. 30, 2003. "I want to know the truth. If anybody has got any information inside our administration or outside our administration, it would be helpful if they came forward with the information so we can find out whether or not these allegations are true and get on about the business." At that moment, as Bush was professing his curiosity and calling for anyone with information to step forward, he was withholding the fact that he had authorized the declassification of some secrets on the Niger uranium issue and ordered those secrets to be given to reporters to undercut Wilson. But Bush acted like he had no information that would be helpful to investigators. Bush played dumb in a performance that fans of "24" might have expected from the devious President Logan. In fall 2003, Bush might still have felt he could get away with the deception because the Plame case was being handled by Attorney General John Ashcroft. But in late 2003, Ashcroft was forced to recuse himself because of his close White House ties. The investigation was turned over to Fitzgerald, the U.S. Attorney in Chicago. A few months later, as Fitzgerald intensified the investigation, Bush quietly hired a personal criminal attorney, James Sharp, who then accompanied the President to a 70-minute interview with Fitzgerald on June 24, 2004. Though not under oath, Bush would have opened himself to charges of making false statements to a federal investigator and obstructing justice if he repeated the deceptive comments he made publicly in September 2003. Those crimes can be felonies and potentially impeachable offenses. Full Truth But if Bush told Fitzgerald the full truth in June 2004, the President would have to acknowledge that he made false and misleading statements several months earlier. Then, if Bush's deposition had leaked before the November 2004 election, his campaign might have been swamped in the scandal of him lying to the American people. So there was a possible motive for Bush to continue with his misleading comments. After the closed-door interview between Bush and Fitzgerald, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said, "No one wants to get to the bottom of this matter more than the President does." To this day, however, Bush has refused to divulge what he told Fitzgerald on the grounds that there's an ongoing investigation, even though - as a witness - he is not bound by the demands of secrecy that apply to the prosecutor. In the latter half of 2004, Fitzgerald concentrated on compelling the cooperation of key journalists who had received leaks about Plame's identity. That strategy did not bear fruit until well after Bush had secured a second term through the closely fought Election 2004. Almost a full year later, in October 2005, Fitzgerald indicted Cheney's chief of staff I. Lewis Libby on five counts of perjury, false statements and obstruction of justice - for allegedly lying about his role in leaking Plame's identity to reporters. Other details about Libby's grand jury testimony did not surface until April 2006, when Fitzgerald disclosed in a court filing that Libby claimed he met with those reporters only on orders from Bush and Cheney. That led to new questions about the roles of the President and Vice President. If Fitzgerald ever decides that Bush and Cheney also broke the law, his options include referring them to the House Judiciary Committee for impeachment proceedings. Yet, despite the evidence that Bush sought to confuse investigators with his misleading public statements in 2003, Fitzgerald appears to be shying away from a constitutional crisis. But it's unclear what the next twists and turns in this political drama might be. As in the fictional world of "24," when presidential wrongdoing is indicated, most U.S. officials bend over backwards and look the other way, rather than accept the possibility that the President of the United States is a criminal and/or a threat to national security.
But President Bush appears to have one other clear advantage over President Logan. In real life, there's no Jack Bauer digging out the truth.
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| Post Scandal Reflects The Murdoch Method On the remarkable videotape that shows Jared Paul Stern allegedly trying to shake down California billionaire Ronald Burkle, the New York Post gossip writer explains succinctly to his prospective client how his world works. If you make "friends" with the powerful gossips who operate Page Six by paying them or their loved ones, then your future will include fewer bad items and more good items. "It's a little bit like the Mafia," says Mr. Stern on the soundtrack, echoing a similar remark made last year by a fired Page Six reporter. Such preening babble lacks subtlety but still points toward a significant truth. Whether the Post is as corruptible as the Stern tape sensationally suggests or not, there can be no doubt that proprietor Rupert Murdoch has long used the News Corporation's assets to reward his friends and punish his enemies. His company isn't a criminal enterprise, but he has often skirted the appearance of sleaze and worse. So any wayward tough guys who have worked for him may only be emulating the godfather's dubious example. To comprehend Mr. Murdoch's unsavory stewardship of his media empire, it is worth looking back to the earliest years following his arrival in the United States. From the very beginning, he shamelessly abused the Post's pages to promote politicians he liked and denigrate those he didn't, as he still does today with all his news outlets. The first inkling of something even worse came during the late winter of 1980. Jimmy Carter, the incumbent President challenged by the insurgent liberal candidacy of Senator Edward Kennedy, badly needed to win the critical Democratic primary in New York. Mr. Murdoch, owner of Ansett Airlines, a troubled Australian aviation company, badly needed a cheap government loan to buy new planes from Boeing. On Feb. 19, 1980, Mr. Murdoch visited Washington, D.C., to meet with the chairman of the U.S. Export-Import Bank, a federal agency that loans money to finance foreign purchases of American products. (That was well before the Australian-born press lord sought U.S. citizenship so that he could legally buy up American broadcasting properties.) After pleading his case for corporate welfare, he went to the White House for lunch with Mr. Carter. Three days later, on Feb. 22, the Post endorsed the Democratic President on the front page (a decision abruptly rescinded in the fall when the paper rudely dumped Mr. Carter and backed Ronald Reagan.) And six days after that endorsement appeared, the Ex-Im Bank approved a $290 million loan to Ansett Airlines on easy terms. That happy series of coincidences soon drew the attention of the Senate Banking Committee, where Mr. Murdoch and other witnesses swore that the loan had nothing to do with the endorsement. The Post publisher conceded that the circumstances could be "misconstrued," however, and said he would avoid such mistakes in the future. It was a touching vow, made with the same sincerity as a promise by Tony Soprano to quit loan-sharking. A long list of prominent politicians have benefited from the largesse of the Murdoch empire since that embarrassing day so long ago. In the world capitals where the Post endorsement doesn't mean much, and where Mr. Murdoch seeks tax breaks, regulatory favors and broadcasting licenses, the media mogul can bestow other reciprocal rewards. Over the years, his companies have handed out lucrative book contracts to such political eminences as Margaret Thatcher, Newt Gingrich, Mikhail and Raisa Gorbachev (for separate his-and-hers memoirs), and Boris Yeltsin. The Thatcher government coddled him by overlooking potential regulatory restrictions on two of News Corp.'s most important acquisitions, The Times of London in 1981 and the Sky satellite network in 1990. Exemptions from the Monopolies Act and the Broadcasting Act were worth far, far more than the few million pounds advanced to the Iron Lady for her memoirs. Within weeks after Mr. Gingrich's Republicans won control of Congress in 1994, he met with Mr. Murdoch in the Capitol. And not long after that, the new Speaker's literary agent had an offer of $4.5 million from HarperCollins, the News Corp. publishing subsidiary, for a two-book contract. Bad as that episode smelled, a worse fragrance has wafted from the Murdoch enterprise in China, where he won broadcasting privileges from the corrupt Communist regime. For a reported advance of $1 million, News Corp. published the stunningly awful hagiography of party boss Deng Xiaoping, authored by daughter Deng Rong. Meanwhile, Mr. Murdoch tried to suppress a critical book on China by the renowned British diplomat Christopher Patten.
Whatever may result from the F.B.I.'s investigation of the "Page Fix" affair, this scandal will at least bring renewed scrutiny to the appalling journalistic standards and practices of the Murdoch media. Their influence both at home and abroad should renew the debate over whether democracy can survive such concentrated private control of news, opinion and entertainment-especially if the management tends to operate "a little like the Mafia."
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How Long Will MoveOn.Org Fail To Oppose Bombing Iran? By Norman Solomon MoveOn.org sent out an email with the subject line "Don't Nuke Iran" to three million people on April 12. "There is one place where all of us can agree: Americans don't support a pre-emptive nuclear attack on Iran, and Congress must act to prevent the president from launching one before it's too late," the message said. And: "Please take a moment to add your name to our petition to stop a nuclear attack on Iran." The petition's two sentences only convey opposition to a "nuclear" attack on Iran: "Congress and President Bush must rule out attacking Iran with nuclear weapons. Even the threat of a nuclear attack eliminates some of the best options we have for diplomacy, and the consequences could be catastrophic." In MoveOn's mass email letter, the only reference to a non-nuclear attack on Iran came in a solitary sentence without any followup: "Even a conventional attack would likely be a disaster." "Likely" be a disaster? Is there any U.S. military attack on Iran that plausibly would not be a disaster? There's no way around the conclusion that the signers of the letter ("Eli, Joan, Nita, Marika and the MoveOn.org Political Action Team") chose to avoid committing themselves -- and avoid devoting MoveOn resources -- to categorical opposition to bombing Iran.
In preparation for this article, I sent emails to each of the four signers of MoveOn's "Don't Nuke Iran" letter, asking them: 1) Why does the letter say nothing against a prospective non-nuclear attack on Iran other than comment that "a conventional attack would likely be a disaster"? 2) Why was the petition confined to opposing a "nuclear" attack on Iran rather than opposing any military attack on Iran? 3) Has MoveOn ever sent out a message to the three-million list taking a clear position against the U.S. attacking Iran (no matter what kind of weaponry would be used)? 4) If the answer to question #3 is "no," why not? A response came on April 13 from Eli Pariser, executive director of MoveOn. Here is his three-paragraph reply in its entirety: "As you know, our focus is on bringing people together around points of consensus. We build our advocacy agenda through dialogue with our members. Since we haven't done any work around Iran thus far, we saw the prospect of a nuclear attack as a good way to begin that conversation -- something everyone can agree was nuts. "As I mention in the ['Don't Nuke Iran'] email, a conventional attack poses many of the same risks as a nuclear one. But just as our Iraq campaign started with a position that attracted a broad membership -- 'Ask Tough Questions,' in August 2002 -- and then escalated, so we're trying here to engage folks beyond the 'peace' community in a national discussion about the consequences of war. "We wouldn't have had the membership to be able to run ads calling for an Iraq exit today if we'd confined our Iraq campaign to the true believers from the very beginning."
Opposition to any bombing of Iran inherently includes opposition to bombing Iran with nuclear weapons. But vice versa is not the case. And so far it is (so to speak) precisely the ambiguity of confining the MoveOn position to "Don't Nuke Iran" that MoveOn's leadership has embraced. As MoveOn's mass email stated on April 12, "There is one place where all of us can agree: Americans don't support a pre-emptive nuclear attack on Iran, and Congress must act to prevent the president from launching one before it's too late." As Eli Pariser wrote to me the next day, "our focus is on bringing people together around points of consensus." This approach debases the role of consensus in progressive political organizing. It shouldn't mean tailing the opinion polls or waving an organizational finger in the wind; nor should it mean taking cues from power brokers among congressional Democrats. Nor should a progressive organization avoid taking historically imperative positions in real time because they might interfere with feeding cash cows a diet of lines that seem optimum for maximizing the flow of "the mother's milk of politics" to pay for ads. The voices in Congress denouncing the prospect of a military attack on Iran, period, are in short supply right now. Yet as it happens, according to a nationwide poll jointly released by Bloomberg and the Los Angeles Times on April 13, the current inclinations of people in the United States are about evenly divided: "Forty-eight percent said they would support military action against Iran if it continues to produce material that can be used to develop a nuclear bomb, down from 57 percent in January. Forty percent oppose military action, up from 33 percent in January." As long as MoveOn's leaders (not to be confused with MoveOn's email recipients) want to confine MoveOn to mobilizing against use of nuclear weaponry in an attack on Iran, they're actually aiding a process that can dangerously reframe policy options -- so that some kind of military attack on Iran becomes increasingly accepted while much of the debate shifts to arguments over whether use of nuclear weapons in the attack should be ruled out. Of course the official scenarios for use of nuclear bombs are deranged and must be condemned. At the same time, in logical and practical terms, unequivocal opposition to bombing Iran signifies clear opposition to bombing Iran with nuclear weapons. Will those who put out MoveOn's email alerts and green light its advertising campaigns eventually use some of the group's resources to promote opposition to any and all bombing of Iran? It's probably a matter of time -- but every day of holding back from engaging in solid unambiguous opposition to any military attack on Iran is a day lost that can never be regained. The MoveOn apparatus is the largest single online mechanism for U.S. progressives to share information, present analysis and take action. But no one should wait for the people who control MoveOn's mass email flow to come around. There are significant efforts underway to utilize the Internet as part of efforts to prevent any attack on Iran. For example, as part of broader organizing campaigns, a coalition of groups has begun a Don't Attack Iran petition. And TrueMajority is promoting an equally valuable Don't Bomb Iran petition. An April 14 letter from TrueMajority says: "Click here to send a message to top Democrats, including Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid and House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, insisting they speak out loudly, now, against any plans to bomb Iran."
That's a message that MoveOn.org hasn't been willing to send.
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Setting The Record Straight By William Rivers Pitt
Bill Simmons, an excellent sportswriter for ESPN, uses a yardstick he calls the Unintentional Comedy Rating to measure the humor of events that were not designed to be funny. For example, level 86 on a scale of 100 is achieved by "any Wimbledon interview where Bud Collins tried to say something foreign to a non-American champion like 'danke shein.'"
A recent perusal of the White House web site unearthed a page that, I think, scores a perfect 100 on the Simmons scale. The page is titled Setting the Record Straight, and is intended to carry forth the administration's argument that it did nothing wrong in pushing for the invasion and occupation of Iraq. Note the rough-edged graphic at the top, meant to display the gritty reality of truth according to Bush and the boys. It isn't funny, not at all, and yet ... it is unintentional comedy of the purest ray serene, a perfect 100 no matter what the East German judges have to say. It is almost, dare I say, sublime.
Take note of the lack of substance to be found. Specifically, note that the rebuttals to accusations of wrongdoing offered here by the White House stop at November of 2005. That's funny all by itself. Just about every action taken by this administration that is now being exposed took place well before 2005. Most, including the leaking of Valerie Plame's name and the decisions to use false and debunked intelligence to defend the decision to invade, took place in 2003.
One document that is conspicuously absent from the White House's rebuttal page is the background briefing held by a "senior administration official" from July 18, 2003. The briefing focused on what the official described as "key judgments of the National Intelligence Estimate." Those key judgments, according to the official, conclude that Iraq was in possession of weapons of mass destruction, was embarked upon a significant program to develop nuclear weapons and had pursued uranium from Niger for this purpose.
We now know that the "senior administration official" delivering this briefing was none other than Lewis "Scooter" Libby, former chief of staff to Vice President Cheney, who is currently under indictment for perjury in the Plame investigation. The talking points from this July 18 briefing had already been given by Libby to New York Times reporter Judith Miller ten days before. Authorization for this leak to Miller came from none other than George W. Bush, who instructed Cheney to "get it out."
The reason for the scramble to spread the White House's version of WMD reality in Iraq has since become crystal clear: they were desperate to put forth a rebuttal to the editorial by Ambassador Joseph Wilson, published on July 6 by the New York Times, which completely dismantled the claims of nuclear threat from Iraq put forth by the administration to justify invasion.
The Libby leak to Miller, and the July 18 briefing ten days later, were all part of a coordinated effort by the White House to undermine and discredit Wilson. In the process, those involved outed Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, who was at the time a deep-cover CIA agent running a network dedicated to tracking any person, nation or group that might give weapons of mass destruction to terrorists.
It seems that for this White House, setting the record straight does not need to include these matters. Certainly, setting the record straight does not include the revelations made by the release of a newly declassified State Department memo described in a late-breaking story by t r u t h o u t investigative journalist Jason Leopold.
"Sixteen days before President Bush's January 28, 2003, State of the Union address," reported Leopold, "in which he said that the US learned from British intelligence that Iraq had attempted to acquire uranium from Africa - an explosive claim that helped pave the way to war - the State Department told the CIA that the documents the uranium claims were based upon were forgeries, according to a newly declassified State Department memo. The revelation of the warning from the closely guarded State Department memo is the first piece of hard evidence and the strongest to date that the Bush administration manipulated and ignored intelligence information in their zeal to win public support for invading Iraq."
The warnings from the State Department were joined at the time by reservations voiced by the International Atomic Energy Agency and American intelligence agencies, all of whom made concerted efforts to deliver their doubts to the White House. The doubts expressed were enough to keep Secretary of State Colin Powell from using the uranium-from-Niger claims in his now-infamous presentation to the United Nations. The White House, however, denies ever having been informed of such warnings.
"One high-ranking State Department official," reported Leopold, "said that when the department's analysts briefed Colin Powell about the Niger forgeries, Powell met with former Director of the CIA George Tenet and shared that information with him. Tenet then told Vice President Dick Cheney and then-National Security Adviser Condoleeza Rice and her former deputy, Stephen Hadley, that the uranium claims were 'dubious,' according to current and former State Department and CIA officials who have direct knowledge of what Tenet discussed with the White House at the time. The White House has long maintained that they were never briefed about the State Department's or the CIA's concerns related to the Niger uranium claims."
Leopold's report carries this statement from a high-ranking State Department official: "I refuse to believe that the findings of a four-star general and an envoy the CIA sent to Niger to personally investigate the accuracy of the intelligence, as well as our own research at the State Department, never got into the hands of President Bush or Vice President Cheney. I don't buy it."
Another bit of the record that has yet to be set straight can still be found on the White House web site, on a page titled Disarm Saddam Hussein. On this page, dated April 18, 2003, the White House states with no ambiguity that Iraq is in possession of 26,000 liters of anthrax, 38,000 liters of botulinum toxin, 500 tons of sarin, mustard gas and VX nerve agent - 500 tons being 1,000,000 pounds - plus almost 30,000 munitions to deliver the stuff, mobile biological weapons labs and connections to al Qaeda. The uranium-from-Niger accusations are also present here. These items were lifted directly from the text of Bush's 2003 State of the Union address.
Amusingly enough, the first item on the White House's "Setting the Record Straight" page is a scolding, directed at the Washington Post, for reporting that the administration knew that the mobile weapons labs claims were utter baloney when they made them. As for the anthrax, botulinum toxin, sarin, mustard gas, VX gas, munitions and connections to al Qaeda ... well ... the world now knows how true that was.
Setting the record straight? It is to laugh ... until you see the headlines from Tuesday:
Reuters: Ministry Copes With Rising Numbers of Orphaned Children
AP: Two Bodies Found in Baghdad
Reuters: Four Bodies Found in Yusufiya
KUNA: Two US Soldiers Wounded in Baghdad
AP: Clashes Force Closure of Baghdad District
Reuters: Gunmen Wound Three Policemen in Baiji
Reuters: Gunmen Kill Policeman, Wound Two Others in Tikrit
MassLive: Marine Injured by Bomb
Reuters: Baghdad Street Battle Smacks of Open Civil War
BNA: Gunmen Kill Two Endowment Authority Employees in Touz Kharmato
AP: Gunmen Kill Policeman in Basra, Bomb Wounds Civilian in Baghdad
AP: Bomb Under Couch at Baghdad Cafe Kills 7
AFP: New Rift Mars Iraq Unity Government Talks
AP: Car Bomb Kills Two Police in Iraq
It is to laugh, until you read the butcher's bill. 2,377 American soldiers have been killed, 49 of those deaths coming in the first eighteen days of April. Tens of thousands more have been wounded. Tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians have been killed and maimed. The country, and indeed the entire region, teeters on the verge of total chaos.
This administration thinks it can set the record straight with a page on their web site? Now that's funny. If the record were indeed ever made truly straight, if all the lies that have been told to such bloody and costly effect were presented before an empowered investigation or inside a courtroom, the men and women within this administration would be staring down the barrel of significant prison time.
Impeachment? That's small potatoes. They'd all be in jail for premeditated murder.
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 Heil Bush, Dear Propaganda Ansager Hannity, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your constant praise of der Fuhrer, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Media Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Wolf's Lair" formally 'Rancho de Bimbo' on 05-27-2006. We salute you herr Hannity, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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AUSTIN, Texas -- Personally, I think this is a really good time not to keep up. The more you try, the less sense it makes, although getting us used to having it all make no sense at all may be an extremely sneaky Karl Rove ploy to justify the war in Iraq. Hard to say.
The latest development to which the only appropriate response is, "Huh," is the news that the "mobile weapons labs" introduced to us by President Bush before the war as conclusive evidence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq were not evidence -- conclusive or otherwise -- of WMD and were not, in fact, mobile weapons labs.
The only thing new here is the news that George W. Bush likely knew a couple of days before he talked about them in public that the Defense Intelligence Agency had found they were not mobile weapons labs.
OK, given everything we already know about the lies before the war, this is not particularly startling -- although I do think it's long past time we stopped referring to the campaign of disinformation and false information that we were fed as anything but lies. No, the startling and funny part of the "mobile weapons lab" lie is the administration's defense of it, which is so batty it's an instant classic.
According to White House spokesman Scott McClellan, the DIA report debunking the "weapons labs" is "a complex intelligence white paper and it's ... one derived from highly classified information (and) takes a substantial amount of time to coordinate and to run through a declassification process."
If I understand what McClellan is saying, Bush leaked bad information from a classified intelligence report because there wasn't enough time for the contradictory DIA report to go through a declassification process. All of which would make more sense if we hadn't just gone through this Valerie Plame episode, where the White House says if the president leaked it, then it's legal to leak it. No problem, the president can declassify at will, they said. I don't know about you, but none of it is becoming clearer for me. Does anyone understand why we have to bomb Iran yet?
Meanwhile, Congress can't figure out how to do a deal on immigration. I'd like to stick my two cents in here to say the reason that deal fell apart and the reason it won't come back together is because of American business, which hires the illegals and donates the campaign money. Bless your sweet heart if you think the deal came unglued over the Republicans ignoring their base or some other political problem. Money, my friends, talks, and bull walks. Look at who wants illegal workers here. Look at who controls Congress.
Courtesy of the Daou Report on salon.com, I found this item on a blog called The Shape of Days, about the recent demonstrations: "There's really no other way to say it: Being here is weird. To be surrounded by a crowd of thousands of people, all of whom look alike, none of whom look like me, many of whom are decorated with our flag, none of whom are speaking our language, on our national Mall ... it's a surreal experience. Despite my best judgment and best intentions, I feel the inklings of xenophobia bubbling up inside. This place isn't for me; I don't belong here. It's time to go."
I suppose this citizen deserves credit for honesty, but I'm so much more amazed by his or her provincialism. I feel one of those rants about suburbia coming on. Never been in a public place before surrounded by people who speak a different language and look different from you? Can you live in a city and not have experienced that?
I was high just from seeing them all -- 500,000 in Dallas! Of course, most of us know the immigrants are there -- it's just so interesting to see them en masse. If you've ever wondered what this country would be like without illegal workers, now you've got the answer. It would come to a halt.
Let me point out again, I don't have a dog in this fight. There are just some things I know from living in Texas all my life. One is, don't bother to build a fence. Two is, if you want to stop illegal immigrants, stop the people who hire them -- quit punishing people who come because there are jobs. Three, this border has always been porous, and it has always worked to the advantage of the United States.
If you want to do the smart thing and look for a long-term solution, try fixing NAFTA and helping with economic development in Mexico. Meantime, I could do without the drivel about how these people are so different. Of course they're not. Try getting out a little more.
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Nuclear Weapons Against Iran
As Iran's nuclear controversy heats up one thing seems abundantly clear. George Bush cannot be allowed to use nuclear weapons to solve the problem. There is no more pressing issue on this planet, not the civil war in Iraq, not the crises in our immigration laws that have brought so many brave souls into the streets, not the voting machines that are dangerously uncheckable, not the nightmarish rollbacks of environmental laws that skew our resources for the benefit of a few desperate corporations, not the tax laws that rape more of our hard working citizens every day, not the decimation of the constituion by the Patriot Act and the domestic spying scandal, not the fading rights of women and working people.
Nothing is more important than stopping the strategic use of nuclear weapons against Iran, because if we open this pandora's box again it will surely be used against us in due time. Never mind the ethical issues, never mind the legal issues or the spiritual and psychological issues, let's talk about saving our own skin. We are the only nation on earth who has so far slaughtered fellow human beings with atomic weapons. Last time we barely got away with it, remember the Cuban Missile Crisis? This time I don't believe it will be so easy, not that the balance of terror between the US and Russia was easy. But this time there is simply no way we will be able to guarantee our safetly after an attack on a sovereign duly elected Islamic nation. Thousands of Muslims the world over will surely feel it's their right, infact their solemn duty, to destroy New York, and/or Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington with a similar weapon. We will from this day forward be a justifiably terrified nation. The Republic, already at risk because of our security fears, will cease to exist. We will have no choice but to become a military state.
Is this what George Bush and his people want? The end of democracy? Clearly they are not comfortable with the democracy in Iran. Most of us aren't. Most of us are no longer comfortable with what democracy has wrought here (George Bush's popularity rating being what it is), but does that give us the right to nuke him?
I don't believe George Bush is an evil man, or that even the people around him are evil (the "evil-doer" concept when applied to the complexity of a human being is hard for me to swallow.) I have watched them in office for the past six years and have come to realize they are nothing more than lost boys, frightened and therefor pugnacious, uninterested in sifting through conflicting, complex data because it makes decision making nearly impossible. It's pretty much impossible for all of us, none of us is handling the issues of our lives and our world very well and, frankly, I respect this administration for even trying. But in the end they have come at it like boys playing war, releasing their fears and frustrations at not being big enough by banging around and pretending with guns and posturing and dreaming of cowboy movies.
I don't know if President Bush really believes in the Apocalypse where the end of the world delivers the good souls to heaven and throws the evil ones into hell. I don't know if he believes, as it implies in scripture, that this Apocalypse will start with a fiery conflagration in the Middle East. I do know that there are millions of good people in America who believe it, good Christians who have supported George Bush with all their hearts, minds and pocketbooks, good people who have been brave and effective in ways that all the brilliant left wing elite could only dream of.
But I also believe that these good-hearted decent Christians need to think twice before they participate in the nuclear slaughter of hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of fellow human beings.
And the rest of us need to think twice too.
Whatever happened to turn the other cheek? Whatever happened to the deepest loving precepts of Christ? Isn't it possible that the book of Revelation is really about an internal Apocalypse? An Apolcylypse of personal rebirth, a spiritual rebirth that brings us to the Divine? And isn't it Christ that said the Kingdom of God is within us? Aren't many of the most profound and powerful aspects of being human "within us?" And I have heard it said that in fact the real concept of Jihad is not an external war against evil, but an internal one. Shouldn't we first purge the evil within ourselves?
He who is without sin, cast the first stone.
But these are difficult concepts, adult concepts and there's a difference between a boy and a man. Between a girl and a woman. These are not concepts that children are supposed to understand, children are supposed to play, that's their work. And to play properly they must be supervised. By adults. And if children are not supervised they are lost. And it appears to me that both sides of this emerging nuclear conflict between the Middle East and the West are monumentally lost and childish, just as nearly all the leaders in the past who have blundered their nations into war have too often been proven by history to be deluded and infantile. Wars have slaughtered billions of innocent men, woman and children, ending so many lives, torturing and maiming so many more and leaving a population on this planet dazed, frightened and hopelessly frozen in the kind of childishness that believes that the end of the world will save us when infact it's the end of being childish that will save us. Isn't that the kind of Apocalypse that the wise men of all religions and philosophies have been trying to talk about, an Apocalypse from childhood into adulthood?
Of course there are no easy answers to any of this. That's one of the terrifying realizations of adulthood, of wisdom. There will never be easy answers. Adult answers are not easy. But at this moment. At this particular moment there is one easy answer, an adult answer to some very lost, very frightened children: a very clear, very firm. No.
No.
No, George Bush, you cannot use nuclear weapons against Iran. No. Absolutely not and if you won't listen, then we must pour into the streets by the millions. If you can't hear us, we who are sitting generals must be as brave as George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. We must fight back, we must speak out, if necessary we must resign loudly. If you and your administration can't listen, we who are in Congress must stand up like the men and women we were elected to be. Real men and women. Like the men and woman who have stood up with wisdom down through history. And history will remember. And our moment in history is now. This moment. We must help George Bush and those around him understand that the answer to this very complicated grownup issue is a very simply, unequivocal --
NO!
... Matt Davies ...  |
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I am me and Rummy's he, Iraq is free and we are all together
Sitting on my own brain, waiting for the end of days
I am the egg head,
Baghdad city policeman sitting pretty little targets in a row
Yellow cake plutonium, imaginary WMD's
I am the egg head,
Sitting in the White house garden talking to the Lord
I am the egg head,
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Parting Shots...
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Few people understand that one of the most notorious individuals in British history may have contributed to the lineage of our current president. Aleister Crowley, a.k.a., "The Great Beast 666" -- the infamous practitioner of "sex magick" whose motto was "Do What Thou Wilt" -- came to know a great many remarkable people, including the maternal grandmother of George W. Bush. "Know," in this case, may be taken in the Biblical sense. Evidence points to the disturbing possibility that he was the true father of Barbara Bush, the former First Lady and mother to George W. Bush. The story may seem difficult to believe at first, until one learns more about the social inter-relations that tied together these unlikely parties. Specifically, we must focus on a fascinating woman named Pauline Pierce, born Pauline Robinson -- whose third child was named Barbara. Most sources divulge little about this woman. We learn more about her husband Marvin Pierce, the president of the McCall Corporation, which published McCall's magazine and Redbook. He married Pauline, a beautiful young socialite, in 1919. Their first child, Martha, was born the next year; the second, James, was born in 1921. At this time, Aleister Crowley inhabited what must have seemed a very different world, as he embarked upon the great communal experiment of the Abbey of Thelema in Italy. Pauline, however, had a hidden side -- what we might call (without intending any judgment or insult) a wild side. We get a whiff of it from this Wikipedia entry: W magazine once described her as "beautiful, fabulous, critical, and meddling" and "a former beauty from Ohio with extravagant tastes"... Rumors that Pauline had an affair with Dwight D. Eisenhower have never been verified... Still, gossip tabloids from the '40s often associated her with prominent men in politics and film. I have not yet been able to acquire independent confirmation of the Eisenhower liaison, although I personally see no reason to doubt that it existed. However, we may well have reason to believe that she began her "experimental" period before the 1940s. A sixth-level initiate within the OTO (the Ordo Templi Orientis, the mystical society that Crowely came to head in the 1920s) first set me down this research path by revealing that Pauline Robinson had befriended an woman named Nellie O'Hara, an American adventuress who, at some point during her European travels, met the famed writer Frank Harris. Despite his advancing years, Harris still maintained a reputation for sexual excess that rivaled Crowley's. During this period (1919-1927), Nellie and Frank Harris lived as man and wife, although they could not actually wed because Harris' second wife was still alive and would not grant a divorce. Harris and Crowley were good friends. Not only that: At this time, and not for the last time, Crowley was very much the proverbial "friend in need." During the Abbey period, a Crowley follower had accidentally died during a magickal ceremony. The incident created a firestorm of unwanted publicity (the sensationalist British press labeled Crowley "The Wickedest Man in the World"), which prompted Mussolini's government to expel Crowley and his followers from Italian soil. By 1924, he lived in poverty in France, where Frank Harris kindly took him under his roof. This arrangement inevitably brought Crowley into contact with Nellie. Crowley's diaries, to which I have been given access, clearly indicate that he depended on Harris for financial assistance: January 3rd 1924 - "No luck about cash yet: but F.H. promises 500 fr to-morrow - so that I can bolt to Paris. One step onward to the Establishment of the Law of Thelema. The money soon ran out, and AC (as his associates called him) soon had to ask his friend for further assistance. At this time, Harris was writing his multi-volume "erotic autobiography," My Life and Loves; he also purchased a newspaper, The Evening Telegram. But he lacked the resources and management skills to make the enterprise a success, and soon found himself in a financial position no better than Crowley's. Despite his parlous economic circumstances, Crowley focused his attention on sex magick. Not many years previously, he and a follower named Jeanne Foster (a.k.a. Soror Hilarion) had conducted a sex-magickal rite designed to give birth to a child destined to carry on Crowley's work. I have not been able to determine whether he conducted similar experiments with Nellie, although given the polyamorous proclivities of all the parties involved, one should not discount the possibility. Nellie's friend Pauline no doubt scandalized her social circle by traveling to France on her own and leaving two very young children in the care of nursemaids. However, her correspondence with her friend -- whose life in France with a famous literary figure must have seemed quite glamorous -- can only have inspired a sense of wanderlust. Her husband, increasingly bound to his duties with the McCall Corporation, did not share this spirit of adventure. Thus it was that four individuals came together: Frank Harris, Nellie O'Hara, Pauline Pierce, and Aleister Crowley. Anyone who has studied Crowley's life will understand that what happened next was, in a sense, inevitable. Crowley's diaries for this period record the initials "PVN," a cryptic reference to his favorite sexual position, which some of his partners found distasteful. (The letters derive from the Latin for "By way of the Infernal Entrance.") This is a common annotation in the records of Crowley's magical practices. We also find the strange initials "ECL." After researching the matter for some time, I have come to the conclusion that this is a reference to the practice known as "Eroto-Comotose Lucidity." Before proceeding, I should emphasize that the year 1924 has a special significance in the Crowley chrnology. At this time, he is said to have undergone the "supreme ordeal" connected with his attainment of the Grade of Ipsissimus, the highest magickal achievement within his order. The exact nature of this ordeal remains mysterious. I believe that an important clue can be found in his description of the rite of Eroto-Comotose Lucidity: The Candidate is made ready for the Ordeal by general athletic training, and by feasting. On the appointed day he is attended by one or more chosen and experienced attendants whose duty is (a) to exhaust him sexually by every known means (b) to rouse him sexually by every known means. Every device and artifice of the courtesan is to be employed, and every stimulant known to the physician. Nor should the attendants reck of danger, but hunt down ruthlessly their appointed prey. Finally the Candidate will into a sleep of utter exhaustion, resembling coma, and it is now that delicacy and skill must be exquisite. Let him be roused from this sleep by stimulation of a definitely and exclusively sexual type. Yet if convenient, music wisely regulated will assist. The attendants will watch with assiduity for signs of waking; and the moment these occur, all stimulation must cease instantly, and the Candidate be allowed to fall again into sleep; but no sooner has this happened than the former practice is resumed. This alteration is to continue indefinitely until the Candidate is in a state which is neither sleep nor waking, and in which his Spirit, set free by perfect exhaustion of the body, and yet prevented from entering the City of Sleep, communes with the Most High and the Most Holy Lord God of its being, maker of heaven and earth. The Ordeal terminates by failure---the occurence of sleep invincible--- or by success, in which ultimate waking is followed by a final performance of the sexual act. The Initiate may then be allowed to sleep, or the practice may be renewed and persisted in until death ends all. The most favourable death is that occurring during the orgasm, and is called Mors Justi. As it is written: Let me die the death of the Righteous, and let my last end be like his! If he did undergo this "ordeal" in 1924, then we must presume that his key associates of that time -- including Nellie and Pauline -- functioned as his assistants. Pauline returned to America in early October of 1924. On June 8, 1925, she gave birth to a girl named Barbara. Barbara Pierce married George H.W. Bush, who eventually became the 41st President of the United States. But who was Barbara's father? The chronology indicates that it could have been Crowley, but it could just as easily have been Marvin Pierce. The truth regarding Crowlean sexual rituals is disclosed only to the highest initiates of the OTO, in a document misleadingly titled "Emblems and Modes of Use." Is Aleister Crowley the father of Barbara Bush? Even she may not know for certain; indeed, I have no way of knowing whether she has ever been told that this possibility exists. However, more than one person has noted the resemblance -- and this resemblance is not just physical. Many will recall the former First Lady's haughty and thoughtless remarks in the aftermath of the Katrina disaster. Those "in the know" were reminded of Aleister Crowley's similar reaction to the loss of life which occurred during the ascent of Kangchanjunga, an expedition he commanded: "This is precisely the sort of thing with which I have no sympathy whatsoever."
I leave the matter for the reader to decide. |
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In This Edition
Howard Zinn looks through, "America's Blinders."
Uri Avnery wants to know, "Who's The Dog? Who's The Tail?"
John Gideon with a new series, "The Approaching 2006 E-Voting 'Train Wreck.'"
Jim Hightower observes, "A Telling Picture."
Mary Pitt wonders, "So You Want To Be A Citizen?"
Chris Floyd considers, "Rage And Light."
William Rivers Pitt is going through dem, "Changes."
Robert Parry reports, "Bush Brandishes Jail Time At Critics."
Joe Conason asks, "Bush Hears Voices, But Does He Listen?"
Norman Solomon explains, "When "Diplomacy" Means War."
Frank Scott reminds us not to, "Act Now, Pray Later."
Washington Post editor Tony Blankley wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award!'
Molly Ivins takes up, "The Israel Debate."
Sheila Samples begs to differ with Bush, "We Are The Deciders."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department 'The White House.Org' returns with another "Ask The White House" but first Uncle Ernie is having a deja vue, all over again in, "The Twi-Light Zone Revisited."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Bob Englehart with additional cartoons from Derf City, MoPaul, Micah Wright, Tom Tomorrow, Vic Harville, Dubya's World.Com, Steve Bradenton, Mark Bryan, Democrats.Com and Dana Summers.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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The Twi-Light Zone Revisited Just when you thought that it couldn't possibly get any stranger than it already is... By Ernest Stewart
"Uncle Ernie's Hollywood Daze" --- On The Road To Los Angles I Hear The Voices --- George W. Bush --- 04/18/06
According to conventional wisdom Bush is the most powerful man on the planet. But the man with all the launch codes is in reality; and has always been, Gomer Pyle's evil twin. No matter whose puppet he is, no matter that in the Crime Family Bush he only rates as Fredo, he still can kill us all on a whim and Rummy, Kindasleezy, Ole Dead Eye and the rest won't lift a finger to stop him. Nor does it matter that he got his Bachelors in history from Yale and a MBA from Harvard and knows nothing of either, he's never earned a thing in his life except criminal charges (think of the war crime charges to come) truly born with a silver coke spoon up his nose. Bush is perhaps the only person in the history of Taxus that drilled for oil and couldn't find any! He lost millions in other peoples money, dumped his stocks just before the word got out and walked away a whole lot richer without a scratch. Of course stock swindling is another old Crime Family Bush tradition, just ask brother Neil about that! No, Smirky the Wonder Chimp is just that, the village idiot, not to mention a coward, a bully and as his blowing up frogs and things with cherry bombs in his youth pointed to but was apparently over-looked by both Pater and Mater a mass murderer! A mass murderer who is beginning to feel the stress from committing all those war crimes, all that treason, torture, sedition, theft and such that he's becoming ever-so-paranoid ala those last few months in der Fuhrer Bunker as the Red army closed in on Berlin. Fortunately for "the allies" Adolph didn't have at his fingertips the ability to destroy the world in a matter of minutes when he too lost what little mind he had left! That is not the problem for Bush, in just one of our "Boomer" subs he has more power than all of the weapons of WWII combined. Our west Taxus prairie monkey being the spoiled brat, little rich kid that he is, is about to reach out and touch someone with baby-bunker-buster nukes each of which is 60 times more powerful than the bomb we dropped on Hiroshima and will kill an estimated 3 million and decimate the lives of 33 million more in four countries, two of which have nukes of their own. How happy do you think our fallout, falling on their citizens is going to make these folks? Can you see the problem the world is facing? Can you see how those problems will soon be effecting you and I? Yes I've heard the argument that Smirky's on a leash and has many sets of puppet strings from Daddy Dearest, to Wall Street, to Tel Aviv, to Riyadh, to Beijing, to Bentonville, to control him. Still, like a bad Jerry Lewis movie (I know, what other kind are there?) the maniac may get loose and we could soon find ourselves all holding hands and singing "We'll Meet Again" ala the last scenes from Dr. Strangelove. Will we nuke Iran before or after the November selections; for those of you who use electronic voting machines, and elections for everybody else! The end-of-days crowd says to look out for the summer 2007! In Other News... I see another Bush flack Tony (Fat Tony) Blankley has crawled out from under his rock over at the Rev. Sun Myung Moon's American fifth column a.k.a. the Washington Times. Fat Tony's latest "bright idea" is to charge any military types who disagree with Smirky and Rummy or who resign their commission in protest with sedition and or mutiny. While Fat Tony does know a lot about sedition and treason; as a "made man" and the editorial director for the Crime Family Moon's American criminal enterprise the aforementioned Times, he commits them on a daily basis! I seem to recall; something from many centuries ago when I too was "A bold old, cold old, dirty, nasty, soldier," from the old "Uniform Code Of Military Justice?" Something about not having to follow an illegal order? You know the law that we put in the code after hanging a bunch of people who kept saying something about how they were "only following ze orders?" As I recall my old Sergeant used to say something about that while doing a lot of grinning and winking but there it was! In fact of point I wrote a few letters to Lyndon Baines about our last major quagmire and why he wanted me to blow up hamlets and slaughter innocent women and children and such? It turns out it was about making the American Military/Industrial/Media complex more complex and richer too! There's that pesky "history repeating itself again" thingie, once again, rearing it's ugly head! No what the Generals were doing was what every citizen is supposed to do at all times, "SPEAK THE TRUTH!" Tell it like it is and if that means that Bush comes out looking like an evil moron, "cest la guerre!" I could be wrong but I'm pretty sure the world already knows that Bush is an evil moron, don't they? Something that Fat Tony ought to check out and maybe even get some experience with, is telling the truth! You know, so that he wouldn't be viewed by everyone as a laughing stock, not to mention by his own words a seditious, traitor? I would remind Fat Tony that aiding and abetting seditious traitors like the Crime Family Bush and the Crime Family Moon makes one a seditious traitor too. And once again if memory serves the traditional punishment for those crimes is being drawn and quartered, eh Fat Tony? ******************************************** We would like to welcome John Gideon to our little band of "merry pranksters!" John joins us of his own free will!* We welcome your wisdom and wit! ******************************************** The new Election 2006 section is open. There are just a few candidates listed right now but the site will be updated constantly. If you know of someone running for a national office that we should know about just email the info and we'll help spread the word. Write "Election 2006" in the subject line.
We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
So how do you like the 2nd coup d'etat so far?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
 America's Blinders By Howard Zinn Now that most Americans no longer believe in the war, now that they no longer trust Bush and his Administration, now that the evidence of deception has become overwhelming (so overwhelming that even the major media, always late, have begun to register indignation), we might ask: How come so many people were so easily fooled? The question is important because it might help us understand why Americans - members of the media as well as the ordinary citizen - rushed to declare their support as the President was sending troops halfway around the world to Iraq. A small example of the innocence (or obsequiousness, to be more exact) of the press is the way it reacted to Colin Powell's presentation in February 2003 to the Security Council, a month before the invasion, a speech which may have set a record for the number of falsehoods told in one talk. In it, Powell confidently rattled off his "evidence": satellite photographs, audio records, reports from informants, with precise statistics on how many gallons of this and that existed for chemical warfare. The New York Times was breathless with admiration. The Washington Post editorial was titled "Irrefutable" and declared that after Powell's talk "it is hard to imagine how anyone could doubt that Iraq possesses weapons of mass destruction." It seems to me there are two reasons, which go deep into our national culture, and which help explain the vulnerability of the press and of the citizenry to outrageous lies whose consequences bring death to tens of thousands of people. If we can understand those reasons, we can guard ourselves better against being deceived. One is in the dimension of time, that is, an absence of historical perspective. The other is in the dimension of space, that is, an inability to think outside the boundaries of nationalism. We are penned in by the arrogant idea that this country is the center of the universe, exceptionally virtuous, admirable, superior. If we don't know history, then we are ready meat for carnivorous politicians and the intellectuals and journalists who supply the carving knives. I am not speaking of the history we learned in school, a history subservient to our political leaders, from the much-admired Founding Fathers to the Presidents of recent years. I mean a history which is honest about the past. If we don't know that history, then any President can stand up to the battery of microphones, declare that we must go to war, and we will have no basis for challenging him. He will say that the nation is in danger, that democracy and liberty are at stake, and that we must therefore send ships and planes to destroy our new enemy, and we will have no reason to disbelieve him. But if we know some history, if we know how many times Presidents have made similar declarations to the country, and how they turned out to be lies, we will not be fooled. Although some of us may pride ourselves that we were never fooled, we still might accept as our civic duty the responsibility to buttress our fellow citizens against the mendacity of our high officials. We would remind whoever we can that President Polk lied to the nation about the reason for going to war with Mexico in 1846. It wasn't that Mexico "shed American blood upon the American soil," but that Polk, and the slave-owning aristocracy, coveted half of Mexico. We would point out that President McKinley lied in 1898 about the reason for invading Cuba, saying we wanted to liberate the Cubans from Spanish control, but the truth is that we really wanted Spain out of Cuba so that the island could be open to United Fruit and other American corporations. He also lied about the reasons for our war in the Philippines, claiming we only wanted to "civilize" the Filipinos, while the real reason was to own a valuable piece of real estate in the far Pacific, even if we had to kill hundreds of thousands of Filipinos to accomplish that. President Woodrow Wilson - so often characterized in our history books as an "idealist" - lied about the reasons for entering the First World War, saying it was a war to "make the world safe for democracy," when it was really a war to make the world safe for the Western imperial powers. Harry Truman lied when he said the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima because it was "a military target." Everyone lied about Vietnam - Kennedy about the extent of our involvement, Johnson about the Gulf of Tonkin, Nixon about the secret bombing of Cambodia, all of them claiming it was to keep South Vietnam free of communism, but really wanting to keep South Vietnam as an American outpost at the edge of the Asian continent. Reagan lied about the invasion of Grenada, claiming falsely that it was a threat to the United States. The elder Bush lied about the invasion of Panama, leading to the death of thousands of ordinary citizens in that country. And he lied again about the reason for attacking Iraq in 1991 - hardly to defend the integrity of Kuwait (can one imagine Bush heartstricken over Iraq's taking of Kuwait?), rather to assert U.S. power in the oil-rich Middle East. Given the overwhelming record of lies told to justify wars, how could anyone listening to the younger Bush believe him as he laid out the reasons for invading Iraq? Would we not instinctively rebel against the sacrifice of lives for oil? A careful reading of history might give us another safeguard against being deceived. It would make clear that there has always been, and is today, a profound conflict of interest between the government and the people of the United States. This thought startles most people, because it goes against everything we have been taught. We have been led to believe that, from the beginning, as our Founding Fathers put it in the Preamble to the Constitution, it was "we the people" who established the new government after the Revolution. When the eminent historian Charles Beard suggested, a hundred years ago, that the Constitution represented not the working people, not the slaves, but the slaveholders, the merchants, the bondholders, he became the object of an indignant editorial in The New York Times. Our culture demands, in its very language, that we accept a commonality of interest binding all of us to one another. We mustn't talk about classes. Only Marxists do that, although James Madison, "Father of the Constitution," said, thirty years before Marx was born that there was an inevitable conflict in society between those who had property and those who did not. Our present leaders are not so candid. They bombard us with phrases like "national interest," "national security," and "national defense" as if all of these concepts applied equally to all of us, colored or white, rich or poor, as if General Motors and Halliburton have the same interests as the rest of us, as if George Bush has the same interest as the young man or woman he sends to war. Surely, in the history of lies told to the population, this is the biggest lie. In the history of secrets, withheld from the American people, this is the biggest secret: that there are classes with different interests in this country. To ignore that - not to know that the history of our country is a history of slaveowner against slave, landlord against tenant, corporation against worker, rich against poor - is to render us helpless before all the lesser lies told to us by people in power. If we as citizens start out with an understanding that these people up there - the President, the Congress, the Supreme Court, all those institutions pretending to be "checks and balances" - do not have our interests at heart, we are on a course towards the truth. Not to know that is to make us helpless before determined liars. The deeply ingrained belief - no, not from birth but from the educational system and from our culture in general - that the United States is an especially virtuous nation makes us especially vulnerable to government deception. It starts early, in the first grade, when we are compelled to "pledge allegiance" (before we even know what that means), forced to proclaim that we are a nation with "liberty and justice for all." And then come the countless ceremonies, whether at the ballpark or elsewhere, where we are expected to stand and bow our heads during the singing of the "Star-Spangled Banner," announcing that we are "the land of the free and the home of the brave." There is also the unofficial national anthem "God Bless America," and you are looked on with suspicion if you ask why we would expect God to single out this one nation - just 5 percent of the world's population - for his or her blessing. If your starting point for evaluating the world around you is the firm belief that this nation is somehow endowed by Providence with unique qualities that make it morally superior to every other nation on Earth, then you are not likely to question the President when he says we are sending our troops here or there, or bombing this or that, in order to spread our values - democracy, liberty, and let's not forget free enterprise - to some God-forsaken (literally) place in the world. It becomes necessary then, if we are going to protect ourselves and our fellow citizens against policies that will be disastrous not only for other people but for Americans too, that we face some facts that disturb the idea of a uniquely virtuous nation. These facts are embarrassing, but must be faced if we are to be honest. We must face our long history of ethnic cleansing, in which millions of Indians were driven off their land by means of massacres and forced evacuations. And our long history, still not behind us, of slavery, segregation, and racism. We must face our record of imperial conquest, in the Caribbean and in the Pacific, our shameful wars against small countries a tenth our size: Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, Afghanistan, Iraq. And the lingering memory of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It is not a history of which we can be proud. Our leaders have taken it for granted, and planted that belief in the minds of many people, that we are entitled, because of our moral superiority, to dominate the world. At the end of World War II, Henry Luce, with an arrogance appropriate to the owner of Time, Life, and Fortune, pronounced this "the American century," saying that victory in the war gave the United States the right "to exert upon the world the full impact of our influence, for such purposes as we see fit and by such means as we see fit." Both the Republican and Democratic parties have embraced this notion. George Bush, in his Inaugural Address on January 20, 2005, said that spreading liberty around the world was "the calling of our time." Years before that, in 1993, President Bill Clinton, speaking at a West Point commencement, declared: "The values you learned here . . . will be able to spread throughout this country and throughout the world and give other people the opportunity to live as you have lived, to fulfill your God-given capacities." What is the idea of our moral superiority based on? Surely not on our behavior toward people in other parts of the world. Is it based on how well people in the United States live? The World Health Organization in 2000 ranked countries in terms of overall health performance, and the United States was thirty-seventh on the list, though it spends more per capita for health care than any other nation. One of five children in this, the richest country in the world, is born in poverty. There are more than forty countries that have better records on infant mortality. Cuba does better. And there is a sure sign of sickness in society when we lead the world in the number of people in prison - more than two million.
A more honest estimate of ourselves as a nation would prepare us all for the next barrage of lies that will accompany the next proposal to inflict our power on some other part of the world. It might also inspire us to create a different history for ourselves, by taking our country away from the liars and killers who govern it, and by rejecting nationalist arrogance, so that we can join the rest of the human race in the common cause of peace and justice.
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Who's The Dog? Who's The Tail? By Uri Avnery I DON'T usually tell these stories, because they might give rise to the suspicion that I am paranoid. For example: 27 years ago, I was invited to give a lecture-tour in 30 American universities, including all the most prestigious ones - Harvard, Yale, Princeton, MIT, Berkeley and so on. My host was the Fellowship of Reconciliation, a respected non-Jewish organization, but the lectures themselves were to be held under the auspices of the Jewish Bet-Hillel chaplains. On arrival at the airport in New York I was met by one of the organizers. "There is a slight hitch," he told me, "29 of the Rabbis have cancelled your lecture." In the end, all the lectures did take place, under the auspices of Christian chaplains. When we came to the lone Rabbi who had not cancelled my lecture, he told me the secret: the lectures had been forbidden in a confidential letter from the Anti-Defamation League, the thought-police of the Jewish establishment. The salient phrase has stuck to my memory: "While it cannot be said that Member of the Knesset Avnery is a traitor, yet..." AND ANOTHER story from real life: a year later I went to Washington DC in order to "sell" the Two-State solution, which at the time was considered an outlandish, not to say crazy, idea. In the course of the visit, the Quakers were so kind as to arrange a press conference for me. When I arrived, I was amazed. The hall was crammed full, practically all the important American media were represented. Many had come straight from a press conference held by Golda Meir, who was also in town. The event was to last an hour, as is usual, but the journalists did not let go. They bombarded me with questions for another two hours. Clearly, what I had to say was quite new to them and they were interested. I was curious how this would be reported in the media. And indeed, the reaction was stunning: not a word appeared in any of the newspapers, on radio or TV. Not one single word. By the way, three years ago I again held a press conference, this time on Capitol Hill in Washington. It was an exact replica of the last time: the crowd of reporters, their obvious interest, the continuation of the conference well beyond the appointed time - and not a single word in the media. I COULD tell some more stories like these, but the point is made. I recount them only in connection with the scandal recently caused by two American professors, Stephen Walt of Harvard and John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago. They published a research paper on the influence of the Israel lobby in the United States. In 80 pages, 40 of them footnotes and sources, the two show how the pro-Israel lobby exercises unbridled power in the US capital, how it terrorizes the members of the Senate and the House of Representatives, how the White House dances to its tune (if indeed a house can dance), how the important media obey its orders and how the universities, too, live in fear of it. The paper caused a storm. And I don't mean the predictable wild attacks by the "friends of Israel" - which means almost all politicians, journalists and professors. These pelted the authors with all the usual accusations: that they were anti-Semites, that they were resurrecting the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and so forth. There was something paradoxical in these attacks, since they only illustrated the authors' case. But the debate that fascinates me is of a different nature. It broke out between senior intellectuals, from the legendary Noam Chomsky, the guru of the Left throughout the world (including Israel), to progressive websites everywhere. The bone of contention: the conclusion of the paper that the Jewish-Israeli lobby dominates US foreign policy and subjugates it to Israeli interests - in glaring contradiction to the national interest of the US itself. A case in point: the American assault on Iraq. Chomsky and others rose up against this assertion. They do not deny the factual findings of the two professors, but object to their conclusions. In their view, it is not the Israel lobby that directs American policy, but the interests of the big corporations that dominate the American empire and exploit Israel for their own selfish aims. Simply put: does the dog wag its tail, or does the tail wag its dog? I AM NERVOUS about sticking my head into a debate between such illustrious intellectuals, but I feel obliged to express my view nevertheless. I'll start with the Jew, who went to the Rabbi and complained about his neighbor. "You are right'" the Rabbi declared. Then came the neighbor and denounced the complainant. "You are right'" the Rabbi announced. "But how can that be," exclaimed the Rabbi's wife, "Only one of the two can be right!" "You are right, too," the Rabbi said. I find myself in a similar situation. I think that both sides are right (and hope to be right, myself, too). The findings of the two professors are right to the last detail. Every Senator and Congressman knows that criticizing the Israeli government is political suicide. Two of them, a Senator and a Congressman, tried - and were politically executed. The Jewish lobby was fully mobilized against them and hounded them out of office. This was done openly, to set a public example. If the Israeli government wanted a law tomorrow annulling the Ten Commandments, 95 Senators (at least) would sign the bill forthwith. President Bush, for example, has withdrawn from all the established American positions regarding our conflict. He accepts automatically the positions of our government, be they as they may. Almost all the American media are closed to Palestinians and Israeli peace activists. As to professors - almost all of them know which side of their bread is peanut-buttered. If, in spite of that, somebody dares to open their mouth against the Israeli policy - as happens once every few years - they are smothered under a volley of denunciations: anti-Semite, Holocaust denier, neo-Nazi. By the way, American guests in Israel, who know that at home it is forbidden to mention the influence of the Jewish-Israeli lobby, are dumbfounded to see that here the lobby does not hide its power in Washington but openly boasts of it. The question, therefore, is not whether the two professors are right in their findings. The question is what conclusions can be drawn from them. LET'S TAKE the Iraq affair. Who is the dog? Who the tail? The Israeli government prayed for this attack, which has eliminated the strategic threat posed by Iraq. America was pushed into the war by a group of Neo-Conservatives, almost all of them Jews, who had a huge influence on the White House. In the past, some of them had acted as advisers to Binyamin Netanyahu. On the face of it, a clear case. The pro-Israeli lobby pushed for the war, Israel is its main beneficiary. If the war ends in a disaster for America, Israel will undoubtedly be blamed. Really? What about the American aim of getting their hands on the main oil reserves of the world, in order to dominate the world economy? What about the aim of placing an American garrison in the center of the main oil-producing area, on top of the Iraqi oil, between the oil of Saudi Arabia, Iran and the Caspian Sea? What about the immense influence of the big oil companies on the Bush family? What about the big multinational corporations, whose outstanding representative is Dick Cheney, that hoped to make hundreds of billions from the "reconstruction of Iraq"? The lesson of the Iraq affair is that the American-Israeli connection is strongest when it seems that American interests and Israeli Interests are one (irrespective of whether that is really the case in the long run). The US uses Israel to dominate the Middle East, Israel uses the US to dominate Palestine. But if something exceptional happens, such as the Jonathan Pollard espionage affair or the sale of an Israeli spy plane to China, and a gap opens between the interests of the two sides, America is quite capable of slapping Israel in the face. AMERICAN-ISRAELI relations are indeed unique. It seems that they have no precedent in history. It is as if King Herod had given orders to Augustus Caesar and appointed the members of the Roman senate. I don't think that this phenomenon can be wholly explained by economic interests. Even the most orthodox Marxist must recognize that it also has a spiritual dimension. It is no accident that American (as well as British) fundamentalist Christians invented the Zionist idea well before Theodor Herzl hit upon it. The evangelical lobby is no less important in today's Washington than the Zionist one. According to its ideology, the Jews must take possession of all the Holy Land in order to make the Second Coming of Christ possible (and then - the part they don't shout about - some Jews will become Christians and the rest will be annihilated at Armaggedon, today's Meggido in Northern Israel). At the basis of the phenomenon lies the uncanny similarity between the two national-religious stories, the American myth and the Israeli. In both, pioneers persecuted for their religion reached the shores of the Promised Land. They were forced to defend themselves against the "savage" natives, who were out to destroy them. They redeemed the land, made the desert bloom, created, with God's help, a flourishing, democratic and moral society.
Both societies live in a state of denial and unconscious guilt feelings - over there because of the genocide committed against the Native Americans and the horrifying slavery of the blacks, here because of the uprooting of half the Palestinian people and the oppression of the other half. Both here and there, people believe in an eternal war between the Sons of Light and the Sons of Darkness.
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 The Approaching 2006 E-Voting 'Train Wreck' Part Three: Are We Making Headway or Losing The Battle? By John Gideon While We Continue to Connect the Dots the Media Continues to Fail To... It is a fact that this primary season is proving to be a disaster. The locomotives of the voting machine vendors and unwary, naive elections officials are headed down the same tracks, straight towards each other, in many states. The vendors only have the bags of government provided cash in sight and they don't seem to care about anything but putting those bags into their coffers. They don't seem to care about signing contracts that they know they cannot meet. They seem to be under the impression that "act now and apologize later" is good business. They seem to understand that the only criteria for getting paid for contracts with the government is having signed the contract. As for the elections officials well, they are blinded by the lights of the fast approaching locomotive and many can only apologize and cover for the vendors. They just don't seem to know, or care - or acknowledge that they either know or care -- that the same story is playing out in the next county over and in the next state over. Ignorance is supposed to be bliss, but it also spells chaos for elections. But wait, all may not be lost. This past week we have seen a bit of progress toward stopping the chaos of ES&S in Indiana and Oregon, while West Virginia just doesn't seem to know or care what is happening to them. As well, New Jersey may be making headway against their bad acting vendor, Sequoia Voting Systems... Indiana Investigates MicroVote and ES&S MicroVote is a fairly unknown voting machine company outside of their home state of Indiana. If they continue with their lack of work ethic they soon won't be heard from in Indiana anymore either. Recently the state found that MicroVote had installed software uncertified by both the fed and the state in voting machines of 47 Indiana counties. As reported by the WISH-TV I-Team, MicroVote management was invited to be sworn in and testify as to why they knowingly sold and installed uncertified software on the Infinity voting machines in those 47 counties. VoteTrustUSA reports that MicroVote has just now sent their software to a federal Independent Test Authority (ITA) to be tested and qualified for use. The state will then have to review the paperwork and certify the software for use in Indiana. All of this with less than two weeks before the Indiana primary. In the meantime counties have been put into a position of having to make a choice. Do they use the potentially still-uncertified software or do they ignore federal and state law and simply not provide a voting system for voters with disabilities? Some counties are choosing to ignore state law and use the uncertified machines. Others will make that decision next week. Elections Systems & Software (ES&S) is now reportedly "groveling" and apologizing to state officials for not having done any better in the state. Some counties are still awaiting delivery of memory packs for the iVotronic Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) voting machines. Thirteen of the memory packs received by Harrison County had mistakes in programming and needed to be returned. Meanwhile officials in other counties are inspecting and testing their machines and peripherals. In many cases those officials are not sure they can be ready. WTHR-TV relates[ "It will be a miracle. We are going to have to work around the clock. They are going to have to work around the clock," said Jill Jackson, Johnson County Clerk. "They" are ES&S, Election Systems and Software. While frontline personnel were busy checking PEB's (personal electronic ballots), their boss, John Groh, was groveling before Indiana's Secretary of State. "In situations where we have not performed up to our own high expectations we apologize. Personally I apologize for that," Groh said at an informational meeting called by Indiana Secretary of State Todd Rokita. But apologies may not be enough for Rokita, who is considering levying fines against the Omaha, Nebraska company for delays and inaccuracies in their voting systems. It's already caused major problems in Johnson County where the county commissioners invested in 459 Ivotronic voting machines which were not ready for absentee voters on April 3. As a result, the county set up temporary voting booths. County Clerk Jackson is very concerned. "I am not in the habit of missing statutory deadlines, but I feel like this was out of my control. I relied on the vendor to meet the deadlines when they sold us the service. They need to make sure they are not missing deadlines." Both MicroVote and ES&S face $300,000 fines for each violation of Indiana state election laws. One can only hope that the state protects the voters from unethical voting machine vendors like these two. Summit County Ohio; the Poster Child For Equipment Failures Yes, the same Summit County that has been having memory card problems, has reported that there seems to be no end to the problems. The Cincinnati Enquirer report: The voting system uses paper ballots, marked in pen by the voter, that are fed into a scanner. The elections board has been having problems in practice runs with the machines' memory cards, which are inserted into ballot scanners to record and tabulate those votes. Some of the cards' batteries have run out and other cards have broken. "One card is physically coming apart at the seams," said elections chief Bryan Williams. Also not working properly is the main ballot tabulator, called the election reporting manager or ERM. It's supposed to read the memory cards and report totals but has been dropping off dozens of races for Republican candidates for precinct committee members. The machines the county purchased to accommodate disabled voters also are having problems. Those machines are supposed to have a computer say candidates' names for voters but the names are being mispronounced, or the ballot is being misread or not read at all. And what is the result for the county of all of these failures by ES&S? As reported earlier this week by the Akron Beacon-Journal: Now, in what is clearly a show of "No Confidence" in their voting machine vendor ES&S, the county elections director is predicting failure with the system in the May 2 Ohio state primary. Summit County Board of Elections Director Bryan Williams is predicting Election Day failures with the memory cards in the county's new optical scan voting system. ``I don't think we can assume anything else,'' Williams said at a meeting Tuesday, where the elections board reviewed the latest list of troubles. It is amazing that ES&S has driven a county election official to say that he actually has no confidence in the elections in his county. It has actually gotten that bad. Oregon's Secretary of State Sues ES&S For Breach of Contract Bill Bradbury, Secretary of State of Oregon, has finally had his fill of ES&S and announced that he has filed, on behalf of the state, a lawsuit against ES&S for breach of contract for failure to deliver the electronic voting machines that would allow people with disabilities to vote privately and independently. Oregon has contracted with ES&S for AutoMark voting machines to satisfy the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) requirement for disabled-accessible voting. The contract terms were agreed to by all parties. Over six months later ES&S decided that they wanted to change the terms of the contract. The state would not agree to these changes so ES&S told them they would not deliver. In a statement Secretary Bradbury said: "I'm disappointed in ES&S," said Bradbury. "They agreed to provide us with voting machines, they didn't follow through on that agreement, and that failure directly punishes people with disabilities." In the meantime the state has decided to use telephone voting for their disabled voters. This is the same system that has been used successfully in Vermont. West Virginia Secretary of State Makes Excuses for ES&S Early voting for the primary began in West Virginia this past week. Many of the state's counties were only able to put out paper ballots because ES&S has failed to provide programming for their voting machines. These machines were supposed to be used to meet the state's HAVA obligation. West Virginia counties are now afraid that the U.S. Department of Justice may take action because they are not compliant. Voters with disabilities are being asked to 'bring a friend' if they come to the polls to vote early. The disabled-voting provisions in HAVA, of course, were theoretically to allow disabled voters to vote by themselves for the first time. Meanwhile WV Secretary of State Betty Ireland issued a press release - which at times sounded like a press release issued on behalf of ES&S -- which says, in part: "Voting machine vendors across the nation are faced with the daunting task of servicing all 50 states at one time," the release said. "Sometimes this can happen when sweeping federal legislation affects all 50 states," Ireland said in the release. "We understand that ES&S is working hard to meet the demands of all its customers. But we still intend to get what we paid for." In fact, ES&S knew what they were doing as they grabbed every possible opportunity to sign a contract with yet another customer. They completely ignored the fact that they would have actually have to provide service to those customers who they'd promised to service. And now they expect everyone to look the other way as they stumble into another election year unable to do so. With the good PR work from officials like Ireland they might just get away with it, but not until after our elections are affected negatively. Sequoia Voting Systems Has Problems In New Jersey The Local Source.Com reported on Wednesday that officials in Essex County New Jersey are concerned that they have not received the voting machines from Sequoia Voting Systems that the company was under contract to deliver. The county is short over 600 Advantage DRE machines and there are only 8 weeks until the state primary election. In a discussion between County Freeholders and Sequoia, the possibility of legal action has now been broached. Sequoia also still owes machines to Monmouth and Passaic Counties. Interestingly this meeting took place after the county had voted in favor of two contracts totaling over $107,000 for printer cartridges for the machines. But what about those voter verified paper audit trail (vvpat) printers? New Jersey law requires that all voting machines used in the state must provide a vvpat by January 1, 2008. On Friday, Assignment Judge Linda Feinberg ruled : "It is "questionable" whether the 8,000 or so Sequoia AVC Advantage machines used across the state can be upgraded by Jan. 1, 2008," Assignment Judge Linda Feinberg said in an opinion this week. Feinberg also said the state may have "grossly underestimated" the cost of replacing or retrofitting the Sequoia AVC Advantage machines. The state pegged the expense at $21 million, said the judge, who heard testimony last month. The Judge's findings now go to a state appeals court, which is trying to gauge whether these machines are so unreliable that they violate voters' constitutional rights. The panel asked Feinberg to determine if the advent of paper audit trails would render the issue moot. It appears to be clear that Sequoia may have taken a bit too big a bite of the apple and may end up choking on that bite. Time will tell how much chaos will ensue in New Jersey's elections.
Enjoy the ride until next week... |
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An AP photograph recently ran in several newspapers - a head shot of W giving a talk in the White House. He was in the forefront of the picture, looking his goofy self, while our stately first president appeared to be just behind him, peering sternly at George. It was only an oil painting of Washington that loomed from the wall to the right of Bush's head, but the contrast between Number One and number 43 was as unflattering for Bush as if the real man had stepped forward from history and stood beside him. The contrast was all the more striking because, on this very day, the White House was scrambling to explain yet another of Bush's lies. This one was George's flat-out claim in 2004 that he had no idea who had authorized the leak of some classified CIA information to reporters - a leak meant to discredit a prominent critic of Bush's Iraq invasion. "If there's a leak out of my administration," barked George W back then, "I want to know who it is. If the person has violated the law, that person will be taken care of." But - oops! - it now appears that the authorization came from the Leaker-in-Chief, Bush himself! Rather than tell the truth, however, the Bushites proceeded to lie about the lie. White House PR flack Scott McClellan began flimming and flamming as fast as he could go, claiming that since Bush has the power to declassify government secrets, any information that he might have okayed to be leaked was - ergo, ipso facto, and presto chango - not really classified. This is Jim Hightower saying... This is a version of Nixon's imperious assertion that "When the president does it, that means that it is not illegal." One thing for sure: George W is a whole lot closer to Nixon's ethics than to George Washington's. And that's why Karl should never let Little George be pictured with the Big Guy.
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My Aunt Tildie has been gone for an extended visit with one of her granddaughters and I thought it would be nice to see her again. I love her active mind, her awareness of whar is going on in the world amd had missed her irrepressible commentary on social problems. As I rang her bell, I could hear the bustle inside as she came to the door, threw it open wide, and motioned me to sit in the usual chair. Without the amenity of the usual offer of a cup of tea or other social protocols, she began telling me what was on her mind.
"Did you see it? Well, did you?" she gushed.
"See what, Aunt Tildie?" I queried, "What are you talking about?"
"The so-called immigrants protesting in the streets demanding their rights and citizenship, as if they had earned them!" she blurted.
"Yes, Aunt Tildie, I saw them but I had no idea that they would upset you so."
The very old lady paused for a deep breath, which she obviously needed, since her face had turned bright red from the excitement and the barrage of words. "Well,"she continued, " there were signs saying, 'I am not a criminal", when by the very fact of having sneaked across the border, they all became criminals, whether that was their intent or not. There were signs demanding 'the vote'! How could they possibly think that they could vote when they have no idea of the issues or the candidates. Besides, we have plenty of voters like that already! That's how we got into this mess in the first place."
"Now, now, Aunt Tildie," I interjected, "I know that you have a real point in there someplace. Suppose you just settle down, collect your thoughts, and tell me what it is about all this that really bothers you."
"You're right, child," (I love it when she calls me "child".) "Suppose we have a cup of tea and I will tell you why I am so irate."
As we sat and stirred our tea, she began again, more quietly. "You know, we have always taken great pride in our nation and our family's service to it, as patriotic as can be, and we revere our founders and the vision they had which was responsible for their creation of a free country, one of law and order, in which we could all work together for the common good. I lost a husband in World War I and a fiancee in the Spanish flu which followed after. Your own brothers and others of my nephews served in World War II, some perished, and others came home with terrible wounds and mental problems, but none of us, including them, ever questioned the rightness of their sacrifice.
"That's what it means to be a citizen of this great country, to love it enough to sacrifice everything for its continuation. We have seen many immigrants from many nations come to our shores. The Africans, of course, had no choice in the matter, being kidnaped and brought in as slaves. but they became as good citizens as any. So did the Irish in fleeing the potato famine, the Jews fleeing persecution in Europe, and all the rest who dreamed for years of a life of freedom and opportunity. They all suffered prejudice and poverty until they learned our language and adapted to the American way of life.
"They were all different, but they had one thing in common. They knocked on the door, so to speak, made application to immigrate and they waited their turn for admission. They filed their papers and were processed according to our laws and, once here, they worked hard at learning our language and our way of doing things until now, when they are part of our common culture and our destiny. This is also true of those of Mexican ancestry whose ancestors were either here at the time of the founding or legally migrated later.
"But these people have broken down our back door and come into our home, taken the food from our children, stolen our jobs, our schools, and our health care, and now they insist that we put their name on the title to the house! It just is not right!"
Sensing the sweet lady becoming more upset, I attempted to mollify her by suggesting that it was an "interesting" way of looking at the problem, but she had not finished. "I saw a show on CNN today. They had a Mexican lady who was working in Georgia. She had sent money home for a smuggler to bring her children over, but they were stopped and sent back. She went back to visit them! She said that she told them that if they wanted her to, she would stay with them, but they wanted her to come back and send for them so they could go to school. Then she cried because she got caught driving without a license and had to pay bail, so that she is now afraid to drive. Doesn't she know that the same thing would happen to me if I were to drive without a license?
"And why doesn't she have a license? Because she is not a citizen! And she is not a citizen because she doesn't belong here! If she had done the proper paperwork and waited in line as so many of her countrymen are doing, she might have been here legally by now, be going to school to learn to speak English, and have her children with her, growing up and learning to be Americans. Or, if she and all the rest like her had stayed in their own country and worked to make the needed changes as our own pioneers did, they might have had an entirely different country and would not need to leave it to better themselves. But that is the problem the world over, Everyone wants what they want NOW! Instant gratification is the order of the day!"
"But, what are we to do with them? The Democrats seem to agree with the President that we need another amnesty because it would be impossible to round them all up and ship them home. There are just too many," I asked.
"We don't need to round them up and ship them back! We can enforce the law against hiring them. We can forbid the free medical care, the free education for their children so that they will know that they have to go home. We can set a date, three years, five years, while we secure the border, that they have to go home. Have offices ready in Mexico to issue secure identity cards like the ones some states use for food stamps, a swipe card with a secret PIN number. They will have to go back to get the card and then we can keep track of them and know where they are."
"I don't mean to argue with you," I said, "but what do you think of the idea that would make it a felony for churches and charitable agencies to provide assistance to them or to hide them from law enforcement?"
"Heavens no!" she exclaimed, "That's what they do! We don't want to kill them! We just want them to go home and stay there until they have permission to come back to work, but not to stay. There are no problems in this situation that cannot be worked out with compassion and common sense. Even the status of the children born here can be provided for with a little work, cooperation, and thought."
"Well, they don't seem to want to pay their dues for citizenship but think they only have to get here and then, perhaps pay for the privilege," I suggested.
"Pay their dues! I like that _expression!" she chortled, "Previous immigrants paid their dues, for sure. Long before they came here, they applied for visas and then they waited, sometimes for years. During that time, they studied and they planned. They knew that they must know some English and so they studied; they read and talked to people who had been here; they considered which part of this great land would suit them better for climate and have work that they knew how to do. They didn't just throw a pack on their back and sneak across the border in the middle of the night to come here and just take whatever they want!
"Then they come out and parade in our streets under a Mexican flag and claim that they were here first! These people not only do not know a thing about the history of the United States; they don't know much of their own history! First, only the indigenous people of the Southwest and Northern Mexico were 'here first'. The rest are descended from the Conquistadores from Spain just as we come from the Northern Europeans. They also conveniently forget that the United States won the Mexican War! American soldiers took the entire country but, finding nobody with the authority to surrender, the President declared Mexico 'ungovernable', called the soldiers home, re-drew the boundary lines of the United States to the present configuration, and 'declared peace'!"
"That's interesting, Aunt Tildie," I responded, "I grew up in an area that was developed during the Mexican War but never studied much about it while I was in school."
"That's because there wasn't much to it! The Mexicans, under the French and Spanish rulers, had resented our taking of Texas and decided to take it back. In the process of trying, they were totally over-run, a new government was formed, and we lived in peace with them until the present day. But then, globalization took over our own government and they began making treaties like GATT, NAFTA, and CAFTA, American factories moved to Mexico's cheap labor and then, on to Southeast Asia. Their President Fox got together with President Bush and decided that an 'open-borders' policy was a good idea. Mexico virtually abandoned responsibility for their own economy and the welfare of their people. Now the people, having seen the American dream, have decided that it is theirs for the taking and our government has done nothing to stop them.
"One would think, given the seriousness of the situation, that our government could have increased the number of Green Cards that were issued to relieve the pressure, but administration decided to just let it happen! The Republican base were thrilled at the opportunity to obtain cheap labor "under the table" with no benefits and no insurance. This President appears to have no respect whatever for the traditional way of doing things or for the laws that were established for the purpose of establishing an orderly manner of society. He views himself not as an elected agent of the people, but as an absolute monarch! Saddam Hussein would not disarm fast enough to suit George W. Bush so we are now butchering millions of men, women, and children in Iraq, all over nothing at all, and soon it will be happening in Iran. While we are 'fighting them over there,' we have been invaded by millions of civilian Mexicans who have no loyalty for our country other than the fulfillment of their own needs."
"Yes, child," she concluded, "I am afraid that the American as we have known him has become a dying breed. Politics and personal gain has trumped patriotism and national sacrifice for the common good. Good old American common sense has gone the way of the dodo. Those who knew the way of life of a few years ago will pass on and the youth and immigrants will become the guides for a nation that will become prey for the other greedy nations. We will go the way of ancient Greece, just history and ruins. It makes me sad and very, very tired."
Not being willing to have the beloved old lady further upset by a discussion of the progress of the "world war on terror", I excused myself and left her, still deep in thought, nodding, in her rocking chair.
Aunt Tildie always leaves me with food for thought and I often enjoy it, but this spoonful of truth will not allow the strongest of antacids to cure the ache that it has put in my belly.
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We have praised Boston Globe columnist and novelist James Carroll highly here, and will do so again soon in a review of his upcoming book, House of War, which I have had the privilege and great pleasure of seeing in proof. The book, subtitled, The Pentagon and the Disastrous Rise of American Power, is a masterpiece, a landmark work that popularizes, and personalizes, the largely hidden history of America's moral and political corruption by the disease of militarism - an illness now reaching a perhaps fatal crisis.
But today, reluctantly, we have to take issue with Carroll's latest Globe column - or at least with one of its central insights. Carroll writes, correctly I think, of how "Americans' anger and despair" is shaping US policy:
"...anger and despair so precisely define the broad American mood that those emotions may be the only things that President Bush and his circle have in common with the surrounding legions of his antagonists. We are in anger and despair because every nightmare of which we were warned has come to pass. Bush's team is in anger and despair because their grand and -- to them -- selfless ambitions have been thwarted at every turn. Indeed, anger and despair can seem universally inevitable responses to what America has done and what it faces now.
"While the anger and despair of those on the margins of power only increase the experience of marginal powerlessness, the anger and despair of those who continue to shape national policy can be truly dangerous if such policy owes more to these emotions than to reasoned realism...."
Leaving aside the arguable notion that the Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld power faction actually feels "selfless" in their quest to impose "full spectrum dominance" on the world (as opposed to pursuing this dominance with mindless avidity, oblivious to any consideration of whether it hurts others or not), Carroll's analysis here is penetrating. But then he goes on to say:
"It was the Bush administration's anger and despair at its inability to capture Osama bin Laden that fueled the patent irrationality of the move against Saddam Hussein. The attack on Iraq three years ago was, at bottom, a blind act of rage at the way Al Qaeda and its leaders had eluded us in Afghanistan; a blindness that showed itself at once in the inadequacy of US war planning."
But here I think that Carroll's novelist's sensibility - personalizing, psychologizing - which serves him so well in his columns and the book, in this case fails to encompass the full political reality. Yes, the Bush factionalists are obviously wrathful characters given to patent irrationality in their policies and their underlying paranoid vision of the world. But their attack on Iraq had absolutely nothing to do with their emotional reaction to Osama bin Laden's apparent escape from their clutches in late 2001.
As Carroll himself delineates in House of War, the plan for invading Iraq is part of a long-term scheme to ensure American dominance of world affairs that goes back to the 1992 "Defense Planning Guidance" document drawn up by Paul Wolfowitz at the behest of then-Defense Secretary Dick Cheney. This plan was then revised, refined and expanded by a series of intertwined "think tanks" and pressure groups during the 1990s, culminating in the Project for a New American Century group, whose "Rebuilding America's Defenses" document, issued in September 2000 - a year before the 9/11 attacks, and several months before the Bush team took power in Washington - provides a detailed blueprint of the vast expansion and "forward thrust" of American military might that we have seen in the past five years. (I've written of this in much greater detail here.)
As often noted here, this PNAC document from 2000 explicitly stated that America should establish a military presence in Iraq no matter what the political situation in that country might be; this was an urgent need that "transcends the issue of the regime of Saddam Hussein." It is now abundantly clear, from a nearly overwhelming number of sources, including some from inside the Bush Administration itself, that the Bush Faction intended to invade Iraq from their first moments in power. As for the effect of September 11 on the faction, we also know that in the very first hours after the devastating attacks, Donald Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz were pushing for an attack on Iraq. This urge had nothing to do with Osama bin Laden's escape; this was before the assault on Afghanistan, before bin Laden's legendary escape at Tora Bora - indeed, bin Laden had not even been identified by the Bush Administration as the author of the attacks at that time.
So with all due respect to Carroll - and the massive research, masterly analysis and hearts blood he put into House of War commands enormous respect - on this particular point, I believe he is mistaken.
He is on much stronger ground, however, in the rest of the column, describing the fevered irrationality at work behind the present warmongering against Iran. The main thrust of the policy, as he says, seems to boil down to this: "To keep you from getting nukes, we will nuke you."
He then concludes, with deep insight:
"Set the cauldron of Iraq to boiling even hotter by daring Iran to join in against us. Justify Iran's impulse to obtain nuclear capacity by using our own nuclear capacity as a thermo-prod. How self-defeating can our actions get?
"Surely, something besides intelligent strategic theory is at work here. Yes. These are the policies of deeply frustrated, angry, and psychologically wounded people. Those of us who oppose them will yield to our own versions of anger and despair at our peril, and the world's. Fierce but reasoned opposition is more to the point than ever."
This is the crux of the matter: how to channel the unavoidable anger and despair produced by the murderous unreason of the nation's leaders into a response that does not itself become infected by the madness it must grapple with.
I confess that I don't know how to do this. And for a long time, I never felt the need to do it; it seemed to me that the articulation of rage and despair at the criminal regime was itself a necessary and important act, given the vast cloud of official lies and media mythmaking that sustained the Bush Faction at such a high level of popularity and unaccountability. You first had to make people see that something was wrong, abysmally wrong, with the Regime and its policies before you could even start trying to rectify the situation.
Now, of course, the Faction has lost its popularity; its myths have been punctured, and the stench of its corruption is pouring out through the fissures, sickening - and awakening - millions of people across the land. But the unaccountability - from most of the media and from almost the entire Establishment - still remains. There is, I think, still a pressing need for, in effect, shouting down the lies and myths that continue to enshroud the Regime. There is still the need, to borrow Henry Miller's phrase, for "inoculating the world with disillusionment."
But it's also true that the times now call for something more than this. Disillusionment and anger are still required, yes - but so is something more constructive. I don't know exactly what that should be. Nothing utopian, certainly; nothing that requires more of human nature than it can give, nothing that posits an end to the manifold imperfections and corruptions endemic to all humankind. Nothing exclusionary, nothing dogmatic -and nothing that partakes of the sickness unto death that has brought us to this degraded state: violence, brutality, vengeance, domination.
Whatever it is, I think it must be some form - or many forms, on many levels - of satyagraha, the Gandhian principle of resolute, non-violent resistance to evil, a force based on compassion, that "seeks to liquidate antagonisms but not the antagonists themselves." If this is not the guiding principle of dissent against the gargantuan engines of militarism, sectarianism, corporatism, ignorance and inequality that maim the world, then we are well and truly lost, and will become, in one fashion or another, a creature of the malign forces we hope to dethrone.
But how best to balance cleansing rage and healing compassion is a wisdom far beyond me at this point. "I and my bosom must debate awhile" on this matter. Meanwhile, James Carroll - despite the slight disagreement here - provides rich material for such meditations.
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Changes By William Rivers Pitt The beleaguered Bush White House has spent the last several weeks insisting that no major shake-up of the administration was necessary, and no reshuffling of personnel was in the works. Hm. The New York Times reported on Monday that James Baker III, the man who pulled George W. Bush's irons out of the fire in Florida during the 2000 recount, the Secretary of State and close confidant of the former president Bush, has been tapped to head up a "congressionally mandated, bipartisan effort to generate new ideas" regarding the chaos in Iraq. Baker will travel to Baghdad and the Mideast region on a "fact-finding mission," after which he will deliver to Mr. Bush "some advice and insights that might be useful to the policy makers in Washington." Whatever else can be said about Mr. Baker, few can deny his effectiveness as a field-general during difficult situations, and his reputation as a power-player is legendary in Washington. A man like this will not be a cipher under any circumstances, and the fact that he is being brought in to deal with the weightiest millstone around this administration's neck is telling. At first blush, the tectonic plates appear to be shifting along Pennsylvania Avenue. The removal of Andy Card as chief of staff, and the placement of Josh Bolten in that position, further indicates that the administration, notwithstanding their denials, intends to start doing things differently. Bolten is looking to be far more hands-on than his predecessor, a significant departure from the insular status quo that has dominated administration deliberations since day one. These seeming changes may only be cosmetic, however. The core of this administration has always been centered around three men - Cheney, Rumsfeld and Bush - and this core remains, for the time being, intact. There is also the added dynamic of the relationship between Baker and Bush. Bush has never entirely welcomed advice from his father, and to have his father's most gifted fixer come swooping in to rescue him once again must be galling. Will he chafe at the intrusion? Will Cheney allow his own domination of administration priorities to be diminished? The Defense Secretary is the wild card in the scenario. Rumsfeld, of course, has dug his heels in after absorbing unprecedented criticism of his tenure from a battery of six retired generals. Were it his decision to make, Rumsfeld would remain in his current position until the last minute of the last day of this administration. Ultimately, however, the decision may not be his to make. New York Senator Hillary Clinton has requested that the Senate Armed Services Committee hold hearings in which those six retired generals would be allowed to air their grievances with Mr. Rumsfeld. The chairman of this committee, Senator John Warner of Virginia, has said he will put the question to a vote before the entire committee. The eleven Democrats on this committee will almost certainly vote in favor of the hearings, which means only two of the thirteen Republicans on the committee have to join them to make these hearings happen. If Senator Collins of Maine and Senator McCain of Arizona, two Republicans who have been scathingly critical of Rumsfeld, can be convinced to vote with the Democrats on the hearings, we will see those six generals slated for a high-profile stomping of Rumsfeld up on Capitol Hill. If these two Republicans, or any two for that matter, cross the pond on this matter, the administration will be forced to deal with a Hobson's Choice: weather the catastrophic damage from six generals testifying about the failure of everything Rumsfeld has laid hands to, or accept his resignation and admit to the failure of everything he has laid his hands to. This accounting has, clearly, left out one of the great power players in modern political history. Karl Rove, or so we hear, is also being moved aside despite his position as Republican kingmaker, and is tasked to hold the Republican congressional majority together with both hands as the 2006 midterm elections loom. No one should be fooled, however; George W. Bush has relied on Rove's tactics and instincts for years, and will not allow his political consigliore to stray too far from the core. As with Rumsfeld, however, the choice may be out of Bush's hands. Fitzgerald is reportedly eyeing Rove in the Plame investigation, and it has been widely speculated that Rove's role is being de-emphasized in case an indictment is in the offing. The confusion and potential upheaval does not stop there. The departure of press secretary Scott McClellan marks the end of a strange time in the White House press room. McClellan was, hands down, the single worst liar in Washington. His press conferences over the last few months came to resemble the contests between Christians and lions in the Roman Coliseum. It has been no accident of fate that the most damaging revelations regarding administration activities have come out on his watch. An energized and combative press corps turned him, on an almost daily basis, into a stammering, beet-faced parody of a spokesman. His reported replacement, Tony Snow of Fox News, may come to fare better in running the gauntlet. But with so many horses already out the barn door, one wonders if anyone can effectively represent the message of an administration that has never been interested in answering questions or accepting responsibility for bad decisions. Are things really changing in this White House, or are we merely seeing a superficial reshuffling that does not affect the center of things? Baker is coming in with all attendant power in tow. A vote on hearings in the Senate may provide enough dynamite to blast Rumsfeld out of his civil service sinecure. Rove has been moved to the side, and could join Scooter Libby on the long honor role of Republican White House staffers who have been indicted. Card is out and Bolten is in. Bush and Cheney, of course, remain. What effect all these seeming changes will have on those two, and the administration in general, remains to be seen. At least we don't have to worry about any potential confusion or missteps that may come with a significant shake-up in the White House. As administration spokesmen have clearly said, such a reshuffling isn't happening, and isn't necessary.
Or something.
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Bush Brandishes Jail Time At Critics By Robert Parry Over the past five-plus years, the American people have gotten a taste of what a triumphant George W. Bush is like, as he basked in high approval ratings and asserted virtually unlimited powers as Commander in Chief. Now, the question is: How will Bush and his inner circle behave when cornered? So far, the answer should send chills through today's weakened American Republic. Bush and his team - faced with plunging poll numbers and cascading disclosures of wrongdoing - appear determined to punish and criminalize resistance to their regime. That is the significance of recent threats from the administration and its supporters who bandy about terms like sedition, espionage and treason when referring to investigative journalists, government whistle-blowers and even retired military generals - critics who have exposed Executive Branch illegalities, incompetence and deceptions. CIA Director Porter Goss, a former Republican congressman long regarded as a political partisan, has escalated pressure on intelligence officials suspected of leaking secrets about Bush's warrantless wiretapping of Americans and the torture of detainees held in clandestine prisons in Asia and Eastern Europe. On April 20, Goss fired a career intelligence officer (identified as Mary O. McCarthy) for allegedly discussing with reporters the CIA's network of secret prisons where terrorism suspects were interrogated and allegedly tortured in defiance of international law and often the laws of the countries involved. Goss had said the disclosure of these clandestine prisons had caused "very severe" damage to "our capabilities to carry out our mission," referring to complaints from foreign officials who had let the CIA use their territory for the so-called "black sites" and faced legal trouble from the torture revelations. "This was a very aggressive internal investigation" to find who leaked the information about the secret prisons, one former CIA officer told the New York Times. [NYT, April 22, 2006] WMD Fight Goss was recruited to the task of putting the CIA back in its place by Vice President Dick Cheney in 2004. During the run-up to the Iraq War, Cheney had banged heads with intelligence analysts who doubted White House claims about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. Though many senior CIA bureaucrats bent to Cheney's pressure on the WMD intelligence, some analysts resisted. After the Iraq invasion failed to find WMD, some of the CIA's suppressed doubts began surfacing in the press and causing Bush political embarrassment during the presidential election campaign. After the November 2004 election, Bush and his allies sought retribution against these out-of-step CIA officials. The powerful conservative news media joined the drumbeat against analysts who were seen as a threat to Bush's goals in Iraq and elsewhere. Conservative columnists, including Robert Novak and David Brooks, argued the CIA's rightful role was to do the president's bidding. "Now that he's been returned to office, President Bush is going to have to differentiate between his opponents and his enemies," wrote Brooks in the New York Times on Nov. 13, 2004. "His opponents are found in the Democratic Party. His enemies are in certain offices of the Central Intelligence Agency." Brooks justified a purge at the CIA because the spy agency had made Bush look bad. "At the height of the campaign, CIA officials, who are supposed to serve the president and stay out of politics and policy, served up leak after leak to discredit the president's Iraq policy," Brooks wrote. "Somebody leaked a CIA report predicting a gloomy or apocalyptic future for the region. ... A senior CIA official, Paul Pillar, reportedly made comments saying he had long felt the decision to go to war would heighten anti-American animosity in the Arab world." In other words, conservative commentators saw what sounded like reasonable CIA analyses as threats to Bush's authority. New Disclosures In 2005, as conditions in Iraq indeed worsened and anti-U.S. sentiment in the Islamic world swelled, the Bush administration lashed out at other disclosures - about the network of secret prisons (by the Washington Post) and Bush's decision to ignore legal requirements for court warrants before spying on communications by American citizens (reported by the New York Times). Bush, his aides and their media allies claimed the news articles inflicted severe damage on U.S. national security, but presented no precise evidence to support those claims. What was clear, however, was that Bush was facing a steep decline in public assessments about his judgment and honesty. By March 2006, Bush's favorable poll numbers were sinking into the mid-30 percentiles with his negatives nearing 60 percent and his strong negatives in the high-40s. SurveyUSA.com, which compiles state-by-state poll numbers, reported in March that Bush had net favorable ratings in only seven states (Nebraska, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Idaho, Alabama, Wyoming, and Utah). By April, Bush's net favorable states had declined to four (Nebraska, Idaho, Wyoming and Utah). In April, too, the Bush administration was stunned when a half dozen retired generals criticized the conduct of the Iraq War and called on Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to resign. Bush's defenders struck back, warning that letting retired generals criticize Rumsfeld - and by implication, Bush - threatened the principle of civilian control of the military. The announcement of the Pulitzer prizes was more bad news for the White House, with awards going to Washington Post reporter Dana Priest for her articles on the secret prisons and to New York Times reporters James Risen and Eric Lichtblau for their disclosure of Bush's warrantless wiretaps. Facing Bush's growing unpopularity and the increased resistance from influential power centers - including the military, the intelligence community and the mainstream press - administration supporters escalated their rhetoric with intimations of legal retaliation against the critics. Sedition? On April 18, Tony Blankley, editorial-page editor of Rev. Sun Myung Moon's staunchly pro-Bush Washington Times, raised the prospect of sedition charges against active-duty military officers who - in collusion with the retired generals - might be considering resignations in protest of Bush's war policies. "Can a series of lawful resignations turn into a mutiny?" Blankley wrote. "And if they are agreed upon in advance, have the agreeing generals formed a felonious conspiracy to make a mutiny?" Blankley wrote that this possible "revolt" by the generals "comes dangerously close to violating three articles of the Uniform Code of Military Justice," including "mutiny and sedition." Blankley thus raised the specter of courts martial against officers who resign rather than carry out orders from Bush. Administration supporters also have suggested imprisonment for journalists who disobey Bush's edicts against writing critical stories about the War on Terror that contain classified information. Former Education Secretary (and now right-wing pundit) Bill Bennett used his national radio program on April 18 to condemn the three Pulitzer-winning journalists - Priest, Risen and Lichtblau - as not "worthy of an award" but rather "worthy of jail." According to a transcript of the remarks published by Editor & Publisher's Web site, Bennett said the reporters "took classified information, secret information, published it in their newspapers, against the wishes of the president, against the requests of the president and others, that they not release it. They not only released it, they publicized it - they put it on the front page, and it damaged us, it hurt us. "How do we know it damaged us? Well, it revealed the existence of the surveillance program, so people are going to stop making calls. Since they are now aware of this, they're going to adjust their behavior. ... On the secret [prison] sites, the CIA sites, we embarrassed our allies. ... So it hurt us there. "As a result are they [the reporters] punished, are they in shame, are they embarrassed, are they arrested? No, they win Pulitzer prizes - they win Pulitzer prizes. I don't think what they did was worthy of an award - I think what they did is worthy of jail, and I think this [Espionage Act] investigation needs to go forward." Right-wing bloggers also began dubbing the awards to the three journalists "the Pulitzer Prize for Treason." Damage Doubtful However, neither right-wing commentators nor Bush administration officials have ever explained exactly how national security interests were hurt by the disclosures. As even Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has acknowledged, al-Qaeda operatives already were aware of the U.S. capability to intercept their electronic communications. At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Feb. 6, 2006, Sen. Joe Biden, D-Delaware, asked Gonzales, "How has this revelation damaged the program" since the administration's attack on the disclosure "seems to presuppose that these very sophisticated al-Qaeda folks didn't think we were intercepting their phone calls?" Gonzales responded, "I think, based on my experience, it is true - you would assume that the enemy is presuming that we are engaged in some kind of surveillance. But if they're not reminded about it all the time in the newspapers and in stories, they sometimes forget" - a response that drew laughter from the citizens in the hearing room. As for the secret prisons, the fallout appears to be largely political, causing embarrassment for countries that collaborated in what appears to be a clear violation of international law by granting space for "black sites" where torture allegedly was practiced. The most likely consequence is that the Bush administration will find it harder in the future to set up secret prisons outside the scrutiny of the International Red Cross, the United Nations and human rights organizations. But that may help U.S. national security - rather than hurt it - by discouraging the Bush administration from engaging in torture that has damaged America's reputation around the world and fueled Muslim rage at the United States. Instead, what appears most keenly at stake in the escalating political rhetoric is the Bush administration's determination to stop its political fall by branding its critics - even U.S. generals and CIA officers - as unpatriotic and then silencing them with threats of imprisonment. Bush is trying to mark the boundaries of permissible political debate. He also wants total control of classified information so he can leak the information that helps him - as he did in summer 2003 to shore up his claims about Iraq's WMD - while keeping a lid on secrets that might make him look bad. The firing of CIA officer Mary McCarthy and the threats of criminal charges against various dissenters are just the latest skirmishes in the political war over who will decide what Americans get to see and hear.
The other signal to Bush's critics, however, is this: If they ever thought he and his administration would accept accountability for their alleged abuses of power without a nasty fight, those critics are very mistaken.
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| Bush Hears Voices, But Does He Listen? "I hear the voices, and I read the front page, and I know the speculation," said the President of the United States, sounding as peevish as a toddler banging his silver spoon on the high chair. "But I'm the decider, and I decide what's best. And what's best is for Don Rumsfeld to remain as the Secretary of Defense." By reminding everybody that he is "the decider," George W. Bush no doubt hoped to stifle embarrassing protests from a growing corps of retired officers such as General Anthony Zinni, who believe that the war in Iraq has been ruinously botched and that the Secretary of Defense should retire. But his defensive outburst only drew attention to the most deserving target of criticism: himself. While the frustrated generals named Mr. Rumsfeld in their complaint, they clearly aimed at Mr. Bush. They know that the Commander in Chief was implicated, from the beginning, in every bad decision perpetrated by the Pentagon civilian leadership. They understand why the President cannot take their advice to dump Rummy, as Brookings Institution military analyst Michael O'Hanlon pointed out: "For Bush to fire Rumsfeld is for Bush to declare himself a failure as president." But the generals, some of whom have supported the President in the past, cannot demand the resignation of the President, of course, nor can they direct their critique at him personally. To do so would set off even more false alarms about their supposed violation of America's traditional civilian control of the military. That is only one of several bogus ripostes to retired flag officers who are now private citizens, with all the rights and privileges that the rest of us enjoy-and considerably more knowledge than most of us possess. Predictably, they are enduring the usual barrage of chaff and nonsense fired off from the right at every prominent White House critic. They have been attacked for speaking up at all, and they have been attacked for not speaking up sooner. They're talking about policy, and they're accused of obsessing about personality. Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, offered the most feeble defense of his boss: "He does his homework. He works weekends, he works nights. People can question my judgment or his judgment, but they should never question the dedication, the patriotism and the work ethic of Secretary Rumsfeld." Nobody has questioned his work ethic, let alone his patriotism (a tactic most often abused by Republicans and not against them). What the flag officers have questioned are his spectacular incompetence and his catastrophic arrogance. As if to confirm their observations, Mr. Rumsfeld airily dismissed his critics by assuring Rush Limbaugh that "this too will pass." In a way, that remark was almost as dishonest as his forgotten claim that he knew where Iraq's weapons of mass destruction would be found. He is well aware that anger has festered in the armed forces for years, not weeks or days, and won't evaporate with a wave of his hand. Expressions of that discontent were first heard following the public assault on Gen. Eric Shinseki by Paul Wolfowitz, then the Deputy Defense Secretary, because the general had dared to urge more "boots on the ground" in Iraq. They were heard when eight retired J.A.G. admirals and generals sent the President a letter demanding a sweeping investigation of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, which meant holding the guilty Mr. Rumsfeld accountable. They were heard when a dozen retired flag officers decided to endorse John Kerry at the Democratic convention in 2004. And they are heard again this year, louder than ever, with scores of Iraq veterans stepping forward to run for Congress as Democrats. Among those candidates is Joe Sestak, a retired vice admiral seeking to unseat Curt Weldon, the entrenched (and truly egregious) Republican incumbent in Pennsylvania's Seventh District. During his 31-year career in the Navy, Mr. Sestak's assignments ranged from commanding a battle group in the Persian Gulf to serving on the National Security Council staff and overseeing the Quadrennial Defense Review. (He also happens to have earned a master's in public administration and a doctorate in government from Harvard.) "One of the primary reasons I entered this election is that I believe invading Iraq was not the right decision," explains Mr. Sestak, who sees the war as a damaging distraction from Al Qaeda, Afghanistan and other serious threats. He now warns that we must find our way out of "a prolonged occupation with rising death, injury and cost .... It will be an occupation that will continue to have goals that are ever changing as they remain elusive. The result will be continued loss of U.S. military and diplomatic credibility."
Yes, the President hears the voices and doesn't like what he hears. So his henchmen scourge those who dare to speak out, regardless of their previous service. But he will never escape the judgment of the men and women in uniform who had to carry out his orders.
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When "Diplomacy" Means War By Norman Solomon One of the nation's leading pollsters, Andrew Kohut of the Pew Research Center, wrote a few weeks ago that among Americans "there is little potential support for the use of force against Iran." This month the White House has continued to emphasize that it is committed to seeking a diplomatic solution. Yet the U.S. government is very likely to launch a military attack on Iran within the next year. How can that be? In the run-up to war, appearances are often deceiving. Official events may seem to be moving in one direction while policymakers are actually headed in another. On their own timetable, White House strategists implement a siege of public opinion that relies on escalating media spin. One administration after another has gone through the motions of staying on a diplomatic track while laying down flagstones on a path to war. Several days ago President Bush said that "the doctrine of prevention is to work together to prevent the Iranians from having a nuclear weapon" -- and he quickly added that "in this case, it means diplomacy." On April 12 the Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, urged the U.N. Security Council to take "strong steps" in response to Iran's announcement of progress toward enriching uranium. Bush and Rice were engaged in a timeworn ritual that involves playacting diplomacy before taking military action. Seven years ago, President Clinton proclaimed that a U.S.-led NATO air war on Yugoslavia was starting because all peaceful avenues for dealing with the Serbian president, Slobodan Milosevic, had reached dead ends. The Clinton administration and the major U.S. media outlets failed to mention that Washington had handed Milosevic a poison-pill ultimatum in the fine print of the proposed Rambouillet accords -- with Appendix B stipulating that NATO troops would have nearly unlimited run of the entire Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. Recent decades of American history are filled with such faux statesmanship: greasing the media wheels and political machinery for military interventions in Southeast Asia, the Caribbean, Central America and the Middle East. But the current administration's eagerness to use "diplomacy" as a prop for going to war has been unusually brazen. On Jan. 31, 2003 -- five days before the ballyhooed speech by then-Secretary of State Colin Powell to the U.N. Security Council -- the president held a private Oval Office meeting with Tony Blair. Summing up the discussion, which occurred nearly two months before the invasion of Iraq, the British prime minister's chief foreign policy adviser David Manning noted in a memo: "Our diplomatic strategy had to be arranged around the military planning." Meanwhile, President Bush and his top aides were still telling the public that they were pursuing all diplomatic channels in hopes of preventing war. Pundits have often advised presidents to use diplomatic maneuvers as virtual shams in order to legitimize the coming warfare. Charles Krauthammer blew his stack in mid-November 1998 when U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan seemed to make progress in averting a U.S. missile strike against Iraq. "It is perfectly fine for an American president to mouth the usual pieties about international consensus and some such," Krauthammer wrote in Time magazine. "But when he starts believing them, he turns the Oval Office over to Kofi Annan and friends." In late summer 2002, with momentum quickening toward an Iraq invasion, Newsweek foreign affairs columnist Fareed Zakaria urged the Bush administration to recognize the public-relations value of allowing U.N. weapons inspectors to spend some time in Iraq. "Even if the inspections do not produce the perfect crisis," he wrote optimistically, "Washington will still be better off for having tried because it would be seen to have made every effort to avoid war." When reality can't hold a candle to perception, then reality is apt to become imperceptible. And in matters of war and peace, when powerful policy wonks in Washington effectively strive for appearances to be deceiving, the result is a pantomime of diplomacy that's scarcely like the real thing. When the actual goal is war, the PR task is to make a show of leaving no diplomatic stone unturned. That kind of macabre ritual was underway on April 10 when the White House press secretary, Scott McClellan, told reporters: "The president has made it very clear that we're working with the international community to find a diplomatic solution when it comes to the Iranian regime and its pursuit of nuclear weapons." The quote appeared the next morning in a New York Times news article under a headline that must have pleased the war planners at the White House: "Bush Insists on Diplomacy in Confronting a Nuclear Iran."
Ambrose Bierce defined diplomacy as "the patriotic act of lying for
one's country." But there is nothing less patriotic than lying to one's
country -- especially when the result is a war that could have been
avoided if honesty had substituted for mendacity.
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Act Now, Pray Later By Frank Scott We destroyed a powerful secular regime in Iraq and replaced it with a powerless sectarian front, in order to create democracy and insure that we wouldn't be attacked by terrorists with nuclear weapons. We have killed tens of thousands of Iraqis, reduced much of the nation to bloody chaos, and its people are very grateful for this. Of course. The immigration debate is simply about whether illegals come here to loiter on street corners, crowd our schools and save up welfare checks until they can buy homes in Beverly Hills, or to assist poor capitalists and help a stressed middle class do its housework and care for its kids, all at minimal social cost absorbed by the upper class and only questioned by racists. Sure. Israel is our most important ally, deserves billions in aid from American taxpayers , merits the absolute support of our government and media, and we should prepare to invade Iran to protect it from genocide. Without a doubt. We demand free elections everywhere unless the winners don t meet our approval, in which case they are labeled terrorists not ready for western civilization, and should be subjected to starvation, invasion or both. No question. In truly supporting freedom of speech, people who dare to question subjects Judeo-Christian theocracy has ruled beyond criticism, like the holocaust, should be persecuted, and if necessary thrown into prison. Obviously. Oh, and global warming is a myth created by puritans who want to end our affluent lifestyles and stop us from driving wherever we want. Like from our living rooms to our toilets. Right. If you accept any of this, you should support our minority ruling establishment, no matter how dangerously bizarre it may seem to a majority of the planets inhabitants. If you are part of that majority, you'd better get moving before this maniacal mob destroys everything. Contrary to the dogma of marketing individualism, that will include you . The inmates have not taken over our institutions, since they have always run them, but a particularly loony bunch is currently pushing humanity towards disaster. Those who create and pay for reality but exercise little control over it need to gain that control before it s too late. If we re truly driven by a survival instinct, we should understand that our demented leaders are a major problem for our future. Democracy is the long term solution, but in the short term anything we can do to get rid of them will be instinctively positive. There are encouraging signs of recognition that the world's deadliest biological weapons are found between the ears of fanatic rulers in the USA and Israel. These religious fundamentalists are far more dangerous than any from other parts of the world, believing as they do in a leadership role for themselves which is sanctioned by deity. A minority sect of Christians trust that they will survive a biblically bloody disaster that kills everyone on earth - except them - after which they will experience an eternity of intelligently designed rapture, while a minority cult of Jews believe they have been chosen by god to reign supreme over a world to stupid to understand their real estate divinity. The power these two governing groups exercise over international political economic life is moving the world closer to unnatural disaster. A global environment more menaced with each demented move by these regimes needs to be countered by a global movement of the un-chosen and un-raptured majority, to act on a major threat to the planet and all its people. Resistance is growing, especially from emerging governments and popular movements that have shown open contempt for the neo-liberal model of market fundamentalism that threatens billions more of earths inhabitants if it isn't stopped. And the problems certainly do not simply exist outside the geographic confines of the U.S. Our public debt has climbed by more than 660 billion dollars in the last year, to finance a particularly idiotic war, raise profits for international capital and lower taxes on national wealth. Gasoline is at three dollars a gallon and rising as we consume nearly 11 million gallons daily, further polluting our environment while endangering supplies with our meddling in the oil producing world. We continue increasing industrial layoffs and exporting decent paying jobs, while importing cheap labor, savaging our middle class and creating an inequality gap in our society comparable to a poor under developed nation. But our official opposition is doing something about this. Are you serious? With a president more isolated than ever, in a White House that has become a Mad House where he thinks outside the envelope while pushing the box, it passively waits for him to self-destruct or be impeached by his own party. Its opposition to the Iraq war is in the most muted, cautious tones, in keeping with its role as partner in crime in our political system. After the recent massive immigration rallies, the Democrats are probably contemplating how many latino votes they can purchase with Israeli lobby dollars. It should be clear that our long term problems will not be solved by any part of the present governing structure. Millions in Latin America have learned that, but we still need to move on from the crackpot realism and frightened caution of lesser evil politics.
The creation of actual democracy here at home is necessary before we can join the global movement to place humanity on a path for success rather than disaster. We can t disparage supporters of present reality theory, as long as we don't seriously oppose present reality practice. It s time to bring our actions into balance with our beliefs, today, or we won't have a prayer for tomorrow.
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 Heil Bush, Dear Propaganda Ansager Blankley, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your calling for sedition charges against the 6 generals who called for Rummy's retirement, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Media Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Wolf's Lair" formally 'Rancho de Bimbo' on 05-27-2006. We salute you herr Blankley, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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AUSTIN, Texas -- One of the consistent deformities in American policy debate has been challenged by a couple of professors, and the reaction proves their point so neatly it's almost funny.
A working paper by John Mearsheimer, professor of political science at the University of Chicago, and Stephen Walt, professor of international affairs at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, called "The Israel Lobby" was printed in the London Review of Books earlier this month. And all hell broke loose in the more excitable reaches of journalism and academe.
For having the sheer effrontery to point out the painfully obvious -- that there is an Israel lobby in the United States -- Mearsheimer and Walt have been accused of being anti-Semitic, nutty and guilty of "kooky academic work." Alan Dershowitz, who seems to be easily upset, went totally ballistic over the mild, academic, not to suggest pretty boring article by Mearsheimer and Walt, calling them "liars" and "bigots."
Of course there is an Israeli lobby in America -- its leading working group is the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). It calls itself "America's Pro-Israel Lobby," and it attempts to influence U.S. legislation and policy.
Several national Jewish organizations lobby from time to time. Big deal -- why is anyone pretending this non-news requires falling on the floor and howling? Because of this weird deformity of debate.
In the United States, we do not have full-throated, full-throttle debate about Israel. In Israel, they have it as matter of course, but the truth is that the accusation of anti-Semitism is far too often raised in this country against anyone who criticizes the government of Israel.
Being pro-Israel is no defense, as I long ago learned to my cost. Now I've gotten used to it. Jews who criticize Israel are charmingly labeled "self-hating Jews." As I have often pointed out, that must mean there are a lot of self-hating Israelis, because those folks raise hell over their own government's policies all the time.
I don't know that I've ever felt intimidated by the knee-jerk "you're anti-Semitic" charge leveled at anyone who criticizes Israel, but I do know I have certainly heard it often enough to become tired of it.
And I wonder if that doesn't produce the same result: giving up on the discussion.
It's the sheer disproportion, the vehemence of the attacks on anyone perceived as criticizing Israel that makes them so odious. Mearsheimer and Walt are both widely respected political scientists -- comparing their writing to "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion" is just silly.
Several critics have pointed out some flaws in the Mearsheimer-Walt paper, including a too-broad use of the term "Israel lobby" -- those of us who are pro-Israel differ widely -- and having perhaps overemphasized the clout of the Israel lobby by ignoring the energy lobby.
It seems to me the root of the difficulty has been Israel's inability first to admit the Palestinians have been treated unfairly and, second, to figure out what to do about it. Now here goes a big fat generalization, but I think many Jews are so accustomed (by reality) to thinking of themselves as victims, it is especially difficult for them to admit they have victimized others.
But the Mearsheimer-Walt paper is not about the basic conflict, but its effect on American foreign policy, and it appears to me their arguments are unexceptional. Israel is the No. 1 recipient of American foreign aid, and it seems an easy case can be made that the United States has subjugated its own interests to those of Israel in the past.
Whether you agree or not, it is a discussion well worth having and one that should not be shut down before it can start by unfair accusations of "anti-Semitism." In a very equal sense, none of this is academic. The Israel lobby was overwhelmingly in favor of starting the war with Iraq and is now among the leading hawks on Iran.
To the extent that our interests do differ from those of Israel, the matter needs to be discussed calmly and fairly. This is not about conspiracies or plots or fantasies or anti-Semitism -- it's about rational discussion of American interests. And, in my case, being pro-Israel. I'm looking forward to hearing from all you nut-jobs again.
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--- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe ---
CNN and the Boston Globe say there are six officers, Fox News says "a handful," the New York Times says seven, the Christian Science Monitor plays it safe with "several," and Rumsfeld himself laughs it off with "two or three out of thousands." There seems to be eight so far -- Gen. Eric Shinseki, former Army Chief of Staff, was cut off at the knees a year before his retirement for testifying under oath during a Senate hearing a month before the assault on Iraq that it would take "several hundred thousand" troops to quell ethnic tensions that could lead to an insurgency. He was soon joined by Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni, former CENTCOM commander; Lt.Gen. Greg Newbold, Director of Operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the war planning; Maj.Gen. John Batiste, former 1st Infantry Division commander; Maj.Gen. Charles Swannack, former commander of the 82d Airborne Division in Iraq; Maj.Gen. John Riggs who, after 39 years in the Army, retired from the Pentagon in 2005; Maj.Gen. Paul Eaton, who oversaw training of Iraqi troops from 2003-2004 and Gen. Wesley Clark, former NATO Supreme Allied Commander. Pay Attention! We are now victims of a full-bore public relations assault. White House bullhorns and media mockingbirds are out in force, only too happy to be diverted from discussing the treasonous Bush/Cheney/Rove/Libby leak of an undercover CIA operative or from investigating the restless murmurings of an impending nuclear attack on Iran. The punditry brigade, including former military brass on media payrolls as "analysts" immediately began regurgitating talking points from a Pentagon memo hurriedly sent out when criticism began to gain momentum. They were then summoned en masse to the Pentagon for a briefing on the miraculous successes of Iraqi Operation Let God Sort 'Em Out. CNN jumped out in front of the pack with a continuous loop of a staged video package showing Marines training top-notch Iraqi troops while winning "hearts and minds" of grateful Iraqi citizens, followed quickly by an article defending Rumsfeld. The issue soon became a disorderly political media debate on whether the generals were at war with each other, if they were attempting a coup of their civilian leaders or were merely rats deserting a sinking ship. The brothers Limbaugh went into complete meltdown. Rush's head exploded as he shrieked that the generals were just a bunch of malcontents hooking up with the "liberal drive-by media" to get rid of Rumsfeld for attempting to fix the mess President Clinton made of the military. David took each general to task for joining the anti-Bush liberal media vultures who "have hovered over Rumsfeld's stubbornly vibrant carcass for way too long..." Then, Rumsfeld, like Dick Cheney does when he needs to "catapault the propaganda," picked up the phone and called the drug-addled, dangerously ignorant "El Rushbo" to reassure millions of panting dittoheads that those who oppose him or criticize his handling of the war are being manipulated by terrorists like Zarqawi, Bin Laden and Zawahiri. It didn't help matters when four retired generals penned an April 17 Wall Street Journal op-ed defending Rumsfeld and scolding their outspoken peers. "We do not believe that it is appropriate for active duty, or retired, senior military officers to publicly criticize U.S. civilian leadership during war," they wrote, and added that the feelings of those who had come forward were "irrelevant." They went on to single out Zinni and Newbold, saying the two "do not understand the true nature of this radical ideology, Islamic exremism, and why we fight in Iraq." They then neatly connected the war in Iraq to 9-11 by smugly suggesting Zinni and Newbold "listen to the tapes of United 93." Generally speaking Who are these four men? Unlike those who were in Iraq and are alarmed at the chaotic, snarled disorder of Rumsfeld's leadership, the four Journal writers are warriors of a different era and were not involved in the planning or execution of the ongoing slaughter. I suspect that Lt. Gen. John S. Crosby, my former boss for whom I have tremendous admiration and respect, now director of the government's Civilian Marksmanship Program (CMP), and Maj. Gen. Burton R. Moore, director of legislative liaison for the Air Force, allowed their names to be used because of a sense of honor and conviction that commissioned officers, whether active or retired, do not speak out against their civilian leaders, especially in a time of war. However, the Journal and other media failed to mention that the latter two -- Vietnam-era Lt. Gen. Thomas McInerney, former assistant vice chief of staff of the Air Force, and Maj. Gen. Paul Vallely, former deputy commander of US Army, Pacific, are paid Fox News analysts and active, aggressive, warmongering Bush supporters. McInerney joined the chorus of "swift-boaters" before the 2004 election, calling Sen. John Kerry's 1971 testimony about US soldiers committing barbaric acts on Vietnamese civilians "treasonous." According to Media Matters, Vallely, infuriated with former ambassador Joe Wilson's "agenda against the war on terror," emerged a week after Cheney chief of staff "Scooter" Libby was indicted on charges of obstruction of justice, perjury, and false statements in the Valerie Plame leak scandal to claim that a year before Robert Novak revealed Plame's identity Wilson had bragged to him and others in the Fox News green room that his wife worked at the CIA. When asked why he had waited two years before coming forward, Vallely remarked he "figured Joe Wilson would self-destruct at some point in time." At first, Vallely said that Wilson had told him "three, possibly five times" in the spring of 2002 that his wife worked at the CIA. Upon further questioning, Vallely then said it was only one time, and perhaps in the "spring-summer" time frame. Then it was "summer-early fall." Vallely called on McInerney to back up his story on ABC's John Batchelor Show. Media Matters reports that McInerney appeared on the show to "repeat and expand upon Vallely's memory," but he would only admit to being a friend of Vallely and did not even suggest that Wilson had discussed his wife's identity. Upon Wilson's threat to sue Vallely for slander, Vallely, mercifully, shut up. The two generals teamed up in 2004 to write a truly frightening manifesto (with a forward written by Fox News Iran-Contra hoodlum Oliver North) on how Rumsfeld should really wage war -- "Endgame: The Blueprint for Victory in the War on Terror." Deluded by a grandiose sense of US power, they expanded Bush's three-nation "Axis of Evil" to an eight-nation "Web of Terror." With the colossal successes of Afghanistan and Iraq, it's now on to Syria and North Korea, Libya, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan. Forget the paradigm of diplomacy; of containment. Forget trying to settle political crises in the Middle East. Screw 'em. Invade 'em. Conquer 'em. McInerney and Villely suggest, however, that because of Iran's size, it might be wiser to "slap" it with an embargo and keep it in line with a naval blockade. So, what's the deal? The administration and the Pentagon's aggressive disinformation pundits want us to believe this issue is political; merely disgruntled generals attempting to stir up a mutiny within the ranks and breed discontent within the populace before an upcoming election. If you believe that -- you're not paying attention. The generals being trashed for speaking out are patriots who have committed their entire lives to honorably serving and protecting the Republic and all it stands for, and are no longer able to remain silent when they see it being wantonly destroyed. George Bush seems to think (sic) that Rumsfeld is doing a heckuva job. He says he doesn't "appreciate the speculation" about his buddy "Don." He's the decider, Bush says. He reads the front page. Bush hears voices and he listens to them. "But mine is the final decision," he says. "I'm the decider, and I decide what is best. And what's best is for Don Rumsfeld to remain as the Secretary of Defense." But this is not about politics. It's about stopping the madness -- and the giggling madman whose aggressive stupidity and exaggerated sense of himself has brought shame to this once proud nation. Henry Kissinger once said, "Of all the despots I've had to deal with, none was more ruthless than Donald Rumsfeld." With Rumsfeld, it's about rendition, brutal torture, sexual humiliation and ghoulishly insane war crimes. It's about a group of immensely brave apolitical patriots being forced to do what the US Congress and the US media steadfastly refuse to do -- tell the American people the truth. The blood dripping from the corpses in Iraq is nothing compared to that literally gushing from those who know what is going on, but choose to remain silent. This is not about Rumsfeld "transforming" the Army. It's about the calculated destruction of all the services. It's about privitazing the military -- contracting out US security to war profiteers such as Halliburton, Bechtel, Blackwater. It's about psychological operations (PsyOps) teams and death squads roaming throughout Iraq murdering innocents in their homes and mosques, gunning down anything that moves in the streets. It's about a secretary of defense not only ordering torture, but getting personally involved in it. This is not about whether Rumsfeld should be replaced. It is about whether he should be hanged for not supporting those for whom he is responsible. It is about sending hundreds of thousands of Americans into the mayhem of an insurgent battlefield; many to certain death as a result of improper training, lack of protective armor and lack of proper equipment. It is about Rumsfeld "disappearing" the nearly 2,400 dead servicemembers who continue to return in the dead of night without honor. It is about 35 families who will drop to their knees tonight and pray for the safety of their children, not knowing they are already dead. It is about more than 20,000 soldiers and marines evacuated from Rumsfeld's war, many physically and mentally damaged beyond repair -- nearly 12,000 of them suffering from disease. This is about destroying entire populations with Depleted Uranium, including many future generations of Americans.
Of course Rumsfeld must go. And, ultimately, he will take George Bush, Dick Cheney, Condi Rice and the rest of the depraved warmongers with him. The American people have finally had enough of aggressive stupidity.
And we are the deciders.
... Bob Englehart ...  |
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Dear Mr. President
What do you feel when you see all the homeless on the street
How do you sleep while the rest of us cry
Dear Mr. President
What kind of father would take his own daughter's rights away
How do you sleep while the rest of us cry
Let me tell you bout hard work
How do you sleep at night
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Parting Shots...
In This Installment:
Rev. Jerry Falwell: Exec. Director Of Global Policy
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Pat Thruster, from Altoona, PA writes:
Rev. Dr. Jerry Falwell:
Honestly, I was surprised by the Supreme Court's ruling. Clearly, the addition of John Roberts and Samuel Alito has not yet tipped the scales of justice in favor of Moral Values(tm). As such, I would ask that loving Christians everywhere join my brother Pat Robertson and me in praying earnestly for the bestowal of rare, debilitating and excruciatingly painful cancers upon Justices John Paul Stevens and that unsightly carpet-munching Christ-killer Ruth Bader Ginsberg.
In the meantime, I'm just glad it's over. And now that I've sued two separate times over these internet address thingamajigs, America can rest assured that my squadron of turbo-competent attack lawyers has taken the wise preventative step of registering all remaining obvious variations of my Godly name.
Praise God!
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John Coctosan, from Mount Vernon, Indiana writes:
Rev. Dr. Jerry Falwell:
Oh yes, 9/11. Well the Lord does work in mysterious ways, John, and it is not for us to question His wisdom. Perhaps the Lord was killing metaphorically that day. After all, who among us did not gaze upon the twin towers of the World Trade Center, and not instantly perceive them as two enormous, erect penises - striped from head to base with thick, ramrod-straight veins, swaying softly in the wind, shamelessly exposed and stimulated almost to the point of climax by their close proximity to one another - as only homosexual penises could be. No doubt the Lord was annoyed by these powerfully deviant erotic totems, and saw fit to destroy them on 9/11 - and I for one still support His decision! What a pleasure it is to once again be able to see lower Manhattan on TV without imagining you're about to get a double money-shot right between the eyes!
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Lazarita Perez, from Bayonne, New Jersey writes:
Rev. Dr. Jerry Falwell:
For the record: my first time was not with my mother in an outhouse. It was with my father in a bathhouse.
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Gavin, from St. Louis, MO writes:
Rev. Dr. Jerry Falwell:
It is my understanding that Sister Betty has copyrighted "America's Best Christian"(tm). And take it from one who knows, if you try to call yourself that, her battalion of hook-nosed unsaved Jewish attorneys will swoop down on you from New York and slap you around like a pre-teen Filipino steet hustler who can't make change for a ten.
Now, I've known dear Betty for many years and I would never speak unkindly about anyone who can parlay Jesus' ascetic teachings into a fleet of private jets and a walk-in closet with more baby seal skins than Greenland. Nevertheless, women ought not go around saying anything, much less bragging about being a better Christian than me. After all, God told all women to kindly shut the h-e-double-l up and let folks with penises do all the talking. 1 Corinthians 14:33-35
But, as anyone worthy of the name "Rich Republican Christian Who Loves Wars" can tell you, you can get around everything God told you to do if you know how to work it. Betty gets around opening her big lady-trap by claiming that when she talks it isn't a female speaking at all: it's a man (Jesus) throwing His voice. And Ann Coulter gets around the prohibition on females talking with a simple chromosome test.
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Frans Klootzak, from Johannesburg, South Africa writes:
Rev. Dr. Jerry Falwell:
Unfortunately, I don't have any quick fixes to offer you. My advice is to pray, Franz. Pray that Jesus will restore the natural order of things before we die. But even if He doesn't, take comfort in the certainty that when folks like us used to call Sun City "a little slice of heaven," they were 100% correct.
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Michael Carland, from Plymouth, New Hampshire writes:
Rev. Dr. Jerry Falwell:
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LouAnne Scharple, from Birmingham, AL writes:
Rev. Dr. Jerry Falwell:
But if you must know, it is common knowledge that before his miraculous political rebirth on 9/11, not only was Mr. Jewly-Annie embroiled in a messy divorce, but he was also spending his nights in a homosexual couple's guest bedroom! Just think of it: a supposed family values Republican, bedding down in such a place! That's why now, every time I look "America's Mayor," I imagine him burying his head beneath goose down pillows, struggling in vain to sleep over the depraved din seeping through thin city apartment walls: a chorus of grunts and sodomy-tortured squeals of the walking damned; their toned, tanned, waxed bodies squeaking loudly against rubber sheets and the creaking chains of a "rough rider" jungle gym group sex gravity boot apparatus!
You can see that too, can't you LouAnne?
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John McCain, from Washington, DC writes:
Rev. Dr. Jerry Falwell:
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Ruth Evans, from Troy, Idaho writes:
Rev. Dr. Jerry Falwell:
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Jason, from Princeton, NJ writes:
Rev. Dr. Jerry Falwell:
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Beau Bissin, from Omaha, NE writes:
Rev. Dr. Jerry Falwell:
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Billy Joe Tireiron, from Oglethorpe Georgia writes:
Rev. Dr. Jerry Falwell:
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Rev. Dr. Jerry Falwell: |
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In This Edition
Robert Fisk asks the, "United States Of Israel?"
Uri Avnery watches, "The Trap."
John Gideon with a new series, "The Approaching 2006 E-Voting 'Train Wreck.'"
Jim Hightower says, Rummy's Doing A Heck Of A Job.
Lt. Gen. William E. Odom with some good advice, "Cut and Run? You Bet!"
Chris Floyd examines, "Cliff Hangers: The Madness of King George's Brinkmanship."
William Rivers Pitt comes to, "A Turning Point."
Robert Parry with yet another must read, "A Reverse Thousand Days."
Joe Conason reminds us that, "Crackdown On Leaks Can Lead to Trouble."
Norman Solomon watches Bush, "Playacting Diplomacy Again On Road To War."
Eric Alterman explores, "Bush's Other War."
Tony Snow wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award!'
Molly Ivins follows, "The Corruption Of Congress."
Thom Hartmann tells, "The Story Of Carl - On Workers Memorial Day."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department 'Will Durst' oversees the "Changing Of The Guard" but first Uncle Ernie wonders, Has Osama Won?"
This week we spotlight the cartoons of David Fitzsimmons with additional cartoons from Ruben Bolling, Micah Wright, After Downing Street.Org, Internet Weekly.Org, Rico Dog, Gary Brookins, Dubya's World.Com, Mike Luckovitch and Daryl Cagle.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Has Osama Won? By Ernest Stewart
The most important thing is for us to find Osama bin Laden. It is our number one priority and we will not rest until we find him. --- G.W. Bush, 9/13/01 I don't know where bin Laden is. I have no idea and really don't care. It's not that important. It's not our priority. --- G.W. Bush, 3/13/02
Has Osama really won? Well according to der Fuhrer he has. Remember when Bush said: "Americans are asking, why do they hate us? They hate what we see right here in this chamber -- a democratically elected government. Their leaders are self-appointed. They hate our freedoms -- our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other?" Instead of the real reasons that it was the Rethuglicans that hated our freedoms i.e. out of the mouth of the monkey himself,
Let's review shall we... #1 "They hate what we see right here in this chamber -- a democratically elected government." Exactly what government is Smirky talking about? Certainly not America's! You become president by being elected by the people, not by being appointed by some seditious shills on the Extreme Court. Or by some seditious traitor with an electronic voting machine company! #2 "They hate our freedoms -- our freedom of religion." Sure if your religion is some form of Pentecostalism; extra money for talking in tongues, you're in like Flynn! Or if you're a holy man and wear a dress and molest children it's going to be a really big payday! However, if you're not a cultist in one of the government approved mythologies don't waste your time filling out the forms! If you're a Buddhist, a Taoist, Hindu or Satanist, don't bother applying. What is needed is freedom from religion, not government sponsored religions! #3 "Our freedom of speech." We saw how well that worked out when the Chinese dictator came to town the other day. Apparently free speech is only free speech when it's confined to a far away space inside of a steel cage... where no one can hear you! #4 "Our freedom to vote." See our new continuing series by John Gideon "The Approaching 2006 E-Voting 'Train Wreck," to see how much your vote really counts. As I said before about the stolen elections in Georgia in 2002 perhaps the red states aren't electing the "der Affe" after all. As one can see by John's articles it's the red states with the electronic voting machines that back Bush. You know, like in Diebold's Ohio where 7,000 people in one district gave Bush 80,000 votes in 2004. #5 "Assemble and disagree with each other." Just don't try it at a Rethuglican controlled event. You don't even have to say a word just wear the wrong t-shirt and the next thing you'll see is some "Jack Booted Thug" with a night stick, trying to render you brain dead as you're whisked away from the event. So you tell me America has Osama won? Also remember that Osama is a very old and good family friend of the Crime Family Bush and their puppet organization the CIA! In Other News... I see where we're celebrating our 3rd anniversary of our Mission Accomplished in Iraq. Try telling that to the 10,000 or so dead American kids families or the 100,000's of dead Iraqis. Not to mention the 30,000 + American kids that no longer have legs or arms or eyes etc. during the last three years of our cake walk in Iraq. Nor do I imagine that any of those kids were killed or maimed by having flowers thrown at them. Has anyone ever won against a guerrilla war? One might say that we did in America against the Indians but... ***** I also observed this week millions of illegals marching in the street, most of them are what? That's right, they're Indians! And by the looks of things, the fight isn't over yet America. Of course you can say that the Indians are not really natives either as they came from Japan and China about 40,000 years before whitey and blackie hit the continent. I bet the tribes wish they would have closed the borders in 1492! Instead, they let a few religious fanatics in and they been fighting terrorism ever since! I have nothing against legal immigrants, we are the great mixing bowl, the great melting pot, give us your tired, your poor and that is part of what used to make us great. I have a simple solution to this illegal problem... For all the illegals a blanket amnesty but you have to go back home. Then, you can come in the front door with a workers card that would be good for say 5 years. And if we really need all these folks then we can speed up the process to where you can get that card in about a week at very little expense. Then if you want to become a citizen you can apply. I'm not sure why you'd want to be one with the last 100 years of American shenanigans but there are no doubt places that would make America (even with all our evils) look good! This will do several good things, one of which is the workers will get at least minimum wage which may turn out to be two or three times what they are making now. This will also keep our corpo-rat goon masters from keeping all the wages down which is what illegal immigrants give the goons the ability to do. Everyone deserves a livable wage, everyone! This will also allow us to find the would be terrorists who are no doubt hiding amongst the otherwise good illegals. For those who still choose to stay without going home or come over illegally after the amnesty then when you're caught it's a year at hard labor where they can earn the bus fare back home, with the further stipulation that you will not be able to legally immigrate. Second offense 5 years, third 10 years. As to their employers, one year at hard labor for each and every illegal employee, 50 illegals, 50 years, no exceptions, no excuses, don't care if you hired them through another agency it's responsibility to make sure that they are here legally! No guest worker card, no work, period! Simple huh? And whatever it takes to enforce it, I'm sure just a couple weeks of the money that it takes to keep our illegal, immoral war in Iraq going would pay for the extra cost of this plan for many years to come! Just one suggestion to all new immigrants when you do get here remember, when in America, do as the Americans do! Come and mix with us! ***** The jurors in the Zacarias Moussaoui trial came up with the right verdict. The death penalty would have just made a martyr out of him and no doubt caused more death and destruction. With "Life" he'll have no easy death and will spend what I'm sure will seem like eternity in solitary confinement begging his keepers for death! Besides I doubt he had anything to do with 911. He was just one of those guys that was never going to get laid, you know the type. He was a sexual loser trying to talk his way into 72 virgins! This tells me he's never had a virgin or he wouldn't be in such a hurry! Ask any man who been the "first" and he'll tell you it ain't all that it's cracked up to be! To me living with 72 virgins would be spending eternity in the ninth circle of Hell! ***** Finally, I watched Massachusetts' governor Mitt Romney on C-span the other day explaining his new plan to require health care insurance for everyone in Massachusetts. What's wrong with this plan? It wouldn't be that Mitt's good buddies in the insurance business would take advantage of this requirement to raise rates, raise deductibles, raise everything, would it? You can bet your last dollar that in a "New York" minute they would! If Mitt does to Massachusetts what his daddy George did when he was the governor of Michigan (which is where Mitt got his strange name from i.e. the shape of the lower peninsula, a mitten) I feel truly sorry for the working poor in Massachusetts!
We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
 United States Of Israel? By Robert Fisk When two of America's most distinguished academics dared to suggest that US foreign policy was being driven by a powerful 'Israel Lobby' whose influence was incompatible with their nation's own interests, they knew they would face allegations of anti-Semitism. But the episode has prompted America's Jewish liberals to confront their own complacency. Might the tide be turning? Stephen Walt towers over me as we walk in the Harvard sunshine past Eliot Street, a big man who needs to be big right now (he's one of two authors of an academic paper on the influence of America's Jewish lobby) but whose fame, or notoriety, depending on your point of view, is of no interest to him. "John and I have deliberately avoided the television shows because we don't think we can discuss these important issues in 10 minutes. It would become 'J' and 'S', the personalities who wrote about the lobby - and we want to open the way to serious discussion about this, to encourage a broader discussion of the forces shaping US foreign policy in the Middle East." "John" is John Mearsheimer, a political scientist at the University of Chicago. Walt is a 50-year-old tenured professor at the John F Kennedy School of Government at Harvard. The two men have caused one of the most extraordinary political storms over the Middle East in recent American history by stating what to many non-Americans is obvious: that the US has been willing to set aside its own security and that of many of its allies in order to advance the interests of Israel, that Israel is a liability in the "war on terror", that the biggest Israeli lobby group, Aipac (the American Israel Public Affairs Committee), is in fact the agent of a foreign government and has a stranglehold on Congress - so much so that US policy towards Israel is not debated there - and that the lobby monitors and condemns academics who are critical of Israel. "Anyone who criticises Israel's actions or argues that pro-Israel groups have significant influence over US Middle East policy," the authors have written, "...stands a good chance of being labelled an anti-Semite. Indeed, anyone who merely claims that there is an Israeli lobby runs the risk of being charged with anti-Semitism ... Anti-Semitism is something no-one wants to be accused of." This is strong stuff in a country where - to quote the late Edward Said - the "last taboo" (now that anyone can talk about blacks, gays and lesbians) is any serious discussion of America's relationship with Israel. Walt is already the author of an elegantly written account of the resistance to US world political dominance, a work that includes more than 50 pages of references. Indeed, those who have read his Taming Political Power: The Global Response to US Primacy will note that the Israeli lobby gets a thumping in this earlier volume because Aipac "has repeatedly targeted members of Congress whom it deemed insufficiently friendly to Israel and helped drive them from office, often by channelling money to their opponents." But how many people in America are putting their own heads above the parapet, now that Mearsheimer and Walt have launched a missile that would fall to the ground unexploded in any other country but which is detonating here at high speed? Not a lot. For a while, the mainstream US press and television - as pro-Israeli, biased and gutless as the two academics infer them to be - did not know whether to report on their conclusions (originally written for The Atlantic Monthly, whose editors apparently took fright, and subsequently reprinted in the London Review of Books in slightly truncated form) or to remain submissively silent. The New York Times, for example, only got round to covering the affair in depth well over two weeks after the report's publication, and then buried its article in the education section on page 19. The academic essay, according to the paper's headline, had created a "debate" about the lobby's influence. They can say that again. Dore Gold, a former ambassador to the UN, who now heads an Israeli lobby group, kicked off by unwittingly proving that the Mearsheimer-Walt theory of "anti-Semitism" abuse is correct. "I believe," he said, "that anti-Semitism may be partly defined as asserting a Jewish conspiracy for doing the same thing non-Jews engage in." Congressman Eliot Engel of New York said that the study itself was "anti-Semitic" and deserved the American public's contempt. Walt has no time for this argument. "We are not saying there is a conspiracy, or a cabal. The Israeli lobby has every right to carry on its work - all Americans like to lobby. What we are saying is that this lobby has a negative influence on US national interests and that this should be discussed. There are vexing problems out in the Middle East and we need to be able to discuss them openly. The Hamas government, for example - how do we deal with this? There may not be complete solutions, but we have to try and have all the information available." Walt doesn't exactly admit to being shocked by some of the responses to his work - it's all part of his desire to keep "discourse" in the academic arena, I suspect, though it probably won't work. But no-one could be anything but angered by his Harvard colleague, Alan Dershowitz, who announced that the two scholars recycled accusations that "would be seized on by bigots to promote their anti-Semitic agendas". The two are preparing a reply to Dershowitz's 45-page attack, but could probably have done without praise from the white supremacist and ex-Ku Klux Klan head David Duke - adulation which allowed newspapers to lump the name of Duke with the names of Mearsheimer and Walt. "Of Israel, Harvard and David Duke," ran the Washington Post's reprehensible headline. The Wall Street Journal, ever Israel's friend in the American press, took an even weirder line on the case. "As Ex-Lobbyists of Pro-Israel Group Face Court, Article Queries Sway on Mideast Policy" its headline proclaimed to astonished readers. Neither Mearsheimer nor Walt had mentioned the trial of two Aipac lobbyists - due to begin next month - who are charged under the Espionage Act with receiving and disseminating classified information provided by a former Pentagon Middle East analyst. The defence team for Steven Rosen and Keith Weissman has indicated that it may call Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley to the stand. Almost a third of the Journal's report is taken up with the Rosen-Weissman trial, adding that the indictment details how the two men "allegedly sought to promote a hawkish US policy toward Iran by trading favours with a number of senior US officials. Lawrence Franklin, the former Pentagon official, has pleaded guilty to misusing classified information. Mr Franklin was charged with orally passing on information about a draft National Security Council paper on Iran to the two lobbyists... as well as other classified information. Mr Franklin was sentenced in December to nearly 13 years in prison..." The Wall Street Journal report goes on to say that lawyers and "many Jewish leaders" - who are not identified - "say the actions of the former Aipac employees were no different from how thousands of Washington lobbyists work. They say the indictment marks the first time in US history that American citizens... have been charged with receiving and disseminating state secrets in conversations." The paper goes on to say that "several members of Congress have expressed concern about the case since it broke in 2004, fearing that the Justice Department may be targeting pro-Israel lobbying groups, such as Aipac. These officials (sic) say they're eager to see the legal process run its course, but are concerned about the lack of transparency in the case." As far as Dershowitz is concerned, it isn't hard for me to sympathise with the terrible pair. He it was who shouted abuse at me during an Irish radio interview when I said that we had to ask the question "Why?" after the 11 September 2001 international crimes against humanity. I was a "dangerous man", Dershowitz shouted over the air, adding that to be "anti-American" - my thought-crime for asking the "Why?" question - was the same as being anti-Semitic. I must, however, also acknowledge another interest. Twelve years ago, one of the Israeli lobby groups that Mearsheimer and Walt fingers prevented any second showing of a film series on Muslims in which I participated for Channel 4 and the Discovery Channel - by stating that my "claim" that Israel was building large Jewish settlements on Arab land was "an egregious falsehood". I was, according to another Israeli support group, "a Henry Higgins with fangs", who was "drooling venom into the living rooms of America." Such nonsense continues to this day. In Australia to launch my new book on the Middle East, for instance, I repeatedly stated that Israel - contrary to the anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists - was not responsible for the crimes of 11 September 2001. Yet the Australian Jewish News claimed that I "stopped just millimetres short of suggesting that Israel was the cause of the 9/11 attacks. The audience reportedly (and predictably) showered him in accolades." This was untrue. There was no applause and no accolades and I never stopped "millimetres" short of accusing Israel of these crimes against humanity. The story in the Australian Jewish News is a lie. So I have to say that - from my own humble experience - Mearsheimer and Walt have a point. And for a man who says he has not been to Israel for 20 years - or Egypt, though he says he had a "great time" in both countries - Walt rightly doesn't claim any on-the-ground expertise. "I've never flown into Afghanistan on a rickety plane, or stood at a checkpoint and seen a bus coming and not known if there is a suicide bomber aboard," he says. Noam Chomsky, America's foremost moral philosopher and linguistics academic - so critical of Israel that he does not even have a regular newspaper column - does travel widely in the region and acknowledges the ruthlessness of the Israeli lobby. But he suggests that American corporate business has more to do with US policy in the Middle East than Israel's supporters - proving, I suppose, that the Left in the United States has an infinite capacity for fratricide. Walt doesn't say he's on the left, but he and Mearsheimer objected to the invasion of Iraq, a once lonely stand that now appears to be as politically acceptable as they hope - rather forlornly - that discussion of the Israeli lobby will become. Walt sits in a Malaysian restaurant with me, patiently (though I can hear the irritation in his voice) explaining that the conspiracy theories about him are nonsense. His stepping down as dean of the Kennedy School was a decision taken before the publication of his report, he says. No one is throwing him out. The much-publicised Harvard disclaimer of ownership to the essay - far from being a gesture of fear and criticism by the university as his would-be supporters have claimed - was mainly drafted by Walt himself, since Mearsheimer, a friend as well as colleague, was a Chicago scholar, not a Harvard don. But something surely has to give. Across the United States, there is growing evidence that the Israeli and neo-conservative lobbies are acquiring ever greater power. The cancellation by a New York theatre company of My Name is Rachel Corrie - a play based on the writings of the young American girl crushed to death by an Israeli bulldozer in Gaza in 2003 - has deeply shocked liberal Jewish Americans, not least because it was Jewish American complaints that got the performance pulled. "How can the West condemn the Islamic world for not accepting Mohamed cartoons," Philip Weiss asked in The Nation, "when a Western writer who speaks out on behalf of Palestinians is silenced? And why is it that Europe and Israel itself have a healthier debate over Palestinian human rights than we can have here?" Corrie died trying to prevent the destruction of a Palestinian home. Enemies of the play falsely claim that she was trying to stop the Israelis from collapsing a tunnel used to smuggle weapons. Hateful e-mails were written about Corrie. Weiss quotes one that reads: "Rachel Corrie won't get 72 virgins but she got what she wanted." Saree Makdisi - a close relative of the late Edward Said - has revealed how a right-wing website is offering cash for University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) students who report on the political leanings of their professors, especially their views on the Middle East. Those in need of dirty money at UCLA should be aware that class notes, handouts and illicit recordings of lectures will now receive a bounty of $100. "I earned my own inaccurate and defamatory 'profile'," Makdisi says, "...not for what I have said in my classes on English poets such as Wordsworth and Blake - my academic speciality, which the website avoids mentioning - but rather for what I have written in newspapers about Middle Eastern politics." Mearsheimer and Walt include a study of such tactics in their report. "In September 2002," they write, "Martin Kramer and Daniel Pipes, two passionately pro-Israel neo-conservatives, established a website (www.campus-watch.org) that posted dossiers on suspect academics and encouraged students to report behaviour that might be considered hostile to Israel... the website still invites students to report 'anti-Israel' activity." Perhaps the most incendiary paragraph in the essay - albeit one whose contents have been confirmed in the Israeli press - discusses Israel's pressure on the United States to invade Iraq. "Israeli intelligence officials had given Washington a variety of alarming reports about Iraq's WMD programmes," the two academics write, quoting a retired Israeli general as saying: "Israeli intelligence was a full partner to the picture presented by American and British intelligence regarding Iraq's non-conventional capabilities."
Walt says he might take a year's sabbatical - though he doesn't want to get typecast as a "lobby" critic - because he needs a rest after his recent administrative post. There will be Israeli lobbyists, no doubt, who would he happy if he made that sabbatical a permanent one. I somehow doubt he will. |
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The Trap By Uri Avnery WHEN YOU see a person walking into a trap, you shout: "Look out!" But when you see a person walking into a trap knowingly, with open eyes, what are you supposed to do? AMIR PERETZ is about to become Minister of Defense and he knows that it is a trap. So why is he doing it? His motives are clear and understandable. In order to effect a fundamental change in political and social policy, he has to become prime minister. That suits his personal ambitions, too. But in Israel, a person who wants to become prime minister needs a military calling card. The last elections have shown this again. Peretz wanted to win as a "social" candidate. All the polls proved that he was indeed perceived by the majority of the voters as the most creditable candidate in social matters. But the battle was won by the candidate who was able to dictate the location of the battlefield. Peretz failed to drag social issues to the center of the stage. Olmert succeeded in keeping security there. The Hamas victory in the Palestinian elections, the continued launching of Qassam rockets from the Gaza Strip into Israel, the Israeli army attack on the Jericho prison, the worsening Iranian nuclear threat - all these pushed the social problems aside. The public was not prepared to vote for a person "without security experience". In the last 30 years, Israel has had seven prime ministers. Three of them (Yitzhak Rabin, Ehud Barak and Ariel Sharon) were generals. Two (Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir) had outstanding records as chiefs of military underground groups, and Shamir has also served as a senior Mossad officer. One (Shimon Peres) was a former minister of defense and the father of the Israeli atom bomb. Binyamin Netanyahu was only a captain in a commando unit, but he bathed in the reflected glory of his heroic brother, Jonathan, who was killed in the Entebbe raid. Peretz needs a security certificate in order to prepare himself for the next round of the battle for the Prime Minister's office. That's why he accepted the job of minister of defense, knowing that it could turn into a horror show. UPON ENTERING the office of the minister of defense, Peretz will have to choose between joining the cannibals or being eaten by them. In the corridor leading to his new office, there hang the photos of all his predecessors. He would be well advised to pause for a moment's reflection before the portrait of the second in the row: Pinhas Lavon. Like Peretz, Lavon was a Labor politician lacking any "security experience". In 1953, David Ben-Gurion surprised everybody by appointing him as his successor in the defense ministry. At that time, too, there were some who suspected that it was a trap. Ben-Gurion, who was retiring temporarily to the Negev, turned the job over to the most unsuitable person, so as not to have an effective rival when or if he decided to come back. Lavon, until then the whitest of doves, turned overnight into a screeching hawk. For example, after soldiers destroyed the furniture of an Arab family while searching their home, he remarked cynically: "They were not of mahogany, were they?" (After that, we in Haolam Hazeh magazine called him "Pinhas Mahogany".) He authorized brutal "retaliation raids" and underwrote the army's determination to sabotage the regime of the new Egyptian leader, Gamal Abd-al-Nasser. The end was sad. Following this line, the army carried out a false-flag sabotage campaign against US and British targets in Egypt designed to cause strife between Egypt and the West. The action failed, the agents were caught and the army chiefs pointed the finger at Lavon, who had to resign shamefully. (This "affair" had far-reaching political results and led eventually to the downfall of Ben-Gurion himself). Until now, almost all the defense ministers have been generals. The few exceptions - Levy Eshkol, Shimon Peres and Moshe Arens - took the easy way out. They just gave the generals all they wanted and adopted their outlook. Because of that, they were considered "good defense ministers". IF PERETZ goes this way, he will be betraying the hopes invested in him. The army will demand that he authorize "targeted liquidations", enlarge the settlement blocs (even if a few "isolated" settlements will be dismantled), put up more roadblocks and generally make life for the Palestinian population intolerable. After a year, no difference between him and his predecessors will be detectible. If he wants to live in peace with the generals, he cannot make significant cuts in the bloated military budget, that shark that eats everything it comes across. Without a big cut, there is no chance for the promised social change. But such a cut would lead to the dismissal of thousands of officers and civilian employees, including the well-organized employees of the military industries. Up will go the cry: Peretz is endangering the security of the state, he is exposing us to the Iranian atom bomb, he is to blame for the deaths of terror victims. In order to be considered a "good defense minister", Peretz must be content with cosmetic budget cuts and disappoint the public that voted for him. IF HE decides, to the contrary, to confront the generals, significantly cut the military budget and impose on the military a different political outlook, he will find himself a very small David up against a very menacing Goliath. The Israeli "security establishment" is a power-center that has no parallel in any other democratic state. It includes not only the huge army and all its branches, the big military industries, the Mossad and Shin Bet (which are not even under his control, but report directly to the prime minister). It includes also many hundreds of retired generals, who occupy key positions in all governmental, political and economic spheres, and who can be relied upon to support each other and the General Staff positions. The Israeli army is not just a professional body. It is also an ideological hothouse. From his induction as a green recruit up to the acquisition of a general's insignia on his shoulders, the officer undergoes an unconscious daily indoctrination which implants in his mind a well-nigh unchangeable outlook. He takes this with him when he moves on, becoming a cabinet minister (whether of Likud or Labor is almost immaterial), the boss of an industrial enterprise or the director-general of an important public service. This is a political-ideological pressure-machine that no government can hold out against. Ariel Sharon, himself a victorious general, could here and there impose his authority on the military. This does not apply to a government headed by three rank civilians: Ehud Olmert (who has hardly been a soldier at all), Amir Peretz (a junior non-combatant officer) and Tsipi Livni (no military record to speak of) . They will be afraid of being accused by the Chief-of-Staff of not understanding anything about military affairs and endangering the life of soldiers and civilians. All the more so since the army holds the one position that is more important than anyone else, perhaps including the Prime Minister: the army intelligence chief, who bears the sole responsibility for the "national evaluation". This view of the world submitted to the cabinet by Army Intelligence practically dictates all its political and security decisions. No minister will ever stand up and say: "Dear comrades, this is a heap of rubbish!" Not even after it was disclosed that one of the last army intelligence chiefs had systematically falsified the professional findings of his subordinates and submitted to the cabinet a deliberately false picture of Palestinian intentions. The senior officers corps, by its very nature, looks at Israel's problems through gunsights - that is to say, with one eye closed. POSSIBLY, PERETZ will change the situation. Possible he will show himself to be a fearless fighter - imposing on the senior officers a political outlook that is alien to them, cutting the fat military budget and insisting on moral standards. Hopefully. There are military experts who say that if Peretz tries to impose his perceptions, the Chief-of-Staff and his generals will eat him for breakfast. Peretz' admirers believe that it will be he who leaves that cannibal meal with a full stomach.
It is said that a clever person knows how to get out of a trap that a wise person would not have walked into in the first place. But when a person enters a trap with open eyes, one can only hope that he knows how to get out - and at least keep one's fingers crossed for him.
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2006 E-Voting 'Train Wreck': Investigations and Problems Continue to Spread By John Gideon When asked by a reporter, "Which is harder to manage, your two children or ES&S?" Marion County, Indiana Clerk Doris Ann Sadler told the Indianapolis Star this week, "Oh, ES&S, definitely. My children are really very easy. In fact, at times I think my children would have done a better job with the voting machines. And they're (ages) 7 and 4." The Electronic Voting Machine Vendor locomotive is still running away down the track at an alarming speed. However, this week some states and county election officials seem to be beginning to notice and are now sending out signals that they intend to either stop the train or - barring that -- at least ensure that companies such as Election Systems and Software (ES&S) do not profit too much from their arrogance, ineptitude and now epidemic failures. Legal complaints against the company were filed this week in West Virginia and Indiana to add to the one previously under way in Oregon. Threats have been heard from Texas, Arkansas, Ohio and elsewhere. Election officials have been forced to change voting procedures in many states and counties to accommodate for ES&S' growing array of failures. Meanwhile no one seems to be talking about the people who will be most affected by this train wreck; the voters... PROBLEMS MOUNT IN SUMMIT COUNTY, OHIO... Memory card failures, as reported in our previous "Train Wreck" articles have been a huge problem for Summit County, Ohio. This past week the Akron Beacon Journal reported that even after testing and retesting memory cards, they were still failing at an alarming rate. In the last round of testing before next week's primary, 17 memory cards failed. The counties voting machine vendor, ES&S promises to provide back-up cards that are pre-loaded with ballot information for the different county precincts. County election board members have expressed concern for the failures and the prospect that the failure rate of memory cards may prove to be "catastrophic" according to one board member. Also of great concern to the County Board of Elections is ES&S' plan for technical support for the county. It seems that ES&S has given up on any possibility of not having chaos and they have decided to distance themselves from the county in the bargain. In order to do this, they've come up with a brilliant plan . ES&S has hired 19 students from the University of Akron who will get a one-day training program and who will then be ES&S' technical representatives in the county. One member of the board said, "It's just not right and will not be tolerated. You guys are supposed to be the gold standards of optical scan, and I'm amazed.'' Apparently ES&S has given up on maintaining their reputation in this county. Who ends up suffering for this arrogance? The voters. EMERCENCY PAPER BALLOTS OK'd IN TEXAS In an April 24 letter to Texas county elections officials, Ann McGeehan, the Texas Director of Elections authorized the many counties who have not received programming media or paper ballots from their vendor to print paper ballots and use those in elections to take place on May 13. Though ES&S was not named in the letter there was no doubt that's the company that McGeehan was speaking about when she said: "We recognize that this kind of service from a certified voting systems vendors [sic] is completely unacceptable and disturbing. We will be pursuing all appropriate remedies from a state level that are available to us." Also in an editorial from the San Antonio Express-News we learn that Bexar County (San Antonio) is one of the Texas counties involved. The editorial gives a very good reason that the county and its voters should get very good service from ES&S: Bexar County spent $8 million on the ES&S system in 2003. But the costs don't stop there. Each time there is an election, ES&S technicians have to program the system and provide technical support. For example, the March primary cost $57,000 in programming fees, $4,600 in technical support fees and $31,000 in voice-recorded files for disabled voters. A $184 shipping fee was charged for the voice-recorded files, despite the fact that they are delivered via the Internet, Callanen said. Beginning in May 2007, the county's warranty with the company runs out. To extend it, the county will have to come up with $185,000 a year, every year. That is too much money to pay if the company is unable to hold up its end of the bargain. Once again, who gets hosed? The tax-payers...otherwise known as; The voters. ES&S MELTS DOWN IN WEST VIRGINA It was just last week that West Virginia Secretary of State Betty Ireland was finding ways to make excuses for the state's voting machine vendor, ES&S. This week Ireland seems to have opened her eyes as legal proceedings have now begun against the company. Either that, or those around her finally shook her awake and she realized that there were problems that needed her attention. In a press release] earlier this week, Ireland says: "I am absolutely appalled by ES&S's delays and the hardships ES&S has placed upon this state and our county officials. ES&S's delay in programming ballots has made the process very difficult - it is inexcusable. We feel the court will appreciate the dilemma the delays have placed the counties in." On Friday the County Commissioners Association of West Virginia announced that they were filing legal action against ES&S with help from the Secretary of State and the state Attorney General's Office. And in Kanawha County the County Commission President Kent Carper has asked County Manager Brent Pauley to place a check for $1.2 million, that the county owes ES&S, under lock and key in his desk drawer. Carper then told the media, "(The company) has embarrassed themselves. I got a feeling this will get their attention." Indiana Certifies Microvote And Announces A Complaint Filed Against ES&S This week the Indiana Elections Commission took the expected move and certified the software used on MicroVote General voting machines that are used in 47 Indiana counties. According to the Indianapolis Star Commission member Tom John said the commission was making this last-minute certification of MicroVote's equipment not for the sake of the company "but for the sake of hundreds of thousands of voters who otherwise would have had to vote on pieces of paper." MicroVote is not off the hook for violations of state law. There will be investigations by the Secretary of State and the Elections Commission. At the same time that MicroVote was certified, Secretary of State Todd Rokita announced that he had filed a complaint against ES&S. The complaint charges that ES&S has violated state law by providing defective equipment and services. The complaint lists 30 possible violations in 3 counties. Each of those complaints may cost ES&S up to $300,000 in civil penalties for each violation. Meanwhile, as reported by the Fort Wayne News-Sentinel] in another embarrassment for ES&S, they proved again that they can't get much done right anywhere as they incorrectly printed 80,000 paper ballots for Porter County, Indiana. They will replace the ballots and pay for the printing. Maybe the voters in all of the ES&S counties will be able to vote on the machines their tax money has paid for...eventually. ARKANSAS JOINS THE "TRAIN WRECK" The Arkansas primary is scheduled to be held on May 23 but early voting is to begin on May 8. So far the Arkansas voting machine vendor; yes, it's ES&S; has failed to deliver all of the voting machines purchased by some counties. They have also failed to provide the ballot programming to many counties. The Arkansas Leader reports that ES&S has not programmed the iVotronic DREs in Pulaski County which is a problem; and they have failed to program the county's optical-scan machines which is a larger problem because the county cannot test their absentee ballots to ensure they work with the machines. The county is now preparing to hand-count those ballots on election night. According to the Fort Smith Times Record Sebastian County has the same problems except that ES&S has also failed to deliver the paper ballots they have contracted to deliver. The county commission has decided that they want to be sure they are ready, so they are having their central-count optical scan machines programmed by their previous contractor and their paper ballots are being printed by the printer who used to print their ballots. They hope to be ready for their voters. Is it too late to avert a disaster in our primary elections? That's probably going to be up to the voting machine vendors in many states and to the elections officials who choose to stand-up to them. What is the federal Elections Assistance Commission (EAC) doing about all of this? Not a thing that we can see. They are just sitting back and telling the world that they have no power to regulate. The corporate mainstream media? Well, the local, and in some cases state-wide, media are reporting what is happening and editorial boards are doing their thing but the national media is sitting with their eyes closed -- failing to connect any dots whatsoever - and keeping mum on this train wreck in the making.
Ssshh! Don't tell anybody. We'd hate to disturb the voters...
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Faced with an extraordinary rebellion by generals who're fed up with his military failures, as well as rising opposition from Republican congress critters who fear that he's a dead-weight drag on their re-election chances, Rummy has mounted an all-out PR blitzkrieg to shore up his position. In a short span, he was everywhere in the media - including holding two press conferences, appearing on both Arab television and on Rush Limbaugh's softball show. He even had to trot out George W, who said he doesn't care what anyone else thinks (even the generals), he thinks Donnie is doing a heck of a job. "I'm the decider," declared George, "I decide what's best." This is the same guy who once said "I'm a uniter, not a divider," which turned out to be a lie. Anyway, he's now decided that he's "The Decider," so Rummy gets to stay... for a while. Rumsfeld himself dismisses his critics, scoffing that the generals calling for his dismissal are just spoilsports upset that he's trying to "reform" the Pentagon. Come on, Rummy, these guys are not talking about the configuration of boxes on the Pentagon's organizational chart - they're talking about your dangerous and deadly ineptness at running a war that you got us into on false pretenses, then mismanaged. As one of the generals, the former chief of the U.S. central command, says of Rumsfeld's leadership: "[In the run up to the Iraq war and it's later conduct], I saw, at a minimum, true dereliction, negligence, and irresponsibility; at worst, lying, incompetence, and corruption." This is Jim Hightower saying... And that's what George W has decided is best for America? It's an important question, for Bush Rummy & Gang now are clamoring to put us in another war - with Iran.
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Withdraw immediately or stay the present course? That is the key question about the war in Iraq today. American public opinion is now decidedly against the war. From liberal New England, where citizens pass town-hall resolutions calling for withdrawal, to the conservative South and West, where more than half of "red state" citizens oppose the war, Americans want out. That sentiment is understandable.
The prewar dream of a liberal Iraqi democracy friendly to the United States is no longer credible. No Iraqi leader with enough power and legitimacy to control the country will be pro-American. Still, U.S. President George W. Bush says the United States must stay the course. Why? Let's consider his administration's most popular arguments for not leaving Iraq.
If we leave, there will be a civil war.
In reality, a civil war in Iraq began just weeks after U.S. forces toppled Saddam. Any close observer could see that then; today, only the blind deny it. Even President Bush, who is normally impervious to uncomfortable facts, recently admitted that Iraq has peered into the abyss of civil war. He ought to look a little closer. Iraqis are fighting Iraqis. Insurgents have killed far more Iraqis than Americans. That's civil war.
Withdrawal will encourage the terrorists.
True, but that is the price we are doomed to pay. Our continued occupation of Iraq also encourages the killers-precisely because our invasion made Iraq safe for them. Our occupation also left the surviving Baathists with one choice: Surrender, or ally with al Qaeda. They chose the latter. Staying the course will not change this fact. Pulling out will most likely result in Sunni groups' turning against al Qaeda and its sympathizers, driving them out of Iraq entirely.
Before U.S. forces stand down, Iraqi security forces must stand up.
The problem in Iraq is not military competency; it is political consolidation. Iraq has a large officer corps with plenty of combat experience from the Iran-Iraq war. Moktada al-Sadr's Shiite militia fights well today without U.S. advisors, as do Kurdish pesh merga units. The problem is loyalty. To whom can officers and troops afford to give their loyalty? The political camps in Iraq are still shifting. So every Iraqi soldier and officer today risks choosing the wrong side. As a result, most choose to retain as much latitude as possible to switch allegiances. All the U.S. military trainers in the world cannot remove that reality. But political consolidation will. It should by now be clear that political power can only be established via Iraqi guns and civil war, not through elections or U.S. colonialism by ventriloquism.
Setting a withdrawal deadline will damage the morale of U.S. troops.
Hiding behind the argument of troop morale shows no willingness to accept the responsibilities of command. The truth is, most wars would stop early if soldiers had the choice of whether or not to continue. This is certainly true in Iraq, where a withdrawal is likely to raise morale among U.S. forces. A recent Zogby poll suggests that most U.S. troops would welcome an early withdrawal deadline. But the strategic question of how to extract the United States from the Iraq disaster is not a matter to be decided by soldiers. Carl von Clausewitz spoke of two kinds of courage: first, bravery in the face of mortal danger; second, the willingness to accept personal responsibility for command decisions. The former is expected of the troops. The latter must be demanded of high-level commanders, including the president.
Withdrawal would undermine U.S. credibility in the world.
Were the United States a middling power, this case might hold some water. But for the world's only superpower, it's patently phony. A rapid reversal of our present course in Iraq would improve U.S. credibility around the world. The same argument was made against withdrawal from Vietnam. It was proved wrong then and it would be proved wrong today. Since Sept. 11, 2001, the world's opinion of the United States has plummeted, with the largest short-term drop in American history. The United States now garners as much international esteem as Russia. Withdrawing and admitting our mistake would reverse this trend. Very few countries have that kind of corrective capacity. I served as a military attach in the U.S. Embassy in Moscow during Richard Nixon's Watergate crisis. When Nixon resigned, several Soviet officials who had previously expressed disdain for the United States told me they were astonished. One diplomat said, "Only your country is powerful enough to do this. It would destroy my country."
Two facts, however painful, must be recognized, or we will remain perilously confused in Iraq. First, invading Iraq was not in the interests of the United States. It was in the interests of Iran and al Qaeda. For Iran, it avenged a grudge against Saddam for his invasion of the country in 1980. For al Qaeda, it made it easier to kill Americans. Second, the war has paralyzed the United States in the world diplomatically and strategically. Although relations with Europe show signs of marginal improvement, the trans-Atlantic alliance still may not survive the war. Only with a rapid withdrawal from Iraq will Washington regain diplomatic and military mobility. Tied down like Gulliver in the sands of Mesopotamia, we simply cannot attract the diplomatic and military cooperation necessary to win the real battle against terror. Getting out of Iraq is the precondition for any improvement.
In fact, getting out now may be our only chance to set things right in Iraq. For starters, if we withdraw, European politicians would be more likely to cooperate with us in a strategy for stabilizing the greater Middle East. Following a withdrawal, all the countries bordering Iraq would likely respond favorably to an offer to help stabilize the situation. The most important of these would be Iran. It dislikes al Qaeda as much as we do. It wants regional stability as much as we do. It wants to produce more oil and gas and sell it. If its leaders really want nuclear weapons, we cannot stop them. But we can engage them.
None of these prospects is possible unless we stop moving deeper into the "big sandy" of Iraq. America must withdraw now. |
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"This is the excellent foppery of the world;" this is the insanity that we live under today. The Bush Administration is supposedly frantic with worry that Iran is about to develop nuclear weapons. A nuclear-armed Iran would be an intolerable threat to U.S. national security - we are told; it would put millions of innocent lives at risk in Israel, Europe and - very,very soon - the United States itself. Why, it's fair to say the acquisition of nuclear weapons by Iran is absolutely, positively the very worst thing that could happen in the world today, short of Osama bin Laden turning up in the Oval Office with an H-bomb strapped around his waist. Now, if you really believed this to be the case, what would be the logical response? Right - you would sit down with the Iranians, talk face to face with them, negotiate and try to defuse the threat. Just as American officials did for decades with the Soviets, who really did have a nuclear arsenal. But what is the Bush Gang's response to this ostensibly overwhelming, allegedly imminent threat? An absolute, adamant refusal to talk directly to Iran about the situation. So says Nicholas Burns, the career diplomat turned War Party mouthpiece at the State Department. Burns is spearheading the U.S. effort to draw up a draconian Security Council resolution that, in the time-honored fashion, will present Iran with impossible terms transparently designed to produce a rejection, after which the usual comic hijinks with bombs, missiles and mass death will ensue. Bushman Burns is using Iran's rejection of an informal Security Council request that it stop its entirely legal enrichment of uranium as the trigger for a new, formal ultimatum. He's got lapdog Britain and gadfly France on board - France having no oil contracts with Iran, unlike the lucrative pacts with Saddam that undergirded Paris' heroic resistance to the last Bush-beating for aggressive war in the Middle East. "The Security Council has no option now but to proceed under Chapter 7," Burns said today, referring not to the U.S. bankruptcy laws (wonder what chapter covers moral bankruptcy?), but to the UN article that makes resolutions compulsory and "opens the way to sanctions or even military action," as the NYT reports. So we are practically at DEFCON 1 already, despite the recent assurance from Bush's own intelligence googily-moogily, John Negroponte, that Iran is many years away from developing a nuclear weapon - that is, if they are trying to develop a nuclear weapon in the first place, an assumption for which there is no hard evidence whatsoever, and which would fly in the face of the very public fatwa against developing a nuclear weapon promulgated by Iran's supreme leader, the Ayatollah Khamanei, who actually controls the nation's nuclear program and its armed forces - not the useful idiot, President Ahmadinejad, whose bellicose comments, bad enough on their own, are wildly distorted and mistranslated in the Western press for maximum scaremongering effect.
But none of this matters. What matters is that the world be pushed to the edge of a cliff as soon as possible, teetering on the brink of a brand new war guaranteed to usher in an era of bloodshed and chaos unseen on a global level since 1945. Then and only then will the proper atmosphere of panic, dread and outright extortion be created - the only atmosphere in which the Bush Regime can revive its sagging political fortunes and thrive anew. And that's why Errand Boy Burns rejected the frantic pleas of European diplomats for the United States to hold direct talks with Iran. No, no, no, said Burns: "isolation, not engagement, is the only acceptable approach," as the NYT reports.
It is the only acceptable approach because it is the only approach that will produce an acceptable result for the Bush Faction: i.e., the imminent threat of war with Iran. What Burns means is that we cannot have direct talks with Iran, because that could lead to negotiations, and negotiations could lead to...peace. And peace don't feed the bulldog.
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A Turning Point By William Rivers Pitt
--- John Kenneth Galbraith ---
George W. Bush marked the three-year anniversary of "Mission Accomplished" in Iraq by declaring that a "turning point" has been reached in that shattered nation. His crotch-bulging strut across the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln, some 1,097 days ago, was intended to show America and the world that victory had been achieved. On May 1st, 2006, the best he could do was promise that victory might possibly come at some indeterminate point in the future.
This is, by the best estimates, the four hundred and twelfth "turning point" that has been reached in Iraq since the disastrous invasion was undertaken. One could argue that, in fact, this "turning point" is for real; after all, Condoleezza Rice and Donald Rumsfeld managed to go to Iraq and return without getting blown sideways out of a Humvee or without having their airplane shot down over Baghdad. That has to count for something.
A look at a few of the headlines from the day after Bush's declaration of a "turning point" show us all how close complete and total victory is. On May 2nd, it was reported that two civilians were kidnapped in Buhriz. Three Iraqi soldiers were wounded by a roadside bomb in Dora. Hundreds of other Iraqi soldiers flipped out and tore off their uniforms when informed that they would not be deployed to their home regions. Fifteen bodies, bound and blindfolded, were found bullet-riddled in Baghdad. Four other bodies, each showing signs of horrific torture, were found in Shula. Three other tortured, bullet-shattered bodies were found in Yusufiya.
76 American soldiers were killed in Iraq during the month of April, the highest count since November of 2005. It had been almost peaceful until April came along. After all, only 31 troops died in March, only 55 died in February, only 62 died in January, and only 68 died in December. The first soldier to die in May was killed on Monday night by a roadside bomb outside Baghdad. The total for the entire conflict now stands at 2,405.
The good news for April is that, according to the Department of Defense, only 12 soldiers were wounded. 489 had been wounded in March, so April represented a big leap forward. A lot fewer soldiers ended April with their brains scrambled, their limbs maimed or their flesh charred. The fact that most of the wounded up and died isn't really something to be discussed in polite company. It just doesn't jibe with the "turning point" talk.
Oh, and the Minneapolis Star-Tribune reported that the need for military blood donations has skyrocketed. "Injuries caused by insurgent attacks in Iraq have forced military donation centers to meet supply levels that exceed peacetime needs," reported the Tribune. "The demand for blood - almost all of which goes to a battlefield - has grown 400 percent since the war in Iraq began."
It seems, as we celebrate this "turning point," that there is blood aplenty in Iraq. Unfortunately, it is all in the wrong place. So, apparently, is the money. Billions of taxpayer dollars have been funneled into Iraq for reconstruction of the petroleum industry and basic infrastructure. Almost none of this reconstruction has been completed, despite the fact that most of the money has somehow been spent. This was the perfect capitalist war: a few people got very rich by stealing all these funds, and the children who have no schools and the families who have neither clean water nor electricity can go pound sand. Literally.
Our "turning point" in Iraq means we can now concentrate on making another disastrous error in Iran. Bush and the crew are pushing for a United Nations resolution for sanctions against Iran, an attempt to curb that nation's alleged nuclear ambitions. There is a lot of tough talk flying around, all of which is as substantial as smoke. China and Russia won't let any sanctions against Iran pass the Security Council, so the point of this quasi-diplomatic effort is difficult to find.
The trouble, of course, is that nobody quite knows what Iran is up to. America had an intelligence network aimed at Iran's nuclear capabilities, but that network hasn't been in place for three long years. CIA agent Valerie Plame, you see, was the one running that network. Because her husband, Ambassador Joseph Wilson, had the temerity to publicly question the Bush administration's right to lie with impunity regarding the threat posed by Iraq, agent Plame was outed by the White House as punishment. In the three years since that happened, our knowledge of Iran's activities has devolved into a big black hole. It's a good thing for all of us this administration cares so much about our national security.
Never fear, however. All this depressing information will soon be much more difficult to come by, even without White House criminals trashing intelligence networks to exact some political revenge. Newly-minted White House chief of staff Josh Bolten has signaled his desire to end the traditional publicly-televised daily press conferences with the White House press secretary. This will take a load off Tony Snow's mind, to be sure, and will save the rest of us from having to hear so many sad, disquieting, disturbing facts.
Bill Maher, host of the HBO program "Real Time," threw a thought for George W. Bush against the wall during his closing monologue the other night. "You govern like Billy Joel drives," said Maher to Bush. "You've performed so poorly I'm surprised that you haven't given yourself a medal. You're a catastrophe that walks like a man. Herbert Hoover was a s****y president, but even he never conceded an entire city to rising water and snakes. On your watch, we've lost almost all of our allies, the surplus, four airliners, two trade centers, a piece of the Pentagon, and the City of New Orleans. Maybe you're just not lucky. I'm not saying you don't love this country. I'm just wondering how much worse it could be if you were on the other side."
Indeed.
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A Reverse Thousand Days By Robert Parry One thousand days, as a measure for a President's accomplishments, were enshrined by the length of John F. Kennedy's time in office cut short by assassination. But now it could be an organizing principle for undoing George W. Bush's troubling legacy - what might be called "a reverse thousand days." With Bush's second term having about as many days left as Kennedy's presidency lasted in total, the challenge to the American people is how to use that time to restore U.S. traditions in a variety of key areas. These include: limits on Executive power; protection of constitutional freedoms; pragmatic policies based on science, not ideology or religion; avoidance of "entangling" foreign conflicts when military objectives are unclear. In five-plus years in office, Bush has pushed radical approaches in each of these areas - asserting "plenary," or unlimited, powers as Commander in Chief; abrogating legal and constitutional rights of citizens; disdaining the "reality-based community" and ordering "preemptive" strikes in an indefinite conflict against vague notions, "terror" and "evil." No question, it has taken the American people collectively a long time to catch on to Bush's game. In November 2004, Bush received a huge number of votes across large swaths of the country (even if his total may have been boosted by some ballot tampering here and there). In 2005, however, as the Iraq War dragged on, as hundreds of more U.S. soldiers returned home in coffins and as new evidence about Bush's pre-war deceptions surfaced, the tide of public opinion turned decisively. Bush's contempt for pragmatic government also was exposed by the inept reaction to Hurricane Katrina; his clumsy campaign to partially privatize Social Security; soaring gasoline prices amid inaction on conservation, alternative fuels and global warming; and the exploding federal debt with hundreds of billions of dollars owed to China and other U.S. rivals. The result has been a collapse in Bush's approval ratings across the country, with Bush now holding a net-positive rating in only four states, according to SurveyUSA.com's state-by-state numbers for April. An overwhelming majority of Americans - 71 percent in a new CBS News poll - also say the nation is "on the wrong track." The public anger has spilled over from the White House to taint both sides of the aisle in Congress as well as the reputation of the U.S. news media, which failed to ask the tough questions during the run-up to the Iraq War. But the American people now must look to themselves if they are to use the next 1,000 days to get the country back "on the right track." Some recommendations: First and foremost, if the Republic is to be protected, the President's claims to unlimited power must be challenged. When Bush asserts "plenary" powers as Commander in Chief, the word "plenary" is defined as "complete in all respects, unlimited or full." It follows that if the President's powers are unlimited, not only are the powers of Congress and the Courts gutted, but so too are the rights of the people. That's the significance of Bush's decision to negate the constitutional right of habeas corpus in denying a fair trial to "enemy combatants," even U.S. citizens, or to ignore the Fourth Amendment's requirement of a court warrant before conducting searches against Americans. In effect, Bush is saying that the "unalienable rights," as promised by the Founders in the Declaration of Independence and guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights, are no longer "unalienable." They exist to the degree Bush says they exist. Bush's theories also have shattered the Founders' delicate "checks and balances," the constitutional design of using the three branches of government - Executive, Legislature and Judiciary - to check each other and thus keep any one from gaining too much power and threatening the people's liberties. But Bush - citing his unlimited powers as Commander in Chief - holds himself above both the Constitution and the law. Even when Bush compromises on statutory language - as he did in December 2005 in the passage of a law barring inhumane treatment of prisoners - he tacks on "signing statements" which reserve his right to ignore the laws. An investigation by the Boston Globe found that Bush has claimed the right to set aside more than 750 statutes, often by putting these "signing statements" quietly into the Federal Register, a publication of official government regulations that is not widely read by Americans. [Boston Globe, April 30, 2006] Besides snubbing new laws, Bush has claimed the power to bypass old ones, such as the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which set up a special secret court to approve Executive Branch requests for warrants to conduct electronic eavesdropping inside the United States. Shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, Bush secretly agreed to let the National Security Agency intercept some communications by Americans without a warrant. Publicly, however, Bush insisted that he was abiding by the legal requirement to obtain warrants in all cases. In 2004, Bush told a crowd in Buffalo, N.Y., that "by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires - a wiretap requires a court order." Only after the New York Times revealed the warrantless wiretap program in December 2005 did Bush admit that he had approved the program. So, Bush had used both secrecy and deception to confuse the public about his presidential authority. Boundless Powers Since Bush thinks his powers are boundless - and since he sees the "war on terror" as a conflict without boundaries - his unlimited powers reach around the world and into every community in the United States. To this "war president," the battlefield is everywhere. Since the "war on terror" is also indefinite, Bush's powers are not simply a response to a short-term emergency. They represent long-term or even permanent changes in the American system of government. Thus, to be honest, U.S. schools should recall old civics books with those quaint lessons about fundamental liberties. Revised editions could be ordered explaining to the schoolchildren how their parents traded the "unalienable rights" bestowed by the Founders on American "posterity" in exchange for a promise of a little more safety while driving to the shopping mall. The children could learn how this generation of Americans also swapped the exalted status as citizens invested with the sovereignty of the Republic for the subordinate positiovn as subjects with their rights dependent on George W. Bush or some successor. Recognition of this new role as quiescent subjects, rather than assertive citizens, has begun to surface in the popular culture, as it did in an episode of ABC-TV's comedy-drama "Boston Legal" on March 14, 2006. The storyline centered on one of the law firm's female secretaries who gets arrested for tax evasion, having sent in her tax return without payment and with a note attached telling the U.S. government to "stick it." The secretary, Melissa Hughes, explains that she took the action out of respect for her late grandfather who had fought in World War II and who believed in the traditional principles of American freedom and justice. She said she was "embarrassed" by the current violations of those principles. When an ambitious U.S. Attorney seeks to make an example of Melissa by portraying her as "un-American," defense attorney Alan Shore, played by James Spader, offers a defense of Melissa's actions. "When the weapons of mass destruction thing turned out to be not true, I expected the American people to rise up," Shore tells the jury. "Ha! They didn't. "Then, when the Abu Ghraib torture thing surfaced and it was revealed that our government participated in rendition, a practice where we kidnap people and turn them over to regimes who specialize in torture, I was sure then the American people would be heard from. We stood mute. "Then came the news that we jailed thousands of so-called terrorist suspects, locked them up without the right to a trial or even the right to confront their accusers. Certainly, we would never stand for that. We did. "And now, it's been discovered the Executive Branch has been conducting massive, illegal, domestic surveillance on its own citizens. You and me. And I at least consoled myself that finally, finally the American people will have had enough. Evidently, we haven't. "In fact, if the people of this country have spoken, the message is 'we're okay with it all.' Torture, warrantless search and seizure, illegal wiretappings, prison without a fair trial - or any trial, war on false pretenses. "We, as a citizenry, are apparently not offended. There are no demonstrations on college campuses. In fact, there's no clear indication that young people seem to notice. "Well, Melissa Hughes noticed. Now, you might think, instead of withholding her taxes, she could have protested the old-fashioned way. Made a placard and demonstrated at a Presidential or Vice-Presidential appearance, but we've lost the right to that as well. "The Secret Service can now declare free-speech zones to contain, control and, in effect, criminalize protest. Stop for a second and try to fathom that. At a presidential rally, parade or appearance, if you have on a supportive T-shirt, you can be there. If you are wearing or carrying something in protest, you can be removed. "This, in the United States of America. This in the United States of America. Is Melissa Hughes the only one embarrassed?" As the Bush presidency ticks down through its last 1,000 days, it is still unclear whether real-life Americans will act like Melissa Hughes and come to the conclusion that they must - individually and together - recover their precious "unalienable rights." But there are signs they are moving in that direction. Overcoming Fear A second recommendation is that if Americans are to hold Bush accountable and restore their traditional freedoms, they must overcome fear with courage and reject the proffered trade-off of rights for security. More than any other motivating force, the Bush administration has relied on fear of terrorism to convince Americans to sacrifice their rights. Some right-wing pundits even argue that surrendering liberties is the patriotic thing to do, because it's needed to prevent another 9/11 attack. In other words, how can you be so selfish to insist on your rights when the lives of fellow Americans are at stake? While there's an emotional appeal to this argument, it ignores the fact that earlier generations of Americans have done the exact opposite. They chose, again and again, to sacrifice safety - and often their lives - for liberty, not the other way around. The United States was not a nation built by cowards, but by people who risked everything - crossing oceans, taming wildernesses, challenging the British army for a chance to establish a political system that placed unprecedented power in the hands of the people. Even amid danger and uncertainty, the nation's course has pressed forward toward greater liberty - the elimination of slavery, women's suffrage, civil rights - not toward sacrificing "unalienable rights" to authoritarian leaders in exchange for dubious promises of more safety. So, the choice facing this generation of Americans is whether they will deliver a message to Bush and other politicians who exploit fear for power that Americans won't be frightened by their own government any more than they will be intimidated by al-Qaeda killers. As horrible as the 9/11 attacks were, they will not be made an excuse for turning back on American traditions of courage and liberty. There is, indeed, a deep irony in Bush's prescription to Americans that to thwart enemies who supposedly "hate our freedoms," the American people must surrender many of those freedoms. Standing Up Thirdly, if the American people truly want to halt the drift toward authoritarian government, they must express themselves in many ways - in the streets, in letters to newspapers and to politicians, on the Internet and at the ballot box. An obvious idea would be to elect a Democratic Congress, which could then launch serious oversight investigations. But there are Democrats, such as Sen. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, who have sided with Bush's claims to extraordinary presidential power in waging the "war on terror," just as there are Republicans, such as Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, who have risked their party's wrath to object. Other voices of dissent against Bush's power grab have come from traditional conservative sources, such political thinkers Pat Buchanan and Paul Craig Roberts, and retired military leaders, such as Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni. But it's obvious, too, that the Democratic rank-and-file has been the backbone of resistance to Bush over the past five years. Also, if the Republicans retain control of Congress in November, Bush would have a strong chance to appoint at least one more Supreme Court justice who could put the high court's seal of approval on the redefinition of American liberty within an imperial presidency. With Bush's appointments of Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito - joining Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas - Bush now has four solid votes in favor of his views on presidential powers. Only one more is needed for a majority. Assuming Democrats could win back the Congress, another question would be whether impeachment of Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney would be in order. Many establishment Democrats fear that talk of the I-word will turn off centrist voters and generate partisan bitterness. But many anti-Bush Americans believe that Bush's violations of the U.S. Constitution - as well as domestic and international law - are so grave that they warrant impeachment, a constitutional remedy that the Founders inserted in the Constitution. Bush's ouster also would signal to the world that the American people reject leaders who not only violate U.S. laws but who thumb their noses at international principles, such as the Nuremberg ban on aggressive wars and the Geneva Conventions against mistreatment of prisoners of war and detainees.
Whether impeachment becomes a practical option or not, the American people who believe that George W. Bush has harmed the defining principles of the Republic now have less than 1,000 days to reverse that dangerous legacy.
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| Crackdown On Leaks Can Lead to Trouble The etiquette and morality of leaking is not always easy to understand, especially for citizens outside Washington. From the journalistic perspective, almost all leaks are inherently good. From the politician's point of view-as the White House is now demonstrating-many leaks are excellent while others are very bad, and the crucial question is whether the revealed facts are flattering or embarrassing. Distinguishing good leaks from bad is especially relevant today, when officials who disclose the wrong information to the wrong people at the wrong time risk federal prosecution. The C.I.A. is zealously pursuing staffers who may have disclosed nasty secrets to the press about the secret prisons it has been operating abroad. Last week, the agency dismissed a longtime employee named Mary McCarthy because of her unauthorized discussions with Washington reporters, including Dana Priest, the Washington Post intelligence specialist. Whether the government will prosecute Ms. McCarthy is yet to be determined, although she denies disclosing the secret-prison story to Ms. Priest. The Justice Department has warned that its leak investigations may result in subpoenas to reporters, seeking to force them to expose their sources. Leading Republicans on Capitol Hill have urged that anyone who discloses or publishes classified information should be hauled before a grand jury. And certain figures in the media have amplified those threats, notably including the virtue guru, superpatriot and degenerate gambler William Bennett. He thinks Ms. Priest and James Risen, the New York Times correspondent who broke the story of warrantless wiretapping by the National Security Agency, should be given prison sentences, not prizes. Despite such confident denunciations from the right, however, determining which leaks are bad and which are good can be a murky process. Is it always bad to leak sensitive classified information to a reporter for The Washington Post? Not if the reporter's name is Bob Woodward and he is writing a laudatory book with a thrilling title like Bush at War. In researching that 2002 best-seller, Mr. Woodward was told about covert operations, secret sources and methods, and relationships with foreign intelligence services, with the blessing of President Bush. After the publication of Bush at War, the President instructed top government officials to continue cooperating with Mr. Woodward in the reporting of his next epic. Is it always bad to leak sensitive information to a reporter for The New York Times? Not if the reporter's name is Judith Miller and she is writing scary stories about Iraq's alleged arsenal of forbidden weapons. Ms. Miller received many classified leaks long before Lewis (Scooter) Libby whispered Valerie Plame's name to her in June 2003. She may even have been awarded a special "clearance" while covering the fruitless search for Saddam's fearsome arsenal in Iraq, courtesy of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. In fact, selective leaks that advance the objectives of the White House and the Pentagon-by misinforming the public-are not really leaks at all. Does anyone who leaks about N.S.A. eavesdropping belong in prison? Not if that person happens to be a Republican Senator. At least twice in recent years, ranking members of that exclusive club have revealed potentially damaging secrets, which were then broadcasted and published. On Sept. 11, 2001, only hours after Al Qaeda's hijackers struck, Senator Orrin Hatch told the Associated Press about a briefing he had just received from intelligence officials. An Al Qaeda operative had been overheard talking with his handler, according to Senator Hatch, who also blabbed to ABC News. "They have an intercept of some information that includes people associated with [Osama] bin Laden who acknowledged a couple of targets were hit," said the voluble Utah Republican, who mentioned that he had heard about the phone intercept from the C.I.A. and the F.B.I. Administration officials were displeased by the Senator's outburst, but nobody tried to prosecute him or lift his security clearances The following year, Senator Richard Shelby evidently told reporters for CNN and Fox News Channel about two messages in Arabic that had been intercepted by the N.S.A. on Sept. 10, 2001. ("The match is about to begin," said one; "Tomorrow is zero hour," said the other; but neither was translated until Sept. 12.) A desultory investigation by the F.B.I. ended without the issuance of any subpoenas, and the bureau referred its findings to the Senate Ethics Committee, which dropped the matter without taking any action against the Alabama Republican. While both Senators denied revealing any classified information, each of them evidently did so. If Al Qaeda's leaders realized that the N.S.A. was monitoring their communications, the damage was likely done years ago by those Senatorial disclosures-and not by last December's newspaper reports.
But protecting national security isn't the purpose of investigating leakers who have exposed the scandalous underside of the Bush administration. Those investigations are meant to intimidate whistleblowers, dissidents and skeptical reporters-and to make sure we don't know anything the White House doesn't want us to know.
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Playacting Diplomacy Again On Road To War By Norman Solomon One of the nation's leading pollsters, Andrew Kohut of the Pew Research Center, wrote a few weeks ago that among Americans "there is little potential support for the use of force against Iran." This month the White House has continued to emphasize that it is committed to seeking a diplomatic solution. Yet the U.S. government is very likely to launch a military attack on Iran within the next year. How can that be? In the runup to war, appearances are often deceiving. Official events may seem to be moving in one direction while policymakers are actually headed in another. On their own timetable, White House strategists implement a siege of public opinion that relies on escalating media spin. One administration after another has gone through the motions of staying on a diplomatic track while laying down flagstones on a path to war. Several days ago President Bush said that "the doctrine of prevention is to work together to prevent the Iranians from having a nuclear weapon" -- and he quickly added that "in this case, it means diplomacy." On April 12 the secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, urged the U.N. Security Council to take "strong steps" in response to Iran's announcement of progress toward enriching uranium. Bush and Rice were engaged in a timeworn ritual that involves playacting diplomacy before taking military action. Seven years ago, President Clinton proclaimed that a U.S.-led NATO air war on Yugoslavia was starting because all peaceful avenues for dealing with the Serbian president, Slobodan Milosevic, had reached dead ends. The Clinton administration and the major U.S. media outlets failed to mention that Washington had handed Milosevic a poison-pill ultimatum in the fine print of the proposed Rambouillet accords -- with Appendix B stipulating that NATO troops would have nearly unlimited run of the entire Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. Recent decades of American history are filled with such faux statesmanship greasing the media wheels and political machinery for military interventions in Southeast Asia, the Caribbean, Central America and the Middle East. But the current administration's eagerness to use "diplomacy" as a prop for going to war has been unusually brazen. On Jan. 31, 2003 -- five days before the ballyhooed speech by then-Secretary of State Colin Powell to the U.N. Security Council -- the president held a private Oval Office meeting with Tony Blair. Summing up the discussion, which occurred nearly two months before the invasion of Iraq, the British prime minister's chief foreign policy adviser David Manning noted in a memo: "Our diplomatic strategy had to be arranged around the military planning." Meanwhile, President Bush and his top aides were still telling the public that they were pursuing all diplomatic channels in hopes of preventing war. Pundits have often advised presidents to use diplomatic maneuvers as virtual shams in order to legitimize the coming warfare. Charles Krauthammer blew his stack in mid-November 1998 when U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan seemed to make progress in averting a U.S. missile strike against Iraq. "It is perfectly fine for an American president to mouth the usual pieties about international consensus and some such," Krauthammer wrote in Time magazine. "But when he starts believing them, he turns the Oval Office over to Kofi Annan and friends." In late summer 2002, with momentum quickening toward an Iraq invasion, Newsweek foreign affairs columnist Fareed Zakaria urged the Bush administration to recognize the public-relations value of allowing U.N. weapons inspectors to spend some time in Iraq. "Even if the inspections do not produce the perfect crisis," he wrote optimistically, "Washington will still be better off for having tried because it would be seen to have made every effort to avoid war." When reality can't hold a candle to perception, then reality is apt to become imperceptible. And in matters of war and peace, when powerful policy wonks in Washington effectively strive for appearances to be deceiving, the result is a pantomime of diplomacy that's scarcely like the real thing. When the actual goal is war, the PR task is to make a show of leaving no diplomatic stone unturned. That kind of macabre ritual was underway on April 10 when White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan told reporters: "The president has made it very clear that we're working with the international community to find a diplomatic solution when it comes to the Iranian regime and its pursuit of nuclear weapons." The quote appeared the next morning in a New York Times news article under a headline that must have pleased the war planners at the White House: "Bush Insists on Diplomacy in Confronting a Nuclear Iran."
Ambrose Bierce defined diplomacy as "the patriotic act of lying for one's country." But there is nothing less patriotic than lying to one's country -- especially when the result is a war that could have been avoided if honesty had substituted for mendacity.
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Bush's Other War By Eric Alterman The Bush Administration's undeclared war on the media has opened up another front, with an FBI demand that its agents be allowed to embark on a fishing expedition through the private papers of the late muckraker Jack Anderson. This action follows another Administration effort to criminalize, under the 1917 Espionage Act, the receiving of classified information; it is prosecuting two American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) members for passing on data from Pentagon official Larry Franklin. The act, which makes it a crime for any person to have "unauthorized possession" of any "information relating to the national defense," is considered anachronistic and likely unconstitutional by many legal scholars. But it is the law the FBI is likely to use against the Anderson family, since it is refusing to allow the FBI to snoop through the columnist's papers, and the bureau has refused to give up. Indeed, the Anderson and AIPAC cases are joined by the fact that the agents apparently told Anderson's son, Kevin, that they expected to find information relating to the AIPAC case itself. This claim is dubious in the extreme, however, as Anderson, who was diagnosed with Parkinson's in 1990, did little investigative reporting during the last decade or so of his life. Mark Feldstein--a journalism professor at George Washington University, where the documents are stored, and the author of a forthcoming biography of Anderson, his former employer--told The Chronicle of Higher Education that he and a number of grad students have studied the papers and found little but "ancient history." Kevin Anderson speculates that the bureau's true objective is "to whitewash Jack Anderson's papers and attempt to remove from history embarrassing documents." There's a long tradition of dishonest Presidents obsessing about Anderson's reporting. Nixon's henchmen are on record discussing his potential murder. This troubling case is but one manifestation of a larger pattern, in which Administration officials decide which classified information they, personally, are entitled to leak and which information they can try to suppress, even to the point of threatening jail. We know that Bush, Dick Cheney, I. Lewis Libby and possibly Karl Rove felt no compunction about releasing classified data to sympathetic reporters like Bob Woodward, Judith Miller and Robert Novak to discredit critics of their plans for Iraq. Recently, Abbe Lowell, a lawyer for AIPAC case defendant Steven Rosen, told the court that Condoleezza Rice leaked national defense information that handed Franklin his twelve-year prison stint. But no matter. Journalists are being questioned and subpoenaed in official leak investigations relating to stories about the National Security Agency's warrantless wiretapping program and the CIA's secret prisons overseas, both of which stories garnered well-deserved Pulitzer Prizes (and one got the alleged CIA leaker, Mary McCarthy, fired). McCarthy not only denies the leak but the knowledge as well. We also learned recently of a program begun after 9/11 through which the National Archives and Records Administration secretly agreed with government agencies to withdraw previously declassified documents from the archives. These agreements were reached during the tenure of US Archivist John Carlin, who now says he was "shocked" to learn of them in a recent New York Times report. (Carlin may have authorized them and forgotten; he may have authorized them and failed to read them; or he may be "shocked" the way Captain Renault was.) Examine these developments in light of those I described more than a year ago in a Nation cover story ("Bush's War on the Press," May 9, 2005) and one cannot escape the conclusion that as its poll numbers fall, the Bush Administration is ratcheting up its war against the media to hide its massive failure to defend the nation's security and uphold the laws of its Constitution. What's going on is more than just the traditional practice of feeding friendly reporters considered to be "in the tank" and shutting out those unwilling to play by the rules of the goldfish bowl that is the White House press room. Rather, it is an assault on accountability itself. Administration officials rarely speak on the record about anything of substance, and even on background they lie with imperial impunity. Cheney and his staff felt empowered to let no one know that the Vice President of the United States shot someone in the face. Secret, potentially nuclear, war plans are being made for Iran, and we as a nation are given no means to judge their necessity or credibility. Meanwhile, punditocracy poohbahs, including Time's Joe Klein and CNN's William Bennett, take the side of those who would squelch our right to know what is being done in our name. Klein passed along unsupported (and frankly unbelievable) claims from "US intelligence sources" that the terrorists are changing their ways because of what they've read about the Administration's illegal wiretapping program in the Times, and Bennett recently told his radio listeners that the Times and Washington Post reporters were worthy not of Pulitzers but of jail. The executives at both papers remain unwilling to explain themselves on such crucial questions as why the Post agreed to withhold the names of the countries where CIA secret prisons had been set up, despite their easy availability on the Human Rights Watch website, and why the Times decided to delay the publication of its massive scoop on domestic wiretapping for more than a year, until just before its reporter was to publish a book that would have scooped the paper.
Moreover, looking at the Administration's plot to discredit Joe Wilson's reporting of his Niger trip--as detailed by Murray Waas in National Journal, and others--it becomes clear that Rove, Libby, Cheney & Co. were desperate to prevent an investigation of their dirty campaign to mislead the country into a ruinous war. They were prepared to break laws, expose CIA operations, ruin reputations and threaten national security to prevent Americans from learning the truth before election time. How much longer can the mainstream media pretend to play this deadly and deceitful game as if it were business as usual?
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 Heil Bush, Dear Propaganda Ansager Snow, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your constant shilling and lying for us through Fox News and your promotion to Junta mouthpiece, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Media Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Wolf's Lair" formally 'Rancho de Bimbo' on 05-27-2006. We salute you herr Snow, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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AUSTIN, Texas -- Either the so-called "lobby reform bill" is the contemptible, cheesy, shoddy piece of hypocrisy it appears to be ... or the Republicans have a sense of humor.
The "lobby reform" bill does show, one could argue, a sort of cheerful, defiant, flipping-the-bird-at-the-public attitude that could pass for humor. You have to admit that calling this an "ethics bill" requires brass bravura.
House Republicans returned last week from a two-week recess prepared to vote for "a relatively tepid ethics bill," as The Washington Post put it, because they said their constituents rarely mentioned the issue.
Forget all that talk back in January when Jack Abramoff was indicted. What restrictions on meals and gifts from lobbyists? More golfing trips! According to Rep. Nancy L. Johnson of Connecticut, former chair of the House ethic committee, passage of the bill will have no political consequences "because people are quite convinced that the rhetoric of reform is just political."
Where can they have gotten that idea? Rep. David Hobson, R-Ohio, told the Post, "We panicked, and we let the media get us panicked."
By George, here's the right way to think of it. The entire Congress lies stinking in open corruption, but they can't let the media panic them. They're actually proud of NOT cleaning it up.
The House bill passed a procedural vote last week 216 to 207, and it is scheduled for floor debate and a final vote on Wednesday -- which gives citizens who don't like being conned a chance to speak. Now is the time for a little hell-raising.
Chellie Pingree of Common Cause said, "This legislation is so weak it's embarrassing." Fred Wertheimer, president of Democracy 21 and a longtime worker in reformist vineyards, said: "This bill is based on the premise that you can fool all of the people all of the time. This is an attempt at one of the greatest legislative scams that I have seen in 30 years of working on these issues."
Come on, people, get mad. You deserve to be treated with contempt if you let them get away with this.
I'm sorry that all these procedural votes seem so picayune, and I know the cost of gas and health insurance are more immediate worries. But it is precisely the corruption of Congress by big money that allows the oil and insurance industries to get away with these fantastic rip-offs.
Watching Washington be taken over by these little sleaze merchants is not only expensive and repulsive, it is destroying America, destroying any sense we ever had that we're a nation, not 298 million individuals cheating to get ahead.
I'm sorry these creeps in Congress have so little sense of what they're supposed to be about that they think it's fine to sneer at ethics. But they work for us. It's our job to keep them under control until we can replace them. Time to get up off our butts and take some responsibility here. Let them hear from you.
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Carl loved books and loved history and, after spending two years in the army as part of the American occupation forces in Japan immediately after World War II, was hoping to graduate from college and teach history, perhaps even at the university level if he could hang on to the GI Bill and his day job in a camera store long enough to get his Ph.D. It was 1950, and he'd been married just a few months, when the surprise came that forced him to drop out of college: his wife was pregnant with their first child.
This was an era when husbands worked, wives tended the home, and being a good father and provider was one of the highest callings to which a man could aspire. Carl dropped out of school, kept his day job from 9 to 5 at the camera shop, and got a second job at a metal fabricating plant, working with molten hot metal from 7 pm to 4 am. For much of his wife's pregnancy and his newborn son's first year, he slept 3 hours a night and caught up on weekends, but in the process earned enough to get them an apartment and to be prepared for the costs of starting a family. Over the next 45 years, he continued to work in the steel and machine industry, in the later years as a bookkeeper/manager for a Michigan tool-and-die company, as three more sons were born.
Carl knew he was doing the right thing when he took that job in the factory, and did it enthusiastically. He considered himself fortunate to be able to find not just one but two good jobs in an era when the economy was still recovering from the Great Depression and the job market was flooded with returned GIs.
Working with molten metal could be dangerous, but the dangers were apparent, and Carl took every precaution to protect himself so he could return home safe to his family. What he didn't realize, however, was that the asbestos used at the casting operation was an insidious poison. He didn't realize that the asbestos industry had known for decades that the stuff could kill, but would continue to profitably market it for another twenty years, while actively using their financial muscle to keep the general public in the dark and prevent governments from stopping them.
Last month, Carl injured himself tripping on the stairs and ended up in the hospital with a compression fracture of his spine: what he thought was causing the terrible pain he'd been experiencing in his abdomen. The doctors, however, discovered that his lungs were filled with a rare form of lung cancer - mesothelioma - that is almost always caused by exposure to asbestos. Last week his doctor told him he had six months to live, and he lives daily with excruciating pain. All because he wanted to do right by his family.
I'm writing this note from Stadtsteinach, Germany, where today I walked along the "Prophet's Way" path with my old friend and mentor, Gottfried Mueller, who's still going strong in his 90s. We went to a sacred place in the forest to say a prayer for Carl and his wife, Jean, who is understandably terrified by the prospect of losing her husband so suddenly to such a hideous disease, and aches at his pain.
On the way back from our walk, Herr Mueller asked me, "How is it that companies could sell asbestos when they knew it would kill people? Why do they poison our food with pesticides when we know that organic agriculture produces better yields and healthier soil?" He swept his arm in an arc encompassing the Bavarian forest around us, many of the trees browning from acid rain. "And why is our air so toxic that it's killing the forests?"
It was, of course, a rhetorical question. We both knew that the answer was that democracy - the idea of government of, by, and for the people - has been twisted and perverted and essentially taken over by entities driven by a single value: profit. And it's happening all over the world.
Which is not to say that profit is a bad thing. Carl, for example, was happy that the company he worked for made enough profit that its owners would keep it in business and pay him a salary. Profit can drive healthy economies, and has its rightful place in the halls of business.
But profit has no place in the halls of governments, which were created by and for living humans. When corporations took over writing the rules that "we, the people" originally put in place to regulate and control profit-driven enterprises, then a sickness known as corporatism seized control of governments, and their people were the first ones to suffer for it. Virtually all legislation in nations that still call themselves democracies now passes through the filters of corporate lobbyists and corporate-funded think-tanks: democracy itself is at risk.
The main engine of corporatism - the chink in governmental law that makes it possible for corporations to so corrupt governmental processes - is an obscure legal doctrine first embraced in 1886 by the Reporter of the U.S. Supreme Court called "corporate personhood." This doctrine suggests that non-living, non-breathing entities called corporations should have the same rights the Founders of democracy defined (in the US in the "Bill of Rights") first for white men, and were extended after the U.S. Civil War to freed slaves, and to women and more fully to people of color in the 1960s via several different anti-discrimination laws.
It turns out that this doctrine of corporations as "persons" was a mistake from the beginning: while the reporter wrote that the Court had agreed with corporate personhood, the court itself, and its chief justice, had specifically and repeatedly ruled against it. (You'll find a photograph of the actual handwritten letter from Morrison R. Waite, the U.S. Supreme Court's Chief Justice, on my website: he said: "we avoided meeting the constitutional question [of corporate personhood] in the decision.")
But because of the words of the reporter, and the promotion of those words by corporations in the decades following 1886, corporations have seized so many "human rights" that they can now prevent the Environmental Protection Agency from performing inspections of their factories by claiming 4th Amendment "privacy rights." They claim they can give unlimited money to politicians - a process that before 1886 was called bribery and was criminal behavior for corporations in virtually all states - by claiming that they are entitled to 1st Amendment free speech rights. They claim that if the majority of the citizens of a local community do not want them to do business in that community, then they are the victims of "discrimination" and can sue that community and its elected officials.
Even though corporations are not alive and cannot vote, they claim the right to influence elections. Even though they do not need fresh water to drink or clean air to breathe, they claim the right to influence the government agencies that were created to regulate them. Even though they have no color or creed or religion, they claim that human people who speak against them are violating their civil rights. Even though they can live for hundreds of years and are not harmed by asbestos, arsenic, tobacco, or other toxins, they claim the human right of privacy to not disclose to governments or to workers and consumers the dangers they know about their own products.
So we now face a crisis that is at once environmental, political, and spiritual/moral. According to the AFL-CIO in a report released for April 28ths Workers Memorial Day, "On an average day in 2004, 152 workers lost their lives as a result of workplace injuries and diseases and another 11,780 were injured." The rate of death and disability among workers has been climbing since Bush became president for the first time in decades, in large part because funding for OSHA and mine safety have been cut. At the same time, Bill Frist and Senate and House Republicans want to wipe out asbestos victim's right to sue for damages (they promote it as "helping asbestos victims"), to protect companies like Halliburton that have huge asbestos liabilities.
How can we best return to our governments the essential values of protecting the "life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness" of their people, and separate from our governments contamination by the profit motive, which rightly should remain in the realm of business and not politics? How do we awaken our voters from the spiritual malaise of consumerism run amok? And what are the most appropriate and practical and positive steps we can take now to remedy the damage already done to our air, food, water, and other commons by the recent insinuation of corporatism into our legislatures and high political offices?
The first part of the answer is for us to awaken to the very real moral and spiritual dilemma we face. This a moral and spiritual dilemma because it transcends politics: it literally means life or death for our citizens and our planet.
Next, we must show up at the ballot box and send clear messages to our elected officials to correct this illness in our body politic. And, then (or perhaps concurrently), we must convince our governments to use their powers of persuasion (through policies like tax breaks and other incentives) to promote renewable and non-toxic forms of energy, agriculture, and medicine, and re-empower our regulatory agencies which have been so badly infiltrated and taken over by the very corporations they were put in place to constrain.
If we do this, and do it soon, our children may still inherit a world that can is just and decent and healthy.
And if you'd like to say a prayer for Carl, I know him well enough to believe that he'd appreciate it. I was his first child.
... David Fitzsimmons ...  |
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Forgive, sounds good.
I'm through, with doubt,
I'm not ready to make nice,
I know you said
I made by bed, and I sleep like a baby,
I'm not ready to make nice,
I'm not ready to make nice,
Forgive, sounds good.
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Parting Shots...
By Will Durst As part one of President Bush's long awaited second term midseason staff purge-athon, Scott McClellan abandoned his plum position as White House Press Secretary. The rumor is he wants to follow in his predecessor, Ari Fleischer's footsteps, and spend more personal time lying to his family. This follows Chief of Staff Andrew Card's resignation and signals a desperate attempt by the Bush Administration to give the perception of a change of direction. Which is very much advisable for Bush, given that the current direction could most accurately be described as sub-basement directed. Does the term "rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic" have any meaning here? Even Karl Rove has seen his role diminished. I imagine he needs more personal time to file the scuff marks off of his cloven hooves. That's right. Bush's brain has been laid off. And yes, that is redundant. In an attempt to reverse poll numbers which are falling faster than an Acme Company cartoon anvil catapulted off the edge of the Grand Canyon with a confused coyote clinging to it, the President hopes that a changing of the guard will be his approval rating equivalent of an animated trampoline. Reportedly, nobody's position is safe, which means even the twins are worried about being supplanted by a couple of good Mormon girls. And although Dick Cheney's head is reputedly on the chopping block, the conventional wisdom inside the Beltway is whoever actually acts as pink slip messenger to the Vice President better be wearing a full body containment suit that is impervious to both birdshot and political fallout of the nuclear variety. Unfortunately, the person the President refuses to replace is the one whose head everyone keeps calling for: Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld. If this were "White House Survivor," Jeff Probst would be snuffing out Rummy's torch while fellow castaways snickered on wooden benches huddling together for warmth. The dapper and verbally flatulent Secretary, however, remains a man who doesn't know the meaning of the word "quit." As it turns out, he seems unfamiliar with a few other words as well: like "strategy," "consensus" and "diplomatic." The recent call by between six and eight hundred generals for his dumpstering has met with stubborn resistance from his boss. When asked, the President said, yes, he hears the voices for Rumsfeld to be returned horizontally to the private sector, but it would be HE who decided, because HE is the chief decider. He's not a divider or a uniter, he's a decider. Who hears the voices. Hmmmmm.
Speaking of Rumsfeld's prize quagmire, Iraq, President Bush said "failure is not an option." So, apparently, it's a factory installed standard equipment feature. Thank the maker. Not sure the tentative low level alterations Dubyah instituted are quite the infusion of new blood his election bound Republican brethren were calling for. Not even sure these guys qualify as old blood. More like sickle cell anemia blood from badger roadkill. Apparently, for the GOP, a changing of the guard is similar to a game of political Volleyball. Every two years, someone yells "Rotate!" and players switch positions. I'll be honest, I can't wait for the photo-op of this entire corrupt cursed imperial ruling class standing in line at the unemployment office -- or better yet chained together while wearing orange jumpsuits. After all, doesn't real regime change start at home?
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Issues & Alibis Vol 6 # 18 (c) 05/05/2006
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In This Edition
Ray McGovern recalls, "My Meeting With Rumsfeld."
Uri Avnery counts, "300 Kisses."
John Gideon with part five of, "The Approaching 2006 E-Voting 'Train Wreck.'"
Jim Hightower remembers, "The Real Mother's Day."
Greg Palast reports, "The President Says Immigrants "Must Learn To Misinterpreate English.""
Chris Floyd gets underneath the, "Long Black Veil: Iraqi Women's 'Liberation' Nightmare."
William Rivers Pitt with, "An Open Letter To Richard Cohen."
Robert Parry follows, "The CIA, A Bush Family Fiefdom."
Joe Conason kisses monkey butt in, "Bush Does Something Right."
Norman Solomon is, "Opening The Debate On Israel."
W. David Jenkins III explores, "Table Scraps And Lies - Bush's Memorial To The 9/11 Families."
General Michael V. Hayden wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award!'
Molly Ivins visits, "The Best Little Whorehouse In Washington."
Kip Sullivan says, "Massachusetts' 'Universal Coverage' Bill Is No Such Thing."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department Stephen Colbert gives his "White House Correspondents Dinner Speech" but first Uncle Ernie explains, "Why They Hate Us."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Bob Gorrell with additional cartoons from Tom Tomorrow, Micah Wright, Dave Ward, Code Pink, Fark.Com, John Deering, Bill Day and Old American Century.Org.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Why They Hate Us You'd hate us too if it happened to you! By Ernest Stewart
When someone makes a move I got one of "those" letters the other day from a young ditto monkey in "Desperation Nevada" wondering about last weeks rant and if I weren't a red, pinko, fag loving, mother f--king communist from a blue state? I assured him that I was all of the above, a radical from Michigan who is pro gay marriage, in fact pro people period. Then I talked about his mother, his grand mother and his great grand mother too! As well as what his daddy caught him doing with his sister out behind the barn and why he couldn't graduate with his High School class but had to do it via the computer after what the police caught him doing with that flock of sheep! As you can see playing head games with your wicked old Uncle has some serious consequences to it! Last week; you'll remember, we went over Bush's bullshit step by step but I really didn't get down to the facts of the matter. I'm guessing you're all aware of what we've done to the tribes from 1492 forward; including the Indians in Mexico in the 1840s, so we'll skip that bit and just concentrate on what we've done since then. The slaughter of the tribes was just us getting in some practice before we turned our peculiar talents onto the world stage in 1898 in the "Spanish American War." This was the war that we fought to liberate enslaved people from the Spanish Empire and add them to our own Empire as slaves. These "properties" included Guam, Puerto Rico and the Philippine Islands. In addition, Cuba was granted "independence" but remained our property until Castro came along in 1959. Most of Central America was next to fall to the American Corpo-rats with the backing of the USMC. This kept us busy through the teens, twenties and thirties with W.W.I sharpening our slaughtering skills. Just some of our victims since W.W.II alone would include: Cuba, Haiti, Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Panama, Mexico, Chile, Granada, Colombia, Bolivia, Venezuela, Uruguay, Paraguay, Ecuador, Zaire, Namibia, Lebanon, Egypt, Greece, Cyprus, Bangladesh, Iran, South Africa, the Philippines, Korea, Vietnam, Laos, Iraq, Cambodia, Libya, Palestine, China, Afghanistan, Sudan, Indonesia, East Timor, Turkey, Angola, Somalia, Yugoslavia, Afghanistan and Iraq." However the monkey and I were discussing the Middle East, so let's take a look at some of our incursions there from W.W.II to the year 2000. When the British and French Empires crumbled after W.W.II we stepped in and took over. Here's a partial list of what we did... 1947-1948: U.S. backs Palestine partition plan. Israel established. U.S. declines to press Israel to allow expelled Palestinians to return. 1949: CIA backs military coup deposing elected government of Syria. 1953: CIA helps overthrow the democratically-elected Mossadeq government in Iran (which had nationalized the British oil company) leading to a quarter-century of repressive and dictatorial rule by the Shah, Mohammed Reza Pahlevi. 1956: U.S. cuts off promised funding for Aswan Dam in Egypt after Egypt receives Eastern bloc arms. 1956: Israel, Britain, and France invade Egypt. U.S. does not support invasion, but the involvement of its NATO allies severely diminishes Washington's reputation in the region. 1958: U.S. troops land in Lebanon to preserve "stability". 1960-1963: U.S. unsuccessfully attempts assassination of Iraqi leader, Abdul Karim Qassim. 1963: U.S. supports coup by Iraqi Baath party (soon to be headed by Saddam Hussein) and reportedly gives them names of communists to murder, which they do with vigor. 1967: U.S. blocks any effort in the Security Council to enforce SC Resolution 242, calling for Israeli withdrawal from territories occupied in the 1967 war. 1970: Civil war between Jordan and PLO. Israel and U.S. discuss intervening on side of Jordan if Syria backs PLO. 1972: U.S. blocks Egyptian leader Anwar Sadat's efforts to reach a peace agreement with Israel. 1973: Airlifted U.S. military aid enables Israel to turn the tide in war with Syria and Egypt. 1973-1975: U.S. supports Kurdish rebels in Iraq. When Iran reaches an agreement with Iraq in 1975 and seals the border, Iraq slaughters Kurds and U.S. denies them refuge. Kissinger secretly explains that "covert action should not be confused with missionary work." 1975: U.S. vetoes Security Council resolution condemning Israeli attacks on Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon. 1978-1979: Iranians begin demonstrations against the Shah. U.S. tells Shah it supports him "without reservation" and urges him to act forcefully. Until the last minute, U.S. tries to organize military coup to save the Shah, but to no avail. 1979-1988: U.S. begins covert aid to Osama and the Mujahideen in Afghanistan six months before Soviet invasion in Dec. 1979. Over the next decade U.S. provides training and more than three billion dollars in arms and aid. 1980-1988: Iran-Iraq war. When Iraq invades Iran, the U.S. opposes any Security Council action to condemn the invasion. U.S. soon removes Iraq from its list of nations supporting terrorism and allows U.S. arms to be transferred to Iraq. At the same time, U.S. lets Israel provide arms to Iran and in 1985 U.S. provides arms directly (though secretly) to Iran. U.S. provides intelligence information to Iraq. Iraq uses chemical weapons in 1984; U.S. restores diplomatic relations with Iraq. 1987 U.S. sends its navy into the Persian Gulf, taking Iraq's side; an overly-aggressive U.S. ship shoots down an Iranian civilian airliner, killing 290. 1981-1986: U.S. holds military maneuvers off the coast of Libya in waters claimed by Libya with the clear purpose of provoking Qaddafi. In 1981, a Libyan plane fires a missile and U.S. shoots down two Libyan planes. In 1986, Libya fires missiles that land far from any target and U.S. attacks Libyan patrol boats, killing 72, and shore installations. When a bomb goes off in a Berlin nightclub, killing three, the U.S. charges that Qaddafi was behind it (possibly true) and conducts major bombing raids in Libya, killing dozens of civilians, including Qaddafi's adopted daughter. 1982: U.S. gives "green light" to Israeli invasion of Lebanon, killing some 17 thousand civilians. U.S. chooses not to invoke its laws prohibiting Israeli use of U.S. weapons except in self-defense. U.S. vetoes several Security Council resolutions condemning the invasion. 1983: U.S. troops sent to Lebanon as part of a multinational peacekeeping force; intervene on one side of a civil war, including bombardment by USS New Jersey. Withdraw after suicide bombing of marine barracks. 1984: U.S.-backed rebels in Afghanistan fire on civilian airliner. 1987-1992: U.S. arms used by Israel to repress first Palestinian Intifada. U.S. vetoes five Security Council resolution condemning Israeli repression. 1988: Saddam Hussein kills many thousands of his own Kurdish population and uses US supplied chemical weapons against them. The U.S. increases its economic ties to Iraq. 1988: U.S. vetoes 3 Security Council resolutions condemning continuing Israeli occupation of and repression in Lebanon. 1990-91: U.S. rejects any diplomatic settlement of the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait (for example, rebuffing any attempt to link the two regional occupations, of Kuwait and of Palestine). U.S. leads international coalition in war against Iraq. Civilian infrastructure targeted. To promote "stability" U.S. refuses to aid post-war uprisings by Shiites in the south and Kurds in the north, denying the rebels access to captured Iraqi weapons and refusing to prohibit Iraqi helicopter flights. 1991: Devastating economic sanctions are imposed on Iraq. U.S. and Britain block all attempts to lift them. Hundreds of thousands die. Though Security Council had stated that sanctions were to be lifted once Saddam Hussein's programs to develop weapons of mass destruction were ended, Washington makes it known that the sanctions would remain as long as Saddam remains in power. Sanctions in fact strengthen Saddam's position. Asked about the horrendous human consequences of the sanctions, Madeleine Albright (U.S. ambassador to the UN and later Secretary of State) declares that "the price is worth it." 1991: U.S. forces permanently based in Saudi Arabia. 1993: U.S. launches missile attack on Iraq, claiming self-defense against an alleged assassination attempt on former president Bush two months earlier. 1998: U.S. and U.K. bomb Iraq over the issue of weapons inspections, even though Security Council is just then meeting to discuss the matter. 1998: U.S. destroys factory producing half of Sudan's pharmaceutical supply, claiming retaliation for attacks on U.S. embassies in Tanzania and Kenya and that factory was involved in chemical warfare. Evidence for the chemical warfare charge widely disputed. 2000: Israel uses U.S. arms in attempt to crush Palestinian uprising, killing hundreds of civilians. Then came Afghanistan which refused our carpet of gold for letting the Vice Fuhrer build his pipeline which resulted in tens of thousands of innocent's either dead or wounded and Iraq where we've slaughtered hundreds of thousands to secure all that lovely oil and keep it off the market. So why does the world hate us? They hate us for some very, very good reasons! In Other News... I see where the Fuhrer named Gen. Michael V. Hayden as CIA director. Bush is doing this so he can pack the CIA with his loyal officer corp and bring it in line with the Pentagoons under Rummy's control. General Mikie has spent the last several years eavesdropping on Americans and prefers electronic eavesdropping to actual spies on the ground. Which is why we knew so little about Osama and his pals or what awaits us in the nightmare to come; Iran. The last time we had a four star in charge of the CIA was when Jimmy Carter appointed Admiral Stansfield Turner. You remember Stan he's the one that brought "psychics" or "psychos" (sorry, I get those two confused) into the CIA with "remote viewing." I'm not sure which one is crazier, only time will tell! ***** Then there was the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Alphonso Jackson publicly admitting that he canceled a government contract with a business because the CEO was critical of President Bush. In violation of several federal statues including 48 CFR 3.101-1. Apparently only those who support the Junta's treason and sedition need apply for the peoples money? Jackson said, " Why should I reward someone who doesn't like the president, so they can use funds to try to campaign against the president? Logic says they don't get the contract. That's the way I believe." Sounds like Mr. Jackson is pleading guilty to treason to me, what does it sound like to you? ***** And finally for those of you curious about what the Iranian President said to our dictator in his letter to Bush here's a link: Full text of Iranian President's letter.
We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
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My Meeting With Rumsfeld By Ray McGovern "Hold 'em, Yale" is one of the best short stories of "Guys and Dolls" creator Damon Runyon, who depicted the New York City underworld in the 1920s. The story deals with an undercover operation to scalp ducats before the annual Yale-Harvard football game. It begins: What I am doing in New Haven on the day of a very large football game between the Harvards and the Yales is something calling for no little explanation, for I am not such a guy as you are likely to find in New Haven at any time - and especially not on the day of a large football game. A variant came to mind Thursday as I walked through a posh Atlanta neighborhood to the Southern Center for International Policy to hear a speech by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. What I am doing in Atlanta on the day of a very large lecture by Donald Rumsfeld to an establishment audience is something calling for no little explanation, for I am not such a guy as you are likely to find in such a venue at any time - and especially not when the ducat requires $40 up front. But serendipity prevailed. The ACLU of Georgia had invited me to their annual dinner on Thursday, May 4, to receive the National Civil Liberties Award. Friends in Atlanta arranged for me to bookend my remarks at the ACLU dinner with a Wednesday presentation to Pax Christi, the Catholic peace movement, and a talk on Friday evening at Quaker House in Decatur. I planned to put the rationale for looming war with Iran in context by drawing an unhappy but direct parallel with the bogus reasons adduced to "justify" the U.S. attack on Iraq more than three years ago. When those friends learned last Monday that Rumsfeld would be in Atlanta Thursday to give an afternoon speech at the Center, it seemed a natural to go. The event was said to be open to the public, but it took tradecraft skills assimilated over a 27-year career with the CIA to acquire a ticket. (The event was strangely absent from the Center's website, reportedly at the insistence of the Defense Department.) The fact that my presence there was pure coincidence turned out to be a huge disappointment for those who began interviews later that day by insisting I tell them why I had stalked Rumsfeld all the way from Washington to Atlanta. Especially people like Paula Zahn, who asked me on Thursday evening "what kind of axe" I had to grind with him. To prepare for my presentations, I took along a briefcase full of notes and clippings, one of which was a New York Times article datelined Atlanta, Sept. 27, 2002, quoting Rumsfeld's assertion that there was "bulletproof" evidence of ties between al-Qaida and the government of Saddam Hussein. This was the kind of unfounded allegation that, at the time, deceived 69 percent of Americans into believing that the Iraqi leader played a role in the tragedy of 9/11. Rumsfeld's "bulletproof" rhetoric also came in the wake of an intensive but quixotic search by my former colleagues at the CIA for any reliable evidence of such ties. A fresh reminder of the Bush administration's Iraq deceptions surfaced Thursday morning, when the Spanish newspaper El Pais published an interview with Paul Pillar, the senior U.S. intelligence specialist on the Middle East and terrorism until he retired late last year. Pillar branded administration attempts to prove a link between al-Qaida and Saddam Hussein "an organized campaign of manipulation... I suppose by some definitions that could be called a lie." I arrived at the Rumsfeld lecture early, took a seat near a microphone set aside for Q-and-A, and thought I might ask Rumsfeld to explain his use of the "bulletproof" adjective, which came at a time when none other than Gen. Brent Scowcroft was describing such evidence as "scant," and the CIA was saying it was non-existent. (The 9/11 commission later ruled definitively in CIA's favor.) Rumsfeld brought up bte noire terrorist al-Zarqawi as proof of collaboration between al-Qaida and Iraq, but that was a canard easily knocked down. It appears that Rumsfeld thinks no one really pays attention. Sadly, as regards the mainstream press, he has been largely right - at least until now. When Rumsfeld broadened our dialogue to include the never-to-be-found Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, saying, "Apparently, there were no weapons of mass destruction," I could not resist reminding him that he had claimed he actually knew where they were. Anyone who followed this issue closely would remember his remark to George Stephanopoulos on March 30, 2003: We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat. As soon as the event was over, CNN asked me for my sources, which I was happy to share. The CNN folks seemed a bit surprised that they all checked out. To their credit, they overcame the more customary "McGovern said this, but Rumsfeld said that" - and the dismissive "well, we'll have to leave it there" - kind of treatment. In Rumsfeldian parlance, what I had said turned out to be "known knowns," even though he provided an altered version on Thursday of his "we know where they are." Better still, in its coverage, CNN quoted what Rumsfeld had said in 2003. That evening a friend emailed me about a call she got from a close associate in "upper management at CNN" to ask about me. She quoted the CNN manager: "We checked and double-checked everything this guy had to say and he was 100 percent accurate." He then asked if those protesting the war "were getting organized or something." She responded, "Indeed we are and have been for some time, and it's about time the mainstream media caught up." With the exception of CNN - and MSNBC which also did its homework and displayed the tangled web woven by the normally articulate defense secretary-the other networks generally limited their coverage to the "he-said-but-he-said" coverage more typical of what passes for journalism these days. Even CNN found it de rigueur to put neocon ideologue Frank Gaffney on with me for Wolf Blitzer. Gaffney is well to the right of Rumsfeld, so I should not have been surprised to hear Gaffney take the line that the U.S. may still find evidence of ties between Iraq and al-Qaeda, and of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Hope springs eternal. And there were more subliminal messages. In some press reports I was described as a "Rumsfeld critic" and "heckler" who was, heavens, "rude to Rumsfeld." Other accounts referred to my "alleged" service with the CIA, which prompted my wife to question - I think in jest - what I was really doing for those 27 years. I believe I was able to convince her without her performing additional fact checking. All in all, my encounter with Rumsfeld was for me a highly instructive experience. The Center's president, Peter White, singled out Rumsfeld's "honesty" in introducing him, and 99 percent of those attending seemed primed to agree. Indeed, their reaction brought to mind film footage of rallies in Germany during the thirties. When Rumsfeld replied to my first question about his false statements on Iraq 's WMD, the applause was automatic. "I did not lie then...," he insisted. This was immediately greeted with what Pravda used to describe as "stormy applause," followed immediately by rather unseemly shouts by this otherwise well-disciplined and well-heeled group to have me summarily thrown out. At the end, as we all filed out slowly, I could make eye contact with only one person - who proceeded to berate me for being insubordinate.
Scary. No open minds there. A graphic reminder for those wishing to spread some truth around that we have our work cut out for us. We have to find imaginative ways to use truth as a lever to pry open closed minds.
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300 Kisses By Uri Avnery SHALL WE start with the good news or the bad news? As confirmed optimists, let's start with the good news. To paraphrase an old Hebrew saying: Don't look at the vessel but at what's not in it. Avigdor Liberman is not in the Israeli government. He made a huge effort to board the ship. He put on an almost liberal mask, ate juicy herring with Yossi Beilin, who called him a nice person. After the elections, Amir Peretz made no mention of Labor's pledge not to sit with him in the cabinet. It seemed that the brutal racist would succeed in achieving legitimacy for his fascist views. But the brutish wolf did not reckon with the wiliness of the fox. Ehud Olmert twisted the gross braggart around his little finger. At the last moment, Liberman was left on shore, looking on with longing eyes as the ship, bedecked with gay flags, put out to sea without him. Furious, he threw away his amiable mask, and gave a speech in the Knesset demanding the execution of the Arab deputies who had met with the members of the Palestinian government. After that, even Beilin will not be having breakfast will him any more. THE SECOND piece of good news is that Shaul Mofaz has been removed from the Ministry of Defense. This primitive man, the king of "targeted liquidations", has been thrown from the high tower of Defense into the empty well of Transportation. One can enjoy the cartoon showing Mofaz driving a tank down the streets of Tel-Aviv. This joy is mixed with deep anxiety. It is difficult to get used to the appellation "Minister of Defense Amir Peretz". Only a few hours before he took the oath of office in the Knesset, soldiers shot an innocent Palestinian taxi driver in the back and killed him. The day before, they had killed "by mistake" a Palestinian woman at her home. From now on, Peretz will bear the responsibility for such acts, which have become part of the daily routine of occupation. He has put himself into an almost impossible position. The next demonstrations we hold will probably have to be against him. THE THIRD item of good news is that this is a civilian government. The four key players (Prime Minister and Ministers of Defense, Finance and Foreign Affairs) are civilians. Undoubtedly, a sign of maturity. Among the 25 cabinet ministers, there are "only" two generals (Mofaz, Binyamin Ben-Eliezer), both in junior positions. Even the number of Shin-Bet officers in the cabinet (Gideon Ezra, Avi Dichter, Raffi Eytan) is larger than that. But let's not rejoice too soon: a civilian government may be browbeaten by the might of the generals and feel the urge to prove its military prowess (echoing the song: Anything you can do, I can do better...) Will these civilians dare to act against the advice of the Chief-of-Staff, who takes part in every cabinet meeting and dictates policy in the name of "security"? In this government, there are no lions. This is a government of foxes, headed by the leader of the pack. With Ariel Sharon, the last of the great figures of the 1948 war is gone. The presence of the pathetic Shimon Peres only underlines this. This is a government of gray party hacks. There are two glaring holes in it. Olmert made his first major mistake when he did not include a member of the Russian-speaking community in the new cabinet. A million immigrants from the former Soviet Union, many of them imbued with a rabid racism they brought with them, will now be pushed even further into a corner. This is a great danger. Bad news. Another community of a million and a quarter is also left outside: the Arab citizens. Like all its predecessors, this government, the 31st in the state's 58 years of existence, is a Jewish government, not an Israeli one. It doesn't have a single Arab member. This large community will also be pushed to the margins. Bad news, indeed. All of Olmert's empty phrases about equality between all citizens cannot cover this up. SO WHAT will top the agenda of the Olmert government? It seems that the most plausible answer is prosaic: its very existence. It is unified by the ardent desire to survive until the end of its four and a half years' term. (The half is a leftover from the last government). This was most vividly expressed by the orgy of kisses in the Knesset when the new ministers took the oath of office. Such an outburst of childish happiness is more typical of lottery-winners than ministers called upon to deal with fateful problems. The Knesset Speaker, Dalia Itzig, the first woman ever to occupy this post, became a Mezuzah, kissed by all the ministers (except for the Orthodox) on her raised podium. Afterwards, the new ministers kissed each other and all the Knesset members they came across, accompanying this with hearty embraces and slaps on the back. If we assume that every minister kissed a dozen persons on average, that makes 300 kisses. It is difficult to imagine such a scene in any other parliament, not to mention the first Knesset. David Ben-Gurion was no great kisser. THE FLAG flying from the mast is, of course, the flag of Convergence. That was and is Olmert's main slogan. But one should not hold one's breath waiting for its implementation. Olmert himself has announced that before the realization, much time should be devoted to dialogue. Dialogue with whom? Well, with the settlers. And with the United States. And with the "international community". Anyone missing from the list? Only the Palestinians. With them it is not possible (nor necessary) to talk - until they recognize the right of existence of Israel as a Jewish State, accept all past treaties, stop the violence and confiscate the weapons of the organizations. In short, surrender unconditionally. And become members of the Zionist Organization, too, while they are at it. Olmert is patient. He is ready to wait for two years. During these two years, the United States and the international community are expected to recognize the "permanent" borders that the Olmert government wants to fix "unilaterally", at its pleasure, without the agreement of the Palestinians and without even talking with them. In the two years, the government will do nothing for peace. On the contrary, it will enlarge the settlement blocs - in order to prepare housing for the settlers who will be moved there, when the time comes, from the isolated settlements. That's to say: first of all the big settlements will be annexed and enlarged, and after that - God willing - some small settlements will be dismantled. According to the plan, all the settlers will remain on the other side of the Green Line. Olmert has already rejected out of hand the suggestion that compensation be paid to the settlers who are willing to come back to Israel now. AND WHAT is the really good news? This government speaks publicly about the "partition of the country" as the "lifeline of Zionism". It speaks of withdrawal from "most of Judea and Samaria" and the dismantling of settlements. That shows a big shift in public opinion. One of the leading racists in the Knesset, Effi Eytam, shouted that "there is no Jewish majority for withdrawal". He should be sent back to third grade to learn his arithmetic. True, according to the racist-nationalist accounting, there are only 58 Jewish members of the Knesset in favor of withdrawal (28 Jewish members of Kadima, 17 of Labor, 7 Pensioners, 5 Meretz, the 1 Jewish member of Hadash). But against them, only 50 Jewish members oppose withdrawal (Likud, Shas, the Orthodox, the Liberman people and the National Union). The remaining 12 members are Arabs, who can be presumed to support withdrawal (1 of Kadima, 2 of Labor, 2 Hadash, 3 Balad, 4 of the United Arab Party). Accordingly, there is not only a large majority in the Knesset (70 against 50) for the partition of the country, but even a "Jewish majority" (58 against 50). That is a geological change in public opinion - a sign of a slow but massive and ongoing process. FEW BELIEVE that this government will indeed last for four and a half years. The general guess is that it will fall in two years, when the "convergence" is slated to start. At that time, Shas will probably secede.
Olmert asked us to be patient. Alright, then, let us be patient as we wait for the next elections.
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2006 E-Voting 'Train Wreck': Is Anybody There? Does Anybody Care? By John Gideon This has been another week of "Train Wrecks" across the country. Three states had major primaries with mixed success and failure, a few states had local elections with failures, and some states are preparing for May primaries and they are meeting the "oncoming locomotive" as they can't get machines or software for the machines and are having to revert to paper ballots or lever machines. Elections Systems and Software (ES&S) is now facing investigations, lawsuits, or just plain pissed-off elections officials in West Virginia, Arkansas, Missouri, Indiana, Texas, Pennsylvania, California, and other jurisdictions. And now we learn that Diebold has a huge security vulnerability that all voting systems experts who know the details are very concerned about. Next Tuesday, May 9, finds the train barreling down on primary elections in West Virginia and Nebraska. May 16 brings potentially hazardous primary election whistle-stops in Kentucky, Oregon and, the grand central station that is Pennsylvania. DIEBOLD 'REVEALS' MAJOR SECURITY PROBLEM According to an article in The Morning Call Diebold has found a 'glitch' that represents a 'potential security vulnerability'. After a bit of research it became evident that, in fact, Diebold had not found this problem and it is not a 'glitch' as they would have the voters believe. It's far worse than a mere 'glitch' as so many in the media (and at the voting machine companies) like to portray these things. As later reported by The BRAD BLOG this problem - a huge one -- was, in fact, discovered by Harri Hursti and Security Innovation in the inspection of Diebold TSx DREs in Emery County, Utah as organized recently by Black Box Voting. An act for which the 23-year elected county elections clerk, Bruce Funk has been pushed out of his job. Or so the state is still fighting to accomplish. It appears at this early date that Diebold probably would have kept this vulnerability, -- reportedly a gaping security flaw -- quiet and not taken any action except that they were asked about it by people in Pennsylvania. They finally were forced to admit its existence and that it's, incredibly, a "feature" of all Diebold touch-screen systems! Administrative steps are being taken by the state, which has sequestered all of the machines, to mitigate, as much as possible, the impact of the problem. What no one at Diebold has told anyone yet is why they allowed the voters in Ohio to vote on these insecure machines. It is apparent that Diebold had no intention of telling anyone but they got caught. Again. One top state election official was quoted in the BRAD BLOG article as saying that this security vulnerability "relates to potential misuse of the procedure by which Diebold does field updates to the machines. It's not a bug -- it's a deliberate but unwise 'feature'. Every jurisdiction that uses the machines should be notified. Now that the story is out, I suspect they will be." Unfortunately, the Election Assistance Commission (EAC) has still not set-up a Help America Vote Act (HAVA) mandated "clearinghouse of information" that would ensure every jurisdiction that uses Diebold AccuVote TS or TSx Direct Recording Electronic voting machines would be notified of this issue. When contacted, the EAC's spokesperson questioned the source of the information until a well-known computer scientist was named as a person to be contacted. It is still to be seen whether the EAC will do their job. Black Box Voting says they will be releasing redacted versions of the reports, to mitigate the security threat, from both Security Innovation and Harri Hursti this week. Complete, un-redacted versions will be sent to all states. LAST WEEK'S PRIMARY SUCCESS: NORTH CAROLINA Even though North Carolina is served entirely by ES&S and even though 1,000 memory cards had to be replaced by the vendor last month after crack state officials bothered to test them, this week's North Carolina primary was nearly trouble free. The successful primary is said to be attributable, in no small part, to the new legislation recently passed by the state and to the diligence of elections officials on the state and local level. Also important to note is that North Carolina has an extensive network of activists who are well known by state and local elections officials and who work closely, in most cases, with those officials. As much credit needs to go to those activists as to the officials. There is talk about the legislature changing some of the laws they just put on the books because they are too restrictive or, more likely, because some special interests don't want them or would prefer to see them changed. This would be a travesty. Why would they want to go from verifiable optical scan ballots and a voter verified paper audit trail requirement to unverifiable Direct Recording Electronic (DRE, touch-screen) elections that cannot be recounted or audited? Why would they want less transparency in the election process instead of what they now have? Let's hope common sense and verifiable elections prevail in the Tarheel state! LAST WEEK'S ELECTION FAILURE: OHIO Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell's talking-heads have been speaking all week about the great success the state saw in this past week's primary election. Of course, Blackwell's office apparently ignored all of the problems across the Buckeye state or passed them off as "glitches" or "snafus" or otherwise blamed any problems on poll workers or voters. Even the media is complicit in the marginalization of the problems through the words they choose to describe them. One newspaper, on the same day had these two headlines over articles that described problems "Snafus plague new digital ballot system" and "Glitches mar Ohio's first punch-card free election". As of May 6 - a full four days after election-day -- Cuyahoga County had still not completed counting all of their ballots. Why? The county was forced to count 17,000 absentee ballots by hand because the Diebold optical-scan machines would not read them. There is some dispute over whether the machines were at fault or if it was the printer who printed the ballots who was at fault. Though it certainly seems as though they might have tested one to see if it worked before they sent out 17,000 to voters. Also of note is that the county actually reported that at one point they could not find 70 memory cards from their DRE voting machines. As of May 5, there were still several cards that were lost. According to the Associated Press the county has used the back-up memory of the voting machines to provide the vote results in place of the memory cards. The state has promised an investigation into the problems in Cuyahoga County. Credit needs to be given to the elections officials in Summit County. They were put in a nearly disastrous position by their vendor, ES&S, who provided them with memory cards that constantly failed during pre-election tests. Election officials predicted a disaster but they were able to overcome terrible service by ES&S and after multiple rounds of tests, they ended up with only one failed card on election-day. No matter whether the problem is the machines, the poll workers, or decisions by elections officials, the voters are the ones who suffer when their votes are not counted. It's time that officials in Ohio begin to think about the voters. LAST WEEK'S OTHER ELECTION FAILURE: INDIANA The run-up to the primary election in Indiana was pretty much a disaster with many counties not sure if they were going to be able to meet state law because their voting machines were not programmed and ready to work until the very last minute. In fact, the problems were so severe that, as reported by The BRAD BLOG , the Secretary of State and the State Board of Elections have both announced investigations and possible fines for ES&S, or perhaps even banishment from the Hoosier state entirely! Primary day proved to be just as much of a "train wreck" in many counties. The Louisville (KY) Courier-Journal reported that Secretary of State Todd Rokita plans to send his chief counsel to Clark, Harrison, Jackson and Washington counties to investigate problems with voting systems sold and maintained by Nebraska-based Election Systems & Software. The paper went on to report: "All four counties use the same combination of ES&S voting machines, including Optech Eagle machines that scan a paper ballot and iVotronic machines, which are designed to help people with disabilities cast their ballots privately. "According to ES&S spokesman Ken Fields, the voting machines tabulated the ballots accurately at the precinct. The problem came when county election workers tried to electronically put the individual machines' tallies into a central computer to determine totals for each candidate. "That meant the counties had to manually enter the number of votes for each candidate in each precinct." Now, with all of the problems running up to the primary and the problems during the primary election, we learned on Saturday that Secretary of State Rokita has postponed, with no new date set, the hearing into the actions of ES&S. As reported by the South Bend Tribune ES&S requested and was granted a continuance. "Rokita postponed the hearing after the voting system vendor, Election Systems & Software, filed a motion for continuance Thursday, according to Rokita spokesman A.J. Feeney-Ruiz. "Feeney-Ruiz did not say what reasons the company cited for its motion, but ES&S had questioned the scope of the hearing when it was announced April 28. "According to a formal complaint filed by Rokita that day, ES&S allegedly provided defective hardware, software and ballots in St. Joseph, Marion and Johnson counties. "A company spokesman said he was only aware of service problems to counties, for which the company had already accepted some blame." ES&S CONTINUES TO FAIL THE VOTERS OF WEST VIRGINIA West Virginia counties have had to use paper ballots in early voting after ES&S was a no show in many places. Many of them are working through the weekend in hopes that they can get ballot programming properly installed on their ES&S provided voting machines and then get all of the required tests done satisfactorily prior to Election Day this coming Tuesday. On May 2, the Charleston Daily Mail, reported that Kanawha County Commissioner Kent Carper had filed a formal complaint with the Secretary of State's office after ES&S failed to appear at public testing for the machines that morning. "The vendor was not present; they promised us 'special attention' and said they would be at every critical phase of this testing," Carper said. The Daily Mail also reports: "Carper contends the election company is not compliant with its initial contract, which called for the machines to be ready by the final date of public testing as well as Jan. 1, 2006, as stated in the Help America Vote Act of 2002." Meanwhile The HuntingtonNews.Net reports[ , under the headline, "COMMENTARY: No, ES&S is Not a Division of FEMA: It Just Seems Like It in Wake of Foul-ups", that the state is reporting that 25 to 30 of the state's 55 counties will be completely ready for next Tuesday's primary. This fact is only due to the long-hours put in by local elections officials. What of the other 25 to 30 counties in the state? WTRF-TV reports that many counties are going to go with paper ballots and either hand-count them or use optical-scan machines for the vote tally in light of the problems. Meanwhile Secretary of State Betty Ireland has said this about ES&S: "I am absolutely appalled by ES&S' delays and the hardships ES&S has placed upon this state and our county officials" ES&S has countered by making excuses and blamed the very law that has brought them millions, if not billions of dollars in contracts! ES&S spokesperson Jill Friedman-Wilson said the company regrets the delays, but called much of the problems associated with readying the machines a struggle to comply with the new federal law. "What we're experiencing is challenges related to the implementation of the Help America Vote Act," Friedman-Wilson said. "We're working as closely as we can with our county partners as quickly as we can." Friedman-Wilson, who said the company is contracted to provide voting equipment in counties in all but three states, said the company also had to rely on the cooperation of the counties in programming the ballots. "ES&S doesn't have responsibility for the substance of the ballots," Friedman-Wilson said. "There's quite a bit of back and forth. It's an intricate process with many steps." In other words, Friedman-Wilson is admitting that ES&S oversold their ability to provide their machines and their services. Who suffers for this greed? Only the voters, of course. ARKANSAS COUNTIES TURN TO PAPER BALLOTS AND LEVER MACHINES DUE TO ES&S FAILURES As reported by The BRAD BLOG and The Pine Bluff Commercial[ Jefferson County has decided that because of several ES&S "failures" the county will have to change their plans from using the ES&S iVotronic DREs to using their old voting system for early voting, the May 23 primary and run-off elections in June. The Commercial relates: "With early voting beginning (Monday) May 8, ES&S hasn't provided us with many essential and critical tools necessary for us to conduct the election to the standards set by law and to our own high standards," [Commission Chairman Trey] Ashcraft said. "In addition to being unable to ensure we would have everything we need to conduct the election, we would have no way to provide our voters with the access we desire in order to familiarize them with the machines," Ashcraft said. "Ashcraft said that as of Monday, Nebraska-based ES&S had not provided the commission with ballots, earphones and flashcards. Earphones are required under the federal Americans with Disabilities Act. Flashcards are needed to store voting data." In the meantime state and local officials are working through the weekend, according to the Baxter Bulletin , in an attempt to have voting machines prepared for 8 2nd District counties. These counties are important because it is the only district in the state with a contested congressional primary this year. Again, elections workers and officials are working overtime in an attempt to clean-up a mess that is only in existence because an election machine vendor over-sold their ability to provide contracted services. The voter ends up being the loser in the long-run. MISSOURI COUNTIES DECIDE PAPER OR LEVERS ARE BETTER THAN FIGHTING ES&S FOR CONTRACT COMPLIANCE The BRAD BLOG tells us that five Missouri counties have now joined the march back in time to their familiar paper ballots or lever machines. Early voting begins in Missouri on May 8. Boone County is making contingency plans to drag a couple of their lever machines out of storage. ES&S failed to properly provide ballot software for Carroll County who will now use paper ballots for early voting and only use e-voting for voters with disabilities in the primary. Searcy County will use lever machines for early voting and on primary day if the iVotronics are not ready in time. Newton and Marion Counties will use hand-counted paper ballots for early voting and hope that the machines will be ready for the primary. Thus ends another week of failures and long hours by elections officials. It seems that some have gotten themselves on the right track and some are struggling to get on that track. Meanwhile the vendors continue to obfuscate and make excuses for their failures. While making millions of dollars in the bargain, of course. Help America Vote, indeed. In closing this week I would like to mention, again, Bruce Funk. He opened his office to allow Harri Hursti, Security Innovations and BlackBoxVoting to inspect the Diebold TSx voting machines that he was forced by the state of Utah to use in elections. For this act state officials have pushed him out of his job...even though it is his act of courage and responsibility that has led to the revelation of a security vulnerability that must be fixed before Diebold TS or TSx machines are used in any elections anywhere in the country.
Funk deserves our support. America needs more courageous and responsible elections officials like him. Please visit the VoteTrustUSA 'Election Integrity Action Center' and let the Emery County Commissioners know how you feel.
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You won't learn it from today's crass commercializers of this annual celebration, but Mother's Day was not meant to be a rose-scented tribute to sweet, docile mom. Rather, it began as a bold cry by mothers for all mothers to rise up against war. In the 1860s, thousands of mothers were devastated by the brutal slaughter of the Civil War, and many dared to stand up (at a time when women could not even vote) to decry war in the name of motherhood - and to urge that all mothers become a force for peace. The original Mother's Day Proclamation was penned in 1870 by Julia Ward Howe, the renown author of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic." Far from the sing-song sweetness of a Hallmark card, this was a stark and ringing call for action: "Arise then, women of this day!" it began. "Our husbands shall not come to us reeking of carnage for caresses and applause. Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn all that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy, and patience." In the spirit of this Julia Ward Howe's proclamation, a nationwide group called CodePink: Women for Peace, will rally in Washington on this coming Mother's Day weekend. There'll be a 24-hour vigil in front of the White House, concerts, organizing sessions, and readings from hundreds of poignant letters that mothers have written to Laura Bush, urging the First Mother to help stop the war in Iraq. This is Jim Hightower saying... Over the long haul, CodePink is organizing to build the greatest gift a mother could get: a world without war. To join the effort, go to www.codepink4peace.org. (c) 2006 Jim Hightower's latest book, "If The Gods Had Meant Us To Vote They Would Have Given Us Candidates," is available in a fully revised and updated paperback edition. |
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OK, I made that up. The quote may be fabricated, but, for Cinco de
Mayo, our President did really, truly demand that, "Those who come
here to our country have a responsibility to learn the English
language."
Fair enough. Certainly, would-be citizens, indeed all citizens,
should be required to comprehend the following sample of the Mother
Tongue, spoken by the President himself. This is from Mr. Bush's
February 4, 2005 explanation of how he will "save" our Social
Security system. Take notes, class, there will be a test:
Ladies and Gentlemen, The President of the United States:
"Because the -- all which is on the table begins to address the big
cost drivers. For example, how benefits are calculate, for example,
is on the table; whether or not benefits rise based upon wage
increases or price increases. There's a series of parts of the
formula that are being considered. And when you couple that, those
different cost drivers, affecting those -- changing those with
personal accounts, the idea is to get what has been promised more
likely to be -- or closer delivered to what has been promised. DOES
THAT MAKE ANY SENSE TO YOU? IT'S KIND OF MUDDLED. Look, there's a
series of things that cause the -- like, for example, benefits are
calculated based upon inflation, as opposed to wage increases. This
is a reform that would help solve the red if that were put into
effect. In other words, how fast benefits grow, how fast the promised
benefits grow, if those -- that that growth is affect, it will help
on the red."
Got that?
So, go ahead, answer the President's question: "Does that make any
sense to you?" And $50 to the first reader who can make it make sense
to anyone. It doesn't make sense, of course. (So I pocket the $50.)
And that's the point. Never, as the POTUS says, "misunderestimate"
him. The Grinning Chimp knows exactly was he's saying -- or, in this
case, exactly what he's not saying.
He is pretending to tell you his plan. But his plan has to do with
revaluing the Chinese yuan, shifting U.S. retirement trillions into
"personal" accounts that banks can shuffle to the more productive
markets of Asia -- and transforming American the Industrial
Powerhouse into America the Planetary Speculator.
Rather than tell you that, he's told nothing -- in as many words as possible.
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George W. Bush's hollow boasts about the "liberation" he has bestowed (by brute force) upon Iraq is bitter gall indeed to the women of the conquered land, who have been delivered into the hands of fierce sectarians whose violent misogynistic zeal would do the Taliban proud. Many of the worst extremist gangs have been directly empowered by the American occupation - indeed, in their guise as government "security forces" and police brigades, they have been armed and trained with millions of American taxpayer dollars. [I'll be writing more on this theme in this week's Moscow Times column.]
A female Iraqi filmmaker has gone undercover - literally so, for there are now vast quadrants of Iraq where women who go unveiled are at grave risk of attack - to show the reality of women's lives under the Bush-imposed regime. As in so many other cases, a despairing consensus emerges: "It's worse than under Saddam." Think about that: worse than life under one of the worst regimes in modern history. That's what Bush has accomplished in Iraq. That is his true legacy.
Bush's father once famously declared that Saddam was "worse than Hitler." Now the judgment of history is already clear: his son is "worse than Saddam."
Natasha Walters reports in The Guardian: 'No one knows what we are going through.'
Excerpts:The film-maker, who lives in Baghdad, wants to keep her identity secret because she fears reprisals, so I'll call her Zeina. When I spoke to her by telephone, the first first thing I asked her was why it is that she feels she has to hide her identity, and in her answer she does not distinguish between the government and the insurgents, in the way that we are taught to do here. "I feel the threat from the government and from the sectarian militias," she says. "The danger in Iraq comes from the Americans, from the sectarian militias - and, of course, it also comes from the crime, the gangs, the random kidnappings."
She decided she wanted to make this film because the things she saw every day were not being seen by the outside world. "No one sees what we are going through. All Iraqis are psychologically traumatised by what is happening. I have seen an eight-year old child who has involuntary tremors, whenever she hears an aeroplane or sees soldiers. I have seen families displaced. I have seen women forced into prostitution because of the poverty of their families."
Zeina was not a supporter of Saddam Hussein's regime. During his rule, she worked as a journalist and a translator of literary criticism. "Politically, before the war, I was not happy," she says. "So many things were not right. We had no freedom of speech, no freedom of expression. But I never imagined the change would be this way, so bad. I never imagined that at all"....
The film is particularly good at capturing the texture of family life lived in such insecurity, and one effective section concentrates on the tale of a young girl, just eight years old, who was picked up by American troops after an attack on the car in which she and her father and other Iraqis were travelling. The troops first took her to a military hospital, but then her family say she was held for three months. They were not informed of her whereabouts and she was interrogated by being asked to identify Iraqi corpses in photographs. Her grandfather eventually tracked her down in Baghdad, and as we see her weeping in his lap we sense her family's frustration at having no accountable authority to whom they can take their anger....
Zeina says the responsibility for these developments squarely at the feet of the occupation - it has given sectarianism the opportunity to flourish. She simply laughs when I ask her whether she feels grateful for the democracy that America has given Iraq. "Democracy? What democracy? We do not have democracy. This democracy that Bush talks about - it is a completely empty structure, based on sectarian and ethnic interests. How can you have democracy when you are afraid that your life will be threatened, or your husband will be killed if you express yourself freely? It is a bad joke."
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An Open Letter To Richard Cohen By William Rivers Pitt Greetings! I was inspired to write you after reading your missive in today's Post regarding all the nasty emails you have received of late. Personally, I found Colbert's performance hilarious and timely, the kind of satirical backhand so desperately needed these days. I don't begrudge you your opinion that he wasn't funny, and I agree with your belief that it wasn't your opinion on his performance that motivated such an angry response. It wasn't. You yourself nailed the reason: "Institution after institution failed America - the presidency, Congress and the press. They all endorsed a war to rid Iraq of what it did not have." The fact that your Colbert commentary became the flint against this rock doesn't mean that Colbert, or your opinion of him, is to blame for the resulting firestorm. The fact is that people are angry - brain-boilingly, apoplectically, mind-bendingly so - at what has happened to this great country. I am, quite often, so angry that my hands shake. Yes, a former high school teacher from New England here, so filled with bile and rage that I sometimes don't recognize my face in the mirror. You, sir, should not be asking why so many of your email friends are so angry. You should be asking why you yourself are not with them in their rage. I have admired a number of your articles over these last years, and know that you are no fool regarding our situation in Iraq and here at home. It isn't your grasp of the issues that concerns me, but the absence of outrage. Do you really care about the things you write about, or is all this merely grist for the mill that provides you a paycheck? "I have seen this anger before," you wrote, "back in the Vietnam War era." No, sir, you have not. You hearken back to rock-throwing days in Vietnam, and lament hatred and rage. But you do not see that those days are quaint by comparison given our current geopolitical situation. Johnson and Nixon, whatever else their faults may have been, were internationalists who understood the need for connection to the wider world. The war in Vietnam, barbaric as it was, did not inspire tens of thousands of Vietnamese to join martyr's brigades. It did not threaten to unleash chaos in a part of the world that holds the economic lifeblood of our whole existence. It did not threaten to shake loose nuclear weapons from quasi-rogue states like Pakistan. You speak of the angry mob because you got slapped around via email, but your characterization of the anti-war crowd tells me you have not spent a single moment out in the streets with them. I have. I have covered dozens of protests, large and small, in cities all across this country before and after the invasion of Iraq. Millions upon millions of Americans participated in these, and never once, not one time, was a rock thrown. No violence was offered anywhere, unless it was violence offered to old ladies by riot-garbed police, as was evidenced in Portland several years ago. I have the photographs to prove it. If you want to see anger, enjoy this picture of a 60-year-old woman holding an anti-war sign while being placed in a hammer-lock by a riot cop: "The hatred is back," you say, as if such hatred is beyond justification. It is interesting that you make so many allusions to Vietnam; the comparison is apt, yet not on point. This is not a situation of "Then" and "Now," but "Then" and "Again." The two issues are joined by a common theme: official malfeasance, presidential lies, administrative fear-mongering and horrific body counts in a faraway land. The lesson of Vietnam was so searing, many believed, that it would never have to be learned again. Why the anger? Because that lesson didn't take, at least with this crowd. Why the anger? Because millions of people are staggered by the idea that, yes Virginia, we have to go through this again. We have to watch soldiers slaughter and be slaughtered for reasons that bear no markings of truth. We have to watch the reputation of this great nation be savaged. We have to watch as our leaders lie to us with their bare faces hanging out. Why the anger? It can be summed up in one run-on sentence: We have lost two towers in New York, a part of the Pentagon, an important American city called New Orleans, our economic solvency, our global reputation, our moral authority, our children's future, we have lost tens of thousands of American soldiers to death and grievous injury, we must endure the Abramoffs and the Cunninghams and the Libbys and the whores and the bribes and the utter corruption, we must contemplate the staggering depth of the hole we have been hurled down into, and we expect little to no help from the mainstream DC press, whose lazy go-along-to-get-along cocktail-circuit mentality allowed so much of this to happen because they failed comprehensively to do their job. George W. Bush and his pals used September 11th against the American people, used perhaps the most horrific day in our collective history, deliberately and with intent, to foster a war of choice that has killed untold tens of thousands of human beings and basically bankrupted our country. They lied about the threat posed by Iraq. They destroyed the career of a CIA agent who was tasked to keep an eye on Iran's nuclear ambitions, and did so to exact petty political revenge against a critic. They tortured people, and spied on American civilians. You cannot fathom anger arising from this? I wrote a book called "War on Iraq" in the summer of 2002. That book stated there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, no al Qaeda connections in Iraq, no connections to 9/11 in Iraq, and thus no reason for the invasion of Iraq. It is now almost the summer of 2006. That book was right then, and is right now, and the millions of Americans who agree with the facts contained therein have shared these four years with me in a state of disbelief, shock, sorrow and yes, anger. None of this had to happen, and the fact that it was allowed to happen inspires the kind of vitriol you got a taste of via email. If you want anger, you should try reading some of the emails I get on a weekly basis. The mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, wives, husbands and children of American soldiers killed in Iraq write to me asking why it happened, what can be done, how this is possible. They write to me because I wrote that book, because somehow they think I have an answer to that bottomless question. I am sorry you were so wounded by the messages you received. I wish that hadn't happened; I am personally from the more-flies-with-honey school of journalistic correspondence. But in the end, truth be told, I don't feel too badly for you. It isn't an excess of outrage that plagues this nation today, but an abject lack of it. Instead of castigating those who take an interest, who have gotten justifiably furious over all that has happened, I suggest you take a moment within yourself and ask why you don't share their feelings. This isn't Vietnam, Mr. Cohen. This is a whole new ballgame, and the stakes are higher by orders of magnitude. It took almost ten years of Vietnam for people to reach the boiling point you are so apparently horrified by (and worthy of note, that rage may have elected Nixon, but also served to stop the killing in Southeast Asia). Should those of us who are angry today wait until 2013 to raise hell? At a minimum, I suggest you head down to your local hardware store and buy a few sheets of 40-grit sandpaper. Apply it liberally - pardon the pun - to any and all parts of your body that may be exposed to the scary anger of the anti-war Left. Toughen up that hide of yours, and greet the coming days with a leathery mien impervious to a few angry emails. Afterwards, you could perhaps figure out why the anger of those who see this war as a crime and this administration as a disaster is so terribly threatening to you. Anger is a gift, after all, one that inspires change. If you don't think we need a change, real change, I can only shake my head. P.S. Another reason for the anger you have absorbed can be laid, frankly, at your own feet. There are enough of us around who can still remember your words from November of 2000: "Given the present bitterness, given the angry irresponsible charges being hurled by both camps, the nation will be in dire need of a conciliator, a likable guy who will make things better and not worse. That man is not Al Gore. That man is George W. Bush."
Locate a mirror, Mr. Cohen. Stare deep within it. Know full well that today, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, will recast all your yesterdays as having passed like a comforting dream. Your ability to remain within the safe bubble of the beltway clubhouse, drifting this way and that in some meandering, rudderless fog, has ended. Al Gore invented the internet, or so we are told, and some bright-eyed editor decided to staple your email address to the bottom of your works. Welcome to the age of electronic accountability.
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The CIA, A Bush Family Fiefdom By Robert Parry Since the 9/11 terror attacks, the U.S. government has tried both structural and personnel changes to fix the nation's intelligence services - including now the ouster of CIA Director Porter Goss - but the remedies have failed because they've missed the core problem. What's wrong with the U.S. intelligence community is that over the past three decades its ethos of telling truth to power has been corrupted by politics to such a degree that George W. Bush now sees the Central Intelligence Agency as virtually his family's fiefdom, with the Langley, Virginia, headquarters even named for his father, George H.W. Bush, a former CIA director. So, when analysts at the CIA were viewed as undercutting George W. Bush's case for war with Iraq, the White House launched a counter-attack against these intelligence professionals for perceived disloyalty. During the buildup to the Iraq War, Vice President Dick Cheney personally went to CIA headquarters to bang heads with intelligence analysts who doubted White House claims about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. While some analysts resisted, many mid-level bureaucrats acquiesced to Cheney. Paul Pillar, the CIA's senior intelligence analyst for the Middle East, said the Bush administration didn't just play games with the principle of objective analysis, but "turned the entire model upside down." After quitting the CIA in 2005, Pillar wrote an article in Foreign Affairs magazine stating that "the administration used intelligence not to inform decision-making, but to justify a decision already made." "The Bush administration deviated from the professional standard not only in using policy to drive intelligence, but also in aggressively using intelligence to win public support for its decision to go to war," Pillar wrote. "This meant selectively adducing data - 'cherry-picking' - rather than using the intelligence community's own analytic judgments." After the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq failed to find WMD, the White House put much of the blame on the spy agency. Some of the suppressed CIA doubts then began to surface, embarrassing Bush during Campaign 2004. At that delicate political moment, Bush installed Goss, a partisan Republican congressman recruited by Cheney, to take over the CIA. The Goss appointment on Sept. 24, 2004, reflected Bush's determination to bring the agency's analytical division into line with his policies both before and after the November 2004 presidential election. Loyal Henchmen Like a Medieval ruler punishing a rebellious province, Bush sent in loyal henchmen to root out perceived traitors. Bush's attitude toward CIA analysts who disagreed with his pre-war assertions about Iraq's WMD was much like his anger toward the French for cautioning him about his Iraq invasion plans. Being right was no protection from Bush's wrath; indeed, it appeared to make him madder. Though Bush has continued to this day to stress how much he values accurate intelligence as vital for the nation's security, his real record has been one of insisting on getting information that fits his preconceptions. So, rather than reward the CIA analysts who had resisted White House pressure to cook the WMD intelligence on Iraq, Bush set out to remove them. (He also took aim at the State Department, another bastion of WMD dissent, where he moved to replace the diffident Colin Powell with the enthusiastic loyalist Condoleezza Rice.) At the CIA, Bush's intelligence purge gained momentum in the weeks after he secured his second term. Bush saw his victory as almost a mystical validation of his view that the "war on terror" was a conflict between good and evil in which people were either with Bush or with the terrorists. Bush called the election his "accountability moment." CIA intelligence professionals got the message that they could either get behind Bush's policies or get out. The loyalty demands led to an exodus of senior CIA officials, including deputy CIA chief John E. McLaughlin and deputy director of operations Stephen R. Kappes. In whipping the remaining intelligence analysts into line, Bush was helped by powerful conservative news personalities - from AM talk radio to Fox News, from right-wing newspaper columnists to Internet bloggers - who conjured up conspiracy theories about a CIA plot to destroy the President. Conservative columnist David Brooks was among those pushing the argument that the CIA's only rightful role was to serve the President. "Now that he's been returned to office, President Bush is going to have to differentiate between his opponents and his enemies," wrote Brooks in the New York Times. "His opponents are found in the Democratic Party. His enemies are in certain offices of the Central Intelligence Agency." To Brooks, the justification for Bush going after the CIA was the release of information that made Bush look bad. "At the height of the campaign, CIA officials, who are supposed to serve the President and stay out of politics and policy, served up leak after leak to discredit the President's Iraq policy," Brooks wrote. "In mid-September [2004], somebody leaked a CIA report predicting a gloomy or apocalyptic future for the region. Later that month, a senior CIA official, Paul Pillar, reportedly made comments saying he had long felt the decision to go to war would heighten anti-American animosity in the Arab world." [NYT, Nov. 13, 2004] On the Mark Nearly 18 months later, those CIA assessments seem to have been right on the mark, as violence in Iraq continues to spin out of control and the Middle East seethes with hatred toward the United States. But in November 2004, the victorious President and his conservative allies were set on throttling those intelligence professionals who still believed that their job was to get the information right, not just tell Bush what he wanted to hear. Bush's counterinsurgency campaign to stamp out disloyalty at the CIA also was more paranoia than recognition of an actual threat. Though the White House selected Goss to lead the purge, the supposed CIA "cabal" never really existed. "He came in to clean up without knowing what he was going to clean up," one former intelligence officer told Washington Post reporter Dana Priest. Nevertheless, Goss and his lieutenants from his old congressional staff drove out a number of mid- and senior-level officers caught up in the search for disloyalty. "The agency was never at war with the White House," former CIA operations officer Gary Berntsen told Priest. "Eighty-five percent of them are Republicans," said Berntsen, a self-described Republican and Bush supporter. "The CIA was a convenient scapegoat." [Washington Post, May 6, 2006] Plus, the claim from Bush's media supporters that the CIA only existed to "serve the President" was not historically accurate. While it may be true that the CIA's operations directorate was created as a secret paramilitary arm for the U.S. executive, the CIA's analytical division was established to provide objective information to both the President and other parts of the U.S. government, including Congress. Even at the height of the Cold War in the 1950s and 1960s, the CIA's analytical division took pride in telling presidents what they didn't want to hear - such as debunking Eisenhower's "bomber gap" or Kennedy's "missile gap" or Johnson's faith in the air war against North Vietnam. Though never perfectly applied, the ethos of objective analysis continued through the mid-1970s. Then, CIA analysis began to come under sustained attack from conservatives and a new group called neoconservatives, who insisted that the Soviet Union was a rapidly expanding military menace with its eye on world conquest. The CIA analytical division held a more nuanced assessment of the Soviet threat, viewing Moscow as a declining superpower struggling to keep pace with the West while coping with fissures inside its own empire. This CIA analysis was the background for the "dtente strategy" followed by President Richard Nixon and his Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who sought to negotiate arms control and other agreements with the Soviet Union. Reagan's Emergence But Nixon's ouster over the Watergate scandal in 1974 and Ronald Reagan's entrance on the national political stage in 1976 altered the political dynamic. Scared by Reagan's successes in the Republican primaries, President Gerald Ford ordered the word "dtente" dropped from the White House lexicon and let then-CIA Director George H.W. Bush open up the CIA's analytical division to an unprecedented challenge from right-wing intellectuals, known as "Team B." The "Team B" assessment, bringing in old-time Cold Warriors and young neoconservatives like Paul Wolfowitz, accused the CIA analytical division of systematically underestimating the growing Soviet threat. In late 1976, to accommodate this powerful conservative wing of the Republican Party, CIA Director Bush adopted a more alarmist CIA estimate of Soviet power. When Reagan became President in 1981, with Bush as his Vice President, the assault on the CIA's analytical division resumed in earnest. Analysts who balked at the new administration's ideological vision of the Soviet Union as a 10-foot-tall behemoth were shunted aside or forced out of the CIA. The CIA's once proud Soviet division took the brunt of the attacks. The surviving analysts began ignoring the mounting evidence of a rapid Soviet decline, so as not to contradict the Reagan-Bush justification for an expanded U.S. military budget and for bloody interventions in Third World conflicts from Nicaragua to Afghanistan. In reality, Moscow couldn't even keep control along its own borders. But the Reagan-Bush pressure on the U.S. intelligence process proved so effective that CIA analysts filtered out the evidence of a Soviet crackup. Ironically, when the Soviet Empire collapsed in the late 1980s, the CIA took the blame for "missing" one of the most important political events of the Twentieth Century. Ironically, too, Reagan, who had built up the Soviet straw man, got the most credit when it fell down. [For details, see Robert Parry's Secrecy & Privilege.] Since then, I have talked with CIA veterans who acknowledged that the politicized agency overstated the Soviet threat despite reliable intelligence from their own agents inside the Soviet bloc who were describing the internal problems. This "intelligence failure" was not just one of misjudgments; it was one of ideological pressure that distorted the Soviet reality to fit with White House policies. Whipping Boy In the second Bush administration, which brought back many of the Reagan-Bush neoconservatives, the same pattern recurred. Intelligence was "cherry-picked" to justify policy, rather than letting objective analysis inform the policy. In effect, Bush made his decisions on "gut" instincts and had evidence compiled to justify his decisions. When Bush's "gut" failed him - such as when he ignored CIA warnings about the 9/11 attacks or when he pushed bogus intelligence on Iraq's WMD - the CIA stood in as the whipping boy, taking the worst of the institutional blame. By 2005, the CIA was stripped of its role as the lead agency in the U.S. intelligence community, when Congress created the new position of National Director of Intelligence on the recommendation of the 9/11 Commission. However, the new post of NDI - directly under the President - didn't address the question of politicization. Nothing was done to rebuild the lost ethos of objective analysis or to reject the notion that the CIA "serves the President." Bush appointed John Negroponte, a career diplomat considered a Cold War hard-liner, to fill the new position as NDI in April 2005. Negroponte had served as ambassador to Honduras in the 1980s when the CIA was organizing the contra war against Nicaragua and he represented the United States as U.N. ambassador when the false Iraq WMD case was presented in 2002-2003. In 2004-2005, he was U.S. ambassador in Iraq as sectarian "death squads" emerged as a new threat. Despite his prominent roles in the Bush administration, Negroponte wasn't viewed as part of the neoconservative inner circle that had pushed the Iraq War. Rather, he fell more into the traditional Cold War camp of hard-nosed operatives who would carry out orders, even ones that stretched the limits of morality. When Negroponte became NDI, Goss had to face the fact of his diminished role in the intelligence community. Instead of being called Director of Central Intelligence, he became just the CIA director. Perhaps trying to demonstrate his intense loyalty to George W. Bush, Goss created more turmoil in the CIA by ordering polygraphs of CIA officials in an investigation into who leaked the secret of clandestine CIA prisons in Eastern Europe where terror suspects were interrogated and allegedly tortured. The polygraphs led to the ouster of veteran CIA officer Mary McCarthy, though she denied leaking the information. Prostitute Probe Goss ran into more controversy when his hand-picked executive director, Kyle "Dusty" Foggo, became embroiled in the investigation of former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham, R-California, who was sentenced in March to more than eight years in prison for accepting $2.4 million in bribes from military contractors. Foggo was a longtime friend of Brent Wilkes, a contractor mentioned in the Cunningham indictment. Foggo also attended poker games that Wilkes organized at the Watergate and the Westin Grand hotels in Washington. According to press reports, federal investigators are looking into allegations that the bribery by the military contractors may have included payments for limousines, poker parties and prostitutes. [NYT, May 7, 2006] Between the disarray from CIA departures and the hint of scandal around Foggo, Goss saw his political stock decline. Negroponte also reportedly felt that Goss was not adapting well to his new subordinate position as just one of many intelligence directors. Meanwhile, Negroponte faced opposition himself from aggressive neoconservatives who objected to his more tempered assessment of the threat from Iran's nuclear program and his hiring of some intelligence analysts who had objected to Bush's Iraq WMD claims. Frank J. Gaffney Jr. an original signer of the neoconservative Project for the New American Century, called for Negroponte's firing because of his Iran assessment and his "abysmal personnel decisions." In an article for Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Washington Times, Gaffney attacked Negroponte for giving top analytical jobs to Thomas Fingar, who had served as assistant secretary of state for intelligence and research, and Kenneth Brill, who was U.S. ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency, which debunked some of the U.S. and British claims about Iraq seeking enriched uranium from Africa. The State Department's Office of Intelligence and Research led the dissent against the Iraq WMD case, especially over what turned out to be false claims that Iraq was developing a nuclear bomb. Gaffney specifically faulted Fingar for his testimony against neoconservative favorite John Bolton to become U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. "Given this background, is it any wonder that Messrs. Negroponte, Fingar and Brill ... gave us the spectacle of absurdly declaring the Iranian regime to be years away from having nuclear weapons?" wrote Gaffney, who was a senior Pentagon official during the Reagan administration. Gaffney accused Negroponte of giving promotions to "government officials in sensitive positions who actively subvert the President's policies," an apparent reference to Fingar and Brill. Iran Cold Water In an interview with NBC News on April 20, Negroponte had cited Iran's limited progress in refining uranium and their use of a cascade of only 164 centrifuges. "According to the experts that I consult, achieving - getting 164 centrifuges to work is still a long way from having the capacity to manufacture sufficient fissile material for a nuclear weapon," Negroponte said. "Our assessment is that the prospects of an Iranian weapon are still a number of years off, and probably into the next decade." Expressing a similar view about Iran in a speech at the National Press Club, Negroponte said, "I think it's important that this issue be kept in perspective." In effect, the DNI was splashing cold water on the more fevered assessment of Iran's nuclear intentions favored by the neoconservatives around Bush. Still, Negroponte appears to have come out on top in this latest power struggle. On May 5, Bush announced Goss's abrupt resignation, and on May 8, Bush named Negroponte's current deputy, Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden, to become CIA chief. While Negroponte's bureaucratic victory may represent a defeat for the neoconservatives, it's not likely to solve the larger problem of a politicized intelligence community. Though considered more professional than Goss, Negroponte and Hayden still have shown themselves to be loyal to Bush's edicts. Negroponte sold Bush's Iraq WMD case at the United Nations and sat behind Secretary of State Colin Powell during his infamous presentation to the Security Council on Feb. 5, 2003. While running the National Security Agency, Hayden implemented Bush's warrantless wiretaps of Americans.
Yet, until the larger question of politicization is addressed - until Bush's sense of entitlement over the intelligence community is ended - the problem of the U.S. government's misuse of intelligence is likely to continue.
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| Bush Does Something Right OK, he may be America's worst president ever. But Bush seems to be willing to compromise on immigration reform -- and that's worth applauding. As president, George W. Bush divides more often than he unites. He spurns bi-partisanship and moderation. He habitually panders to the social prejudices of the Republican base. He serves corporate lobbyists and undermines workers' rights. He pursues electoral advantage at the expense of the public interest. He avoids inconvenient truths, intentionally misleads and refuses to admit error, no matter how grave. For all those reasons and more, he is earning a reputation as America's "worst president." And yet over the past several days, he confounded all those weary expectations by seeking a decent compromise on immigration policy that includes a "pathway to citizenship" for illegal aliens. Reaching out to Democrats as well as Republicans on Capitol Hill, he rejected the bigots in his party and changed his own position to reflect a more realistic and humane approach to this difficult question. Still more surprising, he appears to be acting on principle -- at the risk of alienating GOP leaders and many grass-roots conservatives, and perhaps even forfeiting the Republican congressional majority. Those gestures deserve fair acknowledgment. For once, Bush has changed course for the better. Perhaps the best way to measure how far he has come is to listen to Sen. Ted Kennedy, who has spent years fighting for immigration reform. In January 2004, when the president finally addressed immigration after doing nothing for three years, he proposed a "guest worker" program that would have institutionalized downward pressure on wages, without providing any ladder toward legal status for the millions of undocumented migrant laborers. Kennedy swiftly denounced the Bush proposal as "very disappointing," "woefully inadequate" and "far short of the serious reform our country needs to fix our broken immigration system." Last Tuesday, however, the Massachusetts Democrat expressed very different sentiments after meeting in the White House with Bush and several other senators, including both Majority Leader Bill Frist and Minority Leader Harry Reid. (Right-wing Republicans who oppose the bill, including Texas Sen. John Cornyn, the chairman of the immigration subcommittee, weren't invited.) Kennedy told reporters he feels "enormously grateful" for the "strong leadership" that he expects the president will bring to bear on passage of a comprehensive reform bill. Like any compromise, the legislation that eventually emerges in Washington is certain to be imperfect. It may create barriers to citizenship that some immigrants will find impassable. It will require tougher border enforcement. It could attract more millions across the southern border by rewarding those who are already here. Even a flawed solution is preferable to the punitive fantasy promoted by right-wing House Republicans, who would stigmatize all illegal immigrants as felons -- and presumably envision their incarceration in gigantic detention camps prior to deportation. They want to criminalize those impoverished workers or at best consign them to subcitizen status until they can be kicked out. The most extreme nativists imagine cruel mass deportations of Latino families, or worse, in order to preserve "white America." Those extremists have branded Bush a "traitor" -- and some who were once his most fervent supporters on the far right are attacking him bitterly now. Jerome Corsi, coauthor of "Unfit for Command," the scurrilous Swift Boat Veterans diatribe against John Kerry, recently published a column in Human Events that accuses Bush of swindling "moral conservatives" on immigration and paving the way for Democratic electoral triumph. Corsi mocks the president for saying that it is impossible to deport more than 10 million illegal immigrants -- and hints that a nation capable of winning wars abroad can solve the immigration problem by force of arms. How Bush plans to soothe such angry critics isn't clear yet. Embracing an idea associated with Kennedy (and his Senate colleagues John McCain and Chuck Hagel) has further irritated the Republican base, which is increasingly disenchanted with his presidency anyway. That may be why he didn't come out of that meeting with an explicit endorsement of the Senate bill. He is holding back, according to press reports, because he hopes to broker an agreement with the House leadership, which remains strongly opposed to anything resembling amnesty. It is possible, of course, that Bush's outreach to the Senate on immigration is merely a political feint, intended to defuse an explosive issue until after the midterm elections. He and Karl Rove both have long sought to bring more Hispanics into the Republican Party -- a strategy that began to achieve traction two years ago but has since been stalled by the party's anti-immigrant image. They may believe that the pathway to citizenship will bring back Latino voters, and that they can retain the party's traditional conservatives with the usual tactics of gay-bashing, flag waving and tax cutting.
Whatever the president's ultimate intentions may be, he is behaving for the moment more like a sober leader and less like a partisan zealot. His tragedy, and ours, is that such moments are so much the exception in his presidency rather than the rule.
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Opening The Debate On Israel By Norman Solomon The extended controversy over a paper by two professors, "The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy," is prying the lid off a debate that has been bottled up for decades. Routinely, the American news media have ignored or pilloried any strong criticism of Washington's massive support for Israel. But the paper and an article based on it by respected academics John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and Stephen Walt, academic dean of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, first published March 23 in the London Review of Books, are catalysts for some healthy public discussion of key issues. The first mainstream media reactions to the paper - often with the customary name-calling - were mostly efforts to shut down debate before it could begin. Early venues for vituperative attacks on the paper included the op-ed pages of the Los Angeles Times ("nutty"), the Boston Herald (headline: "Anti-Semitic Paranoia at Harvard") and The Washington Post (headline: "Yes, It's Anti-Semitic"). But other voices have emerged, on the airwaves and in print, to bypass the facile attacks and address crucial issues. If this keeps up, the uproar over what Mr. Mearsheimer and Mr. Walt had to say could invigorate public discourse about Washington's policies toward a country that consistently has received a bigger U.S. aid package for a longer period than any other nation. In April, syndicated columnist Molly Ivins put her astute finger on a vital point. "In the United States, we do not have full-throated, full-throttle debate about Israel," she wrote. "In Israel, they have it as a matter of course, but the truth is that the accusation of anti-Semitism is far too often raised in this country against anyone who criticizes the government of Israel. ... I don't know that I've ever felt intimidated by the knee-jerk 'you're anti-Semitic' charge leveled at anyone who criticizes Israel, but I do know I have certainly heard it often enough to become tired of it. And I wonder if that doesn't produce the same result: giving up on the discussion." The point rings true, and it's one of the central themes emphasized by Mr. Mearsheimer and Mr. Walt. If the barriers to democratic discourse can be overcome, the paper's authors say, the results could be highly beneficial: "Open debate will expose the limits of the strategic and moral case for one-sided U.S. support and could move the U.S. to a position more consistent with its own national interest, with the interests of the other states in the region, and with Israel's long-term interests as well." Outsized support for Israel has been "the centerpiece of U.S. Middle Eastern policy," the professors contend - and the Israel lobby makes that support possible. "Other special-interest groups have managed to skew America's foreign policy, but no lobby has managed to divert it as far from what the national interest would suggest," the paper says. One of the consequences is that "the United States has become the de facto enabler of Israeli expansion in the occupied territories, making it complicit in the crimes perpetrated against the Palestinians." In the United States, "the lobby's campaign to quash debate about Israel is unhealthy for democracy," Mr. Mearsheimer and Mr. Walt assert. They point to grave effects on the body politic: "The inability of Congress to conduct a genuine debate on these important issues paralyzes the entire process of democratic deliberation." While their paper overstates the extent to which pro-Israel pressures determine U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East, a very powerful lobby for Israel clearly has enormous leverage in Washington. And the professors make a convincing case that the U.S. government has been much too closely aligned with Israel - to the detriment of human rights, democracy and other principles that are supposed to constitute American values. The failure to make a distinction between anti-Semitism and criticism of Israel routinely stifles public debate. When convenient, pro-Israel groups in the United States will concede that it's possible to oppose Israeli policies without being anti-Semitic. Yet many of Israel's boosters reflexively pull out the heavy artillery of charging anti-Semitism when their position is challenged. Numerous American Jewish groups dedicated to supporting Israel are eager to equate Israel with Judaism. Sometimes they have the arrogance to depict the country and the religion as inseparable. For example, in April 2000, a full-page United Jewish Appeal ad in The New York Times proclaimed: "The seeds of Jewish life and Jewish communities everywhere begin in Israel." Like many other American Jews who grew up in the 1950s and '60s, I went door to door with blue-and-white UJA cans to raise money for planting trees in Israel. I heard about relatives who had died in concentration camps during the Holocaust two decades earlier and about relatives who had survived and went to Israel. In 1959, my family visited some of them, on a kibbutz and in Tel Aviv. The 1960 blockbuster movie Exodus dramatized the birth of Israel a dozen years earlier. As I remember, Arabs were portrayed in the picture as cold-blooded killers while the Jews who killed Arabs were presented as heroic fighters engaged in self-defense. The film was in sync with frequent media messages that lauded Jews for risking the perilous journey to Palestine and making the desert bloom, as though no one of consequence had been living there before. The Six-Day War in June 1967 enabled Israel to expand the territory it controlled several times over, in the process suppressing huge numbers of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. Their plights and legitimate grievances got little space in the U.S. media. In 1969, the independent American journalist I. F. Stone expressed hope for "a reconstructed Palestine of Jewish and Arab states in peaceful coexistence." He contended that "to bring it about, Israel and the Jewish communities of the world must be willing to look some unpleasant truths squarely in the face. ... One is to recognize that the Arab guerrillas are doing to us what our terrorists and saboteurs of the Irgun, Stern and Haganah did to the British. Another is to be willing to admit that their motives are as honorable as were ours. As a Jew, even as I felt revulsion against the terrorism, I felt it justified by the homelessness of the surviving Jews from the Nazi camps and the bitter scenes when refugee ships sank, or sank themselves, when refused admission to Palestine. "The best of Arab youth feels the same way; they cannot forget the atrocities committed by us against villages like Deir Yassin, nor the uprooting of the Palestinian Arabs from their ancient homeland, for which they feel the same deep ties of sentiment as do so many Jews, however assimilated elsewhere." When I crossed the Allenby Bridge from Jordan into the West Bank 15 years ago, I spoke with a 19-year-old border guard who was carrying a machine gun. He told me that he'd emigrated from Brooklyn, N.Y., a few months earlier. He said the Palestinians should get out of his country. In East Jerusalem, I saw Israeli soldiers brandishing rifle butts at elderly women in a queue. Some in the line reminded me of my grandmothers, only these women were Arab. Today, visitors to the Web site of the Israeli human-rights group B'Tselem can find profuse documentation about systematic denial of Palestinian rights and ongoing violence in all directions. Since autumn 2000, in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, according to the latest figures posted, the number of Israelis killed by Palestinians has totaled 998 and the number of Palestinians killed by Israelis has totaled 3,466. Overall, in the American news media, the horrible killings of Israelis by Palestinian suicide bombers get front-page and prime-time coverage while the horrible killings of Palestinians by Israelis get relatively scant and dispassionate coverage. If the U.S. news media were to become committed to a single standard of human rights, the shift would transform public discourse about basic Israeli policies - and jeopardize the U.S. government's support for them. It is against just such a single standard that the epithet of "anti-Semitism" is commonly wielded. From the viewpoint of Israel and its supporters, the ongoing threat of using the label helps to prevent U.S. media coverage from getting out of hand. Journalists understand critical words about Israel to be hazardous to their careers. In the real world, bigotry toward Jews and support for Israel have long been independent variables. For instance, as Oval Office tapes attest, President Richard M. Nixon was anti-Semitic and did not restrain himself from expressing that virulent prejudice in private. Yet he was a big admirer of the Israeli military and a consistent backer of Israel's government. Now, the neoconservative agenda for the Middle East maintains the U.S. embrace of Israel with great enthusiasm. And defenders of that agenda often resort to timeworn tactics for squelching debate. Last fall, when I met with editors at a newspaper in the Pacific Northwest, a member of the editorial board responded to my reference to neocons by declaring flatly that "neocon" is an "anti-Semitic" term. The absurd claim would probably amuse the most powerful neocons in the U.S. government's executive branch today, Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, neither of whom is Jewish. Over the past couple of decades, a growing number of American Jews have seen their way clear to oppose Israeli actions. Yet their voices continue to be nearly drowned out in major U.S. media outlets by Israel-right-or-wrong outfits such as the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee.
As with all forms of bigotry, anti-Semitism should be condemned. At the same time, these days, America's biggest anti-Semitism problem has to do with the misuse of the label as a manipulative tactic to short-circuit debate about Washington's alliance with Israel.
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Table Scraps And Lies - Bush's Memorial To The 9/11 Families By W. David Jenkins III
"Now that the Moussaoui penalty phase is over, I certainly hope that the information will be flowing freely to the American people." - Kristin Breitweiser on "Hardball" 5/03/06
The Moussaoui trial was little more than a carrot dangled before the American people in hopes that his sentence or possible execution would take much of the heat off the government's ineptitude when it came to matters regarding 9/11. But the truth is that Moussaoui never should have stood trial for crimes related to 9/11. Not because he was innocent but because the government had such a shoddy case against him. One federal capital defense lawyer stated that, "If this had not been 9/11, the government's theory of liability would not have passed the laugh test." So Moussaoui will spend the rest of his life in prison because he didn't tell us that something really bad was going to happen. Think about it. If you remove the 9/11 aspect this charge, does Moussaoui's trial or sentence make any sense? If withholding information about a coming disaster resulting in the death of thousands warrants a life sentence or the death penalty, then shouldn't most of the Bush administration be locked up or on death row because they failed to tell us something bad was going to happen when we invaded Iraq ? Are they not just as guilty for refusing to tell the American people what they knew about the consequences of the invasion far in advance? The underlying foundation of the government's case was that if Moussaoui had talked then we could have possibly prevented 9/11 from happening. Alas! If only he had warned us instead of being such a nasty terrorist we could have saved all of those poor people who perished that day! If Moussaoui had told us what he knew then we wouldn't still be bitching about what to put in that big hole in Southern Manhattan almost five years later! If only we had known! Oh, put a sock in it already. We had plenty of warnings. There were warnings from Richard Clarke, John O'Neill and even former CIA director, George Tenet. The Hart-Rudman report, which documented the threat posed by al Qaeda, was given to the incoming Bush administration nine months before 9/11 and Bush gave it to Cheney and Cheney put it in a closet somewhere. There was also the August 6th PDB warning that bin Laden was determined to attack America . That same month an advisory was received by the Mossad, Israel 's intelligence agency, which warned of "a major assault on the United States " and indicated a "large scale target." The Mossad had also warned that the number of terrorists inside the United States may be as high as two hundred and they had confirmed that the intelligence had been traced back to Afghanistan and Osama bin Laden. There were also warnings from German and Italian intelligence agencies, but Bush chose instead to cut brush and drive his pick 'em up truck around his Crawford "ranch." During the final phase of Moussaoui's trial, FBI agent Harry Samit testified that he had tried several times to get his superiors assist him in confirming his suspicions that Moussaoui was in fact involved with an imminent terrorist attack involving hijacked airliners. Each attempt by Samit to obtain assistance from Washington was thwarted in such a manner as to be deemed "criminally negligent" by the FBI agent. Four years ago former FBI agent, Colleen Rowley, testified how her efforts to investigate Moussaoui were also thwarted by superiors in Washington . Her efforts to obtain warrants to search Moussaoui's laptop stemmed from the belief held by her field office that Moussaoui was in violation of Title 18 United States Code Section 2332b (Acts of terrorism transcending national boundaries) and Section 32 (Destruction of aircraft or aircraft facilities). Rowley's requests were ignored. The government's claim that Moussaoui's guilt rests solely on his refusal to tell what he knew, thus preventing any attempts to stop the 9/11 attacks, is weak if not completely absurd. Even if officials had not been "criminally negligent," an aggressive investigation into Moussaoui might have turned up nothing. Five members of al Qaeda, including alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, had written and video testimony submitted in the trial in which they stated that Moussaoui was not only not involved with any 9/11 plans but was also considered a "loose cannon" and well, maybe just a tad too crazy for al Qaeda. Waleed bin Attash, alleged mastermind of the USS Cole attack, stated that he had to shut off his cell phone because Moussaoui called him everyday with notions of kidnapping Chinese businessmen to help raise money along with other rantings. The real irony, unfortunately, is that Moussaoui's trial included testimony from actual al Qaeda operatives who were responsible for 9/11. But they won't be brought to trial because that would open up questions about "interrogation procedures" that the Bush gang would rather not get into. In other words, because we tortured those, who unlike Moussaoui were actually involved in the attacks, they in turn will never be held responsible or brought to trial. How's that for justice? Moussaoui is just another example that this so called war on terror is little more than misguided farce coupled with lip service and easy fixes that do nothing. Right now, the actual "20th hijacker, Mohamed al-Kahtani, is being held in Guantnamo Bay yet we're supposed to believe that Moussaoui's life sentence closes the book on 9/11 and we should simply move on. I'm curious how families like Kristin Breitweiser's feel right now. I also wonder how they feel when anti-terror agencies like Homeland Security (which Bush never wanted in the first place) prove to be total failures. From politically timed color coded terror alerts to dismal performances before, during and after national disasters like Katrina, the DHS has proven itself to be ineffective and poorly run. How must the families who lost loved ones feel when Michael Cherthoff announces, as he did two weeks ago, that DHS is ready to move ahead in matters of port security (screening dockworkers and checking a greater number of containers) - beginning "some time next year?" Or how must they feel when he states that he trusts the nuclear and chemical plant industries to take "appropriate security measures" themselves? How must they feel when they learn that DHS is spending $25.2 million (double the allowed funding for the 9/11 Commission) to a limousine and transportation service to cart employees around town? How do those families feel when they learn that after almost five years, the FBI still hasn't been able to upgrade its computer systems? How must they feel when someone like Sibel Edmonds is prevented from telling them what she knows regarding the "selective" manner in which the FBI is fighting the war on terror? How must they feel when they hear of the bickering and power struggles between the CIA and the National Intelligence Director? How will they feel as some of those intelligence people are swept up in an unfolding scandal concerning bribery, military contracts and prostitutes? How must they feel when they realize that the main targets in the war on terror are the rights of the American people? Exactly how secure are people supposed to feel as they take a bare footed stroll through the airport while waiting for Grandma to be strip-searched? The war on terror is becoming a tired old mantra and the actions of this administration are proof that 9/11 has simply been a useful prop for them - much like the troops being used as backdrops. Little has been done to actually strengthen security while the Bush gang goes gallivanting around the world spending billions and invading countries. Osama is still out there and we can't do anything with the al Qaeda terrorists we have caught because we tortured them. The Taliban is even stronger now than it was a few years ago because we dropped the ball in Afghanistan to go and invade Iraq . The truth is the war on terror isn't everything the 9/11 families or the rest of us were told it would be. To offer up a crazy in the coconut al Qaeda wanna be like Moussaoui as some sort of appeasement or "justice" is as much an insult to the 9/11 families as was the final report by the 9/11 Commission. Kristin Breitweiser has never settled for the table scraps consistently offered by this administration regarding 9/11 and neither have many of the rest of us. But we have a long way to go before any information starts flowing freely and that knowledge will mean more than any "freedom tower."
The truth will be the ultimate memorial and the 9/11 families, as well as those loved ones they lost that day, deserve nothing less.
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 Heil Bush, Dear General Hayden, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your constant illegal eavesdropping on American citizens and helping to bring the CIA under Deputy Fuhrer Rumsfeld's control, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Military Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Wolf's Lair" formally 'Rancho de Bimbo' on 05-27-2006. We salute you herr Hayden, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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Austin, Texas - Of course I am above sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll. So serious a servant of the public interest am I, I can fogey with the best: On my better days, I make David Broder look like Page Six.
I don't care what anyone smoked 20 years ago, I approve of those who boogie till they puke, and I don't care who anyone in politics is screwing in private, as long as they're not screwing the public.
On other hand, if you expect me to pass up a scandal involving poker, hookers and the Watergate building with crooked defense contractors and the No. 3 guy at the CIA, named Dusty Foggo (Dusty Foggo?! Be still my heart), you expect too much. Any journalist who claims Hookergate is not a legitimate scandal is dead-has been for some time and needs to be unplugged. In addition to sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll, Hookergate is rife with public-interest questions, misfeasance, malfeasance and non-feasance, and many splendid moral points for the children. Recommended for Sunday school use, grades seven and above.
But for starters, let us consider the unenviable record of Porter Goss at the CIA. From the beginning of his tenure, Goss has been criticized for politicizing the agency. He brought a bunch of political hacks with him for staff, one of whom turns out to be the poker player called "Nine Fingers." And in the end, he was probably fired for not having politicized the agency sufficiently.
What is the point of politicizing an intelligence agency? So the CIA officials would get a report from some agent in Iraq saying, "Looks bad." The first thing they'd ask was, "Is this agent a Republican or a Democrat?"
Maybe there really are conservatives who believe everything in Iraq is hunky-dory and there's a giant media conspiracy to hide the joyous tidings. But as you may recall, the ever-nimble minds at Donny Rumsfeld's shop have already tried paying public relations people to invent good news about Iraq and then plant it in newspapers there-it didn't work. In fact, it was so stupid it was humiliating. Fortunately, the Pentagon was once again able to investigate itself and determine it had done nothing illegal.
So now they're turning the CIA over to a general who not only ran the warrantless wiretap program but still can't figure out that it's unconstitutional. Why do I get the feeling this is W. and Karl again flipping the finger at some grown-up they don't like?
Gen. Michael Hayden had mixed reviews as director of the National Security Agency-he's evidently not a good manager, which makes him a perfect Bushie. But is he straightforward enough to have admitted that some warrantless spying has been done for political reasons? None of the usual Washington insiders seems to have a bead on this. Hayden would theoretically report to John Negroponte, Bush's supposed intelligence czar. Negroponte is widely considered worthless. His major achievement so far seems to be organizational charts and buying furniture.
You know me, no conspiracy theories here, but the Bush administration, which doesn't seem to be able to run much, set out to retool the CIA after 9/11 and the Iraq war. Problem is, everything that worked at the CIA-that it warned about 9/11 and said the Iraq war was a bad idea-was on the hit list. The Bushies wanted to eliminate the people who were right and promote those who were wrong. This is no way to shape up an intelligence agency, not to mention the White House spit fit over Joe Wilson's wife.
Next, we need to contemplate sincere, old-fashioned, non-ideological greed, theft and bribery. In the beginning, there was only Duke Cunningham, the high-living, fun-loving super-patriot congressman from San Diego. His yacht was called The Duke-Stir, and he had nice taste in 19th century French commodes. While we all are happy to see our elected representatives enjoying themselves in Washington, that's real people's money. Actually, the yacht and commode were paid for by defense contractor Brent Wilkes (keep an eye on that player). It was people's money that paid for the defense contracts Wilkes allegedly bribed public officials into landing for his clients.
The former inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security, Clark Kent Ervin-that would be the DHS equivalent of a police department's internal affairs chief-tried to blow the whistle on shady contracts at DHS and instead was thrown overboard himself. Folks, we'll never get government straightened out again if we don't keep the IGs strong and independent.
If the Bush administration continues to fall apart at this clip, I think we'll be grateful for incompetence as an excuse.
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Legislators around the country are looking to the law recently passed in Massachusetts for answers on how to cope with the health care crisis in their states. Will Massachusetts really be the first state to achieve universal health insurance? Should Republican voters across the country see this legislation as evidence that Republican Governor Mitt Romney, who is likely to seek his party's nomination for president, is an effective leader, or a "Republican In Name Only" who believes in too much government? Proponents of the new law say it will result in near-universal coverage in the state by 2010, reducing the uninsured rate in Massachusetts to 1 percent from its 2004 rate of 11 percent. Beginning July 1, 2007, the law will require uninsured Massachusetts residents to either buy health insurance or face fines. Romney signed the bill on April 12. The law has drawn an enormous amount of media coverage, much of it superficial. On April 12, the Associated Press reported, "The bill, intended to extend coverage to Massachusetts' estimated 550,000 uninsured, is being touted as a national model, thrusting the state to the forefront of the national debate about how to provide near-universal health care coverage without creating a single government-controlled system. It's also a political coup for Romney as he weighs a potential run for the Republican presidential nomination in 2008." Romney, who has repeatedly stated that the bill represents his thinking more than that of the Democratically controlled House and Senate, told the New York Times, "This is really a landmark for our state because this proves... that we can get health insurance for all our citizens without raising taxes and without a government takeover. The old single-payer canard is gone." However, Romney's expectations of the law are going to be dashed, and his obituary for single-payer will prove to be premature. The fundamental flaw of the Massachusetts law is that it does little to reduce health care cost inflation. The bill attempts to improve coverage by funneling money through the bloated insurance industry. Insurance companies allocate roughly 20 percent of their revenue to cover their administrative costs (which include marketing, telling doctors how to practice medicine, providing dividends, and financing high management salaries). That is 10 times the overhead of Medicare, which allocates only 2 percent of its expenditures to overhead, and about 20 times that of Canada&'s single-payer system, which allocates 1 percent. Moreover, a system of multiple insurers drives up the administrative costs of clinics and hospitals. This is especially true if all or most of the insurers practice managed care. Nor is it likely that lowering the uninsured rate in Massachusetts will lower total health spending and premium inflation. Although the argument is often made that the cost of extending coverage to the uninsured will be more than offset by the reduction in medical costs due to improvements in the health of the formerly uninsured, there is little evidence for this claim. It is true that having health insurance is associated with better health. But it is also true that the insured use many more medical services than the uninsured do, some studies have estimated nearly twice as many. The failure of the Massachusetts' law to cut health care costs will be aggravated by its method of reducing the number of uninsured. It requires all Massachusetts residents to buy health insurance. Health insurance, in other words, will be treated like car insurance you have to have it or you'll be in violation of state law and subject to a fine. This provision, known as an "individual mandate" is supported primarily by Republicans. AFL-CIO president John Sweeney characterized it as "a regressive measure that only Gingrich Republicans would support. Forcing uninsured workers to purchase health care coverage or face higher taxes and fines is the cornerstone of Mr. Gingrich's health care reform proposals," Sweeney said. "It is unconscionable that Massachusetts has adopted this misguided individual mandate." To meet their obligations under the mandate, most employed Massachusetts' residents will continue to buy health insurance from their employer. But because the law does little to reduce premium inflation, employer flight from the health insurance market will continue, forcing more and more employees to purchase insurance on their own. In Massachusetts today, it costs employers about $4,000 per year to insure an employee without dependents and $11,000 a year to insure an employee with dependents. So, how will the state's uninsured be able to afford such a big-ticket item? The law requires the state to pay the entire premium for those under the federal poverty level (about $10,000 in annual income for an individual), and to provide sliding scale subsidies for those between poverty level ($20,000 for a family of four) and 300 percent of poverty (about $29,000 for an individual). Unfortunately, it is impossible from reading the law to know what the minimum level of coverage will be, how much insurance companies will charge for it, and how much the subsidy will be for any given income level. The law merely tells us that a state board with the odd name board of the connector; will determine what constitutes; minimum creditable coverage, and that this board will determine how big the subsidies have to be to make the coverage affordable to residents. (The term "connector" in the board's title reflects its central task of assembling individuals who don't have insurance through work and small employers into a large pool so that they can purchase insurance at the lower rates large employers get.) To get some sense of how the law is going to work, we must turn to statements by the lawmakers who wrote it. They claim they can reduce insurance premiums for individuals, for example, from $4,000 down to $2,400 a year. This seems extremely unlikely. The only way the Massachusetts insurance industry can reduce premiums even a little, never mind by 40 percent, will be by offering substantially reduced coverage. This will not endear residents to Governor Romney and his "model" legislation. If, on the other hand, coverage is not reduced and premiums therefore remain near current levels, subsidies will have to be raised, which means taxes will have to go up, which won't endear Romney to Massachusetts' residents or to voters, especially Republican voters, in other states. What will probably infuriate residents most will be the enforcement of this bill. The bill requires employers, providers, and residents to make reports to the government about who has insurance, and it punishes the uninsured with fines enforceable by the Department of Revenue. Residents who don't have insurance in 2007 will lose their personal income tax exemption (worth about $150). In succeeding years they will be fined half the price of the cheapest health insurance policy that the "connector" deems to be "creditable coverage:" about $1,200 if premiums indeed fall to the $2,400 range, and closer to $2,000 if premiums are in today's $4,000 range. Penalties for families will apparently be even higher. The spectacle of hundreds of thousands of Massachusetts' residents having to buy insurance with awful coverage that they cannot afford, and many refusing to buy insurance and taking steps to avoid paying their fines (such as not filing income taxes) will come into focus in the latter half of 2007 and the first half of 2008; that is, in the year leading up to the 2008 Republican national convention. The media, in short, will have plenty of time to unearth horror stories about Romney's "model" legislation. Odds are good that Romney will rue the day he took credit for this bill. |
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I don't know what they have to say,
Your proposition may be good,
I'm opposed to it,
(Chorus)
For months before my son was born,
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Parting Shots...
Wow, what an honor. The White House Correspondents' Dinner. To actually sit here, at the same table with my hero, George W. Bush, to be this close to the man. I feel like I'm dreaming. Somebody pinch me. You know what? I'm a pretty sound sleeper -- that may not be enough. Somebody shoot me in the face. Is he really not here tonight? Dammit. The one guy who could have helped. By the way, before I get started, if anybody needs anything else at their tables, just speak slowly and clearly into your table numbers. Somebody from the NSA will be right over with a cocktail. Mark Smith, ladies and gentlemen of the press corps, Madame First Lady, Mr. President, my name is Stephen Colbert and tonight it's my privilege to celebrate this president. We're not so different, he and I. We get it. We're not brainiacs on the nerd patrol. We're not members of the factinista. We go straight from the gut, right sir? That's where the truth lies, right down here in the gut. Do you know you have more nerve endings in your gut than you have in your head? You can look it up. I know some of you are going to say "I did look it up, and that's not true." That's 'cause you looked it up in a book. Next time, look it up in your gut. I did. My gut tells me that's how our nervous system works. Every night on my show, the Colbert Report, I speak straight from the gut, OK? I give people the truth, unfiltered by rational argument. I call it the "No Fact Zone." Fox News, I hold a copyright on that term. I'm a simple man with a simple mind. I hold a simple set of beliefs that I live by. Number one, I believe in America. I believe it exists. My gut tells me I live there. I feel that it extends from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and I strongly believe it has 50 states. And I cannot wait to see how the Washington Post spins that one tomorrow. Ambassador Zhou Wenzhong, welcome. Your great country makes our Happy Meals possible. I said it's a celebration. I believe the government that governs best is the government that governs least. And by these standards, we have set up a fabulous government in Iraq. I believe in pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps. I believe it is possible -- I saw this guy do it once in Cirque du Soleil. It was magical. And though I am a committed Christian, I believe that everyone has the right to their own religion, be you Hindu, Jewish or Muslim. I believe there are infinite paths to accepting Jesus Christ as your personal savior. Ladies and gentlemen, I believe it's yogurt. But I refuse to believe it's not butter. Most of all, I believe in this president. Now, I know there are some polls out there saying this man has a 32% approval rating. But guys like us, we don't pay attention to the polls. We know that polls are just a collection of statistics that reflect what people are thinking in "reality." And reality has a well-known liberal bias. So, Mr. President, please, pay no attention to the people that say the glass is half full. Sir, pay no attention to the people who say the glass is half empty, because 32% means it's 2/3 empty. There's still some liquid in that glass is my point, but I wouldn't drink it. The last third is usually backwash. Okay, look, folks, my point is that I don't believe this is a low point in this presidency. I believe it is just a lull before a comeback. I mean, it's like the movie "Rocky." All right. The president in this case is Rocky Balboa and Apollo Creed is -- everything else in the world. It's the tenth round. He's bloodied. His corner man, Mick, who in this case I guess would be the vice president, he's yelling, "Cut me, Dick, cut me!," and every time he falls everyone says, "Stay down! Stay down!" Does he stay down? No. Like Rocky, he gets back up, and in the end he -- actually, he loses in the first movie. OK. Doesn't matter. The point is it is the heart-warming story of a man who was repeatedly punched in the face. So don't pay attention to the approval ratings that say 68% of Americans disapprove of the job this man is doing. I ask you this, does that not also logically mean that 68% approve of the job he's not doing? Think about it. I haven't. I stand by this man. I stand by this man because he stands for things. Not only for things, he stands on things. Things like aircraft carriers and rubble and recently flooded city squares. And that sends a strong message, that no matter what happens to America, she will always rebound -- with the most powerfully staged photo ops in the world. Now, there may be an energy crisis. This president has a very forward-thinking energy policy. Why do you think he's down on the ranch cutting that brush all the time? He's trying to create an alternative energy source. By 2008 we will have a mesquite-powered car! And I just like the guy. He's a good Joe. Obviously loves his wife, calls her his better half. And polls show America agrees. She's a true lady and a wonderful woman. But I just have one beef, ma'am. I'm sorry, but this reading initiative. I'm sorry, I've never been a fan of books. I don't trust them. They're all fact, no heart. I mean, they're elitist, telling us what is or isn't true, or what did or didn't happen. Who's Britannica to tell me the Panama Canal was built in 1914? If I want to say it was built in 1941, that's my right as an American! I'm with the president, let history decide what did or did not happen. The greatest thing about this man is he's steady. You know where he stands. He believes the same thing Wednesday that he believed on Monday, no matter what happened Tuesday. Events can change; this man's beliefs never will. As excited as I am to be here with the president, I am appalled to be surrounded by the liberal media that is destroying America, with the exception of Fox News. Fox News gives you both sides of every story: the president's side, and the vice president's side. But the rest of you, what are you thinking, reporting on NSA wiretapping or secret prisons in eastern Europe? Those things are secret for a very important reason: they're super-depressing. And if that's your goal, well, misery accomplished. Over the last five years you people were so good -- over tax cuts, WMD intelligence, the effect of global warming. We Americans didn't want to know, and you had the courtesy not to try to find out. Those were good times, as far as we knew. But, listen, let's review the rules. Here's how it works: the president makes decisions. He's the Decider. The press secretary announces those decisions, and you people of the press type those decisions down. Make, announce, type. Just put 'em through a spell check and go home. Get to know your family again. Make love to your wife. Write that novel you got kicking around in your head. You know, the one about the intrepid Washington reporter with the courage to stand up to the administration. You know - fiction! Because really, what incentive do these people have to answer your questions, after all? I mean, nothing satisfies you. Everybody asks for personnel changes. So the White House has personnel changes. Then you write, "Oh, they're just rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic." First of all, that is a terrible metaphor. This administration is not sinking. This administration is soaring. If anything, they are rearranging the deck chairs on the Hindenburg! Now, it's not all bad guys out there. Some are heroes: Christopher Buckley, Jeff Sacks, Ken Burns, Bob Schieffer. They've all been on my show. By the way, Mr. President, thank you for agreeing to be on my show. I was just as shocked as everyone here is, I promise you. How's Tuesday for you? I've got Frank Rich, but we can bump him. And I mean bump him. I know a guy. Say the word. See who we've got here tonight. General Moseley, Air Force Chief of Staff. General Peter Pace, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. They still support Rumsfeld. Right, you guys aren't retired yet, right? Right, they still support Rumsfeld. Look, by the way, I've got a theory about how to handle these retired generals causing all this trouble: don't let them retire! Come on, we've got a stop-loss program; let's use it on these guys. I've seen Zinni and that crowd on Wolf Blitzer. If you're strong enough to go on one of those pundit shows, you can stand on a bank of computers and order men into battle. Come on. Jesse Jackson is here, the Reverend. Haven't heard from the Reverend in a little while. I had him on the show. Very interesting and challenging interview. You can ask him anything, but he's going to say what he wants, at the pace that he wants. It's like boxing a glacier. Enjoy that metaphor, by the way, because your grandchildren will have no idea what a glacier is. John McCain is here. John McCain, John McCain, what a maverick! Somebody find out what fork he used on his salad, because I guarantee you it wasn't a salad fork. This guy could have used a spoon! There's no predicting him. By the way, Senator McCain, it's so wonderful to see you coming back into the Republican fold. I have a summer house in South Carolina; look me up when you go to speak at Bob Jones University. So glad you've seen the light, sir. Mayor Nagin! Mayor Nagin is here from New Orleans, the chocolate city! Yeah, give it up. Mayor Nagin, I'd like to welcome you to Washington, D.C., the chocolate city with a marshmallow center. And a graham cracker crust of corruption. It's a Mallomar, I guess is what I'm describing. Joe Wilson is here, Joe Wilson right down here in front, the most famous husband since Desi Arnaz. And of course he brought along his lovely wife Valerie Plame. Oh, my god! Oh, what have I said? [looks horrified] I am sorry, Mr. President, I meant to say he brought along "Joe Wilson's wife. "Patrick Fitzgerald is not here tonight? OK. Dodged a bullet. And, of course, we can't forget the man of the hour, new press secretary, Tony Snow. Secret Service name, "Snow Job." Toughest job. What a hero! Took the second toughest job in government, next to, of course, the ambassador to Iraq.
Got some big shoes to fill, Tony. Big shoes to fill. Scott McClellan could say nothing like nobody else. |
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Issues & Alibis Vol 6 # 19 (c) 05/12/2006
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In This Edition
Noam Chomsky concludes, "A Just War? Hardly."
Uri Avnery hears, "Voices From Prison."
John Gideon with part six of, "The Approaching 2006 E-Voting 'Train Wreck.'"
Jim Hightower follows, "The Granny Peace Brigade."
Greg Palast covers, "The Spies Who Shag Us."
Chris Floyd reports, "Smoke Alarm: Yet More Evidence For War Crimes."
Frank Rich questions, "Will The Real Traitors Please Stand Up?"
Robert Parry explores, "Dixie Chicks, Valerie Plame & Bush."
Joe Conason wonders about John McCain, "Maverick -- Or Panderer?"
Norman Solomon looks into, "Corporate Media And Advocacy Journalism."
Ted Rall wants to know, "Who Will Inherit The NSA?"
Sinator Trent Lott wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award!'
Molly Ivins asks, "Could Lunacy Explain Bush's Policies?"
Jesse Jackson says it's, "Time To Call Bush On Lawbreaking."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department the fabulous Betty Bowers returns with a movie review of "The Da Vinci Code" but first Uncle Ernie is, "Solving The Immigration Problem."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Cal Grondahl with additional cartoons from Derf City, Micah Wright, Cunningham Strikes, Tom Tomorrow, Daryl Cagle, Old American Century.Org, Internet Weekly.Org, Patriotboy Blogspot.Com, Bob Gorrell and Dave Ward.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Solving The Immigration Problem By Ernest Stewart
Of course I missed the speech. I never watch our beloved Fuhrer when he's orating or even if he's just talking to himself. Since I dropped out to do this I can no longer afford to replace the TV every time the monkey pops up. Ergo I read his rants instead of watching them, which keeps me from lobbing a brick through the screen!
So what's my conclusion of his latest insanity, just that! Like most Rethuglican plans it sounds almost sane with just a cursory glance but like all things Rethuglican the Devil is in the details. And of course since this is a Karl Rove speech there are no details. I've heard this same speech for the last 40 years. The speech was designed to placate that part of the party that has been calling for closing the border and a general round up and deportation of all illegals and that part of the party that wants to keep them all here so they can keep exploiting them and generally keep wages down and the employees who owe their soul to the "company store." In other words full of sound and fury and signifying nothing.
One would have thought that since 911 the Rethuglicans that claim to be all about protecting us from another Rethuglican planned attack would have at least closed the borders but just the opposite has occurred with some 4 million illegals waltzing into America in the last 5 years alone. I wonder how many are terrorists bent on pay back, don't you? While the vast majority of our illegal population are for the most part honest people about 2% or 240,000 of them are thieves and murderers. Just what we needed, eh? Where has the INS been during the last 5 years? I see that only now in advance of Bush's rant do we see anything, a few token round ups of a few hundred while 12 million scoff laws laugh their asses off and plan their next march.
Does Bush propose any penalties for our unwanted guests, nope although he says he is ready to stop parts of our "catch and release program," just parts but not all of the current program that releases illegal aliens back into society with a promise that they will come back for their deportation hearings, a promise that apparently none of them keep. And for gods sake let's do nothing to upset Mexican president Foxx who is doing everything in his power to send us more and more of his poor. So you know what is going to happen, what is going to change now that Smirky is aware of the problem? If you answered not a god damned thing, you win a cookie! There is far too much money to be made off the "braceros" to ever stop it but I do have a simple plan!
Let's bring the troops home from Iraq and send them into Mexico to over throw their government and replace it with our own. Let's make Mexico the 51st state! That will end 95% of our illegal immigration problem. Not to mention all that lovely Mexican oil that we'll have which should power our Panzers for several more decades. And for all you pot smokers out there think how easy it will be to bring that pound of Acapulco Gold or Michoacan across what will then only be a state line with no border stops or guard dogs. It's a win, win situation for us! As for the former Mexicans, now Americans, well you will certainly learn to be careful for what you wish for!
In Other News...
I see where certain numerologists are having a field day about the approaching date of June 6th or as they see it 06-06-06 or 666 and are expecting Bush to begin bombing Iran on that date and further stating it will be the beginning of WWIII or perhaps the bibles Apocalypse or Armageddon? They also fear a Rethuglican sponsored terrorist attack as well. I think the latter is more probable. As my end times friends have assured me nothing like that will happen until June 5th, 2007 the 40th anniversary of the "6 Day War" of June 5-11 1967. Of course with Bush as the anti-Christ it certainly seems possible but he's got to rebuild the Temple first and what of the "Man in the Blue Turban" where is he? Still just to make sure I'd stay out of large public gatherings and off of public transportation June 6th in fact I'd stay away from them until we get the Junta out of power!
*****
Did you see that piece of film released by the FBI showing the 911 attack on the Pentagon? You know the one that proves positive it wasn't an airliner that hit the building but either a Tomahawk cruise missile or a drone? Did it send chills down your spine? From the look of the hole it left my guess would be the Tomahawk? The one thing I know for sure that thin white streak wasn't an airliner.
*****
And finally does it strike you as a little odd that the three companies that sold us out to the NSA and Bush; i.e. AT&T, Bell South and Verizon, are the same three companies that are trying to take over the Internet? I didn't think it would! However, if it did strike you as a little odd then perhaps you need to see this week's video down in our Have You Seen This... department.
We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
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A Just War? Hardly Noam Chomsky Spurred by these times of invasions and evasions, discussion of "just war" has had a renaissance among scholars and even among policy-makers. Concepts aside, actions in the real world all too often reinforce the maxim of Thucydides that "The strong do as they can, while the weak suffer what they must" - which is not only indisputably unjust, but at the present stage of human civilisation, a literal threat to the survival of the species. In his highly praised reflections on just war, Michael Walzer describes the invasion of Afghanistan as "a triumph of just war theory," standing alongside Kosovo as a "just war." Unfortunately, in these two cases, as throughout, his arguments rely crucially on premises like "seems to me entirely justified," or "I believe" or "no doubt." Facts are ignored, even the most obvious ones. Consider Afghanistan. As the bombing began in October 2001, President Bush warned Afghans that it would continue until they handed over people that the US suspected of terrorism. The word "suspected" is important. Eight months later, FBI head Robert S. Mueller III told editors at The Washington Post that after what must have been the most intense manhunt in history, "We think the masterminds of (the Sept. 11 attacks) were in Afghanistan, high in the al-Qaida leadership. Plotters and others - the principals - came together in Germany and perhaps elsewhere." What was still unclear in June 2002 could not have been known definitively the preceding October, though few doubted at once that it was true. Nor did I, for what it's worth, but surmise and evidence are two different things. At least it seems fair to say that the circumstances raise a question about whether bombing Afghans was a transparent example of "just war." Walzer's arguments are directed to unnamed targets - for example, campus opponents who are "pacifists." He adds that their "pacifism" is a "bad argument," because he thinks violence is sometimes legitimate. We may well agree that violence is sometimes legitimate (I do), but "I think" is hardly an overwhelming argument in the real-world cases that he discusses. By "just war," counterterrorism or some other rationale, the US exempts itself from the fundamental principles of world order that it played the primary role in formulating and enacting. After World War II, a new regime of international law was instituted. Its provisions on laws of war are codified in the UN Charter, the Geneva Conventions and the Nuremberg principles, adopted by the General Assembly. The Charter bars the threat or use of force unless authorized by the Security Council or, under Article 51, in self-defense against armed attack until the Security Council acts. In 2004, a high level UN panel, including, among others, former National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft, concluded that "Article 51 needs neither extension nor restriction of its long-understood scope ... In a world full of perceived potential threats, the risk to the global order and the norm of nonintervention on which it continues to be based is simply too great for the legality of unilateral preventive action, as distinct from collectively endorsed action, to be accepted. Allowing one to so act is to allow all." The National Security Strategy of September 2002, just largely reiterated in March, grants the US the right to carry out what it calls "pre-emptive war," which means not pre-emptive, but "preventive war." That's the right to commit aggression, plain and simple. In the wording of the Nuremberg Tribunal, aggression is "the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole" - all the evil in the tortured land of Iraq that flowed from the US-UK invasion, for example. The concept of aggression was defined clearly enough by US Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson, who was chief prosecutor for the United States at Nuremberg. The concept was restated in an authoritative General Assembly resolution. An "aggressor," Jackson proposed to the tribunal, is a state that is the first to commit such actions as "invasion of its armed forces, with or without a declaration of war, of the territory of another State." That applies to the invasion of Iraq. Also relevant are Justice Jackson's eloquent words at Nuremberg: "If certain acts of violation of treaties are crimes, they are crimes whether the United States does them or whether Germany does them, and we are not prepared to lay down a rule of criminal conduct against others which we would not be willing to have invoked against us." And elsewhere: "We must never forget that the record on which we judge these defendants is the record on which history will judge us tomorrow. To pass these defendants a poisoned chalice is to put it to our own lips as well." For the political leadership, the threat of adherence to these principles - and to the rule of law in general - is serious indeed. Or it would be, if anyone dared to defy "the single ruthless superpower whose leadership intends to shape the world according to its own forceful world view," as Reuven Pedatzur wrote in Haaretz last May. Let me state a couple of simple truths. The first is that actions are evaluated in terms of the range of likely consequences. A second is the principle of universality; we apply to ourselves the same standards we apply to others, if not more stringent ones.
Apart from being the merest truisms, these principles are also the foundation of just war theory, at least any version of it that deserves to be taken serious
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Voices From Prison By Uri Avnery PRISON SERVES an important function in the annals of every revolutionary movement. It serves as a college for activists, center for the crystallization of ideas, rallying point for leaders, platform for dialogue between the various factions. For the Palestinian liberation movement, prison plays all these roles and many more. During the 39 years of occupation, hundreds of thousands of young Palestinians have passed through Israeli prisons. At any given time, an average of 10 thousand Palestinians are held in prison. This, the liveliest and most active section of the Palestinian people, is in continuous ferment. People from every class, every town and village, every political and military faction are to be found there. Prisoners have ample time. They have an opportunity to learn, to think, to organize seminars, to concentrate full-time on the problems of their people, to exchange views, to work out solutions. In order to prevent an explosion, the Israeli prison authorities allow these prisoners a large measure of communal life and self-government. This is a wise policy. In practice, the prisons resemble camps for prisoners of war. Clashes between the prisoners and the prison authorities are comparatively rare. ONE OF the results is that, in prison, the inmates learn Hebrew. They watch Israeli TV, listen to Israeli radio, become acquainted with the Israeli way of life. They do not become Zionists, by any means, but come to know Israeli reality and even to appreciate some of its components. Israeli democracy, for example. "What we liked most," an ex-prisoner once told me, "was to see the Knesset debates on TV. When we saw Knesset members shouting at the Prime Minister and cursing members of the government, we really got excited. Where do you have such a thing in the Arab world?" This found its expression when Yasser Arafat and his people came back to Palestine. The ongoing controversy between the returnees from Tunisia and the "people from within" was not only a result of a generation gap, but also of a difference of outlook. Arafat and his people have never lived in a democratic country. When they thought about the future Palestinian state, they had before their eyes the systems of Jordan, Egypt, Tunisia and Lebanon. They were surprised when the young people, led by the ex-prisoners, pointed towards the Israeli model. Not by accident, almost all my Palestinian friends are ex-prisoners, people who have spent a long time in prison, sometimes 10 and even 20 years. I always wonder at the absence of bitterness in their mind. Most of them believe that peace with Israel is possible and necessary. Therefore, while many of them were critical of Arafat's way of governing, they wholeheartedly supported his peace policy. By the way, the outlook of the ex-prisoners reflects somewhat positively on the prison authorities. Many of the prisoners had undergone torture in the interrogation stage, when they were held by the Shin-Bet, but after they reached prison, their treatment there has not left many mental scars. ALL THIS comes as an introduction to the central event of this week: the agreement achieved in prison between the representatives of all the Palestinian factions. This is a document of very great importance for the Palestinians, both because of the identity of its authors and its content. At this time, many leaders of the various Palestinian factions are in prison, from Marwan Barghouti, the leader of Fatah in the West Bank, to Sheik Abd-al-Khaliq al-Natshe, a Hamas leader. With them there are the leaders of Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front and the Democratic Front. They spend their time there in a permanent discussion, while keeping constant contact with the leaders of their organizations outside and the activists inside. God knows how they do it. When the leaders of the prisoners speak with one voice, what they say carries a greater moral weight than the statements of any Palestinian institution, including the presidency, the parliament and the government. THIS IS the background, against which this fascinating document should be examined. In general, it follows the policy of Yasser Arafat: the Two-State solution, a Palestinian state in all the territory occupied in 1967 with East Jerusalem as its capital, the release of all Palestinian prisoners. This means, of course, the recognition of Israel in practice. For the Israeli public, the most problematical part concerns, as usual, the refugee problem. No Palestinian leader can give up the Right of Return, and this document, too, raises this demand. But in practice, the Palestinians acknowledge the fact that this problem can be solved only in agreement with Israel. That means that return to Israel must necessarily be limited in numbers, and the greater part of the solution lies in a return to the Palestinian state and payment of compensation. There is a difference between the recognition of the Right of Return in principle, as a basic human right, and the exercise of this right in the real world. An important part of the document concerns putting the Palestinian house in order. The body that is supposed to represent the whole Palestinian people, inside and outside the country, is the PLO. That is also the body that has signed all the agreements with Israel. But the PLO is now far from reflecting the domestic Palestinian political reality. Hamas, which came into being at the beginning of the first intifada, is not represented at all. The same goes for Islamic Jihad. The document demands that both be represented in the PLO - a reasonable and wise demand. It also calls for new elections to the all-Palestinian parliament - the Palestinian National Council, and for a National Unity Government. THE PRISON agreement can help Hamas to cope with the new reality - and that is, probably, one of the main motives of its authors. The sweeping victory of Hamas in the Palestinian parliamentary elections was a surprise not only for Israel and the world, but also for Hamas itself. The movement was completely unprepared for assuming the responsibilities of power. The new situation creates a severe contradiction between the ideology of Hamas and the requirements of a governing party. As Ariel Sharon said: "What you see from here you don't see from there." This contradiction finds its expression in the declarations of different leaders of Hamas. This is not duplicity, but rather an expression of different reactions to a new reality. The point of view of Khaled Mashaal in Damascus is necessarily quite different from the point of view of Ismail Haniyeh, the new Prime Minister in Gaza. Political and military leaders also often see things differently. That is a natural confusion, and probably more time will pass before a consensus is achieved and a joint position defined. No wonder, therefore, that leaders are voicing opinions that contradict each other. One is seen on Israeli TV declaring with much pathos that "we demand not only Jerusalem, but also Haifa, Besan and Tiberias", while another asserts that the movement "will not recognize Israel until it returns to the 1967 borders" - a "no" that implies a "yes". The prison agreement is designed to help in creating the new consensus, which should enable Hamas to conduct a policy based on a compromise between the ideology and theology of the movement and the requirements of the Palestinian people. The possible line: the PLO, led by Mahmoud Abbas, will conduct negotiations with Israel and present the agreement (if there be one) for ratification by a Palestinian referendum. Hamas will undertake in advance to accept the result. At the same time, Hamas will declare a Hudna (armistice) for many years, allowing an end to violence from both sides. THAT IS possible. The question is whether the Israeli government wants it. At the moment, it does not look like it. It openly calls for the defining of the "permanent borders" of Israel unilaterally, with the annexation of large areas of territory. Such a policy necessitates a situation of "no partner". This means that the government will reject anything that might create a credible partner, one who would also be accepted by the world.
During the show trial of Marwan Barghouti, we - my colleagues and I - stood outside the hall, carrying posters that said: "Send Barghouti to the negotiation table and not to prison!" But the appearance of this document suggests that sending him to prison was perhaps the biggest favor the Israeli government could have done him and the Palestinian people.
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2006 E-Voting Train Wreck: The Wheels Begin To Come Off Diebold Disasters Leading to Self-Destruction As ES&S Continues to Meltdown and Miss One Contractual Obligation After Another... By John Gideon Yes, the wheels are wobbling on the locomotives. The vendors --ES&S, Diebold, and the rest -- attempt to keep a stiff upper lip as they both fail to perform, yet continue collecting tax-payer dollars from the county election coffers. Meanwhile some elections officials have just turned a blind-eye to what is happening while they continue to make excuses for their vendors: The private corporate American Electronic Voting Machine behemoths that are being paid to take over America's Public Electoral system. And the Election Assistance Commission (EAC) which was put in place by the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), theoretically, to keep all of this from occurring? Well, all they do is raise their hands and shrug and tell anyone who asks that they don't do voting systems certification so they just don't know anything. The Sergeant Schultz Defense, perhaps... And the corporate media? It took the announcement of a huge security chasm with the Diebold TS and TSx touch-screen machines for them to finally wake up and realize the voters in our country may like to hear a bit about what is happening with their elections. Of course, each media outlet spins it in their own way. The Wall Street Journal, reported on the Diebold issue with little or nothing from the computer scientists while overloading their article with plenty of misinformation from Diebold and their showcase state of Maryland. The New York Times did a good job of reporting both sides. The Rev. Moon's United Press Internation joined the WSJ in mis-reporting and giving their pro-corporate, pro-electronic bias spin. But, hey! The media has woken up a little. Let's hope they will now sit up and take notice and not go back into hibernation. This next Tuesday we have three more states holding primary elections. Oregon, Kentucky and Pennsylvania are the next locomotives on the tracks. Pennsylvania is of special concern because of the number of ES&S and Diebold counties and the fact that this is the first election to be held on new electronic voting machines in almost every county. Diebold's Perfect Storm This week was the week for the long-awaited revelation of a hole in Diebold's Direct Recording Machine's (DRE) security. This hole in security is comparable to the size of the eye in the "Perfect Storm". Initial information about this security problem was discussed in last week's "Train Wreck" and was reported prior to that by The BRAD BLOG. On Thursday, BlackBoxVoting.Org who organized the inspections of Diebold TSx DREs in Emery County, Utah, released a lightly-redacted report, for security reasons, of Finnish Computer Scientist Harri Hursti's revelations from the examination. An un-redacted copy of this report was sent to many federal and state officials in hope they will take the steps necessary to close this gaping security hole. It must be stated that none of this crucial information would be available to America without the assistance and integrity of Bruce Funk, who, as the Emery County Clerk, noticed a problem with the Diebold TSx voting machines that were delivered to him. He contacted BlackBoxVoting.Org who brought Harri Hursti over from Finland to inspect the machines along with computer security specialists from Security Innovations. If Bruce Funk had not cared so much about the voters in his county, and ultimately in the whole country, this security hole - which Diebold has admitted to building into their machines purposely to make it easier to update software -- would have gone unnoticed publicly for who knows how long. Unfortunately Mr. Funk must now fight to get his job back because Diebold lashed out against him and the state and county took their side and turned their back on Mr. Funk. What is the reaction to this from Diebold and from some of the states? David Bear, a spokesman for the company says: "For there to be a problem here, you're basically assuming a premise where you have some evil and nefarious election officials who would sneak in and introduce a piece of software," he said. "I don't believe these evil elections people exist." Meanwhile, Deborah Hench, San Joaquin County California Registrar of Voters and ardent Diebold supporter says: "We're prepared for those types of problems. There are always activists that are anti-electronic voting, and they're constantly trying to put pressure on us to change our system." Maryland Elections Administrator, Linda Lamone, an even more ardent Diebold supporter had this to say: "We are taking steps." She said she is confident that the problem will have little effect in Maryland because of strict rules about who is permitted to handle voting machines in the state. "Everyone that has access to them has to undergo a criminal background check," she said. From Utah we have Joe Demma, Chief of Staff in the Lieutenant Governor's Office who supports Diebold and has apparently supported removing the 23-year elected Bruce Funk from his job says: "With whatever system you have, if you let the coyote into the henhouse, he's going to have dinner. It's the job of our county clerks, and they all do a good job, of not letting that happen." All except Funk who found the problems in the first place, I presume? And from Mark Radke, another Diebold 'talking-head' official and apologist who's been singing the same tired song for years as he's been pushing his company's faulty wares: "The risk factor associated with electronic voting is far less than paper ballots. Paper ballots can be more easily altered than electronic votes which are encrypted and digitally signed for additional protection." The lack of concern by these State Officials and Diebold Officials (the differences between the two are often very slight if any) and their attempts to minimize the situation stand in marked contrast to the comments of computer scientists across the country. Michael I. Shamos, a professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon University who is an examiner of electronic voting systems for Pennsylvania said: "It's the most severe security flaw ever discovered in a voting system" Douglas W. Jones, a professor of computer science at the University of Iowa says: "This is the barn door being wide open, while people were arguing over the lock on the front door." Avi Rubin, a Johns Hopkins University computer science professor had this to say: "On a scale of one to 10, if the problems we found before were a six, this is a 10. It's a totally different ballgame." And what of the questions that should be asked? Diebold has known about this huge hole in their security since they installed it. Why are they now claiming it was just discovered? And why has the Election Assistance Commission had nothing to say about this security issue? Hopefully these questions and more will be answered in the coming weeks and hopefully the corporate media will stick around for awhile and do their jobs. There is plenty of room for them. Another Primary Election Failure For ES&S - West Virginia This past Tuesday gave us two state primaries - Nebraska and West Virginia. While Nebraska seemed to have a quiet and fairly problem free primary election West Virginia's was anything but error free or quiet. The same locomotive that steamrolled through Indiana and left destruction in it's wake showed-up in West Virginia during early voting and continued through canvassing. As we reported in last week's "Train Wreck" Election Systems & Software (ES&S) has failed to provide voting machines, ballot programming or paper ballots to many of West Virginia's counties to support early voting. The primary was no better. A short list gives us just a few of the problems that have affected the voters in numerous counties: Taylor County's votes could not be counted on election night because the main computer would not read tabulators from individual voting machines. Upshur County's counter was in such bad shape that as of midnight the county was trying to get a similar machine from a neighboring county Mineral County's optical scan ballot counter was producing skewed results Ohio County could not count about 800 absentee votes because it was not given the equipment to do so Clay, Gilmer, Greenbrier, Putnam, McDowell and Webster all violated provisions of the Help America Vote Act of 2002 when they were not able provide any voting machines for their voters with disabilities. Mercer County used paper ballots, but poll workers trained on the new automated voting machines, a person at the county clerk's office said. Numerous questions from confused workers slowed the counting process. Mingo County's vote-counting machine broke at one point during the evening tally, delaying the count. Berkeley County began counting paper ballots on their optical-scan machine only to find that incorrect software had been installed. Last week we reported that Kanawha County Commissioner Kent Carper had filed a formal complaint with the Secretary of State's office after ES&S failed to appear at public testing for the machines. ES&S agreed to a request from Kanawha County elections officials that ES&S have a technician present during the final count of all votes. However, even with the knowledge that the county had previously filed a formal complaint ES&S pulled their technician after only a couple hours. When the technician left the system went down for a few hours until elections officials could find a solution themselves. With all of the knowledge of failures on the part of ES&S Secretary of State Betty Ireland filed a formal complaint with the Election Assistance Commission on Wednesday. As reported by The State Journal Secretary Ireland had this to say: ""I am more than upset that or county clerks and their staffs and county commissions had to withstand stress and anxiety over the broken promises and delays ES&S put them through". "And, Ireland says, now that the election is over, strategy talks about the problems with Election Systems and Software will begin...but, "We will not and cannot discuss publicly our legal strategy. As before, we continue to work with the Attorney General's Office to address our options". "The state's selection committee chose ES&S because of its past service in the state and it's knowledge of West Virginia election deadlines and procedures. Ireland says, "Unfortunately, we now feel ES&S let West Virginia down."" So much like their failure in Indiana, Oregon, California, and Arkansas ES&S has let down the voters of the state of West Virginia. ES&S Re-Writes Their Contract With Tennessee But Forgets To Tell The State Just this past Saturday the Tennessean reported that ES&S had decided that their contract with the state of Tennessee did not suit their plans so they changed the contract form language and added, without permission, "used equipment" language to their order form. This means that counties in the state will now get iVotronic Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) voting machines that are being used in the Pennsylvania primary on Tuesday. This way ES&S can move these machines from one state to another like filling a hole by digging another hole. You never get rid of the hole. The state has apparently decided that they will use this breach as a bargaining chip for a better price for maintenance and other fees that they can expect to pay for the whole life of the voting machines or until ES&S decides to walk-out on their contracts. While the state may see a chance to get something from this unethical act by ES&S some of the counties are not too happy with the situation. "Eddie Bryan, chairman of the Davidson County Election Commission, said he doesn't know why ES&S bid on Metro's business if it can't deliver the goods. ""These people have been playing games with us," he said. "I'm not for having any used equipment."" The Arkansas Mess Gets No Better While ES&S seems to be gaining in Arkansas supporting their early voting it seems that every step forward they make; they take another step back. According to WPTY-TV24 while Pulaski County got the software for their ES&S iVotronics (four days late) St. Francis County got their ballots. That sounds great except that they received 75 different styles of ballots from ES&S but they only ordered 18 different ballot styles. KAIT - TV8 reports that many counties that were forced by ES&S to use paper ballots ran out of those ballots on Monday and Tuesday. The reporter called ES&S and spoke with an official at their printer in Omaha, Nebraska. The official claimed to know nothing about any ballot shortages. However, Craighead County Commissioners say that they have spoken many times with ES&S representatives about the ballot shortage. Florida Counties Receive Uncertified Diebold DREs On Friday The Daytona Beach News Journal reported that officials in Volusia County discovered that the 210 upgraded Diebold TSx DREs that they had just taken custody looked a bit different than the other DREs they had on-hand. These new machines are 'Model D' which are not yet certified for use by the state. And Volusia is only one of five counties who have these machines. The News Journal reports: "If, God forbid, (the mistake) was never caught and we went through an election cycle -- the whole darn election cycle could be challenged," Volusia County Chairman Frank Bruno said. "Thirty of Florida's 67 counties use Diebold voting equipment, but only five, including Volusia, got the uncertified models," said Ann McFall, Volusia County supervisor of elections. "I think it's an embarrassment to Diebold and the Division (of Elections)," McFall said. "I'm happy my department caught this. No other county caught this." Of course the state is circling-the-wagons of support for Diebold. The Orlando Sentinel reports: "Jenny Nash, a spokeswoman for the state Division of Elections, who said the machines from Diebold Election Systems are nearly the same as those already certified. ""It's just a modification," Nash said. She compared it to a routine software update on a home computer. "It's very similar to that."" And: "David R. Drury, chief of the state's Bureau of Voting Systems Certification, said in an e-mail to a Leon County official that Model D is the same as the other three certified models in "form, fit, and function." "Still, he listed several changes with the hardware and operating system. The changes include a new liquid-crystal display, a new "inverter" to power the LCD and changes to the motherboard to accommodate a "graphics processor, flash memory, and voltage regulators. The motherboard also includes the addition of fuses to the modem outputs to improve immunity to phone line faults," he wrote. "The operating system is also "slightly different," Drury wrote. The "firmware" has not changed, he said in the e-mail." Excuse me? It's the same except that it has had many changes? Now here are two locomotives running directly at each other and this in a state where the legislature cares enough about elections that they have ignored any plea for a VVPAT and made any audit illegal.
So that was the week that was. More revelations. More problems. More investigations. More voters who really don't know if their vote was counted as it was cast. More elections officials and poll workers who have had to work long hours just to clean up what mess the vendors have left them. Meanwhile, more money in the vendor's coffers and more opportunity for them to obfuscate and misinform the media. Maybe it will get better? Only the voters hope so.
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Last fall, these 18 ladies (ranging from 62 to 91 years old) descended on an Army recruiting station in Manhattan. They wanted to enlist and be sent to Iraq in the place of young people who otherwise would have to go. "Kill us, not them," was their plea - a grandmotherly gesture to focus public attention on the deadly price of Bush's war of lies. When told to go away, they simply sat down - for which they were arrested, handcuffed, jailed, and charged with "disorderly conduct." The prosecutor offered to dismiss the charges if the grannies agreed not to cause any "trouble" for six months. No deal, shouted the 18, instead demanding their day in court. As one put it, "We are at a very important point in the history of our country. It is our responsibility as patriots not to be silent." In their six-day trial, prosecutors claimed the women had blocked access to the recruiters. But Judy Lear responded that if someone had approached, she would have moved over - "I'm a very polite person," she noted. Well, sniffed prosecutors, you people weren't really prepared to go to war - to which Diana Dreyfus retorted, "I was totally prepared. I had just recently gotten divorced. I was ready." When the judge finally dismissed all charges, the grannies gathered happily with their lawyer, who told them: "The decision today says the first Amendment protects you to protest peacefully. So - go do it." The grannies cheered. This is Jim Hightower saying... An old cliche declares that if you're not a liberal at 20 you have no heart, but if you're not a conservative at 40 you have no brain. Maybe so, but if you're not a radical by 60, you're really not living at all. (c) 2006 Jim Hightower's latest book, "If The Gods Had Meant Us To Vote They Would Have Given Us Candidates," is available in a fully revised and updated paperback edition. |
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I know you're shocked -- SHOCKED! -- that George Bush is listening in on all your phone calls. Without a warrant. That's nothing. And it's not news.
This is: the snooping into your phone bill is just the snout of the
pig of a strange, lucrative link-up between the Administration's
Homeland Security spy network and private companies operating beyond
the reach of the laws meant to protect us from our government. You
can call it the privatization of the FBI -- though it is better
described as the creation of a private KGB.
(For the full story, see "Double Cheese With Fear," in Armed Madhouse: Who's Afraid of Osama Wolf and Other Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Class War.")
The leader in the field of what is called "data mining," is a
company, formed in 1997, called, "ChoicePoint, Inc," which has sucked up over a billion dollars in national security contracts.
Worried about Dick Cheney listening in Sunday on your call to Mom?
That ain't nothing. You should be more concerned that they are
linking this info to your medical records, your bill purchases and
your entire personal profile including, not incidentally, your voting
registration. Five years ago, I discovered that ChoicePoint had
already gathered 16 billion data files on Americans -- and I know
they've expanded their ops at an explosive rate.
They are paid to keep an eye on you -- because the FBI can't. For
the government to collect this stuff is against the law unless you're
suspected of a crime. (The law in question is the Constitution.)
But ChoicePoint can collect if for "commercial" purchases -- and
under the Bush Administration's suspect reading of the Patriot Act --
our domestic spying apparatchiks can then BUY the info from
ChoicePoint.
Who ARE these guys selling George Bush a piece of you?
ChoicePoint's board has more Republicans than a Palm Beach country
club. It was funded, and its board stocked, by such Republican sugar
daddies as billionaires Bernie Marcus and Ken Langone -- even after
Langone was charged by the Securities Exchange Commission with abuse
of inside information.
I first ran across these guys in 2000 in Florida when our
Guardian/BBC team discovered the list of 94,000 "felons" that
Katherine Harris had ordered removed from Florida's voter rolls
before the election. Virtually every voter purged was innocent of
any crime except, in most cases, Voting While Black. Who came up
with this electoral hit list that gave Bush the White House?
ChoicePoint, Inc.
And worse, they KNEW the racially-tainted list of felons was bogus.
And when we caught them, they lied about it. While they've since
apologized to the NAACP, ChoicePoint's ethnic cleansing of voter
rolls has been amply assuaged by the man the company elected.
And now ChoicePoint and George Bush want your blood. Forget your
phone bill. ChoicePoint, a sickened executive of the company told us
in confidence, "hope[s] to build a database of DNA samples from every
person in the United States ...linked to all the other information
held by CP [ChoicePoint]" from medical to voting records.
And ChoicePoint lied about that too. The company publicly denied
they gave DNA to the Feds -- but then told our investigator,
pretending to seek work, that ChoicePoint was "the number one"
provider of DNA info to the FBI.
"And that scares the hell out of me," said the executive (who has
since left the company), because ChoicePoint gets it WRONG so often.
We are not contracting out our Homeland Security to James Bond
here. It's more like Austin Powers, Inc. Besides the 97% error rate
in finding Florida "felons," Illinois State Police fired the company
after discovering ChoicePoint had produced test "results" on rape
case evidence ... that didn't exist. And ChoicePoint just got hit
with the largest fine in Federal Trade Commission history for letting
identity thieves purchase 145,000 credit card records.
But it won't stop, despite Republican senators shedding big crocodile
tears about "surveillance" of innocent Americans. That's because
FEAR is a lucrative business -- not just for ChoicePoint, but for
firms such as Syntech, Sybase and Lockheed-Martin -- each of which
has provided lucrative posts or profits to connected Republicans
including former Total Information Awareness chief John Poindexter
(Syntech), Marvin Bush (Sybase) and Lynn Cheney (Lockheed-Martin).
But how can they get Americans to give up our personal files, our
phone logs, our DNA and our rights? Easy. Fear sells better than
sex -- and they want you to be afraid. Back to today's New York
Times, page 28: "Wider Use of DNA Lists is Urged in Fighting Crime."
And who is providing the technology? It comes, says the Times, from
the work done on using DNA fragments to identity victims of the
September 11 attack. And who did that job (for $12 million, no bid)?
ChoicePoint, Inc. Which is NOT mentioned by the Times.
"Genetic surveillance would thus shift from the individual [the
alleged criminal] to the family," says the Times -- which will
require, of course, a national DNA database of NON-criminals.
It doesn't end there. Turn to the same newspaper, page 23, with a
story about a weird new law passed by the state of Georgia to fight
illegal immigration. Every single employer and government agency
will be required to match citizen or worker data against national
databases to affirm citizenship. It won't stop illegal border
crossing, but hey, someone's going to make big bucks on selling data.
And guess what local boy owns the data mine? ChoicePoint, Inc., of
Alpharetta, Georgia.
The knuckleheads at the Times don't put the three stories together
because the real players aren't in the press releases their reporters
re-write.
But that's the Fear Industry for you. You aren't safer from
terrorists or criminals or "felon" voters. But the national wallet
is several billion dollars lighter and the Bill of Rights is a couple
amendments shorter.
And that's their program. They get the data mine -- and we get the shaft.
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Here's yet another smoking gun revealing the fireless smoke of lies that the Bush Regime spread across the land to justify its outright war of aggression in Iraq. How many more times do we have to be shown glaring evidence that the war was a con job from the word go, that lies were told - deliberate lies, knowing lies, lies now soaked with innocent blood - by leaders who drape themselves in Christian piety, before this crime is at last called by its rightful name, and the long-dormant, hard-rusted machinery of justice begins to move against these death-dealing hypocrites?
Excerpts from AP: A year after Bush administration claims about Iraqi "bioweapons trailers" were discredited by American experts, U.S. officials were still suppressing the findings, says a senior member of the CIA-led Iraq inspection team.
At one point, former U.N. arms inspector Rod Barton says, a CIA officer told him it was "politically not possible" to report that the White House claims were untrue. In the end, Barton says, he felt "complicit in deceit."
.... Much sought after for his expertise, Barton served on the U.N. Iraq arms inspection teams of 1991-98 and 2002-03. After the U.S. invasion, he was an aide to chief U.S. inspector Charles Duelfer.
The Washington Post reported last month that a U.S. fact-finding mission confidentially advised Washington on May 27, 2003, that two truck trailers found in Iraq were not mobile units for manufacturing bioweapons, as had been suspected. Two days later, President Bush still asserted the trailers were bioweapons labs, and other administration officials repeated that line for months afterward.
... The debunking of the "mobile biolabs" claim began in classified reports long before the U.S. invasion, when German intelligence in 2001 and 2002 told U.S. officials that the story's source, an Iraqi defector code-named "Curveball," was unreliable, official investigations later found. U.N. inspectors determined in early 2003, before the war, that parts of Curveball's story were false....
Testing the equipment in early May 2003, U.S. experts found no traces of biological agents, and later that month the U.S. fact-finders filed their negative report from Baghdad. But on May 29, Bush assured Polish television: "We found the weapons of mass destruction. We found biological laboratories." Then national security adviser Condoleezza Rice and Secretary of State Colin Powell later made similar statements. As late as January 2004, Vice President Dick Cheney called the trailers "conclusive evidence" of Iraqi WMD, one of the reasons given for invading Iraq. The experts' findings were classified, never to be released, The Washington Post reported last month.
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 Will The Real Traitors Please Stand Up? By Frank Rich When America panics, it goes hunting for scapegoats. But from Salem onward, we've more often than not ended up pillorying the innocent. Abe Rosenthal, the legendary Times editor who died last week, and his publisher, Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, were denounced as treasonous in 1971 when they defied the Nixon administration to publish the Pentagon Papers, the secret government history of the Vietnam War. Today we know who the real traitors were: the officials who squandered American blood and treasure on an ill-considered war and then tried to cover up their lies and mistakes. It was precisely those lies and mistakes, of course, that were laid bare by the thousands of pages of classified Pentagon documents leaked to both The Times and The Washington Post. This history is predictably repeating itself now that the public has turned on the war in Iraq. The administration's die-hard defenders are desperate to deflect blame for the fiasco, and, guess what, the traitors once again are The Times and The Post. This time the newspapers committed the crime of exposing warrantless spying on Americans by the National Security Agency (The Times) and the C.I.A.'s secret "black site" Eastern European prisons (The Post). Aping the Nixon template, the current White House tried to stop both papers from publishing and when that failed impugned their patriotism. President Bush, himself a sometime leaker of intelligence, called the leaking of the N.S.A. surveillance program a "shameful act" that is "helping the enemy." Porter Goss, who was then still C.I.A. director, piled on in February with a Times Op-Ed piece denouncing leakers for potentially risking American lives and compromising national security. When reporters at both papers were awarded Pulitzer Prizes last month, administration surrogates, led by bloviator in chief William Bennett, called for them to be charged under the 1917 Espionage Act. We can see this charade for what it is: a Hail Mary pass by the leaders who bungled a war and want to change the subject to the journalists who caught them in the act. What really angers the White House and its defenders about both the Post and Times scoops are not the legal questions the stories raise about unregulated gulags and unconstitutional domestic snooping, but the unmasking of yet more administration failures in a war effort riddled with ineptitude. It's the recklessness at the top of our government, not the press's exposure of it, that has truly aided the enemy, put American lives at risk and potentially sabotaged national security. That's where the buck stops, and if there's to be a witch hunt for traitors, that's where it should begin. Well before Dana Priest of The Post uncovered the secret prisons last November, the C.I.A. had failed to keep its detention "secrets" secret. Having obtained flight logs, The Sunday Times of London first reported in November 2004 that the United States was flying detainees "to countries that routinely use torture." Six months later, The New York Times added many details, noting that "plane-spotting hobbyists, activists and journalists in a dozen countries have tracked the mysterious planes' movements." These articles, capped by Ms. Priest's, do not impede our ability to detain terrorists. But they do show how the administration, by condoning torture, has surrendered the moral high ground to anti-American jihadists and botched the war of ideas that we can't afford to lose. The N.S.A. eavesdropping exposed in December by James Risen and Eric Lichtblau of The Times is another American debacle. Hoping to suggest othe r w i s e a n d c a s t t h e p a p e r a s t r e a s o n o u s , D i c k C h e n e y i m m e d i a t e l y c l a i m e d t h a t t h e p r o g r a m h a d s a v e d " t h o u s a n d s o f l i v e s . " T h e W h i t e H o u s e ' s j o u r n a l i s t i c m o u t h p i e c e , t h e W a l l S t r e e t J o u r n a l e d i t o r i a l p a g e , w r o t e t h a t t h e T i m e s e x p o s Z " m a y h a v e r u i n e d o n e o f our most effective anti-Al Qaeda surveillance programs." Surely they jest. If this is one of our "most effective" programs, we're in worse trouble than we thought. Our enemy is smart enough to figure out on its own that its phone calls are monitored 24/7, since even under existing law the government can eavesdrop for 72 hours before seeking a warrant (which is almost always granted). As The Times subsequently reported, the N.S.A. program was worse than ineffective; it was counterproductive. Its gusher of data wasted F.B.I. time and manpower on wild-goose chases and minor leads while uncovering no new active Qaeda plots in the United States. Like the N.S.A. database on 200 million American phone customers that was described last week by USA Today, this program may have more to do with monitoring "traitors" like reporters and leakers than with tracking terrorists. Journalists and whistle-blowers who relay such government blunders are easily defended against the charge of treason. It's often those who make the accusations we should be most worried about. Mr. Goss, a particularly vivid example, should not escape into retirement unexamined. He was so inept that an overzealous witch hunter might mistake him for a Qaeda double agent. Even before he went to the C.I.A., he was a drag on national security. In "Breakdown," a book about intelligence failures before the 9/11 attacks, the conservative journalist Bill Gertz delineates how Mr. Goss, then chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, played a major role in abdicating Congressional oversight of the C.I.A., trying to cover up its poor performance while terrorists plotted with impunity. After 9/11, his committee's "investigation" of what went wrong was notoriously toothless. Once he ascended to the C.I.A. in 2004, Mr. Goss behaved like most other Bush appointees: he put politics ahead of the national interest, and stashed cronies and partisan hacks in crucial positions. On Friday, the F.B.I. searched the home and office of one of them, Dusty Foggo, the No. 3 agency official in the Goss regime. Mr. Foggo is being investigated by four federal agencies pursuing the bribery scandal that has already landed former Congressman Randy (Duke) Cunningham in jail. Though Washington is titillated by gossip about prostitutes and Watergate "poker parties" swirling around this Warren Harding-like tale, at least the grafters of Teapot Dome didn't play games with the nation's defense during wartime. Besides driving out career employees, underperforming on Iran intelligence and scaling back a daily cross-agency meeting on terrorism, Mr. Goss's only other apparent accomplishment at the C.I.A. was his war on those traitorous leakers. Intriguingly, this was a new cause for him. "There's a leak every day in the paper," he told The Sarasota Herald-Tribune when the identity of the officer Valerie Wilson was exposed in 2003. He argued then that there was no point in tracking leaks down because "that's all we'd do." What prompted Mr. Goss's about-face was revealed in his early memo instructing C.I.A. employees to "support the administration and its policies in our work." His mission was not to protect our country but to prevent the airing of administration dirty laundry, including leaks detailing how the White House ignored accurate C.I.A. intelligence on Iraq before the war. On his watch, C.I.A. lawyers also tried to halt publication of "Jawbreaker," the former clandestine officer Gary Berntsen's account of how the American command let Osama bin Laden escape when Mr. Berntsen's team had him trapped in Tora Bora in December 2001. The one officer fired for alleged leaking during the Goss purge had no access to classified intelligence about secret prisons but was presumably a witness to her boss's management disasters. Soon to come are the Senate's hearings on Mr. Goss's successor, Gen. Michael Hayden, the former head of the N.S.A. As Jon Stewart reminded us last week, Mr. Bush endorsed his new C.I.A. choice with the same encomium he had bestowed on Mr. Goss: He's "the right man" to lead the C.I.A. "at this critical moment in our nation's history." That's not exactly reassuring. This being an election year, Karl Rove hopes the hearings can portray Bush opponents as soft on terrorism when they question any national security move. It was this bullying that led so many Democrats to rubber-stamp the Iraq war resolution in the 2002 election season and Mr. Goss's appointment in the autumn of 2004. Will they fall into the same trap in 2006? Will they be so busy soliloquizing about civil liberties that they'll fail to investigate the nominee's record? It was under General Hayden, a self-styled electronic surveillance whiz, that the N.S.A. intercepted actual Qaeda messages on Sept. 10, 2001 - "Tomorrow is zero hour" for one - and failed to translate them until Sept. 12. That same fateful summer, General Hayden's N.S.A. also failed to recognize that "some of the terrorists had set up shop literally under its nose," as the national-security authority James Bamford wrote in The Washington Post in 2002. The Qaeda cell that hijacked American Flight 77 and plowed into the Pentagon was based in the same town, Laurel, Md., as the N.S.A., and "for months, the terrorists and the N.S.A. employees exercised in some of the same local health clubs and shopped in the same grocery stores."
If Democrats - and, for that matter, Republicans - let a president with a Nixonesque approval rating install yet another second-rate sycophant at yet another security agency, even one as diminished as the C.I.A., someone should charge those senators with treason, too.
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Dixie Chicks, Valerie Plame & Bush By Robert Parry A politician's reaction to dissent is often the true test of a commitment to democracy. Great leaders not only tolerate criticism, but welcome disagreement as part of a fair competition of ideas leading to the best result for society. Certainly, no one who truly cares about democracy favors punishing critics and demonizing dissenters. But just such hostility has been the calling card of George W. Bush and his backers over the past five years as they have subjected public critics to vilification, ridicule and retaliation. While Bush doesn't always join personally in the attack-dog operations, he has a remarkable record of never calling off the dogs, letting his surrogates inflict the damage while he winks his approval. In some cases, however, such as the punishment of former Ambassador Joseph Wilson and his wife, CIA officer Valerie Plame, Bush has actually gotten his hands dirty. [See below.] The Bush-on-the-sidelines cases are illustrated by what happened to the Dixie Chicks, a three-woman country-western band that has faced three years of boycotts because lead singer, Natalie Maines, criticized Bush as he was stampeding the nation toward war with Iraq. During a March 10, 2003, concert in London, Maines, a Texan, remarked, "we're ashamed the President of the United States is from Texas." Two days later - just a week before Bush launched the Iraq invasion - she added, "I feel the President is ignoring the opinions of many in the U.S. and alienating the rest of the world." With war hysteria then sweeping America, the right-wing attack machine switched into high gear, organizing rallies to drive trucks over Dixie Chicks CDs and threatening country-western stations that played Dixie Chicks music. Maines later apologized, but it was too late to stop the group's songs from falling down the country music charts. On April 24, 2003, with the Iraq War barely a month old, NBC News anchor Tom Brokaw asked Bush about the boycott of the Dixie Chicks. The President responded that the singers "can say what they want to say," but he added that his supporters then had an equal right to punish the singers for their comments. "They shouldn't have their feelings hurt just because some people don't want to buy their records when they speak out," Bush said. "Freedom is a two-way street." So, instead of encouraging a full-and-free debate, Bush made clear that he saw nothing wrong with his followers hurting Americans who disagree with him. Pattern of Attack Other celebrities who opposed the Iraq War, such as Sean Penn, got a similar treatment. Bush's supporters even gloated when Penn lost acting work because he had criticized the rush to war. "Sean Penn is fired from an acting job and finds out that actions bring about consequences. Whoa, dude!" chortled pro-Bush MSNBC commentator Joe Scarborough. Scarborough, a former Republican congressman, cited as justification for Penn's punishment the actor's comment during a pre-war trip to Iraq that "I cannot conceive of any reason why the American people and the world would not have shared with them the evidence that they [Bush administration officials] claim to have of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq." [MSNBC transcript, May 18, 2003] In other words, no matter how reasonable or accurate the concerns expressed by Bush's Iraq War critics, they could expect retaliation. With Bush's quiet encouragement, his supporters also denigrated skeptical U.S. allies, such as France by pouring French wine into gutters and renaming "French fries" as "freedom fries." Bush's backers even mocked U.N. arms inspector Hans Blix for not finding WMD in Iraq in the weeks before the U.S. invasion. CNBC's right-wing comic Dennis Miller likened Blix's U.N. inspectors to the cartoon character Scooby Doo, racing fruitlessly around Iraq in vans. As it turned out, of course, the Iraq War critics were right. The problem wasn't the incompetence of Blix but the fact that Bush's claims about Iraq's WMD were false, as Bush's arms inspectors David Kay and Charles Duelfer concluded after the invasion. But the critics never got any apologies or repair to the careers. As CBS's "60 Minutes" reported in a segment on May 14, 2006, the Dixie Chicks were still haunted by the pro-Bush boycott three years later. "They have already paid a huge price for their outspokenness, and not just monetarily," said correspondent Steve Kroft. Sometimes, Iraq War supporters even turned to threats of violence. During one tour, lead singer Maines was warned, "You will be shot dead at your show in Dallas," forcing her to perform there under tight police protection, said the group's banjo player, Emily Robison. In another incident, a shotgun was pointed at a radio station's van because it had the group's picture on the side, Robison said. Though the Dixie Chicks are still shunned by many country-western stations, they have refused to back down. Indeed, one of their new songs - entitled "Not Ready to Make Nice" - takes on the hatred and intolerance they faced for voicing an opinion about Bush and the Iraq War. As Kroft noted, "Not Ready to Make Nice" received favorable reviews and became one of the most downloaded country songs on the Internet, but it still "fizzled on the charts" as Bush supporters called up stations and demanded that it never be played. Asked to explain why these tactics work, Maines said, "when you're in the corporate world, and when that's your livelihood, and when 100 people e-mail you that they'll never listen to your station again, you get scared of losing your job. And why did they need to stand up for us? They're not our friends. They're not our family. And they cave." [CBS's "60 Minutes," May 14, 2006] The Plame Case But what's most troubling is that this intolerance toward dissent is not simply overzealous Bush supporters acting out, but rather loyal followers who are getting their signals from the top levels of the Bush administration. For instance, a new federal court filing by special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald revealed that Vice President Dick Cheney apparently instigated the campaign to punish former Ambassador Wilson for his criticism of the administration's claims that Iraq had sought enriched uranium from Africa. After reading Wilson's July 6, 2003, opinion article in the New York Times, Cheney scrawled questions in the space above the article, according to the court filing. Cheney's questions would soon shape the hostile talking points that White House officials and their right-wing supporters would spread against Wilson and his CIA officer wife, Valerie Plame. "Those annotations support the proposition that publication of the Wilson Op-Ed acutely focused the attention of the Vice President and the defendant - his chief of staff [I. Lewis Libby] - on Mr. Wilson, on the assertions made in his article, and on responding to these assertions," according to a May 12, 2006, filing by Fitzgerald. Cheney's questions addressed the reasons why the CIA sent Wilson to Niger in 2002 to check out - and ultimately discredit - suspicions about Iraq allegedly seeking "yellowcake" uranium from Africa. "Have they [CIA officials] done this sort of thing before?" Cheney wrote. "Send an Amb[assador] to answer a question? Do we ordinarily send people out pro bono to work for us? Or did his wife send him on a junket?" Though Cheney did not write down Plame's name, his questions indicate that he was aware that she worked for the CIA and was in a position (dealing with WMD issues) to have a hand in her husband's assignment to check out the Niger reports. Over the next several days, White House officials, including Libby and Bush's political adviser Karl Rove, allegedly disseminated information about Plame's CIA identity to journalists in the context of knocking down Wilson's critical article. In effect, the White House tried to cast Wilson's trip as a case of nepotism arranged by his wife. On July 14, 2003, Plame was publicly identified as a CIA operative in a column by right-wing commentator Robert Novak, destroying her career at the CIA and forcing the spy agency to terminate the undercover operation that she had headed. A CIA complaint to the Justice Department prompted an investigation into the illegal exposure of a CIA officer. Initially, when the investigation was still under the direct control of Attorney General John Ashcroft, Bush and other White House officials denied any knowledge about the leak. Bush pretended that he wanted to get to the bottom of the matter. "If there is a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is," Bush said on Sept. 30, 2003. "I want to know the truth. If anybody has got any information inside our administration or outside our administration, it would be helpful if they came forward with the information so we can find out whether or not these allegations are true." Yet, even as Bush was professing his curiosity and calling for anyone with information to step forward, he was withholding the fact that he had authorized the declassification of some secrets about the Niger uranium issue and had ordered Cheney to arrange for those secrets to be given to reporters. In other words, though Bush knew a great deal about how the anti-Wilson scheme got started - since he was involved in starting it - he uttered misleading public statements to conceal the White House role and possibly to signal to others that they should follow suit in denying knowledge. Failed Cover-up The cover-up might have worked, except in late 2003, Ashcroft recused himself because of a conflict of interest, and Fitzgerald - the U.S. Attorney in Chicago - was named as the special prosecutor. Fitzgerald pursued the investigation far more aggressively, even demanding that journalists testify about the White House leaks. In October 2005, Fitzgerald indicted Libby on five counts of perjury, lying to investigators and obstruction of justice. In a court filing on April 5, 2006, Fitzgerald added that his investigation had uncovered government documents that "could be characterized as reflecting a plan to discredit, punish, or seek revenge against Mr. Wilson" because of his criticism of the administration's handling of the Niger evidence. Beyond the actual Plame leak, the White House oversaw a public-relations strategy to denigrate Wilson. The Republican National Committee put out talking points ridiculing Wilson, and the Republican-run Senate Intelligence Committee made misleading claims about his honesty in a WMD report. Rather than thank Wilson for undertaking a difficult fact-finding trip to Niger for no pay - and for reporting accurately about the dubious Iraq-Niger claims - the Bush administration sought to smear the former ambassador and, in so doing, destroyed his wife's career and the effectiveness of her undercover work on WMDs. Plame has since quit the CIA. The common thread linking the Plame case to the attacks on the Dixie Chicks and other anti-war celebrities is Bush's all-consuming intolerance of dissent. Rather than welcome contrary opinions and use them to refine his own thinking, Bush operates from the premise that his "gut" judgments are right and all they require is that the American people get in line behind him. Bush then views any continued criticism as evidence of disloyalty. While Bush will tolerate people voicing disagreement, he feels they should pay a steep price, exacted by Bush's loyalists inside and outside the government. So, when Bush's supporters malign his critics as "traitors" and spit out other hate-filled expressions bordering on exhortations to violence, Bush sees no obligation to rein in the intimidating rhetoric.
Instead, Bush almost seems to relish the punishments meted out to Americans who dissent.
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| Maverick -- Or Panderer? Will John McCain abandon his principled opposition to a federal ban on gay marriage to suck up to the religious right? Next month, the Senate will act out what has become a favorite Republican ritual in election years by calling up a constitutional amendment to prohibit homosexual couples from marrying. In theory, the objective of this splashy spectacle is to pass the Federal Marriage Amendment with the required two-thirds majority and send this obnoxious legislation forward toward full ratification by Congress and the states. But since that is impossible, why would the Senate leadership waste everyone's time on this nonsense? If nothing else, the marriage amendment provides a test for the most politically ambitious Republican senators -- notably Majority Leader Bill Frist, who promised evangelical conservatives last winter that he would bring the amendment to a vote before the summer recess, and Sen. John McCain, whose principled opposition to the amendment is now an obstacle to any rapprochement with the religious right. For McCain, the issue of the marriage amendment has risen again at a particularly inconvenient moment. As he moves toward a presidential campaign in 2008, his dilemma is whether to pander to the right, and thus destroy his centrist "maverick" image, or uphold principle and damage his prospects in the Republican primaries. This weekend, he is scheduled to deliver the commencement address at Liberty University, the Virginia higher education institution where Jerry Falwell molds young minds. At that happy event the Arizona senator will share the podium with Family Research Council president Tony Perkins, who has publicly mocked McCain's reputation for "straight talk" and questioned his commitment to the "sanctity of marriage." Whatever McCain tells the students at Liberty, his appearance there may mark a disappointing end to his peculiar public courtship with Falwell, which began with private meetings in Washington. At first the fundamentalist pastor, once described by McCain as an "agent of intolerance," seemed to be holding out the possibility of an eventual presidential endorsement. "We dealt with every difference we have," said Falwell several weeks ago, adding that he thought he could support the Arizonan in 2008. "There are no deal breakers now. But I told him, 'You have a lot of fence mending to do.' He is in the process of healing the breach with evangelical groups." For consorting with McCain, who is widely despised on the religious right for many reasons, Falwell himself came under sharp criticism from his comrades. When he announced the Liberty University invitation, the American Family Association's news Web site, Agape Press, expressed shock because of "McCain's past opposition to the Federal Marriage Amendment, his support for embryonic stem-cell research, and his recent cameo appearance in the raunchy, nudity-filled movie 'Wedding Crashers.'" Falwell initially responded by suggesting that McCain might change his position on the marriage amendment this year. He claimed that the Arizona senator had assured him that if federal courts invalidated the state amendments banning gay marriage, McCain would become "a champion and a leader" for the Federal Marriage Amendment. In an essay that appeared in the New York Times on May 6, however, Falwell acknowledged that the two men differ on the marriage amendment. Yet he went on to say that McCain "is the front-runner for the [2008] nomination and is the kind of conservative candidate whom I would have little trouble supporting." In interviews with evangelical journalists, Falwell has offered a different reason for their new relationship. "I have known him for quite some time," said the reverend, "but I had an extended conversation with him several months ago in his office, and he told me of his commitment to Jesus Christ and his desire at this stage of his life to honor the Lord." However sincere that desire may be -- along with the undoubtedly sincere desire to neutralize opposition on the Republican right -- McCain apparently hasn't changed his mind about the marriage amendment. While visiting Iowa recently, he said he still plans to vote against the amendment, reprising the role he played in 2004. Back then Frist brought the marriage amendment to the floor as a cynical ploy, driven by electoral politics rather than fervent faith. At the command of President Bush and Karl Rove, he was seeking to excite the right and force Democrats to vote against the amendment. While the divisive strategy worked, the amendment itself embarrassingly expired in a filibuster at the hands of the Democrats and a few Republicans -- most notably including McCain. That moment was among the Arizona senator's best in recent years, when he has since spent so much time debasing himself for a president whose henchmen once tried to drown him and his family in campaign filth. "The constitutional amendment we're debating today strikes me as antithetical in every way to the core philosophy of Republicans," McCain said during the floor debate. "It usurps from the states a fundamental authority they have always possessed and imposes a federal remedy for a problem that most states do not believe confronts them." He vowed to change his position only if federal judges invalidated state marriage laws, forcing the states to recognize gay nuptials. Now Perkins and other religious-right leaders complain that McCain is ducking even that commitment. "Although Senator McCain holds claim to the 'Straight Talk Express,' we are confused about his commitment to protect marriage," Perkins said in a recent press release. "Two years ago, the Senator opposed a marriage amendment because he felt that state marriage amendments would survive federal court challenges. However, since then we've seen Nebraska's marriage amendment struck down and other state amendments tied up in court." In other words, no more excuses: He must either vote the partisan line or be tarred as "anti-family." Of course, if McCain changes his vote next month, he will be pilloried as a flip-flopper, no matter what explanation he may offer. His critics will laughingly point out that he was against the amendment before he was for it. His status as a tolerant, moderate Republican maverick will fall. So the chances are that he will stick with his position, at least for now. But as the presidential primaries draw nearer, the pressure to support the marriage amendment will grow. So determined are his adversaries on the right to defeat McCain that unless he knuckles under on their issues they may threaten to mount a third-party religious candidacy against him.
For McCain, the Falwell gambit solved nothing, even if he can truly depend on the man who once led the Moral Majority. Most of the religious right still despises him, and the problem they pose has not changed. He can choose authenticity, which means alienating the largest and most determined voting bloc in his party. Or he can choose expediency, which means repelling the independent voters who form his own constituency. The lesser Republican candidates trailing behind are waiting for him to make that choice.
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Corporate Media And Advocacy Journalism By Norman Solomon We see this kind of news story now and again. Sometimes we try to imagine the people behind the numbers, the human realities underneath the surface abstractions. But overall, the responses testify to journalism's failings -- and our own. "Poor nutrition contributes to the deaths of some 5.6 million children every year," an Associated Press dispatch said in early May, citing new data from the U.N. Children's Fund. And: "In its report, UNICEF said one of every four children under age 5, including 146 million children in the developing world, is underweight." The future is bleak for many children who will be born in the next decade. As AP noted, "the world has fallen far short in efforts to reduce hunger by half before 2015." Reading this news over a more-than-ample breakfast, I thought about the limitations of journalistic work that is often done with the best of intentions. Try as they might, reporters and editors don't often go beyond the professional groove of the media workplace. Journalists routinely function as cogs in media machinery that processes tragedy as just another news commodity. Many people are troubled by the patterns of negative events around the world. And hunger is especially disturbing; in an era of prodigious affluence for some, the absence of basic nutrition for huge numbers of human beings is a basic moral obscenity. Across the spectrums of culture, faith and ideologies -- whether remedies might seem to lie in religious charity or governmental action -- heartfelt desire to reduce suffering is very common. News outlets are adept at producing vivid stories about misfortune. Those stories might be emotionally affecting or even politically mobilizing in terms of relief efforts. But the overarching matter of priorities is not apt to come into media focus. In general, corporate-employed journalists are not much more inclined to hammer at the skewed character of national and global priorities than corporate chieftains or government officials are. In a world where so much wealth and so much poverty coexist, the maintenance of a rough status quo depends on a sense of propriety that borders on -- and even intersects with -- moral if not legal criminality. The institutional realities of power may numb us to our own personal sense of the distinction between what is just and what is just not acceptable. On this planet in 2006, no greater contrast exists than the gap between human hunger and military spending. While international relief agencies slash already-meager food budgets because of funding shortfalls, the largesse for weaponry and war continues to be grotesquely generous. The globe's biggest offender is the United States government, which at the current skyrocketing rate of expenditures is -- if you add up all the standard budgets and "supplemental" appropriations for war -- closing in on a time when U.S. military spending will reach $2 billion per day. This is what Martin Luther King Jr. was talking about in 1967 when he warned: "A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death." Such an occurrence isn't sudden; it overtakes us gradually, becoming part of the normalized scenery. Journalism, in its prevalent incarnations, has a strong tendency to blend into that scenery. And whether you're working in a newsroom or watching in a living room or reading at a breakfast table, it takes a conscious act of will to look at the big picture -- and challenge the reigning priorities that are simultaneously quite proper and horrific. We're encouraged to see high-quality journalism as dispassionate, so that professionals do their jobs without advocating. But passive acceptance of murderous priorities in our midst is a form of de facto advocacy. It's advocacy of the most convincing sort -- by example. A hoary cliche says money makes the world go 'round. The extent to which that's true may be arguable. But deeper questions revolve around the priorities that ought to determine the profoundly important choices made by individuals and institutions. Journalism can't answer those questions.
But journalism should ask them.
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Who Will Inherit The NSA? By Ted Rall NEW YORK--Several months ago employees of Verizon, the company that enjoys a monopoly on local telephone service where I live, confirmed that my telephone has been tapped by the government. (Note to government: No, I won't reveal their names. No, not even if you throw me in jail. Unlike The New York Times, I protect my sources. Let's just say they're people in a position to know and leave it at that.) "I don't mind that Bush is listening to my calls," I told the security department representative who took one of my several requests to replace the bug with a new-and-improved eavesdropping device that wouldn't generate a roar of static. "It's not like I'm calling al Qaeda. And if they called me, I wouldn't be able to hear them because of the noise on the line." Most Americans feel the same as me. We're not doing anything wrong, so why should we care if the government knows when we're stuck on credit card company permahold? If losing our privacy can prevent another 9/11, isn't it worth it? No. Hell no. First and foremost, domestic spying is not an anti-terrorism program. It is terrorism. "We are not trolling through the personal lives of millions of innocent Americans," Bush says. But, in a carbon copy of the Total Information Awareness data-mining project that was shot down in response to a bipartisan public outcry in 2002, that's exactly what the National Security Agency is doing. As USA Today reported on May 11, the NSA purchased the complete "call-detail histories" for every customer of the biggest three phone companies: AT&T, BellSouth and Verizon. "It's the largest database ever assembled in the world," USA Today quotes a source. Your government, paying your tax dollars to companies you already paid to place calls you presumed to be private, is trying "to create a database of every call ever made." According to the paper, the three telecommunications giants also agreed to keep the NSA updated on new calls placed by their combined 230 million customers. (Verizon and BellSouth deny the story, although close cooperation between such companies and intelligence agencies has long been well-established.) The CIA estimates that there are between 2,000 and 10,000 al Qaeda members worldwide. Even if there are dozen or two "sleeper cell" members in the United States, they don't use the phone unless they're complete idiots. NSA data-mining will never uncover a terrorist or terrorist plot. Then why--why really--are government spooks sorting through our phone records? Because information is power. Calling logs, coupled with analogous databases of e-mail, wire transfer and fax transmissions, could give the FBI the information it needs to pressure a reluctant witness to turn state's evidence in a crucial case. The SEC could scan for calling clusters between corporate officials and investors in its investigations of insider trading. Politicians could neutralize their rivals by threatening to reveal their personal indiscretions. If the NSA were truly interested in monitoring and capturing Islamist terrorists, it wouldn't give a damn about your call ordering a large pizza, half pepperoni/half onions. It would buy records from outfits like the satellite telephone company Thuraya, the dominant telecommunications provider in the remote regions of Middle East, Central and South Asia where America's enemies live. Mullah Omar, leader of the Taliban, uses a Thuraya. It's hard to accept but the truth is obvious: our government doesn't want to catch the 9/11 murderers. After all, Bush could simply call his friend Pervez Musharraf, the military dictator of Pakistan who seized power as a Taliban ally, and ask him to pass the phone over the dinner table to Osama so he could get a Hellfire missile lock from a nearby Predator drone plane. Americans' first instincts are probably correct. In the short term, most people have little to fear from the NSA data-mining and other domestic surveillance programs. Besides, there's nothing new here. During the 1990s a Clinton-era NSA chief freely admitted to the French magazine Le Nouvel Observateur that its Echelon keyword and voice-recognition software system sought to intercept "every communication in the world." Although the current Administration is headed by fascists who would love to toss every Democratic voter into the ovens, they haven't yet managed to transform America into the police state of their dreams. If I didn't believe there was still plenty of life left in our democracy, after all, would I be writing this? Still, it is odd to hear the same Americans who would shoot their neighbor for watching them through their bedroom window say they don't care if some faceless bureaucrat listens to them have phone sex. Despite Watergate, Iran-Contra and a hundred other scandals that provide ample evidence for the opposite reaction, most Americans trust the government. Even if you trust this government, however, there is no way to know what form of government will rule this country in the future. Someday, and this is certain, a revolution or civil disturbance or invasion will topple the system created by the Founding Fathers in 1787. Some successor regime, run by people you don't know and may not like (and more to the point may not like you), will inherit the security apparatus currently being put into place. That's what happened in Europe during World War II. When the Germans invaded a country they inherited its police files and other records. It was easier for the Nazis to find and arrest Jews in nations that listed their citizens' religion in their records. Right now, you may be a Republican voter living in a red state, and you may find yourself in perfect agreement with your political leaders. What will you do if someone like me becomes president? What about my pal the radical anarchist who believes that the country's salvation lies in murdering every registered Republican? He's a smart guy. You never know.
True, some future American tyrant could order the creation of a huge database of information to track everything you do--if such a thing doesn't already exist. But why make it easy for him? It's smarter to never create such a dangerous set of records in the first place.
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 Heil Bush, Dear Uber Fuhrer Lott, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your attack of patriots questioning our total surveilance of Americans by saying, "Do we want security... or do we want to get in a twit about our civil libertarian rights," Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Rethuglican Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Wolf's Lair" formally 'Rancho de Bimbo' on 05-27-2006. We salute you herr Lott, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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AUSTIN, Texas -- I hate to raise such an ugly possibility, but have you considered lunacy as an explanation? Craziness would make a certain amount of sense. I mean, you announce you are going to militarize the Mexican border, but you assure the president of Mexico you are not militarizing the border. You announce you are sending the National Guard, but then you assure everyone it's not very many soldiers and just for a little while.
Militarizing the border is a totally terrible idea. Do we have a State Department? Are they sentient? How much do you want to infuriate Mexico when it's sitting on quite a bit of oil? Bush knows what the most likely outcome of this move will be. He was governor during the political firestorm that ensued when a Marine taking part in anti-drug patrols on the border shot and killed Esequiel Hernandez, an innocent goat-herder from Redford, Texas. That's the definition of crazy -- repeatedly doing the same thing and expecting a different result.
I suppose politics could explain it, too. It's quite possible that lunacy and politics are closely related. It's still damned hard cheese for the Guard, though. The Guard is heavily deployed in Iraq, currently 20 percent of those serving, down from 40 percent last year. Some soldiers are sent back for multiple tours. Lt. Gen. James Helmly, head of the Army Reserve, said the Reserve is rapidly degenerating into "a broken force" and is "in grave danger of being unable to meet other operational requirements." Happy hurricane season to you, too. The Guard is also short on equipment and falling short on recruiting goals.
But right-wingers are very unhappy with Bush right now, and this is a strong, red-meat gesture that will make them happy, even if it does nothing to shut down the border. You want to shut down illegal immigration? You want to use the military as police? Make it illegal to hire undocumented workers and put the National Guard into enforcing that. Then rewrite NAFTA and invest in Mexico.
Meanwhile, further proof that the entire party is cuckoo comes to us with the passage of another $70 billion tax cut for the rich. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities says the average middle-income household will get a $20 tax cut, while those making more than $1 million a year will get nearly $42,000.
The Washington Post editorialized, "Budgetary dishonesty, distributional unfairness, fiscal irresponsibility -- by now the words are so familiar, it can be hard to appreciate how damaging this fiscal course will be."
Both President Bush and Veep Cheney are still going around claiming if you cut taxes, your tax revenues increase. No, they don't. Now we're just in whackoville. It's not true. Their own economists tell them it's not true, but they go about claiming it is with the same desperate tenacity they clung to false tales of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. How pathetic.
Speaking of lunacy, the saddest report from Iraq is that American soldiers showing signs of psychological distress and depression are being kept on active duty, increasing the risk of suicide. The Hartford Courant reports that even soldiers who have already been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress syndrome are kept on duty. This has led to an increase in the suicide rate -- 22 soldiers in 2005. And as I have reported before, the military is unprepared to deal with the flood of head cases coming back from Iraq. How many ways can we mistreat our own soldiers, while the right makes this elaborate show of devotion to "the troops"?
The consistent pattern that runs through all these problems is the failure to distinguish fantasy from reality. Mexican immigrants keep crossing the border because they can get jobs here -- and most of those jobs are provided by companies whose CEOs support George W. Bush. That's where he can have an impact on the problem, should he choose to do so.
The $70 billion tax cut is part of a continuing right-wing fantasy going back to the Laffer Curve. Of course, clinging to demonstrably false economic precepts is understandable when you benefit from them, but at some point reality does intervene.
As for the Iraq fantasy and those who pushed it on a reluctant country through lies, disinformation and bending intelligence -- isn't there a law against that?
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The Fourth Amendment of the Constitution protects the privacy and liberty of Americans. It says the government can't search or seize you without a warrant issued on probable cause to believe you are involved in a crime. This right is the line between a democracy and a police state, where the state can search or seize at will. That is the line that the NSA program erased.
President Bush authorized the program and defends it. "We are not trolling through the personal lives of millions of innocent Americans," he said last week. How do we know? The court set up to provide warrants has been ignored. The law set up to regulate the system has been trampled. How do we know the president is telling the truth? Trust us, he says.
Trust the president who led us into Iraq on the basis of disinformation and misinformation? Trust the president who just weeks ago told us the NSA program involved only international calls with al-Qaida? The same president who said he'd fire anyone in the White House who helped leak the identity of Valerie Plame, the undercover CIA employee whose husband helped expose Bush's lies about Iraq's nuclear capacity? Now, with Karl Rove in the center of the effort to discredit Wilson and out Plame, the president says he has no comment on a continuing criminal investigation.
This isn't a routine Washington dustup. This concerns the trampling of the Fourth Amendment by the government and the sale of our privacy by the phone companies. And it isn't an isolated case. Bush, along with Vice President Dick Cheney, who is the major force behind this thing, believes the president acts above the law in the war on terror. He claims the right to make war without a congressional declaration; to surveil Americans without warrant; to arrest us without probable cause; to hold us without a hearing; to deny us the right to counsel or even to hear the charges against us if the government decides, on the basis of evidence they need not produce, to tag us as accomplices in the war on terror.
Now most Americans would gladly sacrifice some of our liberties if it would increase our security against another Sept. 11. Bush counts on that feeling when he acts above the law. But the entire fabric of our freedom is woven into a system of checks and balances.
Here, all the checks and balances have been tossed aside. Qwest, the only honorable phone company, refused to cooperate with the NSA in this program without a warrant or permission from the FISA Court. NSA refused to produce either; the FISA court was ignored. The NSA and the administration have simply refused to supply information to Congress, and the lame Republican Congress has refused to hold them accountable. When the Justice Department's independent Office of Professional Responsibility opened an investigation on the lawyers who signed off the program, the White House refused to provide the secrecy clearances needed to have the investigation go forward. "Trust us," the president says, and then he ensures that we have no choice but to trust him, since every legal check and balance is locked out.
It is time for accountability. Two public-interest lawyers have sued Verizon for $5 billion for violating the law, which should force the administration to defend the program before an independent court. Don't hold your breath for this Congress to hold hearings. But Democrats should stand up and promise an in-depth series of investigations of this administration and its lawlessness - from Halliburton's making off with billions in sole-source contracts to the cesspool of hidden prisons to the trampling of liberties at home.
We wage the war on al-Qaida terrorists in defense of our freedoms. We'd better make certain this administration isn't shredding those freedoms along the way. ... Cal Grondahl ...  |
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You call yourself a Christian
And listen, I love gasoline
How come you're so wrong
It's liberty for all
But one thing that is certain
How come you're so wrong
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah...
It's getting very scary
We must have loads more bases
How come you're so wrong
Yeah ha ha ha
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
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Parting Shots...
Mrs. Betty Bowers is the First to Review "The Da Vinci Code" The Da Vinci Code is a wildly contrived story about how the forbidden love between Jesus and Mary Magdalene, the Brad and Angelina of Judea, was revealed by Renaissance fresco-paparazzi, and later immortalized by Pierre Plantard, the L. Ron Hubbard of France, in the 1960s with his fabulous hoax called the "Priory of Sion," which author Dan Brown, the Tom Cruise of literature, took seriously. Opus Dei Vinci: The Book Behind This Dreadful Movie As an unwavering Republican, I have quite naturally burned more books than I have read.[1] As such, I seldom read any fiction not found between the bejeweled covers of the Bowers' family Bible. Nevertheless, believing that anything that infuriates Catholics can't be all bad, I finally closed my autographed Bible long enough to read the The Da Vinci Code. I must say that Dan Brown's book proved a delightful change of pace. After all, the entire volume has far less gratuitous sex and dismemberment by psychotic zealots than even the first chapter of the Bible, the Lord's more effective stab at writing a book that makes Catholics look silly. After decades of reading the Bible, it was such a delightful novelty to find a book where the readers can look down their noses at the author, rather than the other way around! Indeed, there is something to be said for reading anything that doesn't constantly tell me what I should be washing the filthy feet of strangers instead of shopping. And since there was no chance that anyone would ever expect me to abide by any of the words in The Da Vinci Code, I tried an approach I deem most suitable for the New Testament: I actually read it rather carefully.
 This man (on the left wearing a fabulous vintage chiffon-lined Dior gold lame gown over a silk Vera Wang empire waist tulle cocktail dress, accessorized with a 3-foot beaded peaked House of Whoville hat, and the ruby slippers Judy Garland wore in the Wizard of Oz) is worried that The Da Vinci Code might make the Roman Catholic Church look foolish. As a True Christian(tm) whose amber-paneled prayer room contains only King James Bibles, I must admit that I initially found reading an entire work from start to finish (instead of cherry picking the sentences most suitable for needle-pointing onto throw pillows) a revolutionary, and potentially dangerous, approach to understanding a book. And now that I've thrown caution to the wind by trying this wholly secular fad called "reading the whole thing," I'm left unconvinced that this time-consuming technique in any way better edifies a reader. To be honest, I found the plot points of The Da Vinci Code no easier to swallow or piece together than those in the fragments of the Bible I've read. Indeed, The Da Vinci Code has more convoluted and gimmicky twists than anything I've read since I thumbed through the pleadings filed in Denise Richards vs. Charlie Sheen a/k/a Customer on The Smoking Gun. Fortunately, I am a Southern Baptist. That means, of course, that I never succumb to using common sense as a crutch -- or rely on the uncooperative niceties of logic to make a story work. Indeed, my staunch refusal to yield to the quintessentially "liberal elite" expectation that things should make sense has made possible my enjoyment of countless Hollywood movies. This is particularly the case with that Scientology robot trilogy called "Mission Impossible," which even a cursory attachment to logic would have rendered unwatchable. Veni Vedi da Vinci: The Movie I find, however, that my forgiving ability to overlook cinematic flaws is not without limits. Frankly, The Da Vinci Code tested the tensile strength of my seemingly elastic credulity. While the film is a fairly faithful adaptation of the book, it accomplishes this fidelity in the manner that television programs are faithful to the movies upon which they are based. You know, sort of the same thing, only with less attractive people.
 Take, for instance, Tom Hanks, who plays Robert Langdon. Now you know that I would never ridicule anyone for their personal appearance if I couldn't claim that I was actually talking about someone else if called on it. Nevertheless, I must break this already malleable rule to comment on Mr. Hanks' face. Friends, we are talking about a face that will frighten more people away from the consequences of booze than MADD's most graphic teenager-through-a-windshield public service spot could ever hope to accomplish. When I was reading the book, I imagined Robert Langdon more as George Clooney. Well, truth be told, exactly like George Clooney, only in tighter pants. Not Don Knotts in a greasy mullet. I'm not saying that I don't appreciate how difficult it must be to pull off an authentic NASCAR hairstyle with hair plugs, but I just don't see even a French gal (who, let's be honest, is used to men with bad hair) giving her number, much less her Smart Car, to someone who looks like that.[2] Sophie Neveu, the love interest with said Smart Car, is played by Audrey Tatou, who had elfish charm and Hanks' haircut in Amelie. Poor Audrey, a full 20 years Hanks' junior and thereby slightly older than Hanks in Hollywood years, is left with the thankless task of bedding such an unsightly man, simply because her grandfather, Jacques Sauniere, has more puzzles to solve than Vanna White. Indeed, when not participating in ritualistic sex orgies in response to postings on the Normandy Craig's List, the French Jacques Sauniere is writing clues to his French granddaughter in English. Like that could happen. In behavior more typically French, in a wildly over-the-top gesture, he flags his most important cryptic clue with his naked body. An American would have used a Post-It.
 Jacques Sauniere body is found in the Denon Wing of the Louvre. Some claim he was posing in homage to Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvian Man, but I suspect that being naked and spread eagle in public was something he picked up from Paris Hilton. Don't worry about seeing his rude parts. Ron Howard has him lit like Madonna: You can't see anything! Anyway, none of this really matters. The thing that has the Pope pooping his Prada is that Hanks' character discovers super-confidential information so secret it is only available to those few, privileged souls who know how to order books off the Internet from Amazon. The secret? Jesus finally made an honest woman out of Mary Magdalene! According to Dan Brown, the Catholic Church hid this fact because it didn't wish to revere a female. Call me a nitpicking killjoy, but I find this professed Catholic aversion to genuflecting before women a bit difficult to swallow. We are, after all, talking about an institution that has spent the past 2,000 years demoting Jesus and His Daddy, so as to better transform a bit part in the Gospel of Mark, played by the other Mary, into its Goddess. Clearly, it was simply a case of one Mary being the wrong Mary. In fact, I suspect that divinity is much like the Screen Actors Guild: You can't use a name that has already been taken. But I don't know why the Catholics are so eager to venerate Mary (the mother one). Frankly, had that Mary been a more diligent homemaker and whipped up a hot meal on her Son's last night on Earth, the other Mary and Jesus would never have had to dine in a public restaurant for the Last Supper in the first place. Had they stayed home, they wouldn't have been subjected to the galling - and, according to The Da Vinci Code, Gauling -- infamy of being the Brad and Angelina of their time. Flaunting a romance destined for doom, but not before being memorialized by Judean gossips and, later, by Renaissance fresco-paparazzi. Apparently, in times before a camera with a telescopic lens, celebrity sightings were reported in fine art. But only to those who can read things backwards in blood. While the post-Kodak celebrity paparazzi may be less skilled than Leonardo da Vinci when it comes to composition, they are, frankly, more reliable. Speaking of which: Would someone please remember to go to the Paramount Prop Department and retrieve Suri if Tom Cruise ever returns from his relentless promotion of his new film? Thanks.
FOOTNOTE 1: Indeed, I don't wish to brag, but I'm quite confident that our planet is currently minus a handful of glaciers as a result of the wildly successful Harry Potter "Eternal Flame" Bonfire franchises, which I have managed to sell in 37 states. For those of you have bought into an outrageous liberal fiction called "Cause and Effect" and have concerns about the potentially deleterious effect submergence might have on the resale value of expensive beach homes, I encourage you Henny Pennys to take the more environmentally friendly "green approach" to book burning. It's called "censorship."
FOOTNOTE 2: Since Tom Hanks is an executive producer on HBO's Big Love, I think it is safe to assume that he drew inspiration for his character's appearance from that program's cluster of incestuous Mormon hillbillies who inhabit the clapboard shacks at the Juniper Creek polygamy compound. Goodness me, since all the men at Big Love's Juniper Creek look like Sweet Betsy from Pike's pimp, it is a marvel they are able to attract enough wives to fix lunch, much less populate their private prairie bordellos! |
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In This Edition
Rory O'Connor tells the strange tale of, "The (Other) Story Judith Miller Didn't Write."
Uri Avnery asks, "Who's Guilty? The Victim, Of Course!"
Ray McGovern connects, "Eavesdropping, Gagging, And The Constitution."
Jim Hightower counts, "The Ungodly Pensions Of CEOs."
Greg Palast reports, "Big Brother INC. Tries To Fool Randi Rhodes... And That's Not Nice."
Chris Floyd explores, "Gates Of Eden: A Nation In Chains."
Mary Pitt explains, "A Time For Euthanasia."
Robert Parry stands for, "Liberty Over Safety."
Joe Conason watches as, "Desperate Bush Turns
To The National Guard."
William Rivers Pitt says, "Just Don't Tell 'Em You Know Me."
Seymour Hersh is, "Listening In."
Ohio state court judge Timothy McGinty wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award!'
Molly Ivins looks on, "As We Survey The Crumbling Ruins."
Sheila Samples considers, "Nature Of The Beast."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department 'The Onion' reports "Passengers Bravely Take Down Plane Showing Big Momma's House 2" but first Uncle Ernie wants to know, "What Time Is It?"
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Walt Handelsman with additional cartoons from Ward Sutton, Micah Wright, Bruce Yurgil, Rex Babin, Hollywood Liberal.Com, The Whitehouse.Org, Old American Century.Org, Dubya's World.Com, Internet Weekly.Org, Daryl Cagle and Paul from Chicago.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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What Time Is It? I'm confused, it's as if I became unstuck in time! Is it 2006 or is it 1938? By Ernest Stewart
This is a mad-house, feels like being cloned My beacon's been moved under moon and star Where am I to go now that I've gone too far
Soon you will come to know
This is nothing new folks. There has been no radical new thinking, no new direction just the same ole same ole fascist bullsh-t we've seen again and again and again since at least 6000 BCE. It's just that "history repeating itself again" magical thingie. Yes it must be magic, it has to be! What other way to explain how the same ole sh-t keeps happening again and again and again? I know the Sheeple have been bred to be dumb but Jeez Louise! Sure I'll grant you the fantasy/sci-fi that they teach through High School as civics and history won't prepare you in the least for reality. No reality is only to be taught to the bosses and then only on a need to know basis. So it's only taught in college and then only to a select few. The workers have no need for the truth! Now Bush and his goons haven't done anything new. There's been plenty of traitors, even seditious traitors, genocidal maniacs as well as common heretics, murderers, thieves and enemies of the people in control of this country and in control of the world since day one. There really is nothing new here. We are the product of the weapon, the weapon invented us, not the other way around so we come by our evil honestly. In the last 8000 years our civilization has evolved but we haven't. We are still pretty much the Killer Ape but our weapons are no longer animal bones or a stone axe but Hydrogen bombs launched from space. Other than our weapons what is new; and for the most part for the first time, is how open the Junta has been about doing all their crimes in front of our eyes. Political crimes even in Nazi Germany or Caesars Rome were done behind closed doors be they in the Roman Senate, the Fuhrer Bunker or the Oval Office. Not only have the doors been open in the Junta's offices but they've gone so far as to do it on camera and then dare the world to stop them. In fact they've done it so often that even the Sheeple are starting to take notice. They're not going to do anything of course and of course our masters know this. I'm sure they're think of it as a release valve on a steam engine. Just blowing off steam. Which is probably why your dear old Uncle hasn't been sent down to Gitmo for some water-boarding yet? The internet is like pot smoking it calms you down. Which is the reason both are allowed to function. It keeps the hot heads busy and allows our criminal masters to keep going to the bank. Trouble is they've just about bled this country dry and Iraq with all that lovely oil isn't bringing in any money as it can't be sold so as to keep it off the market and keep prices high. Like Der Snifter found out you need to keep bribing the master class of the master race and ergo like Adolf, George needs to find some new gold to keep the Panzers flowing. He's to the point now that it would take 5 years to pay off our national debt, that's using every penny that the entire country makes and I don't see the CEOs and board members giving up the obscene salary's or their golden parachutes for the good of America, do you? Or 25 years if we doubled the taxes and taxed every man, woman and child an extra half million or $20 thousand a year for 25 years. We're to the point where nobody wants our markers or our money. Governments through out the world are changing from Dollars to Euros. Consider that the last four US depressions were all fixed by simply declaring war on someone. Worked in 1898, 1917, 1941 and 1964 so why shouldn't it work again in say 2007? Not to mention all that lovely power we gave our monkey after 911. We placed him and his stooges above the law over PNAC's planned Reichstag Fire and I really don't see the Sheeple rising up to stop them, do you? Our troops will be begging for the relative safety of Baghdad before Bush is through with them. Remember that the world unlike America knows it's history so you see Russia, China, India and the like rearming at a furious pace. Not everyone looks forward to the American master race being the world's policeman and Boss of Bosses! In Other News... Have you heard about Carol Fisher who was ordered by Ohio state court Judge Timothy McGinty to undergo a psychological examination as a part of her pre-sentencing investigation in an anti-Bush poster incident. Fisher who was peacefully protesting the Junta until she was attacked by a couple of Jack Booted thugs from the Cleveland Heights PD. From the beginning, Judge Timmy openly claimed Fisher suffered from "mental problems" because she resisted a brutal encounter on January 28, 2006 when Cleveland Heights police manhandled and arrested her after she complied with orders to not display the anti-Bush posters on a downtown Cleveland Heights street. Her crime was carrying an anti-Bush poster. WTF? And during a last minute May 9 hearing, Judge McGinty said that Fischer's opposition to the Bush administration makes her "delusional;" I'm going to repeat that again for those of you on drugs, if you oppose Bush you are...
...ergo he sent her off for a little electro-shock therapy at the local funny farm. What's the next step to be for Carol, off to a death er "Happy Camp" or just a simple lobotomy? Can you see why we awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' to judge Timmy this week and why many call Cleveland "The Mistake On The Lake?" ***** And finally everybody's favorite Zionazi and Rethuglican wolf in sheep's clothing Joe Lieberman is feeling the heat from liberal Democratic challenger Ned Lamont. Joe promises to run as an independent if he loses the August primary thus splitting the vote and giving the Rethuglican challenger a shot at a solid Democratic seat. Joe who takes his orders from Tel Aviv and Smirky has been a fervent supporter of the slaughter in Iraq, Extreme Court judge Sammy (the coathanger) Alito and the Junta's energy program just to name a few of Bush's insane ideas. Joe swears he won't support the Democratic nominee as his challenger Ned Lamont has sworn to do. Needless to say we're supporting Ned and we hope Ned's victory will send a message to all the other rat-wing Democrats especially the DNC! If you're a Connecticut voter make sure that you vote in the August primary! Find out more about Ned at our new Election 2006 section.
We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
 The (Other) Story Judith Miller Didn't Write By Rory O'Connor and William Scott Malone Introduction: On October 12, 2000, the guided missile destroyer USS Cole pulled into harbor for refueling in Aden, Yemen. Less than two hours later, suicide bombers Ibrahim al-Thawr and Abdullah al-Misawa approached the ship's port side in a small inflatable craft laden with explosives and blew a 40-by-40-foot gash in it, killing seventeen sailors and injuring thirty-nine others. The attack on the Cole, organized and carried out by Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda terrorist group, was a seminal but still murky and largely misunderstood event in America's ongoing "Long War." Two weeks prior, military analysts associated with an experimental intelligence program known as ABLE DANGER had warned top officials of the existence of an active Al Qaeda cell in Aden, Yemen. And two days before the attack, they had conveyed "actionable intelligence" of possible terrorist activity in and around the port of Aden to General Pete Schoomaker, then Commander in Chief of the United States Special Operation Command (SOCOM). The same information was also conveyed to a top intelligence officer at the United States Central Command (CENTCOM), headed by the newly appointed General Tommy Franks. As CENTCOM commander, Franks oversaw all US Armed Forces operations in a twenty five-country region that included Yemen, as well as the Fifth Fleet to which the Cole was tasked. It remains unclear what action, if any, top officials at SOCOM and CENTCOM took in response to the ABLE DANGER warnings about planned Al Qaeda activities in Aden harbor. None of the officials involved has ever spoken about the pre-attack warnings, and a post-attack forensic analysis of the episode remains highly classified and off-limits within the bowels of the Pentagon. Subsequent investigations exonerated the Cole's commander, Kirk Lippold, but Lippold's career has been ruined nonetheless. He remains in legal and professional limbo, with a recommended promotion and new command held up for the past four years by political concerns and maneuvering. Meanwhile, no disciplinary action was ever taken against any SOCOM or CENTCOM officials. General Schoomaker was later promoted out of retirement to Chief of Staff, United States Army, and General Franks went on to lead the combat operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. Enter Judith Miller, the Pulitzer Prize-winning ex-New York Times reporter at the center of the ongoing perjury and obstruction of justice case involving former top White House official I. Lewis (Scooter) Libby. Miller spent eighty-five days in jail before finally disclosing that Libby was the anonymous source who confirmed to her that Valerie Plame was a CIA official, although Miller never wrote a story about Plame. Now, in an exclusive interview, Miller tells the details of how the attack on the Cole spurred her reporting on Al Qaeda and led her, in July 2001, to a still-anonymous top-level White House source, who shared top-secret NSA signals intelligence (SIGINT) concerning an even bigger impending Al Qaeda attack, perhaps to be visited on the continental United States. Ultimately, however, Miller never wrote that story either. But two months later -on September 11 - Miller and her editor at the Times, Stephen Engelberg, another Pulitzer Prize winner, both remembered and regretted the story they "didn't do." -ROC and WSM Interview with Judy Miller: "I was working on a special project in 2000-2001 - trying to do a series on where Al Qaeda was, who Al Qaeda was, and what kind of a threat it posed to the US. In the beginning I thought it was going to be pretty straightforward, but it turned out to be anything but. And it took me a long, long time, and a lot of trips to the Middle East, and a lot of dead ends, before I finally understood how I could tell the story to the American people. It was a long-term investigative piece, which meant that for the most part, I didn't write articles on specific individual attacks - I was working the story... "I was fairly persuaded that the attack on the Cole was an Al Qaeda operation, based on the sources that I was talking to, because I had no independent information, obviously. The people that I was covering ardently believed that Al Qaeda was behind a lot of these attacks on American forces and Americans throughout the Middle East that we were beginning to see. At the time there was still a fair amount of debate and a fair amount of resistance to that thesis within the intelligence community, as it's so-called. But from the get go, I think the instinctive reaction of the people I was covering was that this was an Al Qaeda operation. So I started looking at the attack on the Cole as an example of Al Qaeda terrorism.
"I learned that the Al Qaeda Cole attack was not exactly a hugely efficient operation, and I learned later on that there had been an earlier attempt to take out the Cole or another American ship that had floundered badly because of poor Al Qaeda training. Because of incidents like that - you know, overloading a dinghy that was supposed to go have gone out to the ship and blow it up, so that the dinghy would sink - people tended to discount Al Qaeda. They said, 'Oh, they are just a bunch of amateurs." But I'd never thought that. I never believed that. And the people I was covering didn't think that...
"I was in New York, but I remember coming down to D.C. one day that weekend, just to be around in case something happened... Misery loves company, is how I would put it. If it were going to be a stress-filled weekend, it was better to do it together. It also meant I wouldn't have trouble tracking people down - or as much trouble - because as you know, some of these people can be very elusive.
"The people in the counter-terrorism (CT) office were very worried about attacks here in the United States, and that was, it struck me, another debate in the intelligence community. Because a lot of intelligence people did not believe that Al Qaeda had the ability to strike within the United States. The CT people thought they were wrong. But I got the sense at that time that the counter-terrorism people in the White House were viewed as extremist on these views.
"Everyone in Washington was very spun-up in the CT world at that time. I think everybody knew that an attack was coming -- everyone who followed this. But you know you can only 'Cry wolf' within a newspaper or, I imagine, within an intelligence agency, so many times before people start saying there he goes - or there she goes - again!
"Even that weekend, there was lot else going on. There was always a lot going on at the White House, so to a certain extent, there was that kind of 'Cry wolf' problem. But I got the sense that part of the reason that I was being told of what was going on was that the people in counter terrorism were trying to get the word to the President or the senior officials through the press, because they were not able to get listened to themselves.
"Sometimes, you wonder about why people tell you things and why people...we always wonder why people leak things, but that's a very common motivation in Washington. I remember once when I was a reporter in Egypt, and someone from the Agency gave me very good material on terrorism and local Islamic groups.
"I said, 'Why are you doing this? Why are you giving this to me?' and he said, 'I just can't get my headquarters to pay attention to me but I know that if it's from the New York Times, they're going to give it a good read and ask me questions about it.' And there's also this genuine concern about how, if only the President shared the sense of panic and concern that they did, more would be done to try and protect the country.
"This was a case wherein some serious preparations were made in terms of getting the message out and responding, because at the end of that week, there was a sigh of relief. As somebody metaphorically put it: 'They uncorked the White House champagne' that weekend because nothing had happened. We got through the weekend... nothing had happened.
"But I did manage to have a conversation with a source that weekend. The person told me that there was some concern about an intercept that had been picked up. The incident that had gotten everyone's attention was a conversation between two members of Al Qaeda. And they had been talking to one another, supposedly expressing disappointment that the United States had not chosen to retaliate more seriously against what had happened to the Cole. And one Al Qaeda operative was overheard saying to the other, 'Don't worry; we're planning something so big now that the US will have to respond.'
"And I was obviously floored by that information. I thought it was a very good story: (1) the source was impeccable; (2) the information was specific, tying Al Qaeda operatives to, at least, knowledge of the attack of the Cole; and (3) they were warning that something big was coming, to which the United States would have to respond. This struck me as a major Page One-potential story.
"I remember going back to work in New York the next day and meeting with my editor Stephen Engelberg. I was rather excited, as I usually get about information of this kind, and I said, 'Steve, I think we have a great story. And the story is that two members of Al Qaeda overheard on an intercept (and I assumed that it was the National Security Agency, because that's who does these things) were heard complaining about the lack of American response to the Cole, but also... contemplating what would happen the next time, when there was, as they said, the impending major attack that was being planned. They said this was such a big attack that the US would have to respond.' Then I waited.
"And Stephen said, 'That's great! Who were the guys overheard?'
"I said, 'Well, I don't know. I just know that they were both Al Qaeda operatives.'
"'Where were they overheard?' Steve asked.
"Well, I didn't know where the two individuals were. I didn't know what countries they were in; I didn't know whether they were having a local call or a long distance call.
"'What was the attack they were planning?' he said. 'Was it domestic, was it international, was it another military target, was it a civilian target?'
I didn't know.
"'Had they discussed it?'
"I didn't know, and it was at that point that I realized that I didn't have the whole story. As Steve put it to me, 'You have a great first and second paragraph. What's your third?"'
Stephen Engelberg confirms Miller's tale in all respects. Engelberg first mentioned the incident in an article by Douglas McCollam in the October, 2005 edition of Columbia Journalism Review, which noted:
"Miller was naturally excited about the scoop and wanted the Times to go with the story. Engelberg, himself a veteran intelligence reporter, wasn't so sure. There had been a lot of chatter about potential attacks; how did they know this was anything other than big talk? Who were these guys? What country were they in? How had we gotten the intercept? Miller didn't have any answers and Engelberg didn't think they could publish without more context. Miller agreed to try and find out more, but in the end the story never ran."
In a recent interview with the authors, Engelberg expanded on his comments. "I recall thinking it made perfect sense at the time," Engelberg told us. "The Cole attack was out of character - unlike the Africa embassy attacks, the Millennium plot, the earlier World Trade Center bombing.
"That weekend, pre-4th of July, everybody was nervous," said Engelberg. "Judy went down to check with the White House and the NSC types at the Old Executive Office Building and CTC. And she came back in and had the story. And I knew the source.
"Judy had two guys talking, but no names or details," Engelberg recalled. "One guy says, 'The US didn't retaliate for the Cole.' And the other guy says the coming attack 'will be so big they're gonna have to retaliate.' But no details... Judy had the what, but not the who and the where.
"I said, 'Check with the CIA, NSA, DIA,'" Engelberg remembered. "But we couldn't get anything that week."
Interview with Judy Miller:
"I realized that this information was enormously sensitive, and that it was going to be difficult to get more information, but that my source undoubtedly knew more. So I promised to Steve that I would go back and try to get more. And I did...try.
"He knew who my source was. He knew that the source was impeccable. I had also confirmed from a second source that such a conversation had taken place - that there was such an intercept - though my second source did not seem to know as much about the content of the intercept as the first source did. But that was enough for me to know that there was a good story there.
"But whoever knew about the 'who' and the 'where' was not willing tell me at that time. After the fact I was told that, 'The bad guys were in Yemen on this conversation.' I didn't know that at that time. I remember knowing that the person who've told me seemed to know who had been overheard, but he was not about to share that information with me...
"And Washington being Washington and the CT world being the CT world, I was soon off pursuing other things. I simply couldn't nail it down with more specificity. I argued at that time that it was worth going with just what we had, even if it was vague, that the fact that the Al Qaeda was planning something that was so spectacular that we have to respond was worth getting into the paper in some way, shape or form. But I think Steve decided and I ultimately agreed that we needed more details. And I simply couldn't pry them loose.
"At the time I also had had a book coming out (Germs: Biological Weapons and America's Secret War, with William Broad and Stephen Engelberg). Steve, Bill Broad and I were co-authors of a book about biological terrorism. So we were working flat out on that book trying to meet our deadline. I was desperately trying to get my arms around this series that we were trying to do on Al Qaeda. I was having a lot of trouble because the information was very hard to come by. There was a lot going on. I was also doing biological weapons stories and homeland security stories. And in Washington, if you don't have a sense of immediacy about something and if you sense that there is bureaucratic resistance to a story, you tend to focus on areas of less resistance.
"Our pub date was September 10th. I remember I was very worried about whether or not the publisher was actually going to get copies of the books to the warehouses in time. Because of course, Steve, Bill and I had delivered the manuscript late - everything was very late.
"The morning of September 11, I was downtown about 12 blocks from the World Trade Center. I remember walking to a school around the corner with a very clear view of the World Trade Center, because it was just a few blocks away. And all I can remember thinking was, 'Are they going to get those books to the warehouses on time?' I was also trying to make up my mind whom I was going to vote for in the New York Democratic Primary. And - everybody says this - it was one of most beautiful days in New York I ever remember!
"When I got to the Baxter School, there were people standing out in front of the school, pointing at the World Trade Center, which was on fire, and I looked up. I asked what had happened, and they said that a plane had hit the World Trade Center. There was an awfully big gash in the building and, I didn't see the plane, but there was an awful lot of smoke and I thought, 'Gosh! That was a pretty big space for a Cessna or something to have gotten into that building.'
"And here I had spent my whole summer, my whole past year thinking about an Al Qaeda attack, and I yet wouldn't let myself believe that it was happening right then. I simply wouldn't believe. So I turned around without voting, without going into the building, and I started to call my CT sources in Washington and I remember reaching the counter-terrorism office at the White House and I was told that nobody was there, that all of the principals were out giving speeches, or doing something else. And I said, 'Okay, I'll try to call back in 15 minutes.'
"By that time I walked to my house a couple of blocks away and I heard a boom and I turned around and once again, I didn't see the plane, but I saw the fire shoot out from the building from the plane.
"It was only then, after the second plane hit, that I allowed myself to believe that it really was a terrorist attack - the attack that we had been so worried about for so long. And I think I was kind of amazed at myself, at the power of denial. When you don't want to believe something's happening, it does not, it's not happening! And I think that was what was going on in the intelligence community. The idea that Al Qaeda would actually strike in the United States, not at the Cole or overseas, or in Jordan as part of a warning bombing plot, but here in the US, that was just kind of unthinkable! People were in the state of denial, as I was that morning.
"I remember calling back the White House that morning, and at that point, I talked to the secretary in the counter-terrorism office and she said: 'Nobody's here, Judy, and we're evacuating this building. I gotta go. Bye.' At that point, I hadn't even heard about the Pentagon attack, but I knew.
"It was very strange...it was a strange feeling to have written a series that virtually predicted this, and to have had not a single other reporter call, not a single other newspaper follow-up on some of the information that we had broken in that series. At the time of the series, which was published in January 2001, we had information about chemical and biological experiments at Al Qaeda camps. We had gotten the location of the camps, we had gotten satellite overhead of the camps. I had interviewed, in Afghanistan, Al Qaeda-trained people who said that they were going to get out of the 'prison' in Afghanistan and go back and continue their jihad. They had talked about suicide bombings. We had Jordanian intelligence say that attempts to blow up hotels, roads and tourist targets in Jordan over the millennium was part of the Al Qaeda planned attack. And yet I guess people just didn't believe it. But I believed it. I believed it absolutely, because I've covered these militants for so long. There was nothing they wouldn't do if they could do it."
Like Judy Miller, Steve Engelberg, now managing editor of The Oregonian in Portland, still thinks about that story that got away. "More than once I've wondered what would have happened if we'd run the piece?" he told the CJR. "A case can be made that it would have been alarmist and I just couldn't justify it, but you can't help but think maybe I made the wrong call."
Engelberg told us the same thing. "On September 11th, I was standing on the platform at the 125th Street station," he remembered ruefully more than four years later. "I was with a friend and we both saw the World Trade Center burning and saw the second one hit. 'It's Al-Qaeda!' I yelled. 'We had a heads up!' So yes, I do still have regrets."
So does Judy Miller.
"I don't remember what I said to Steve on September 11," she concluded in her interview with us. "I don't think we said anything at all to each other. He just knew what I was thinking and I knew what he was thinking. We were so stunned by what was happening, and there was so much to do, and I think that was the day in which words just fail you.
"So I sometimes think back, and Steve and I have talked a few times about the fact that that story wasn't fit and that neither one of us pursued it at that time with the kind of vigor and determination that we would have had we known what was going to happen. And I always wondered how the person who sent that [intercept] warning must have felt.
"You know sometimes in journalism you regret the stories you do; but most of the time you regret the ones that you didn't do." |
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Who's Guilty? The Victim, Of Course! By Uri Avnery THOSE WHO listened to the radio news last Saturday heard a stunning report: that Muhammad Abu-Ter and Uri Avnery had barricaded themselves together in a private home in a-Ram. The very fact that these two - the No. 2 man of Hamas and the notorious Israeli leftist - were together was already shocking enough. But the fact that they had invaded the home of an innocent Palestinian family and barricaded themselves there, like criminals fleeing from the police, was even more staggering. This false news item would, perhaps, deserve no special mention, if it were not typical of the whole media coverage, not only of this specific demonstration, but of all joint demonstrations of Israeli peace activists and Palestinians. More than that, it throws light on the close connection between the Israeli media and the occupation regime. Without this connection, it is doubtful if the occupation could have lasted for the 39 years it has so far. Therefore it is worthwhile to analyze the events in detail. FIRST OF all, the background. A-Ram (that's how the name is spoken, though its written form is al-Ram) was a small Palestinian village north of Jerusalem, on the highway to Ramallah. Since the "unification" of Jerusalem in 1967, the village has become much bigger. The reason: while the Palestinian population doubles every 18 years or so, it is well-nigh impossible to obtain a building permit in East Jerusalem. For lack of an alternative, many Arab East Jerusalemites build homes for their enlarged families in the surrounding villages. A-Ram has in fact become a town, but most of its 50 thousand inhabitants have Jerusalem (i.e. Israeli) identity cards, and their life revolves around Jerusalem. Their work, health services and universities are there. Officially, however, the town belongs to the occupied territories. When it was decided to build the Separation Wall around Jerusalem, the plan was to cut a-Ram off from the city. Worse: the path of the Wall passes right down the middle of the main street - so that it does not separate between Palestinians and Israelis, but mostly between Palestinians and Palestinians. To get an idea: it is as if a wall had been built in the middle of Broadway, from 42nd Street to Harlem. Or in the middle of the Champs-Elysees, from the Place de la Concorde to the Arc de Triomphe. Or in Berlin, in the middle of the Kurfuerstendamm, from the Memorial Church to the Messegelaende. The two parts of the city and its neighborhoods would be separated by a nine meter high wall. When this was only in the planning stage, the inhabitants held a number of non-violent demonstrations. To all of them, Israeli peace activists were invited and came. But in the meantime, the monstrous Wall has become reality. It cuts off the holders of Israeli identity cards from the city where their businesses and places of employment are located. It cuts off the pupils from their schools, which are only 100 meters away on the other side of the wall. Not to mention the students who are separated from their universities; the sick, separated from their hospitals; even the dead, separated from their cemeteries. Now the wall is nearing completion. It is still under discussion in the Supreme Court, but experience shows that that is pretty hopeless. One can still reach the town through an army checkpoint, but even this hole is about to be plugged: the Wall will close off this place, too. In the meantime, in some places there is still a high fence instead of the concrete structure, pending the conclusion of the court proceedings. In order to protest this, a large Palestinian-Israeli event was planned. It was to be a march in the main street, along the Wall (on the Palestinian side, of course), from the town center to an improvised tribune, where speeches were to be made. The details were worked out in three planning sessions. In order to underline the non-violent character of the event, it was decided that the schoolchildren, whose schools have been cut off, would march at the head in their school uniforms, their satchels on their backs, accompanied by their teachers. Also, an alternative route was planned for them in case there would be a danger of a clash with the army. WHEN WE - about 300 Israeli activists of several peace movements - were approaching a-Ram, we were informed that large forces were waiting to block our passage at the checkpoint. Going around them, we reached the wall on the "Israeli" side. At this point there stands a high fence, instead of the concrete structure. We breached it and many demonstrators succeeded in crossing to the "Palestinian" side, into a-Ram, before the army, which was surprised by this move, succeeded in rushing up reinforcements. In the meantime, the Palestinian demonstration had already started on its way, exactly as planned - at the head a group of boy-scout drummers with their flags, after them the small children of the first class, behind them the other schoolchildren, from small to big, then the main demonstration with posters and flags, led by a row of leaders of all Palestinian parties. The Israeli activists mingled with the Palestinians in order to demonstrate solidarity, and I was invited to join the front row. That way I found myself walking between Abu-Ter, the Hamas leader who has become famous in Israel not least because of his brightly shining dyed red beard, and the Palestinian minister for Jerusalem affairs, Abu Arafeh, also a Hamas member. Next to them there were the leaders of Fatah, the Popular Front, the Democratic Front and the People's (ex-Communist) Party. We marched arm in arm, and it seemed that the demonstration would pass off peacefully. And then, suddenly, we saw that the road ahead of us was blocked by a large contingent of soldiers and policemen who were waiting for us - rows of soldiers heavily armed from head to foot, in front of them mounted police on their horses and behind them army Humvees. The first concern was the safety of the children. Their teachers led them into a side street, and we marched slowly on, on our way to the tribune. There could not have been a less threatening sight than the row of notables, arm in arm, walking in front. ABOUT WHAT happened then I can testify as an eye-witness, and I am prepared to undergo any lie-detector test: When we were about 50 meters from the concentration of soldiers and horses in the main street of a-Ram, a voice from a megaphone announced that the area had been declared a "Closed Military Zone" and that our demonstration was illegal. While we were standing, facing the soldiers, a huge salvo of tear gas canisters suddenly rained down on us. It was not preceded by any provocation. Clouds of gas rose up between us, in front and behind. More salvos of stun grenades raised hell, and so we escaped to the nearby houses. I entered the nearest one and found myself in the company of Abu Ter, who received me with great friendliness. Our eyes were burning and tearful, and we could not talk much, but we decided to have a more meaningful conversation soon. When the gas dispersed, we emerged to join the continuing demonstration. The activists formed again and again on the road, the policemen and soldiers attacked us again and again with tear gas and stun grenades, storming forward in waves - armed and well-protected soldiers, Humvees and police riders (wearing spurs, which are forbidden by Israeli laws for animal protection.) Only at this stage - and that's the main thing! - did some local children and youngsters start to throw stones at the policemen - stones that could do no damage, since they fell short of the policemen, whose gas launchers have a far longer range. The demo organizers did their best to restrain them, but the anger of the youngsters against the soldiers who had invaded their town was too strong. After two hours, through a dialog with the senior police officer, contact was broken off and the Israeli activists returned home. In the course of the event, 12 people - seven Palestinians and five Israelis - were detained. The Israelis were released a few hours later, the Palestinians remained in custody, with our lawyers dealing with their cases. THAT WAS what happened in a-Ram. From then on, it was a story of the media. The demonstration was widely covered, for two main reasons - the violence used and the meeting between me and Abu-Ter, which provided a piquant angle, since until now there has been no dialog between Hamas and Israelis. The news on all the three Israeli TV networks reported on the event extensively. That by itself was unusual - generally, most TV stations ignore our demonstrations, or devote a few seconds to them (except for a few reports by brave reporters.) This time, too, no Israeli medium - TV, radio or newspaper - troubled to send reporters or photographers to the event, so there was no eyewitness Israeli media report from the scene. The TV stations showed clips taken by foreign networks. The reporters just made the most of what they heard from the police and us. And lo and behold: all the media reported the same: the demonstrators had started the violence by throwing stones, two policemen "had been wounded and treated on the spot". (This lie repeats itself at all our demonstrations. One could begin to suspect that there are two policemen whose sole duties are to be "wounded and treated on the spot" each time we demonstrate.) The police and army statements were outright lies. They knew in advance that our demonstration would be non-violent. I rely on them to have their agents at all our meetings, and we spoke about our preparations openly over the phone and in our e-mails. Two paid ads were published before the events in Haaretz. It is absolutely clear that the army and police had prepared in advance to suppress the demonstration by force. Otherwise they would not have brought horses and Humvees. For many years we have witnessed the mendacity of official spokespersons, and I have no doubt that the reporters covering the occupied territories are aware of it. In some media, a sentence saying that "the demonstrators argue that it was the policemen who started the violence" appeared, but in all the media it was stressed that the violence started with us, so the police had no alternative but to react. This is an Israeli tradition, which has unfortunately also been accepted by the international media: the Israeli security forces always "react" to the violence of the other side. But, curiously enough, the killed and wounded are mostly on the other side. The small example of a-Ram illustrates what happens on a larger scale throughout the country: in matters concerning the army and police, the news in all the media, without exception, from Maariv to Haaretz, from Channel 1 to Channel 10, is indistinguishable from government propaganda. (with honorable exceptions in opinion columns and the op-ed pages.)
The chances of the victims getting fair coverage are close to nil. After all, the victims are always to blame.
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Eavesdropping, Gagging, And The Constitution By Ray McGovern Is the National Security Agency being "turned against the people," as the Congressional committee led by Sen. Frank Church warned might happen? We the people cannot know; it's classified. Thursday's slick but evasive testimony by Gen. Mike Hayden, the president's nominee to head the Central Intelligence Agency, put the spotlight on Hayden's personal role in an aggressive NSA program that skirts strict 30-year-old legal restrictions on eavesdropping on American citizens. As NSA director from 1999 to 2005, Hayden did the White House's bidding in devising and implementing that program without adequately informing Congress - as required by law. When an unauthorized disclosure revealed the program to the press, Hayden agreed to play point-man with smoke and mirrors. Small wonder that the White House considers him the perfect man for the CIA job. The Fourth Amendment is supposed to protect us from "unreasonable searches and seizures," unless the government can establish "probable cause" that a crime is involved. The NSA, FBI, and other agencies of government had been running programs in clear violation of the amendment in the decades before the Church committee held extensive hearings on these matters in 1975. While acknowledging the NSA's technological capability as a "sensitive national asset valuable to national defense," the Church committee sharply warned, "If not properly controlled ... this same capability could be turned against the American people, at great cost to liberty." The upshot was the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which passed in 1978 in an effort to ensure that (1) this capability could play an effective role for national defense and (2) it would not be "turned against the American people." The football lingo favored by Gen. Hayden provides an instructive metaphor here. FISA was essentially an "end run" around the Fourth Amendment. But it was a legal play authorized by the 1978 legislation out of concern that this valuable eavesdropping tool not be lost to intelligence officials charged with protecting US national security. To ensure as much as possible that Constitutional protections would not be jeopardized, the 1978 law gave the government permission to eavesdrop on Americans only with a warrant from a special court set up for that purpose (the FISA court). At the same time, in recognition of the occasional need for intelligence officers to act quickly, the law specifically allows eavesdropping on US citizens for 72 hours before a warrant must be sought. Illegal Procedure After 9/11, at the urging of Vice President Dick Cheney and his counsel David Addington, President George W. Bush authorized what can be likened to an end run around the FISA end run. But since this new play ignores the requirement for a court warrant, it amounts to "illegal procedure." And this is recognized by virtually everyone but the most zealous fans of the Bush team, who argue vehemently that the play should not be called back and the team not be penalized. As I noted in an earlier article, Adm. Bobby Ray Inman, NSA director (1977-81), who over a long career has earned wide respect from Republicans and Democrats alike, recently leveled pointed criticism at the new administration program. Inman stressed, "There clearly was a line in the FISA statutes which says you couldn't do this." He also pointed to an "extra sentence put in the bill, which said, 'You can't do anything that is not authorized by this bill.'" He added that we should get away from the idea that the program can continue. Fouling One Off Switching to the baseball lingo equally favored by Hayden, at his confirmation hearing Thursday he swung at a fat pitch from administration loyalist, Sen. Kit Bond (R-Missouri). But instead of knocking it over the fence, per the game plan, Hayden fouled up by fouling it off. Bond's delivery: "Did you believe that your primary responsibility as director of NSA was to execute a program that your NSA lawyers, the Justice Department lawyers, and White House officials all told you was legal, and that you were ordered to carry it out by the president of the United States?" Instead of the simple "Yes" that was anticipated, Hayden paused and spoke rather poignantly - and revealingly: "I had to make this personal decision in early October 2001, and it was a personal decision.... I could not not do this." Why should it be such an enormous personal decision whether or not to obey a White House order? No one asked Hayden, but it requires no particular acuity to figure it out. This is a military officer who had indoctrinated NSA employees with what used to be known as NSA's "First Commandment" - Thou Shalt Not Eavesdrop on US Citizens; an officer who, like the rest of us, had sworn to defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; a military man well aware one must never obey an unlawful order. That, it seems clear, is why Hayden found it a difficult personal decision. Did the new, post-9/11 "paradigm" created by then-White House counsel Alberto Gonzales and David Addington trump the Constitution? President George W. Bush on January 23, 2006: "I had all kinds of lawyers review the process." Seems so. The same ones who were concurrently devising ways to "legalize" torture and indefinite detention without due process. No American, save perhaps Adm. Inman, who was present at the creation of FISA, knew the FISA law better than Hayden. Nonetheless, the general said Thursday that he did not even require a written legal opinion to satisfy himself that this very aggressive surveillance program, to be implemented without warrant and without adequate consultation in Congress, could be considered legal. Attorneys from the Justice Department and elsewhere were said to have blessed the program. But when Congressman Maurice Hinchey (D-NY) asked now-Attorney General Gonzales to have lawyers look into the advice rendered at the time by Justice attorneys, he was told that Justice had to drop the investigation. The lame excuse? The NSA had refused to grant the attorneys from Justice the needed clearances to look into the NSA program. The Powell Virus Infected like so many other senior military officers by what might be called the "Powell virus," Hayden could "not not" salute his commander in chief - whether the order be legal or illegal. He could not summon the courage to say "Sir, no sir," as the excellent new film on Vietnam puts it. Hayden's Prussian boot-click is what we can anticipate if he is confirmed as director of the CIA. This is why the White House considers him so highly qualified for the job. But it is hardly what the country needs in dealing with the long train of abuses and usurpations adopted post-9/11, including kidnapping, extraordinary rendition, torture, sequestering detainees without notification to the Red Cross, and illegal surveillance. Lies, Leaks, and the Constitution The confirmation hearing also raised the issue of leaks, with Gen. Hayden subjecting them to harsh criticism. After all, his nomination would slide through easily, were it not for unauthorized disclosures showing that, at the behest of the vice president (and maybe the president too, who knows?), Hayden devised and ran illegal programs in violation of FISA and the Fourth Amendment. We retirees who have had first-hand experience with the value of leaks have been working hard to put them in perspective. Twenty months ago a dozen former government officials established the Truth-Telling Coalition to encourage serving officials to expose consequential government lies - the varying reasons adduced for attacking Iraq, for example. Our initial appeal issued on September 9, 2004, was very direct: "We know how misplaced loyalty to bosses, agencies, and careers can obscure the higher allegiance all government officials owe the Constitution, the sovereign public, and the young men and women put in harm's way. We urge you to act on those higher loyalties." We were trying to challenge the pervasive temptation - especially among officials working on classified matters - to hunker down and avoid placing job and financial future at risk. The coalition urged government officials instead to provide such information both to Congress and, through the media, to the public. "Truth-telling is a patriotic and effective way to serve the nation," we wrote. Good News and Bad News The good news is that many officials still serving in the national security parts of our government have found ways to expose crimes like kidnapping "suspected terrorists," torturing them or "rendering" them to other countries to be tortured, holding them incommunicado without the required notice to the Red Cross, warrantless eavesdropping.... The list goes on. The bad news is that administration officials and those in Congress who do their bidding seem determined to intimidate those like Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) from exercising our First Amendment rights to speak out against that which we should speak out against: What the Nuremberg Tribunal called "the supreme international crime" of initiating a war of aggression. Especially considering that, as Nuremberg stressed, such a war contains the "accumulated evil of the whole." Just like the evils mentioned above, which are still going on. It is abundantly clear that the George W. Bush administration - enjoying abroad "sole-remaining-superpower" status, and at home effective control of all three formerly independent branches of government - believes it has carte blanche to continue these abuses under the rubric of the "Long War" on terror. So, rather than addressing these abuses, the executive branch and its courtiers in Congress have been fixated on stemming the flow of revelations to the press. Goss and His Lie Detectors Toward this end, before former CIA director Porter Goss was given a pink slip on May 5, he had earned the dubious distinction of blowing more electrical circuits than any of his predecessors through overuse of polygraph machines for "single-issue" questioning: i.e., have you talked to the press? Goss fired senior analyst Mary McCarthy ten days short of retirement as a warning to those misguided souls who may still believe the Fourth Estate has an important role to play in curbing government excesses. During his tepid exit interview with President George W. Bush, the president described him (accurately) as a "transition" leader. The transition has been from bad ("slam-dunk" Tenet) to worse (yes-man Hayden). Gen. Hayden, by most accounts, was a decent sort until he fell in with bad companions - Vice President Dick Cheney, his "sure-you-can-do-anything" lawyer David Addington, Alberto Gonzales, and other hired-gun lawyers. Sniffing absolute power can do things to the most righteous. Forget the warrantless eavesdropping. What kind of person would lust after a job, the description of which includes supervising kidnapping, rendition and torture? Under pressure from his patron, Vice President Dick Cheney, to plug the leaks, Goss repeatedly condemned public discussion of intelligence matters - not only by current employees, but also by retirees - and was extremely critical of the media for publishing unauthorized disclosures. Similarly driven by Cheney, House Intelligence Committee chairman Pete Hoekstra has expressed outrage at the disclosures, particularly those regarding warrantless eavesdropping and secret CIA-run prisons abroad. The problem is that Hoekstra is in a position to do something about it. The odor of fascism rises from his latest effort to intimidate those like VIPS from speaking and writing about administration behavior. Hoekstra inserted the following into the Intelligence Authorization Act for FY'07 (HR 5020), which has passed the House: SEC. 413. STUDY ON REVOKING PENSIONS OF PERSONS WHO COMMIT UNAUTHORIZED DISCLOSURES OF CLASSIFIED INFORMATION. (a) Study - The Director of National Intelligence shall conduct a study on the feasibility of revoking the pensions of personnel in the intelligence community ... who commit unauthorized disclosures of classified information, including whether revoking such pensions is feasible under existing law or under the administrative authority of the Director of National Intelligence or any other head of an element of the intelligence community. Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte would have 90 days from the date of enactment (the bill has not yet made it to the president's desk) to conduct and submit the study to the House and Senate intelligence committees. Who decides what constitutes "classified information?" Not CIA retirees, you can be sure. Administration spokesmen have stressed that, despite previous disclosures to the press, programs like the eavesdropping and secret prisons remain classified. Journalists, too, are in jeopardy. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales warned Sunday on ABC's "This Week" that they can be prosecuted for publishing classified information, and insisted that the government will not hesitate to track telephone calls involving reporters as part of criminal investigations regarding leaks. Gonzales said he understood the role of the press, but insisted that the rights of a free press cannot trump national security concerns. There it is, folks. The same Addington/Gonzales team that created a "post-9/11 paradigm" to justify torture can use that paradigm to trump the First Amendment as well. And we now have it straight from the mouth of the attorney general. If the bill is passed with Hoekstra's SEC. 413 intact, we who have been speaking out against administration misdeeds will be reduced to hoping that any penalties are not made retroactive. The cognoscenti tell us not to worry; the Constitution will in the end trump draconian legislation of that kind. But given the current whiff of fascism wafting over Washington, it seems altogether possible the administration would not shy away from using our tax dollars to bring us to trial, and deprive us of our pensions for use in defending ourselves.
O Tempora, O Mores!
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There's even a term for the platinum pensions reserved for the corporate elite: "Top Hat" plans, they're called. But while the CEOs are feathering their own nests with multimillion-dollar annual pension payments, they're working double-time to destroy the retirement nest eggs of millions of their rank-and-file workers.
Leading this pension-busting movement is the Business Roundtable, a lobbying front made up of the CEOs of America's 400 largest and richest corporations. The Roundtable wails that its members simply can no longer be expected to pay the middle-class pensions that they negotiated - supposedly in good faith - with workers. Roundtable members say that workers must "take responsibility" for their own retirement accounts, rather than expecting the corporation to come through for them.
The Business Roundtable is also leading of another mingy effort to downsize the "golden years" of America's working class. It has been an enthusiastic backer of George W's push to privatize our Social Security program. The top honcho of the Roundtable has grandly declared that its members will spend what it takes" to switch Social Security to private pension accounts.
The CEOs want everyone's retirement to be at the mercy of the market... except theirs, of course. Consider such Roundtable members as Home Depot, IBM, ExxonMobile, Pfizer, Coca-Cola, Prudential, and GE - the CEOs of these giants are to get corporate-guaranteed pension payments of more than $2 million a year.
This is Jim Hightower saying... The attitude of these CEOs is summed up by Exxon Mobil. It's executive suite at corporate headquarters is known as the "God Pod." To keep track of the hypocrisy of these false gods - and to help bring them down to earth - go to www.paywatch.org.
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I smell mendacity! The sticky-sweet Atlanta drawl of the PR flack for
America's private KGB was dancing in rhetorical circles with Randi
Rhodes, Air American, on her broadcast yesterday. Unfortunately for
the Bush-friendly Spies-R-Us contractor, Randi also has a keen nose
for the telltale scent of pure bullshit.
By "private KGB," I mean ChoicePoint, Inc., the Atlanta company that
keeps over 16 billion records on Americans which it sells to the FBI,
Homeland Security and, through a bit of a slip-up, identity thieves.
They are watching you because George and Dick don't have time to
track everyone in America (and that would be illegal, to boot),
ChoicePoint does it. Then turns over the electronic you --
cross-matched profiles of voting registration, your DNA info and who
knows what else -- for a price.
Randi was on the phone to one James Lee, Marketing Director of
ChoicePoint. He was trying to explain some of the good work they do
for government -- and responding to the evil lies about his
corporation by a reporter (me).
I was listening in from a glass booth. The Eichmann treatment was
required by ChoicePoint -- they wouldn't let her interview the
company if anyone else was in the room. They also warned her, her
interview would be "taped" ... AND, they didn't have to add, they
know where she lives -- and where she votes and a whole lot more
about Randi that maybe Randi herself doesn't know. Just a friendly
warning.
It seems the data guys were upset that she had me on her show on
Monday to talk about my investigations of the company which I
conducted for BBC-TV, for Harper's and for my new book, Armed
Madhouse. [ Yeah, that's a plug: order it at www.GregPalast.com ]
The company's name came up because of the Bush regime's getting
caught with their hands in the data jar: spying on Americans, sucking
our phone records into data bases where George and Dick can peruse
them at leisure, without warrants.
ChoicePoint's the big banana in the data game, with fat no-bid
contracts with Big Brother Bush's agency and the Department of
Fatherland Security. (Homeland? Deutschland? Whatever.) Other
governments, including Mexico, threatened ChoicePoint operatives with
arrest for their use and misuse of data, but Dick and George like'm
just fine. That's because ChoicePoint provides just the data that
suits their needs -- not necessarily accurate, but accurate is not
what is needed.
For example, ChoicePoint is the company that gave Katherine Harris
and Jeb Bush the list of Florida voters, most of them Black, which
were removed as "felons" before the 2000 election. The list was
ridiculously inaccurate -- these were innocent citizens -- but those
African-Americans lost their voting rights anyway and Jeb's brother
thereby took the White House.
That's not nice, what Jeb and Katherine did -- but ChoicePoint kept
silent. In return, they received a high, and highly suspect, fee for
their "work."
And that's dangerous. Because, after ChoicePoint selected our
president for us, our president selected them for no-bid jobs to save
us from terrorists -- which they do by keeping track of us. (Odd, I
thought Americans were the VICTIMS of terror -- they've made us the
SUSPECTS.)
In Armed Madhouse, I reveal that one ChoicePoint executive
confidentially told me the company's chairman hoped to build a
national DNA database. Dracula's got nothing on these guys: they are
already the biggest providers of DNA info to the FBI, they boast.
They boast about it one week -- then they deny it another. This
week's flavor is denial.
Back to Randi. I wasn't allowed in the room with her, so I waited in
the glass booth. ChoicePoint had a huge list of complaints about my
latest comment on their activities. I thought it important for the
public to know how these private "data mining" companies drill into
you and sell up the valuable nuggets they find to Mr. Bush's spy
apparatus.
As a public service -- everyone needs a laugh once in a while -- I'm
reprinting their inventive rebuttal to my report, "The Spies Who Shag
Us"
The company uses some clever rhetorical sleights of hand: "No data
files or 'dossiers' exist at ChoicePoint." Now that's just darn
strange for a data company.
But that's a quibble. Let's move to the out and out flaming
fabrications, whoppers and what, before George Bush took office, we
used to call "stinking, bald-faced lies." (Now we call it,
"intelligence.")
ChoicePoint swore to Ms. Rhodes that they do not have or sell
"credit" information. Yet, according to the company's own filing,
among their other Big Brother products, they sell:
"...claims history data, motor vehicle records, police
records, CREDIT INFORMATION and modeling services...employment
background screenings and drug testing administration services,
public record searches, vital record services, credential
verification, due diligence information, DNA identification services,
authentication services and people and shareholder locator
information searches...print fulfillment, teleservices, database and
campaign management services..."
Uh, oh. They are either fibbing to the Securities and Exchange
Commission (their CEO is already under investigation by the SEC) --
or they are prevaricating to Randi. They shouldn't do that, because,
the lady has class -- she let ChoicePoint give their goofy alibi
uninterrupted; but, lie to her, and, as my editor says, "she'll bite
off a chicken's head while it's laying eggs."
So who are you toying with, Mr. ChoicePoint, the SEC or Randi?
There's more. ChoicePoint's PR apologist says it doesn't maintain
credit card records, but they fail to mention that they sell "credit
report headers" -- which is why the federal government just fined
them a record $10 million for letting identity thieves run off with
this kind of info. They sell "SSN verification" (your social security
number), financial reports, education verification, reference
verification, felony checks, motor vehicle records, asset location
and information on criminal suspects and their neighbors and
relatives. Howdy, neighbor!
Let's go back to ChoicePoint's dirty work for the Brothers Bush.
ChoicePoint writes that it didn't get its corporate hands dirty in
the racist purge of voters which fixed the 2000 election. That was
the fault of some company called "DBT" which ChoicePoint only
purchased, they claim, "after DBT's work was done for the state."
Au contraire. ChoicePoint bought DBT before the election, while the
purges were in full swing. Then, right after the "election,"
ChoicePoint's PR mouthpieces boasted about how the company was going
to cash in on its "success" (their word) in purging Florida voter
rolls. Their PR flack told me at the time, "Given the outcome of our
work in Florida, and with a new president in place (!), we think our
services will expand across the country." But then we caught them --
and they quit elections games and moved on to saving us from Al
Qaeda. Lord help us.
Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn about ChoicePoint. They're in
it for the money. If they turned a blind eye to evil, if they abetted
the theft of an election and kept silent to keep the money, well,
that's the Fear Industry for you.
It's not what ChoicePoint sells that terrifies me, it's whom they're
selling it to: a regime for whom information is a weapon and
disinformation a way of life.
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Beneath the thunder of the mighty cataclysms unleashed by the Bush Administration - the war crime in Iraq, the global torture gulag, the epic corruption, the gutting of the Constitution, the open embrace of presidential tyranny - a quieter degradation of American society has continued apace. And this slow descent into barbarism didn't begin with George W. Bush - although his illicit regime certainly represents the apotheosis of the dark forces driving the decay.
With the world's attention understandably diverted by the latest scandals and shameless posturings of the Bush Faction - domestic spying, bribes and hookers at the CIA, military units roaring down to the border to scare unarmed poor people looking for work - few noticed a small story that cast a harsh, penetrating light on the corrosion of the national character.
Earlier this month, the International Centre for Prison Studies at King's College London released its annual World Prison Population List. And there, standing proudly at the head of the line, towering far above all others, is that shining city on the hill, the United States of America. But strangely enough, the Bush gang and its many media sycophants failed to celebrate - or even note - yet another instance where a triumphant America leads the world. Where are the cheering hordes shouting "USA! USA!" at the news that the land of the free imprisons more people than any other country in the world - both in raw numbers and as a percentage of its population?
Yes, the world's greatest democracy now has more than two million of its citizens locked up in iron cages: an incarceration rate of 714 per 100,000 of the national population, the Centre reports. The only countries within shouting distance are such bastions of penological enlightenment as China (1.55 million prisoners, plus some unsorted "administrative detainees"), Russia (a wimpy 763,000) and Brazil (330,000), whose exemplary prison management has been on such prominent display this week.
Inside the Homeland, the state of Texas sets the pace, as you might imagine. During George W. Bush's tenure there as governor in the 1990s, Texas had the fastest growing prison population in the country, almost doubling the national rate, as the Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice reports. In fact, by the time Dubya was translated to glory by Daddy's buddies on the Supreme Court, one out of every 20 adult Texans were "either in prison, jail, on probation or parole," the CJCJ notes; a level of "judicial control" that reached to one in three for African-American males. George also killed more convicts than any other governor in modern U.S. history as well - a nice warm-up for the valorous feats of mass slaughter yet to come.
But although the U.S. prison population has soared to record-breaking heights during George W. Bush's presidency, America's status as the most punitive nation on earth is by no means solely his doing. Bush is merely standing on the shoulders of giants - such as, say, Bill Clinton, who once created 50 brand-new federal offenses in a single draconian measure, and expanded the federal death penalty to 60 new offenses during his term. In fact, like the great cathedrals of old, the building of Fortress America has been the work of decades, with an entire society yoked to the common task. At each step, the promulgation of ever-more draconian punishments for ever-lesser offenses, and the criminalization of ever-broader swathes of ordinary human behavior, have been greeted with hosannahs from a public and press who seem to be insatiable gluttons for punishment - someone else's punishment, that is, and preferably someone of dusky hue.
The main engine of this mass incarceration has been the 35-year "war on drugs": a spurious battle against an abstract noun that provides an endless fount of profits, payoffs and power for the politically connected while only worsening the problem it purports to address - just like the "war on terror." The "war on drugs" has in fact been the most effective assault on an underclass since Stalin's campaign against the kulaks.
It was launched by Richard Nixon, after urban unrest had shaken major American cities during those famous "long, hot summers" of the Sixties. Yet even as the crackdowns began, America's inner cities were being flooded with heroin, much of it originating in Southeast Asia, where the CIA and its hired warlords ran well-funded black ops in and around Vietnam. At home, criminal gangs reaped staggering riches from the criminalization of the natural, if often unhealthy, human craving for intoxication. Ronald Reagan upped the ante in the 1980s, with a rash of "mandatory sentencing" laws that can put even first-time, small-time offenders away for years. His term also saw a new flood -- crack cocaine - devastating the inner cities, even as his covert operators used drug money to fund the terrorist Contra army in Nicaragua and run illegal weapons to Iran, while the downtown druglords grew more powerful. The American underclass was caught in a classic pincer movement, attacked by both the state and the gangs. There were no more "long, hot summers" of protest against injustice; there was simply the struggle to survive.
Under Reagan, Bush I and Clinton, the feverish privatization of the prison system added a new impetus for wholesale, long-term detention. Politically-wired corporations need to keep those profit-making cells filled, and the politicians they grease are happy to oblige with "tougher" sentences and new crimes to prosecute. Now Bush Junior is readying another front in the war on the underclass, promising this week to build 4,000 new cells for immigrant detainees this year alone - having prudently handed Halliburton a $385 million "contingency" contract back in February to build, lo and behold, "immigrant detention centers" should the need for them arise, the NY Times reports.
Like the war on drugs, the equally ill-conceived war on immigrants will be directed at the poorest and most vulnerable, not the "coyote" gangs who profit from this human trafficking - and certainly not the American businesses and wealthy Homelanders who love the dirt-cheap labor of the illegals. Those for-profit prisons will soon be filled to bursting with this new harvest.
A nation's true values can be measured in how it treats the poor, the weak, the damaged, the unconnected. For more than 30 years, the answer of the American power structure has been clear: you lock them up, you shut them up, you grind them down - and make big bucks in the process.
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A Time For Euthanasia By Mary Pitt The old dog has outlived its usefulness. Granted, we have loved it dearly for its caring companionship and its contribution to the safety which we have found so precious. It still has the endearing tail wag when we approach and always seems glad to act in an ingratiating manner, but the teeth have grown smooth and the body is reluctant to move. When threatened, it can only growl and bare its now-useless teeth, trying to convince us that it is still "on the job" and performing its usual duties. But, however, much we love it, we most let it go; we must put it out of its misery for its own good, and ours. We are as helpless with it as we would be without it and it is time to find a new dog that can still hunt. Yes, friends, it is time to give up and end the life of the Democratic Party. For too many years, the official party line has been one of compromise and conciliation, of "playing nice" no matter how rough the game may get. When faced with campaign after campaign of Republican dirty tricks, they have deigned to fight back in a similar matter with the truth as a powerful weapon and expose the opposition as the phonies they actually are or to oppose the infractions against the very laws in the formation of which they have paricipated. They stand silently while the Constitution is blatantly reduced to a "goddam piece of paper" and the principles stated in the Declaration of Independence merely an antiquated political statement. One by one, the amendments to the Constitution which guarantee the civil rights of each and every American citizen have been negated in the name of "National Security". Since the dastardly destruction of the World Trade Center, our "Democratic" representatives have bought into every lie that has been offered by the adminstration. They blandly accept the claim that "the world changed on September 11, 2001". But those whose vision is still twenty-twenty can see that the "world" is still the same. It is the United States that has changed, and they are complicit in that change. The one-time bastion of peace and freedom, the example to all the world of what a nation should be has fallen into disrepute with a greater rapidity than the dive in President Bush's poll ratings. They believed the President's rantings that "they hate us and want to kill us, so we have to kill them first", and they allowed the unnecessary invasion of a helpless Iraq at the cost of the abandonment of the search for Osama Bin Laden and now they cannot even bare their ineffective teeth in an effort to correct the dire situation which that caused and to require withdrawal of our troops. After the towers fell, we watched, aghast, as blanket authority was given to the adminstrative branch to make all decisions, the oppressive Patriot Act was passed by a Congress, most of whom had not even read it. And then, rather than to admit that they had made a mistake, they renewed it on request! Now and then, there have been "objections" and a show of a bit of independence, but it always disappears when it is time to count the votes. They sit by and do nothing as the laws that they pass are nullified by the President on signing by "administrative exceptions"; they see pay-offs and corruption and make little or no investigation into whether or how they can bring this arrogant administration back under Constitutional control. They are afraid to attempt any constructive measures because they have lost confidence in right and truth as the strongest weapons of democracy, recognizing only things they can count, majority and the ballot box, things that they cannot win unless they demonstrate a passion for protecting them. Every time they attempted to stand up to protect the people, Mr. Bush would scream "Nine-eleven", and they would scurry under the porch and then return to their docile submission, allowing the illegal orders to stand and the rights of the citizens to be even further compromised. Now, Nancy Pelosi has announced that there will be no movement toward impeachment if they win the majority in Congress this year! The only possible advancement in the fortunes of this old and decrepit party is furnished by the penicillin of progressive branches within the party who are working on the state and local levels, but the infections in the head of the aging body are fighting back against this needed medication and the prognosis is not good. The Progressives are finding new and aggressive candidates to run for office, but their choices are too often rejected by party-liners who are chosen by the party leaders for their "years of loyalty and hard work". Thus, there will be no permission for the necessary application of "new blood" to create the energy that will allow the body to recover. But time is short! The wolves are circling at the door and even our telephones are useless to make calls for help and a young, aggressive watchdog who will fight tooth-and-nail to save the inhabitants of this nation from destruction is essetnial to our survival. The endangered people of this nation/family must make a decision and make it soon. The "old dog" must be put down so that a new one can take over and perform the duties of protecting us from the corporate wolves. Let us hope that we can quickly find one with real teeth and the willingness, wit, and strength to use them effectively on our behalf. The decision can no longer be delayed and the first step must be taken.
It's time to euthanize the Democratic Party.
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Liberty Over Safety By Robert Parry Until now, every generation of Americans has traded safety for liberty. From the Lexington Green to the Normandy beaches, from the Sons of Liberty to the Freedom Riders, it has been part of the American narrative that risks are taken to expand freedom, not freedoms sacrificed to avoid risk. The Founders challenged the most powerful military on earth, the British army, all the while knowing that defeat would send them to the gallows. The American colonists spurned their relative comfort as British subjects for a chance to be citizens of a Republic dedicated to the vision that some rights are "unalienable" and that no man should be king. Since then, despite some ups and downs, the course of the American nation has been to advance those ideals and broaden those freedoms. In the early years of the Republic, African-American slaves resisted their bondage, often aided by white Abolitionists who defied unjust laws on runaways and pressed the government to restrict slave states and ultimately to eliminate slavery. With the Civil War and Abraham Lincoln's emancipation of the slaves, the United States underwent a painful rebirth that reaffirmed the nation's original commitment to the principle that "all men are created equal." Again, the cause of freedom trumped safety, a choice for which Lincoln and thousands of brave soldiers gave their lives. In the latter half of the Nineteenth Century and into the Twentieth, the Suffragettes demanded and fought for extension of basic American rights to female citizens. These women risked their reputations and their personal security to gain the right to vote and other legal guarantees for women. When fascist totalitarianism threatened the world in the 1930s and 1940s, American soldiers turned back the tide of repression in Europe and Asia, laying down their lives by the tens of thousands in countless battlefields from Normandy to Iwo Jima. The march of freedom continued in the United States in the 1950s and 1960s, as the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights fighters - both black and white - risked and sometimes lost their lives to tear down the walls of racial segregation. For two centuries, this expansion of freedom always came with dangers and sacrifices. Yet, the trade-off was always the same: safety for liberty. Reversed March Only in this generation - only on our watch - has the march reversed. Instead of swapping safety for liberty, this generation - traumatized by the 9/11 attacks and under the leadership of George W. Bush - has chosen to trade liberties for safety. Instead of Patrick Henry's stirring Revolutionary War cry of "give me liberty or give me death," this era has Sen. Pat Roberts's instant-classic expression of self over nation. "You have no civil liberties if you are dead," the Kansas Republican explained on May 18 before the Senate Intelligence Committee, which he chairs. Roberts's dictum echoed through the mainstream media where it was embraced as a pithy expression of homespun common sense. But the commentators missed how Roberts's preference for life over liberty was the antithesis of Henry's option of liberty or death. Roberts's statement also represented a betrayal of two centuries of bravery by American patriots who gave their own lives so others could be free. After all, it would follow logically that if "you have no civil liberties if you are dead," then all those Americans who died for liberty were basically fools. Roberts's adage reflects a self-centeredness, which would shame the millions of Americans who came before, putting principle and the interests of "posterity" ahead of themselves. If Roberts is right, the Minutemen who died at Lexington Green and at Bunker Hill had no liberty; the African-Americans who enlisted in the Union Army and died in Civil War battles had no liberty; the GIs who died on the Normandy beaches or Marines who died at Iwo Jima had no liberty; Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights heroes who gave their lives had no liberty. If Sen. Roberts is right, they had no liberties because they died in the fight for liberty. In Roberts's view - which apparently is the dominant opinion of the Bush administration and many of its supporters - personal safety for the individual tops the principles of freedom for the nation. This security-over-everything notion has emerged as the key justification for stripping the American people of their "unalienable rights," liberties that were promised them in the Declaration of Independence and enshrined in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. But the American people are now told that the President is exercising "plenary" - or unlimited - powers as long as the indefinite "war on terror" continues. Bush has been ceded these boundless powers with only a meek request from the populace that he make life in the United States a little safer from the threat of another al-Qaeda attack. Discretionary Rights So, Bush holds discretion over the constitutional guarantee of a fair trial, the right to know the charges against you and to confront your accuser, the protection against warrantless searches and seizures, the delicate checks and balances designed by the Founders, the prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment, the power to wage war, even the right to freedom of speech. In claiming "plenary" powers as Commander in Chief and arguing that the United States is part of the battlefield, Bush has asserted that all rights are his, that they are given to the people only when he says so, that the rights are no longer "unalienable." Like before the Declaration of Independence, the American people find themselves as "subjects" reliant for their rights on the generosity of a leader, rather than "citizens" possessing rights that can't be denied. [For details, see Consortiumnews.com's "The End of Unalienable Rights."] As a trade-off for accepting Bush's unlimited powers, the American people have gotten assurances that Bush will make protecting them his top priority. Yet, the presidential oath says nothing about shielding the public from danger; rather it's a vow to "preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States." Since George Washington first took the oath, it has been the Constitution that is paramount, because it enshrines the liberties that define America. Within that presidential oath and within the nation's historic commitment to freedom, there is no assurance against risk or danger. There is no government guarantee of safety, nor is there a promise that harm might not come to American citizens.
Indeed, it has been assumed by all previous generations of Americans - dating back to the beginning of the Republic and ending only with today's fearful generation - that risk and danger were part of the price for maintaining and spreading freedom.
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| Desperate Bush Turns To The National Guard For a brief moment last month, George W. Bush behaved like a responsible leader instead of a partisan demagogue. On the issue of immigration, which provokes so much demagogic and divisive rhetoric on the right, he followed his better instincts by seeking compromise. He took the risk of alienating his own right-wing base and reached out to John McCain and Ted Kennedy by endorsing a "path to citizenship" for illegal immigrants. Then he must have looked at the polls showing that the Republican base is deserting him-and panicked. The President's decision to dispatch 6,000 National Guardsmen to the Mexican border, which he announced in a nationally televised speech on Monday night, gives off a sour smell of desperation. Polls published the following day indicated that overwhelming majorities of voters favor sending troops to the southern boundary. Presumably the White House polled to test its own "solution" as well as the President's message before scheduling his address. No matter what the polls told Karl Rove about mobilizing the troops, the sad truth for him and his boss is that the public now regards Mr. Bush with a cynical eye. Conservatives no longer trust him on the issue of immigration, while liberals, moderates and independents no longer trust him at all. It is sad, because he once had the opportunity-and the sincere motivation-to lead the nation to a more enlightened policy toward immigrant workers and their families. His welcoming attitude, dating back to his years in Texas, has long been his most admirable quality as a political leader. If that attitude attracted Hispanic voters to his party, then at least it represented a refreshing change from the "Southern strategy" of racially coded messages and the polarizing anti-immigrant policies of the recent past. Compared with much of the dubious image-making that has suffused his campaigns and his Presidency, Mr. Bush's friendliness toward the Latino community seemed authentic and rooted in his own experience. Unfortunately, he has waited too long to lead on this issue, and he has proved so incompetent as President that he lacks credibility. At this late date, sending thousands of troops southward in an effort to appear tough only underscores his failure. Prospects for immigration reform along the lines proposed by Senators McCain and Kennedy would not be so dim if Mr. Bush hadn't neglected border security over the past several years. The voters who now express such resentment and fear might have been mollified if the government had done more to restore control over the borders. While the President boasts about boosting the number of Border Patrol agents by thousands, the truth is that his last budget only provided enough money to add 200 new agents. In Congress, members of both parties have sought increased spending on border security, only to be rebuffed by the administration. That neglect has opened space for the ugliest elements in American society to reassert their brutality and prejudice. Extreme nativists imagine cruel mass deportations of Latino families, or worse, in order to preserve "white America." Those lunatics have branded Mr. Bush a "traitor," and many of his once-fervent right-wing supporters are attacking him bitterly. On the far-right Web site WorldNetDaily, a columnist who describes himself as a "Christian libertarian" recently explained why he knew that the President is wrong about mass deportations. "If it took the Germans less than four years to rid themselves of six million Jews, many of whom spoke German and were fully integrated into German society," he wrote, "it couldn't possibly take more than eight years to deport 12 million illegal aliens, many of whom don't speak English and are not integrated into American society."
Assuming that civilized Americans are not prepared to contemplate a "final solution," then someday we may realize that massive human migrations require substantial solutions. What we need is a hemispheric development effort to improve wages and social conditions in Mexico and Central America. But there are domestic policies that could also prove effective.
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Just Don't Tell 'Em You Know Me By William Rivers Pitt
You thought you was the cool fool,
Just one thing I ask of you,
Shake it, shake it Sugaree,
Just don't tell 'em you know me. Damned right. The saga of the broadening "Duke" Cunningham cash-and-prostitutes-for-contracts bribery scandal, coupled with the still-burning Abramoff influence-peddling scheme, coupled again with the wide fallout from the sudden political demise of Tom DeLay, has a crowd of people in the GOP wondering when there will be a Federal knock on their door. There are a lot of names on the roll call for this combined mess, and many of those names sit on the member list of important House committees like Intelligence and Appropriations. All of this could be written off as just another swampy example of the old absolute-power-corrupts-absolutely phenomenon, and it seems in many press circles that this is exactly where these stories are getting filed. Politicians are corrupt? Stop the presses. A race horse with a broken leg is getting more ink and air time these days. There's a question that needs to be asked, because this set of scandals - the Cunningham scandal in particular - highlights a situation that plows right through "corruption" and "hypocrisy" before parking itself directly in front of the door to "national security." That's right, "national security." That issue so many Democrats are terrified of because the country seems to be convinced that the GOP has that issue in the bag. Republicans will keep us safe, so goes the lore, while Democrats will sell the Puget Sound and most of Manhattan to Osama bin Laden and the Ayatollah for pennies on the dollar ... right before raising your taxes and teaching your children how to perform abortions. Etc., etc. Over the last several years, the Bush administration and their Republican congressional allies have moved mountains to make sure that the myriad national security catastrophes we have endured are blamed on someone else. Their favorite whipping post has been the intelligence community - the CIA in particular. 9/11 happened because of intelligence failures. The fact that no WMD were found in Iraq was due to intelligence failures. Not our fault, folks. The bad spies lied to me. They're probably Democrats, too. So here's the question: Randy "Duke" Cunningham gets busted for taking bribes from defense contractors who wooed him with money and whores. Those defense contractors were looking to get contracts within the intelligence community and they got them. This went on for years and appears to have involved a whole roomful of Republicans who sit on incredibly important House committees. How is this not a glaring national security issue? Could it be that if corrupt Republican House members were not letting bribe-happy contractors into the intelligence community by way of the doggy door, perhaps disasters like 9/11 and Iraq could have been avoided? Any defense contractor who has to offer bribes to get a gig is, prima facie, not suited for the role they seek, and a danger to the nation. The same Republicans who lament the shabby state of our intelligence services have been enjoying handsome cash endowments by shuttling these criminals into these services. Thus far, I've seen nobody putting this question to them in just this way, and it needs to be asked. If you are going to save your own political bacon by blaming the CIA for your own failures, the least you can do is not take bribes to water down the very intelligence apparatus you denigrate. The fact that this has been going on for some time now blows several Holland Tunnels through the whole "Republicans keep us safe" tapestry that has been weaved over the national debate. You would think, after the events of the last several days, that this corruption issue has suddenly fallen apart as a campaign issue for the Democrats. Rep. William Jefferson of Louisiana has come under the shadow of scandal, having been accused of taking cash bribes to help a Virginia businesswoman nail down telephone and Internet installation contracts in Nigeria and Ghana. The pundit class is solicitously noting that, oh well, the Democrats have lost this issue for the midterms thanks to Rep. Jefferson, and the Republicans are secretly rejoicing that, for once, they aren't the ones with mud on them. This is a different kettle of fish, however, for several reasons. First of all, Jefferson is vehemently denying any wrongdoing. We will all just have to wait and see how far that carries. Second of all - and this is where Machiavelli makes an appearance - you have to wonder whether the moves against Jefferson have been made to deliberately conflate Republican corruption with Democrats, the ultimate goal of which would be to torpedo the issue before the midterms heat up. A raid on the Rayburn House Office Building by Federal agents? In all the history of the republic, such a thing has never happened. The dramatic nature of this action guaranteed that the situation surrounding Rep. Jefferson would be moved dramatically to the head of the line of scandal stories being reported. Jefferson, a Democrat, is now the poster child for congressional corruption, thanks to that raid. The raid was so egregious that it inspired Republican Speaker of the House Hastert to rise on defense of Jefferson, and of Congress as a whole. "The actions of the Justice Department in seeking and executing this warrant," said Hastert in a prepared statement, "raise important constitutional issues that go well beyond the specifics of this case. Insofar as I am aware, since the founding of our republic 219 years ago, the Justice Department has never found it necessary to do what it did Saturday night, crossing this Separation of Powers line, in order to successfully prosecute corruption by members of Congress. Nothing I have learned in the last 48 hours leads me to believe that there was any necessity to change the precedent established over those 219 years." It is terribly convenient timing. And lest we forget, the raid was undertaken with the full knowledge of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. "It would appear," said Hastert in his statement, "that the Attorney General himself was aware that Separation of Powers concerns existed." Given the ham-fisted, politically-motivated power plays that have been the hallmark of this administration, it is not too far a stretch to imagine that the actions of the FBI on Saturday night were undertaken to change the subject in Washington. Yet even if Jefferson is guilty, and even if the actions of the FBI come to be deemed acceptable - why not, since we appear to be collectively bent on trashing most of our constitutional protections these days - the question asked above still stands. If Jefferson took bribes, he did so to help a Virginia business install phone and Internet lines in Africa. This is a far, far cry from the kind of frontal attacks upon our intelligence branches that corrupt Republicans like Cunningham and his friends have profited from. Jefferson, if guilty, is merely venal. Cunningham, who has confessed his guilt, put personal profit before the national security of this country, and he had many Republican friends who helped him. This is the difference between the devil and the deep blue sea. It is all the difference in the world.
It would be great if our national conversation on this subject could be framed this way - that is to say, properly. There are a lot of GOP congressfolk walking around Washington right now hoping and praying that their indicted cohorts, and the prostitutes who entertained them, have forgotten their names. It is one thing to take a bribe. It is another entirely to take a bribe that cuts the legs out from under our ability as a nation to defend itself. Given all that has happened in New York and Washington and Pennsylvania and Iraq, the cash they took is covered with blood.
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 Listening In By Seymour Hersh A few days before the start of the confirmation hearings for General Michael Hayden, who has been nominated by President Bush to be the head of the C.I.A., I spoke to an official of the National Security Agency who recently retired. The official joined the N.S.A. in the mid-nineteen-seventies, soon after contentious congressional hearings that redefined the relationship between national security and the public's right to privacy. The hearings, which revealed that, among other abuses, the N.S.A. had illegally intercepted telegrams to and from the United States, led to the passage of the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, to protect citizens from unlawful surveillance. "When I first came in, I heard from all my elders that 'we'll never be able to collect intelligence again,'" the former official said. "They'd whine, 'Why do we have to report to oversight committees?' " But, over the next few years, he told me, the agency did find a way to operate within the law. "We built a system that protected national security and left people able to go home at night without worrying whether what they did that day was appropriate or legal." After the attacks of September 11, 2001, it was clear that the intelligence community needed to get more aggressive and improve its performance. The Administration, deciding on a quick fix, returned to the tactic that got intelligence agencies in trouble thirty years ago: intercepting large numbers of electronic communications made by Americans. The N.S.A.'s carefully constructed rules were set aside. Last December, the Times reported that the N.S.A. was listening in on calls between people in the United States and people in other countries, and a few weeks ago USA Today reported that the agency was collecting information on millions of private domestic calls. A security consultant working with a major telecommunications carrier told me that his client set up a top-secret high-speed circuit between its main computer complex and Quantico, Virginia, the site of a government-intelligence computer center. This link provided direct access to the carrier's network core-the critical area of its system, where all its data are stored. "What the companies are doing is worse than turning over records," the consultant said. "They're providing total access to all the data." "This is not about getting a cardboard box of monthly phone bills in alphabetical order," a former senior intelligence official said. The Administration's goal after September 11th was to find suspected terrorists and target them for capture or, in some cases, air strikes. "The N.S.A. is getting real-time actionable intelligence," the former official said. The N.S.A. also programmed computers to map the connections between telephone numbers in the United States and suspect numbers abroad, sometimes focussing on a geographic area, rather than on a specific person-for example, a region of Pakistan. Such calls often triggered a process, known as "chaining," in which subsequent calls to and from the American number were monitored and linked. The way it worked, one high-level Bush Administration intelligence official told me, was for the agency "to take the first number out to two, three, or more levels of separation, and see if one of them comes back"-if, say, someone down the chain was also calling the original, suspect number. As the chain grew longer, more and more Americans inevitably were drawn in. FISA requires the government to get a warrant from a special court if it wants to eavesdrop on calls made or received by Americans. (It is generally legal for the government to wiretap a call if it is purely foreign.) The legal implications of chaining are less clear. Two people who worked on the N.S.A. call-tracking program told me they believed that, in its early stages, it did not violate the law. "We were not listening to an individual's conversation," a defense contractor said. "We were gathering data on the incidence of calls made to and from his phone by people associated with him and others." Similarly, the Administration intelligence official said that no warrant was needed, because "there's no personal identifier involved, other than the metadata from a call being placed." But the point, obviously, was to identify terrorists. "After you hit something, you have to figure out what to do with it," the Administration intelligence official told me. The next step, theoretically, could have been to get a suspect's name and go to the fisa court for a warrant to listen in. One problem, however, was the volume and the ambiguity of the data that had already been generated. ("There's too many calls and not enough judges in the world," the former senior intelligence official said.) The agency would also have had to reveal how far it had gone, and how many Americans were involved. And there was a risk that the court could shut down the program. Instead, the N.S.A. began, in some cases, to eavesdrop on callers (often using computers to listen for key words) or to investigate them using traditional police methods. A government consultant told me that tens of thousands of Americans had had their calls monitored in one way or the other. "In the old days, you needed probable cause to listen in," the consultant explained. "But you could not listen in to generate probable cause. What they're doing is a violation of the spirit of the law." One C.I.A. officer told me that the Administration, by not approaching the FISA court early on, had made it much harder to go to the court later. The Administration intelligence official acknowledged that the implications of the program had not been fully thought out. "There's a lot that needs to be looked at," he said. "We are in a technology age. We need to tweak fisa, and we need to reconsider how we handle privacy issues." Marc Rotenberg, the executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, believes that if the White House had gone to Congress after September 11th and asked for the necessary changes in FISA "it would have got them." He told me, "The N.S.A. had a lot of latitude under FISA to get the data it needed. I think the White House purposefully ignored the law, because the President did not want to do the monitoring under FISA. There is a strong commitment inside the intelligence community to obey the law, and the community is getting dragged into the mud on this." General Hayden, who as the head of the N.S.A. supervised the intercept program, is seen by many as a competent professional who was too quick to follow orders without asking enough questions. As one senior congressional staff aide said, "The concern is that the Administration says, 'We're going to do this,' and he does it-even if he knows better." Former Democratic Senator Bob Kerrey, who was a member of the 9/11 Commission, had a harsher assessment. Kerrey criticized Hayden for his suggestion, after the Times expos, that the N.S.A.'s wiretap program could have prevented the attacks of 9/11. "That's patently false and an indication that he's willing to politicize intelligence and use false information to help the President," Kerrey said. Hayden's public confirmation hearing last week before the Senate Intelligence Committee was unlike the tough-minded House and Senate investigations of three decades ago, and added little to what is known about the wiretap program. One unexamined issue was the effectiveness of the N.S.A. program. "The vast majority of what we did with the intelligence was ill-focussed and not productive," a Pentagon consultant told me. "It's intelligence in real time, but you have to know where you're looking and what you're after."
On May 11th, President Bush, responding to the USA Today story, said, "If Al Qaeda or their associates are making calls into the United States, or out of the United States, we want to know what they are saying." That is valid, and a well-conceived, properly supervised intercept program would be an important asset. "Nobody disputes the value of the tool," the former senior intelligence official told me. "It's the unresolved tension between the operators saying, 'Here's what we can build,' and the legal people saying, 'Just because you can build it doesn't mean you can use it.' " It's a tension that the President and his advisers have not even begun to come to terms with.
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 Heil Bush, Dear Ohio Zustand Gerichtshof Richter McGinty, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your sending Bush protesters for psychological examinations thus officially linking protesting to insanity giving us the ability to put away anyone who protests. Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Judicial Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Wolf's Lair" formally 'Rancho de Bimbo' on 05-27-2006. We salute you herr McGinty, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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AUSTIN - Looking at the wreckage of the Bush administration leaves one with the depressed query, "Now what?"
The only help to the country that can come from this ugly and spectacular crack-up is that, in theory, things can't get worse. This administration is so discredited that it cannot talk the country into an unnecessary war with Iran as it did with Iraq. In theory, spending is so out of control that it cannot cut taxes for the rich again; the fiscal irresponsibility of the Bushies is among its lasting legacies.
As we all know, things can always get worse, and often do.
It's going to be up to the Democrats to hold the metaphoric hands of this crippled administration until it limps off stage. The Republican National Committee has a new scare tactic for the faithful: You must give to the party, or else the Democrats will spend the next two years investigating the administration (horror of horrors). Those who recall the insanely trivial investigations of the Clinton years may indeed regard this as the ultimate waste of time and money (as even Ken Starr concluded, there never was anything to Whitewater), but in fact it could be a therapeutic use of the next biennium. In fact, the offenses are not comparable.
Suppose we stopped to investigate why and how and who is responsible for this administration's lies, deformed policies and inability to govern. There is a wealth of lessons to be learned about the dangers of ideological delusion and contempt for governance.
Trouble is, the world is not apt to hold still for two years. It seems to me pointless to impeach George W. Bush. The Republicans so trivialized impeachment into partisan piffle that it would look like little more than payback. And Dick Cheney is seriously off the rails, apparently deeply paranoid -- let's not put him in charge.
The minimum we should expect of Bush in return for dropping impeachment (or not) is that he cease breaking the law. Despite the opinions of Cheney, Alberto Gonzales, David Addington, etc., the president of the United States does not have the authority to set aside the law.
(If Bush were impeached, I would use as evidence his astounding statement in March that the matter of getting American troops out of Iraq "will be decided by future presidents and future governments of Iraq." What a contemptible statement.)
It would be easier to contemplate a two-year holding period if Bush hadn't already wasted so much time. Of particular note in this department is "the inconvenient truth": global warming.
Wasting eight years in the face of what we already knew when Bush came in is not only insane but also unforgivable. A recent poll showed the majority of Americans believe that the war in Iraq will be the overriding issue of Bush's presidency. I suspect that future historians will fixate on his global warming record -- not only doing nothing to stop it but letting the hole get dug deeper as well.
Barring emergency, I suspect that the wisest thing Democrats can do in the next two years is to begin steadily undoing what Bush hath wrought -- on tax and spending, on global warming, and on surveillance and other illegal lunges for power. Bush ran in 2000 as a moderate. He did not bother to inform us at the time that he felt the government of this country needed a much stronger executive above the law. Congress has sat by passively while this administration has accrued more and more power. If members of Congress think the legislative branch should be equal, it's time for them to stir their stumps.
Am I jumping to conclusions? Can Karl Rove yet steer his party away from electoral disaster in the fall? I do not think George W. can be put together again, so Rove's only option is go negative against the Democrats -- no surprise there. They could attack Democrats on almost anything, but that would leave the large question "Compared to what?" It would be interesting to see an election in which Bush is not a factor and the whole fight is over what Tom DeLay and the K Street Project have made of the Congress. If ever a gang of corrupt jerks deserved to be held accountable, it's this one.
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America has lost its way. We are a confused nation, beset on all sides by fear and paranoia. After the orchestrated 9-11 attack on New York City and Washington D.C., and its follow-up anthrax attack on Democratic legislators, Americans of all stripes rushed en masse to George Bush's Fools' Gate to trade their morality and compassion for empty promises of security. The consequences of that Faustian trade are unbelievable. In order to be safe we signed a pact with Decider Bush to condone any atrocity he could dream up so long as it happened in other lands to other men, other women, other children. He agreed, and further decided that no law conjured up by mere man applied to him, especially the U.S. Constitution, and demanded we sacrifice our freedoms as collateral for this evil pact.
How easily we were fooled! Fat, indolent, and full of self-righteous pus, we were ripe for harvest. We are at the mercy of The Decider, who is manipulated from behind the scenes by unelected neo-Straussian thugs lusting for the matrix of a One World Order. They are joined by Christo-fascists soiling themselves at the thought of gaining dominion over the government apparatus and realizing their dream of stoning gays and liberals to death, and by rapacious corporations intent on ransacking the universe until it is stripped of all treasure and resources. Although their agendae differ, this greedy axis shares a single goal -- that of complete power and control -- an area where morality dies aborning. They also share one other critical attribute -- they are aggressively anti-American -- traitors contemptuous of representative democracy who will not rest until every last vestige of it is wiped from the face of the earth.
The war they are waging is on us.
We have lost much over the past five years, but nothing as profound as our spirituality. The religious among us are little more than blind sheep milling around, stumbling in single file in the direction of the loudest voice blaring from Tower of Babel churches and media ministries. They are unable to discern good from evil and incapable of recognizing the filthy hypocrisy of the religious right's fundamentalist theocracy. And there are more of them every day -- God's warriors eagerly following the divinely inspired Bush into a dark world of assassination, torture, murder and madness. Bush is "born again." He said so himself. God talks to him. Would he do anything that was not God's will?
I wonder if there is just one true Christian who can look at what Bush has done in the last five years, and what he is threatening to do in the next three and say that Bush is "born again"? Do Christians not know their own God? Did not God warn us to be vigilant against the "Deceiver" masquerading as a messenger of light lest we fall prey to, and become a part of, the evil swirling around us? Are we not responsible for discerning the nature of the beast -- the false prophets sent out into the world?
I do not recognize this devilishly destructive, violent god of the evangelical religious right who has sent Bush on his genocidal mission. The God I am familiar with is the One to whom my mother knelt in tearful prayer each night and raised her sweet, wonderful voice in praise each day. He is the One to whom David sang in Psalm 5:4 --"For thou are not a God who delights in wickedness; evil may not sojourn with thee. The boastful may not stand before thy eyes; thou hatest all evildoers. Thou destroyest those who speak lies; the Lord abhors bloodthirsty and deceitful men."
Do not be deceived. Emerson says that virtue or vice emit a breath every moment, and each breath Bush, Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell and the hypocritical Republican Christo-fascist machine emit are putrid blasts of evil lies. As Carolyn Baker writes so succinctly..." The religious right of twenty-first century America is anti-American, inherently violent, and a cruel, tyrannical, punitive, force of death and destruction. "
Baker says the "unredeemed, the unbelievers, the poor, the feminists, the gay and lesbian, the disabled, the homeless, the mentally ill, the addicted, and those who are conscientiously following divergent spiritual paths of their choice, are suffering in the wake of Christian fundamentalism's devastation of the economy, the earth, and the human race." She says adult human lives do not matter to these people and, unless we follow their tenets, we deserve to "burn in hell for all of eternity. Hence, we are expendable, inconsequential, and a force to be conquered, broken, imprisoned, or killed."
How easily these creatures who have never served their country in uniform send others to be maimed, broken and killed in an endless "war on terror," which is nothing but an abstraction whose reality lies in the mind of the beholder. Day after weary day the bodies pile up at the feet of the stubborn, mean-spirited Bush and the beast he has unleashed upon the world whose thirst for blood cannot be quenched. There have been 2,471 Americans slaughtered because of the shameful lies told by Bush, Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice, Donald Rumsfeld and others -- and especially by the dishonorable Colin Powell who carried the beast's water all the way to the United Nations. Hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi and Afghanistani men, women and children have perished on the alter of Bush's god, who is even now panting to bury his fangs in the throat of Iran.
The present-day "religion" has little to do with Christianity. It is all bloody politics. The Republican party is little more than a fascist religious cult whose goal is to take over this republic and rule it by the cold compassion of the Old Testament God. For those who doubt that consolidating power and controlling politics is far more important to the religious right than saving souls, Katherine Yurica reports in her The New Messiahs text that Pat Robertson announced publicly on his 700 Club at a time when the religious right was gaining dominance, "We have enough votes to run the country -- and when the people say, 'we've had enough,' we're going to take over the country."
Yurica said there was never any doubt of the ultimate goal of not only Robertson, but Jerry Falwell, Tim LaHaye and many others. "What is dominion?" Pat Robertson asked his television audience, "Well," he said, "dominion is lordship, to reign and rule."
And kill. The scent of innocent blood sends these guys into nearly as wild a frenzy as it does Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld. Falwell recently announced in trembling excitement, "You've got to kill the terrorists before the killing stops. And I'm for the president to chase them all over the world. If it takes 10 years, blow them all away in the name of the Lord."
Robertson has called on his followers to pray for the deaths of Supreme Court justices. He has called for the assassination of Venezuela's Hugo Chavez no less than three times. Both Falwell and Robertson openly blamed the attacks of 9-11 on gays, lesbians and pagan liberals. If Robertson weren't so dangerous the blasphemous "chats" he claims to have, wherein he trivializes, demeans and ridicules the Creator of the entire Universe, would be hilarious. Just last week Robertson babbled that God gave him a heavenly weather report. "If I heard the Lord right," he said, "storms and possibly a tsunami would hit US coasts this year."
And, in April, God helped him cure a woman of her asthma. Robertson said fortunately he had his wife with him -- "this haunting woman...very attractive -- striking brunette, 45 years old, you know thin, 5'8" kinda thing..." Robertson said he prayed, "Lord, what's wrong with her?" And God said, "ask her about her sex life." Robertson and God argued for a bit before Robertson asked her about her marriage, which she said was "wonderful." He turned back to God, reminding us again that he had his wife with him, and asked, "Lord, what's the matter?" God insisted, "Ask her about her sex life." So, as soon as ol' Pat asked her about her sex life and she said she didn't have any, God cured her of her asthma.
The beasts who would destroy us -- will destroy us -- if we are not vigilant -- walk among us not as the hideous demons they are, but hide their true nature behind the masks of their twisted ethos, disguised as bumbling, arrogant fools. Thanks to them, America is no longer a Beacon of Freedom to the rest of the world, but a flickering ray of shame and derision. Thanks to them, God has become a symbol of hate and terror. Because of their lust, the American Flag is now America's funeral shroud.
... Walt Handelsman ...  |
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With elections round the corner
We give you Homosexual marriage
Lies lit up the daytime
We give you Homosexual marriage
Billy Frist and Arlen Spector
Gas will be four bucks a gallon
We give you Homosexual marriage
With scandal all around us
It must be Homosexual marriage
Just remember there's a price paid
You give them Homosexual marriage
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Parting Shots...
WASHINGTON, DC-The Federal Aviation Administration announced today that United Airlines Flight 43, which crashed outside Parkersburg, WV last Thursday, was in fact brought down by passengers who voluntarily sacrificed their lives in order to prevent the screening of the in-flight movie selection, Big Momma's House 2. All 105 people onboard died in the crash. "As we examine the passengers' cell-phone calls and flight recordings, we get a sense of the incredible courage displayed by these ordinary men and women," said FAA Administrator Marion Blakey at a press conference Monday, during which excerpts from the recordings were played. "They acted in the only way they could to stop this unspeakable horror starring Martin Lawrence as an FBI agent who goes undercover as a nanny for a sexy murder suspect." "These people are true American heroes," Blakey added. Flight 43 left New York's LaGuardia Airport on schedule last Thursday at 10:17 a.m. en route to Los Angeles with no indication of any suspiciously bad entertainment activity aboard. Black-box evidence indicates that, 40 minutes after takeoff, the crew walked through the cabin and asked passengers to close their window screens. The audio recording goes eerily quiet after a flight attendant can be heard announcing that Big Momma's House 2 would be shown. "It will be days, months perhaps, before we have a complete picture of exactly what happened," said FAA crash investigator Matthew Roberts, whose team was given the unpleasant job of analyzing Flight 43's last moments. "But we know that the passengers somehow assembled toward the rear of the cabin without attracting attention to themselves-which couldn't have been easy, considering the tense silence that typically accompanies a Big Momma's House film-and decided that they would rather die than let anyone do this to them." Around 11:00, business-class passenger Charles Rice left an emotional message on the cell-phone voicemail of his fiance, Kathi Kearney. "Honey, it's me," Rice said in one of the excerpts. "I... God. Listen, they've darkened the cabin, and they've started showing Big Momma's House 2. The second one, I mean, and it... it's pretty bad. This might not go well, honey. A bunch of us are going to try to stop them. I have to go, we're going to go now. God, I am so sorry. You know I love you." Although Roberts said they may never determine who acted first or how the passengers organized their resistance to the brutally awful comedy, it is believed that all onboard were united in their need to stop the movie from being shown. In an amazing coincidence, at least one other person aboard Flight 43 had actually survived a screening of the original Big Momma's House on an international flight in 2001, which may have given them impetus to act. "It seems clear that, from the opening moments of the film, they knew exactly how it had to end-either 99 minutes later as Martin Lawrence's excruciating mugging brought it all to a heinous conclusion, or with the deaths of everyone aboard," Roberts said. "We can only hope that we would act with the same bravery and conscientiousness if presented with the same situation." Cabin recordings seem to indicate that a refreshment cart was used to charge the attendant station at the front of the aircraft at a decisive moment in the film in which a sexy potential villain asks Lawrence's character for help removing her bra. Much of the recording is incoherent, but Blakey played a 15-second segment in which some of the flight attendants can be heard exhorting passengers to remain seated while others seemed to be voicing second thoughts. "Clearly, the passengers were facing well-trained hard-liners intent on doing as much damage as they could," said Blakey, gesturing to the charred, partially melted Big Momma's House 2 DVD case found in the wreckage as evidence. "When they found the hospitality station locked down and secured as per airline policy, the only choice they had left was to infiltrate the cockpit." One last garbled transmission was made from Flight 43 just before it disappeared from air-traffic control's monitors. Though the FAA has not released it publicly, Blakey confirmed that the passengers can be clearly heard reciting the Lord's Prayer over the scream of the engines and the high falsetto shriek of a female-impersonating Martin Lawrence.
Plans are already underway to honor the victims by presenting them with the Presidential Medal Of Freedom, a $4 million memorial in the West Virginia field where Flight 43 crashed, and a proposed Spring 2007 release of Flight 43, a big-budget action comedy-drama starring Chris Tucker as Martin Lawrence. |
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In This Edition
Tom Engelhardt concludes, "Thirty Flew Into The Cuckoo's Nest."
Uri Avnery recalls, "Missed Opportunities."
Doris "Granny D" Haddock is, "Preparing For The Post-Carbon Age."
Jim Hightower watches as, "Bush's IRS Goes After Poor Folks."
Greg Palast follows, "Lay Convicted, Bush Walks (and Ahnold Gets Lay'd)."
Chris Floyd explores, "Bush's China Syndrome."
Andrew Buncombe reports, "Bush Planted Fake News Stories On American TV."
Robert Parry explains, "Bush's My Lai."
Joe Conason finds, "Nobody's Laughing At Al Gore's Truths."
Norman Solomon celebrates, "Media Memorial Day."
Ted Rall revisits, "The 10,000th Haditha."
Generalissimo Alberto Gonzales wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award!'
Molly Ivins says, "Reform The System Or Lose The Democracy."
Maureen Dowd warns, "Don't Become Them."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department the White House.Org presents 'Ask the White House' this week it's "Mary Cheney: Blissfully Well-Adjusted Second Daughter" but first Uncle Ernie looks for parallels in the, "Last Days In The Fuhrer Bunker."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Vic Harville with additional cartoons from Derf City, Micah Wright, Buzz Flash, Nick Anderson, Mark Streeter, Walt Handlesman and Pat Bagley.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Last Days In The Fuhrer Bunker By Ernest Stewart
"There is nothing more frightening than active ignorance."
"Meet the new boss. Same as the old boss!"
For those and many other reasons a lot of liberal and leftward pundits are predicting that we're now in the final daze of the countdown before the Bush Junta's collapse and "Happy Days" are here at last! Sure, there are many similarities between The Crime Family Bush and their business partner Adolph Hitler. In fact, many think the Junta is using the Third Reich's playbook and who knows perhaps they're right? Even though Bush is beginning to resemble Hitler in his last couple of months spent down in the bunker, still I beg to differ! I truly do wish it were that easy, I truly do! Wouldn't it be nice if our Matrixed brothers and sister unplugged themselves and could finally see the light and see their responsibility for it? Wouldn't that be a joyous day? But when has that ever happened? I mean, maybe I was absent that day from my studies, when we covered a real government BY and FOR the people? Excuse me but when did that ever happen? I've spent the last 45 years studying 8000 years of recorded history & poli-sci and I'll be damned if I can find any golden age of wisdom, love and righteousness. Can you? Don't point to the ancient Geeks er Greeks and that Athens democracy song-and-dance. Yes for a hundred years democracy was tried by the ruling class men but it didn't apply to their horses, their slaves, their wives and their other possessions either. Nothing really changes, as the Firesign Theatre once said, "The ancient Geeks ate their servants, we throw away light bulbs!" So even if we hung the Junta and their pals, every one; nothing would change. In about a minute's time the next strongman, dictator, crime family would come along. As long as the power remains intact we can expect more of the same. Just like "The Who" said, "Meet the new boss. Same as the old boss!" Until we take this a step forward and actually give power to the people, that is to say the truth, it's just business as usual! So won't you help? Help us save the world, awaken a Sheeple today! In Other News... For all of you End-Timers out there I have to report another sign of the Apocalypse. Satan's little girl Ann Coulter is releasing her latest collection of rambling, "Clueless" on his Satanic Majesty's day of days, June sixth or for you numerologists 666. What better day to launch a book of hate and lies than on 666? However I understand that Ann gives a great recipe for Southern Fried liberal babies." Sounds yummy, eh? Also, knowing our Junta's love of numbers I'd stay off of airliners and other modes of public transportation and away from ball games, concerts and other large gatherings on Tuesday! ***** I see that the two Bush appointees to the Extreme Court i.e. Johnny (da Enforcer) Roberts and Sammy (da Coathanger) Alito joined with Tony Light-Fingers, Fat Tony and Slappy T when they ruled to hush up the whistle-blowers, ruling that the 1st Amendment doesn't apply to government employees who disclose waste and fraud as part of their jobs! The Gang of Five(tm) said the government's interest in effectively managing operations outweighs the interests that protect employee speech and this includes cases of reporting criminal behavior. I'm going to repeat that again for those of you on drugs. If you work for the government you give up your We can now kiss the 1st Amendment goodbye as we already have the 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th and 12th Amendments. When will enough be enough America? ***** And finally, here are some fun fact's about the "Bird Flu!" Y'all take notes, there's going to be a short quiz afterwards...
Did you know that the current "bird flu" was discovered in Vietnam in 1997? Roche Laboratories. Do you know who bought the patent for Tamiflu from Roche Laboratories in 1996? Gilead Sciences Inc. Do you know who was the then president of Gilead Sciences Inc. and remains a major shareholder? Deputy Fuhrer Donald Rumsfeld!
Did you know that the base of Tamiflu is crushed aniseed? Roche Laboratories.
Did you know that sales of Tamiflu were over $254 million in 2004 and more than $1 billion in 2005? So what have we learned? Let's Review! We've learned... That Bush's friends decide that the medicine Tamiflu is the solution for a pandemic that has not yet occurred and that has caused a hundred twenty nine deaths worldwide since 1997. That this medicine doesn't so much as cure the common flu. That in normal conditions this virus does not affect humans. That Rumsfeld sells the patent for Tamiflu to Roche for which they pay him a fortune. That Roche acquires 90% of the global production of crushed aniseed, the base for the anti-virus. (If you were wondering where your black licorice or black licorice flavored drinks went, now you know!) That the governments all over the world threaten a pandemic and then buy industrial quantities of the product from Roche.
So in conclusion; we end up paying for medicine that we don't need, for a pandemic that isn't coming, so that Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush can keep going to the bank! Can you dig it? Happy Summer Vacation Y'all! ********************************************
We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
And more importantly, what are you planning on doing about it?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
 Thirty Flew Into The Cuckoo's Nest The Tangled Web of American "Intelligence" By Tom Engelhardt In recent months, among other uproars and scandals, Americans learned that the Defense Department has been collecting intelligence on and tracking domestic antiwar activists; that, since 2001, the National Security Agency (NSA) has had a presidentially authorized, law-breaking, warrantless surveillance program to listen in on the international phone calls of possibly tens of thousands of U.S. citizens; that, with the help of three of the four major telephone companies, it also has had a data-mining operation - "the largest database ever assembled in the world" - linked, at least one case, directly into a major telecommunication carrier's network core ("where all its data are stored"), giving it access to almost all telephone calls made in this country; that, as Director of the CIA, Porter Goss, a Bush-appointed, Cheney-backed, ex-congressman, had whipped out his lie detector and conducted an internal war and purge of an agency viewed by the administration as little better than the Axis of Evil, tearing its upper ranks apart via numerous resignations and retirements; that, meanwhile, Goss's third-in-command, a fellow with the evocative name of Kyle "Dusty" Foggo (think: fog o' intelligence), was being investigated for possibly granting illegal Agency sweetheart contracts to a pal already involved in another major Washington corruption scandal (and don't even get me started on those poker games and prostitutes); that Goss, in turn, was pushed out of the CIA by Director of National Intelligence (DNI) John Negroponte, head of a new uber-intelligence "office" (ODNI) meant to coordinate the whole sprawling "intelligence community," and his second in command, Air Force General Michael Hayden, the former head of the NSA (who oversaw those surveillance and data-mining operations for the administration); that the President then nominated the active-duty general to take Goss's place as the head of the country's major civilian spy agency - in his Senate hearings, he would offer the following comment on Goss's tenure: "You get a lot more authority when the work force doesn't think it's amateur hour on the top floor"; that Republican and Democratic Senators, having questioned the credibility of a military man who had overseen a patently illegal surveillance program on American citizens for years and then defended it vigorously, promptly collapsed in a non-oppositional heap of praise, and rubber-stamped him director by a vote of 78-15; that in the ever-upward-rippling CIA-agent-outing case of Valerie Plame - about which a stonewalling Goss said, while still head of the House Intelligence Committee, "Somebody sends me a blue dress and some DNA, I'll have an investigation" - rumors of Karl Rove's indictment continued to circulate; while Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald reserved the right to call the Vice President, whose office seems ever more in his sightlines, to testify in former aide I. Lewis Libby's trial next year. All this news involving what we call "intelligence" - and much more - played out on the front pages of the nation's newspapers and on TV, replete with copious leaks from within the intelligence community, threats from the White House to prosecute journalists reporting those leaks, outraged press editorials about sundry intelligence topics, and a great deal of heat and noise. Each scandal came and went, the news spotlight flickering from one to the next; and yet, as Hayden's testimony before the Senate made clear, just about no one seemed to have the urge to ask the obvious what's-it-all-about-Alfie question. Nobody wondered what this thing called "intelligence," over which so many tens of thousands of analysts, code breakers, and agents labor with so many tens of billions of our dollars, really is; what sort of knowledge about our planet all those acronymic intelligence organizations really deliver. The value of the "intelligence community" to deliver this thing called "intelligence," whatever mistakes or missteps might be made, is simply taken for granted. Department of Redundancy Let's back up a moment, though, and consider what any of us out here can know about the alphabet soup of the American Intelligence Community or IC (as it likes to term itself). Start with the simplest thing: There's obviously a lot we don't know. Much of this world is, by definition, plunged into the darkness of secrecy, including untold billions of dollars hidden away in highly classified "black" budgets. Moreover, the blanket of intelligence secrecy (regularly broken by leaks to the media from so many unhappy members of that roiling "community") has grown ever more encompassing, given the Bush administration's general mania for secrecy. So whatever numbers follow have to be taken with a large grain of unverifiable salt. But we do know this: The IC is simply enormous with, seemingly, a life of its own - imperially vast, a veritable mountain of proliferating agencies, groups, and organizations, larger by multiples than that of any other country - and growing more enormous almost literally as you read. Until fairly recently, newspaper articles regularly cited an iconic 15 civilian and military intelligence agencies in that all-American "community," a number now raised to 16 at the official website of the IC, and that figure doesn't even include Negroponte's new Office of the Director of National Intelligence with its near billion-dollar budget. In addition to the Central Intelligence Agency, the gang of 16 includes the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), the NSA (surveillance and code-breaking), the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO- satellites), and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA - mapping), all under the aegis of the Pentagon, as well as the intelligence agencies of each of the Armed Services and the Coast Guard. Our second defense department, the Department of Homeland Security, has its own expanding intelligence arm with a mouthful of a name: the Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Directorate. (No self-respecting agency in our government would be without one!) So do the FBI, the State Department, the Energy Department, the Drug Enforcement Department, and the Treasury Department. But the iconic 16 (or 17) don't include numerous other intelligence groupings tucked away in the government. Some outsiders doing the counting have come up with upwards of 30 entities in the IC. That assumedly represents a whole heap of secret knowledge and, certainly, a whole heap of taxpayer money. Recently, in a slip of the tongue, Mary Margaret Graham, deputy director for national intelligence collection under Negroponte, offered (for only the third time since the founding of the CIA) a public estimate of the overall annual U.S. intelligence budget - $44 billion just to cover the iconic 15. Undoubtedly, that's a low-ball figure, but as a crude measure of IC growth, consider that it's almost $18 billion higher than the 1998 IC budget - that being the last time such an estimate came our way. Of the various intelligence outfits, the CIA, the IC's star of the big and small screen, is the most famous (or infamous, depending on your address on this planet). Its budget is estimated at perhaps $5 billion a year and, by another ballpark estimate, it has 16,000 employees; yet, in budgetary and payroll terms, that makes up a relatively small part of the intelligence landscape, dwarfed by the Pentagon's intelligence organizations. The NSA has a budget estimated at $6-8 billion yearly; the NRO, $6-8 billion; the NGA, $3 billion; the DIA, $1 billion; and that's not even counting the sizeable intelligence outfits run by the four individual services. Cumulatively, an estimated 80-85% (or possibly more) of the total U.S. intelligence budget is controlled by the Pentagon, the 800 pound intelligence gorilla in the IC room - and in the midst of a growth spurt that's threatening to send it soaring into the one-ton range. As with so much else in these last years, the real story in the intelligence community seems to have had less to do with the production of, or analysis of, intelligence than with its militarization. Known for his skill as a bureaucratic infighter, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld conducted a tough rear-guard action against the creation of Negroponte's 9/11 Commission-sponsored ODNI; then, upon "giving in," he managed to get what was essentially a Pentagon veto over Negroponte's power to meddle with military intelligence. He also lobbied successfully in Congress "to curtail much of Negroponte's clout over personnel and budgets." (According to Doyle McManus and Peter Spiegel of the Los Angeles Times, when Negroponte did try to make changes at the Defense Department, he was told "to take a flying leap.") Far more important, just as in recent years the Pentagon has moved into areas once controlled by the State Department, so Rumsfeld has for several years been moving aggressively to infringe on the CIA's key turf, "human intelligence" or "humint." (Think: operatives out in the field doing whatever.) Not long after 9/11, according to Barton Gelman of the Washington Post, Rumsfeld issued a written order to end his "near total dependence on [the] CIA" for humint. Then, using "reprogrammed funds" not authorized by Congress, he established a secret organization, the Strategic Support Branch, to provide him "with independent tools for the 'full spectrum of humint operations.'" In March 2003, he set up his right-hand man, neocon Stephen Cambone, as the first ever undersecretary of defense for intelligence. (Cambone is now regularly referred to as the Pentagon's "intelligence czar.") Cambone, in turn, took on as his deputy, the notorious, born-again, evangelizing Lieutenant-General William G. Boykin, who plunged himself into controversy in 2003 by saying of Islam, "I knew my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God and his was an idol," and of President Bush, "The majority of Americans did not vote for him. Why is he there? And I tell you this morning that he's in the White House because God put him there for a time such as this." Naturally, he rose in the administration hierarchy as a result. Rumsfeld charged them both with "reorganizing" - meaning, of course, expanding - Pentagon intelligence operations through "the Special Operations Command, which reports to Rumsfeld and falls outside the orbit controlled by John Negroponte." They were to expand specifically into the CIA's "humint" area, creating intelligence that would "prepare the battlefield" - in part, by sending covert operations teams to spy in various countries where no battlefield was even faintly in sight. Cambone now "oversees 130 full-time personnel and more than 100 contractors in an office whose responsibilities include domestic counterintelligence, long-range threat planning and budgeting for new technologies." And only a month ago, Rumsfeld gave the "green light" for yet another new group to be set up - the Defense Joint Intelligence Operations Center, to further "centralize" intelligence. For some years now, the American IC has focused much attention on the issue of global nuclear proliferation, but think of these as the real "proliferation wars," inside the only world, the only reality, that truly matters. The results, no matter which agencies top the list of winners, add up to an unsightly, ungainly Department of Redundancy and Overlap. While the NSA may, for instance, be conducting extensive data-mining operations, so is another new Pentagon organization, the Counterintelligence Field Activity or CIFA (on which more below). You don't have to be inside the IC to see it as a vast bureaucratic landscape for fierce turf wars, power grabs, mini-empire building, squabbling, scrabbling, coups and purges, alarums and preemptive attacks; nor do you need special insider's knowledge to recognize that the basic urge to know the world in a deeper way, to anticipate what one's enemies (and friends) have in mind, to grasp how they think and what they may do, takes, at best, a distinct second place to the complex politics of, the real and necessary knowledge of, the intelligence world itself. Intelligence Empire Builders in a Growth Universe Put another way, the real story of American intelligence is simply growth and bureaucratic infighting. The Bush administration, supposedly made up of "conservatives" who loath (and once endlessly railed against) "big government," have ensured that, like the Pentagon, the IC, already an entangled monstrosity when they arrived, would experience its greatest growth spurt in memory, becoming an ever more bloated example of hopeless big government. This reflects a more general pattern clearly visible in the creation of the administration's pride and joy, the Department of Homeland Security, another vast, bloated, inefficient agency filled with redundancy, riddled by turf wars, plagued by inefficiency - and just to make matters worse still, the creation of an ever-expanding US Northern Command (Northcom) for the defense of - you guessed it - the "homeland." Within the IC, consider but three examples of Bush administration growth policies: Start with the CIA, an agency in the process of being downgraded. It has, in fact, lost its central position as the President's daily briefer - Negroponte does that now - and the agency is no longer his covert right-arm either. As intelligence expert Thomas Powers wrote recently: "Historically the CIA had a customer base of one - the president. When its primacy in reporting to the White House was taken away, the agency was being told in effect that henceforth it would be talking to itself." But talking, it turns out, is hardly everything in the IC. In the very period when it was slipping down the pole of influence, its forces on the ground were ramping up. The Agency has opened or reopened 20 stations and bases abroad, experienced a flood of new recruits, and, since 2001, tripled the number of case officers it has in the field - without as yet coming anywhere close to "a presidential directive, announced in late 2004, to increase the number of case officers and intelligence analysts by an additional 50 percent." Or take Negroponte's ODNI operation. When originally suggested by the 9/11 commission and approved by Congress, it was to be a lean, mean coordination office meant to bring the sprawling IC under some control. Its staff of perhaps 750 was to lop the fat and overlap out of the IC. Instead, according to Walter Pincus of the Washington Post, it has undergone "rapid growth," now has a staff of over 1,500, and a budget of nearly $1 billion - "about one-third the size of all CIA funding in years before... Sept. 11, 2001" - without yet having any significant accomplishments (other, of course, than its own growth). Or, to return to the Pentagon, consider the Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA), which started as a small office to protect military facilities and personnel, but in the last years has "grown from an agency that coordinated policy and oversaw the counterintelligence activities of units within the military services and Pentagon agencies to an analytic and operational organization with nine directorates and ever-widening authority." As CIFA garnered more power, it also gained "the ability to propose missions to Army, Navy and Air Force units, which combined have about 4,000 trained active, reserve and civilian investigators in the United States and abroad." At the same time, according to that NBC Investigative Unit, it is becoming "the superpower of data mining within the U.S. national security community... Since March 2004, CIFA has awarded at least $33 million in contracts to corporate giants Lockheed Martin, Unisys Corporation, Computer Sciences Corporation and Northrop Grumman to develop databases that comb through classified and unclassified government data, commercial information and Internet chatter to help sniff out terrorists, saboteurs and spies." Recently, CIFA reportedly "contracted with Computer Sciences Corp. to buy identity-masking software, which could allow it to create fake Web sites and monitor legitimate U.S. sites without leaving clues that it had been there." Now, multiply what happened at the CIA, ODNI, and CIFA, across 17-30 major and minor organizations, all sensing financial good times and looking for expansive "intelligence" missions to "protect" us all And so, as Kurt Vonnegut might have written, it goes. Thirty Flew Into the Cuckoo's Nest There is, of course, no way for an outsider - or probably any insider either - to keep track of, or make sense of, this imperial mess. In the this-way-the-madness category, consider just how blind to the larger impulsions of the intelligence world you have to be to decide to reorganize, coordinate, and simplify it, so that information-sharing and the like become normal ways of life, by placing yet another "office" on top of the hodgepodge of powerful competitors already in existence. You would have to be nearly brain-dead not to predict that such a new office would have no choice but to follow the well-beaten path of expansion, develop its own institutional base, its own institutional prerogatives, and its own turf, only adding to the chaos - or wither and die. This is, by now, a process that should be as predictable as that at the Pentagon when it comes to the competing weapons systems of the four services. In the most recent Department of Defense budget, for instance, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, supposedly intent on "transforming" the military into a leaner, more agile, more high-tech fighting force, let every major weapons system, no matter how useless or redundant, pass through essentially untouched and with not a single one cut. With the IC, add in another factor: Even if all its competing parts really did add up to a "community" - rather than a group of warring, bureaucratic mini-states on a collective proliferation mission - what kind of "intelligence" could possibly come out of such a conglomerate entity? Try to imagine these organizations, each filled with thousands of employees, most of them believing in intelligence and that they are in the process of delivering it, sorting through and pouring out information of every sort. Globally, all those billions of telephone calls, cell-phone calls, letters, and emails to be monitored, all those satellite photos to be checked and interpreted, all that data to be mined, all that territory to be mapped, all that "humint" to sort through, not to speak of the "open-source" material in the media, on-line, in foreign documents of every sort, spewing into our world in a Babel of languages and images. From such a tangled web of intelligence organizations, fighting for turf, squirreling away money in black accounts, running covert operations (not to speak of secret prisons and interrogations, kidnappings and assassinations), surveilling everyone in hearing or sight, and monitoring the universe, undoubtedly comes a tangled mass of information, however computerized, beyond the ken of any set of human beings. This is the definition not of "intelligence," but of information overkill. It is a perfect formula either for drowning in data or cherry-picking only the data and analyses that suit your preexisting plans and urges. You can find hints of this problem in many news pieces on individual intelligence programs. For instance, that NBC Investigative Unit mentioned earlier cited "Pentagon observers" who worried that, "in the effort to thwart the next 9/11, the U.S. military is now collecting too much data, both undermining its own analysis efforts by forcing analysts to wade through a mountain of rubble in order to obtain potentially key nuggets of intelligence and entangling U.S. citizens in the U.S. military's expanding and quiet collection of domestic threat data." Seymour Hersh in a recent New Yorker piece on the NSA surveillance and data-mining programs similarly quoted a "Pentagon consultant" this way: "The vast majority of what we did with the intelligence was ill-focused and not productive... It's intelligence in real time, but you have to know where you're looking and what you're after." Almost by definition, what has to emerge from the IC much of the time is essentially the opposite of "intelligence," whatever that might be. We out here often fret about being barraged by information; now, imagine a world filled with hopeless reams and streams of information, a world in which any piece of information will be but another needle in an endless series of haystacks. In a sense, the minute you begin "mining" billions of phone calls, you've already admitted that, in information terms, you're at a loss. In search of information on the inner workings of our world, no one reasonable would ever set up a system like the IC. Were you forced to reform such an already existing mechanism, you would certainly cut all those agencies and organizations down to, at most, two competing ones - for alternate views of the world. Not that that would be ideal either. For a maximum of a few million dollars, you might put almost any fifty knowledgeable people in a building with normal computers, access to the usual search engines, libraries, and open-source information, and you would surely arrive at a more comprehensible, saner view of our planet and what to do on it than anything $44 billion and a bevy of militarized agencies could produce. If, in fact, you had simply read Tomdispatch.com (produced for next to nothing) on a number of areas of the world over the last few years, you would have had more coherent, accurate "intelligence" than the IC seems to have been able to provide much of the time. And let's not forget that human beings, no matter what they say on the phone, in emails, or even to their closest associates in private often don't themselves understand what they are about to do or why they are doing it, and so are essentially unpredictable. In other words, whatever the IC may be, it can't be a system for the reasonable delivery of "intelligence" to American leaders. If you need proof of this, just consider one thing: On the single most important subject for every administration in the last decades of the last century, the Intelligence Community simply didn't have a clue. With so many of its resources focused on that other empire, the USSR, they were incapable of predicting its collapse even as it was happening. Most of them didn't believe it even after it happened. Oh, and here's one more awkward thing to throw into the intelligence mix. The administration that has done more than any other in recent memory to expand the IC, that has poured untold billions into ever more active intelligence capacities, has had a visible, violent allergy to intelligence. After the endless sorting of information, after the blind alleys and lying informants, after all that pressure from the Vice President as well as other top officials, and who knows what else, when the IC actually got it right, it made no difference whatsoever - as in the daily briefing handed to the President on that lazy August day in 2001 in Crawford, Texas ("Bin Laden determined to strike in US") or on al-Qaeda links to Saddam Hussein, or on Niger yellowcake and those infamous "16 words" in the President's 2003 State of the Union Address. In those cases, the intelligence was simply ignored in favor of exaggerated or doctored versions of the same, or lies based on nothing at all (except perhaps a blinding desire to invade Iraq). For $44 billion dollars a year, this administration still had to set up a small separate operation inside the Pentagon, Douglas Feith's Office of Special Plans, to search for the "intelligence" that would take them where they wanted to go anyway. If the IC actually worked as an effective intelligence delivery system, we would be a genius nation, a Mensa among states. We would have an invaluable secret repository of knowledge that would be the equivalent of the destroyed ancient Library of Alexandria (which reputedly collected all the knowledge in the then-known world). And you would have to wonder, looking back on the last years: In that case, how exactly could we be quite so dumb? But let's consider the obvious: While undoubtedly filled with hard-working, thoughtful intelligence analysts, producing - sometimes - on-target intelligence, the IC is not in any normal sense a system for the delivery of "intelligence"; that is, operative information through which our leaders could take in the world, its dangers and its possibilities. At the very least, that is only the most tertiary aspect of its operations. And yet, based on claims about the crucial nature of intelligence in our world, it continues to expand without cease.
If not primarily for intelligence, then what is it for, if anything? Does anyone know? Does it even matter? Those are certainly questions worth asking. What we lack, in helping us begin to answer them, is an American John Le Carr, who could bring back in striking form from the strange netherworld of the IC, as Le Carr so devastatingly did from the Cold War world of superpower espionage, a real sense of the lay of the land.
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Missed Opportunities (Partial List) By Uri Avnery "THE PALESTINIANS never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity!" - this phrase, coined by Abba Eban, has become a by-word. It also illustrates a wise Talmudic saying: "He who finds fault in others (really) finds his own faults." No doubt, from the beginning of the conflict, the Palestinians have missed opportunities. But these are negligible compared to the opportunities missed by the State of Israel in its 58 years of existence. The list that follows is far from complete. ON THE morrow of the war of 1948, in which Israel was founded, we could have achieved peace. During the war, all the territory in which, according to the United Nations resolution of November 1947, the Arab Palestinian state should have been established, was occupied by Israel, Jordan and Egypt. Israel conquered and annexed about half of it, and the rest was divided between Jordan (which annexed the West Bank) and Egypt (which occupied the Gaza Strip). More than half the Palestinians were driven from their homes - partly by the war itself, partly by a deliberate Israeli policy. The name Palestine disappeared from the map. In the Swiss town of Lausanne, a tripartite committee, representing the United States, France and Turkey, was convened in order to mediate between the parties. The Palestinians were not invited, since they were no longer recognized as a political entity. But a delegation of three prominent Palestinians did appear, ostensibly to speak for the refugees, but in reality to represent the Palestinian people. They contacted the Israeli representative, Eliyahu Sassoon, and offered to open direct negotiations for peace. On instructions from Jerusalem, Sassoon declined. David Ben-Gurion did not want any negotiations that might have compelled him to take back at least some of the refugees, and perhaps even to give back some of the territory just occupied. Contrary to the UN resolution, he was determined to prevent at all costs the establishment of a Palestinian state. He believed that the Palestinian question had been closed, that the very name Palestine had disappeared forever, that the Palestinian people had ceased to exist. Much blood was shed because of this monumental mistake. IN JULY 1952, the revolution of the Free Officers took place in Egypt. One sole voice in Israel welcomed it publicly - the weekly news magazine Haolam Hazeh, which I edited. Ben-Gurion did indeed voice a rhetorical appeal to the formal leader of the revolution, the old general Muhammad Naguib, but the moment it became clear that the real leader was Gamal Abd-al-Nasser, Ben-Gurion declared war on him. The appearance of Abd-al-Nasser frightened Ben-Gurion, because here was a new type of Arab: a young officer, energetic, charismatic, striving to unite the Arab world. From his ascent to power until his death, 18 years later, the Egyptian leader sent out feelers again and again to find out if a settlement with Israel was feasible. Ben-Gurion rejected all these efforts and systematically prepared for the war of 1956, in which Israel tried, in collusion with France and Great Britain, then two predatory colonial powers, to overthrow Abd-al-Nasser. Thus he fixed for generations the image of Israel as a foreign implant in the region, a bridgehead of the hostile West. Ben-Gurion was a sworn enemy of the pan-Arab idea and did everything possible to block its realization - an effort that was crowned with success by his heir, Levy Eshkol, in the war of 1967. Like many decisions of Israeli governments, this one also contained a logical contradiction. Almost all Palestinians lionized Abd-al-Nasser. They were ready to let the Palestinian identity be absorbed into pan-Arabism. Only after the defeat of Pan-Arabism, not least by Israel, did the specific Palestinian identity return to center stage. It is difficult to estimate the seriousness of the dozens of Abd-al-Nasser's peace feelers throughout the years. They were just never put to the test. THE HISTORIC opportunity, the mother of all opportunities, came with the 1967 Six-day War. The Israeli army won an incredible victory over four Arab armies. After the six days, Israel was in possession of all the territory of historic Palestine, as well as the Sinai Peninsula and the Golan Heights. The entire Arab world was humiliated and powerless, and reacted with empty and bellicose phrases (the famous "No's" of Khartoum). The Palestinian people was in a state of shock. It was one of the rare historic moments when a whole people is able to change its basic conceptions. At that momentous time we could have made peace with the Palestinian people and offered them life in a free state of their own, within the pre-war borders, in peace with Israel. While the war was still going on, I personally proposed this to the Prime Minister, Levy Eshkol. He rejected the idea out of hand. The temptation to acquire new territories and settle there was just too strong. (I must explain here why I mention myself in this article: I was an eye-witness to many of the events, and to some of them I am now the sole remaining witness.) I raised the idea again and again in the Knesset, of which I was a member at the time. To reinforce my arguments, I held a series of conversations with the local leaders of the Palestinian community and ascertained that they were ready to establish a Palestinian state, instead of returning to Jordanian rule. I have in my possession a document signed by the Prime Minister's advisor for the occupied territories, Moshe Sassoon (the son of the Sassoon from the Lausanne affair) in which he confirmed my findings. We missed the opportunity to make peace with the conservative, moderate leadership of the Palestinian community - and got the PLO instead. IN OCTOBER 1973 the Yom Kippur (or Ramadan) War broke out. The main blame for the war must rest with Prime Minister Golda Meir, who had arrogantly and rudely rejected all the peace proposals made by the Egyptian President, Anwar Sadat. In spite of initial Israeli setbacks, the war ended in an Israeli military victory. Yasser Arafat, by now the uncontested leader of the Palestinian people, drew the conclusion that it was impossible to vanquish Israel militarily. A sober and pragmatic leader, Arafat decided that the Palestinian national aims must be attained through a settlement with Israel. He instructed his people to establish secret contacts with Israelis who had connections to the center of the Israeli establishment. I myself conveyed messages from him to the new Prime Minister, Yitzhak Rabin. Like Eshkol before him, Rabin was prepared to listen patiently, but he rejected the Palestinian feelers. "I won't take the first step towards a Palestinian solution," he told me in 1976, "Because the first step will inevitably lead to a Palestinian state, which I do not want." (Intermezzo: Rabin, like all the Israeli leadership at that time, advocated the "Jordanian Option", which meant giving back a part of the occupied territories to King Hussein and annexing the rest to Israel. Once, Foreign Minister Yig'al Allon informed Rabin that Henry Kissinger proposed turning Jericho over to Hussein immediately, in order to give him a foothold on the West Bank and perhaps enable him to prevent the PLO from becoming the dominant factor. Remembering that Golda Meir had promised to hold elections before giving back any territory, Rabin answered Allon: "I am not prepared to go to elections because of Jericho".) Already in 1974, Arafat induced the Palestinian National Council (the PLO parliament in exile) to pass a resolution that opened the way to the Two-State Solution. It took him 14 more years to get the Council to adopt a resolution that officially set up the State of Palestine in a part of the country - thereby recognizing Israel's rule over 78% of historic Palestine. That was a revolutionary decision with far-reaching consequences. Israel did not hear and did not see. It just ignored it. IN NOVEMBER 1977,Anwar Sadat did something unprecedented in history: in spite of the state of war existing between Israel and Egypt, he came to Jerusalem, the center of the enemy camp. He offered peace: not just peace between two states, but between Israel and the entire Arab world, with Palestine at the center. When the negotiations started at Cairo's Mina House, at the foot of the Pyramids, the Egyptians hoisted the Palestinian flag, together with the flags of the other Arab nations invited. The Israeli delegation raised hell, and the Egyptians were compelled to pull the flags down. At the 1978 Camp David conference, where the peace terms were worked out, Sadat fought valiantly for a settlement of the Palestinian issue. The foundations for an Israeli-Palestinian peace could have been laid there. But Menachem Begin refused adamantly. In the end, a meaningless document was adopted. In it, Begin did recognize "the just requirements of the Palestinian people", but immediately added a letter asserting he meant "the Arabs of the Land of Israel". Arafat was present at the session of the Egyptian parliament, when Sadat announced his planned visit to Jerusalem. He applauded. He also proposed sending a Palestinian delegation to Mina House. Among his colleagues, a revolt broke out. It was the only time during his long career when his position was seriously threatened. But the situation would probably have been different, if Sadat had obtained Begin's agreement to the establishment of a Palestinian state in the occupied territories, as he requested. It is possible that this failure cost Sadat his life. IN SEPTEMBER 1993, a year after the return of Rabin to power, a historic breakthrough was achieved. The State of Israel and the PLO, on behalf of the Palestinian people, at long last recognized each other and signed the Declaration of Principles of Oslo. This envisaged that within five years, the Final Status would be realized. At the last moment, Rabin's emissaries, mostly military men, made many changes in the text previously agreed upon. The Israeli obligations became much more vague. Arafat did not care. He believed Rabin and was convinced that the agreement would necessarily lead to the establishment of the Palestinian state. But almost from the first moment, Israel began violating the agreement. Specific dates for implementation were laid down - but Rabin smashed the agreed time-table, declaring that "there are no sacred dates". The passage between the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, an essential item in the agreement, was not opened (to this very day). The third and most important "redeployment" (withdrawal) of the Israeli army was not carried out at all. The negotiations for the Final Status, that were meant to be concluded by 1999, did not even start in earnest. In 2000, Prime Minister Ehud Barak compelled Arafat to come to a conference at Camp David, without any preparations or prior understandings. That was the last opportunity to reach agreement with Arafat, then at the height of his authority. Instead, Barak treated Arafat with open contempt and submitted what amounted to an ultimatum - a list of terms that may have seemed "generous" from the Israeli point of view, but fell far short of the minimum needed by Arafat. Returning home, Barak declared that Arafat wanted to "throw us into the sea". This way, Barak paved the way for Ariel Sharon's ascent to power and to the siege on Arafat, which ended in his murder. Arafat was a tough national leader who disdained no means to achieve freedom for his people - diplomacy, violence, even doubletalk. But he had a huge personal authority, and he was able and willing not only to sign a peace agreement, but also to convince his people to accept it. Those who did not want the strong and charismatic Arafat got Mahmoud Abbas, who finds it much more difficult to assert his authority. IN NOVEMBER 2004, Arafat died. In free elections, a large majority chose Mahmoud Abbas as his successor. "Abu Mazen", as he is generally known, has been for a long time identified with the idea of peace with Israel, more than any other senior Palestinian leader. The Israeli government, which had demonized Arafat for many years, could have embraced his successor. It was another opportunity to achieve a reasonable compromise. True, Abbas does not have the authority of Arafat, but if he had achieved impressive political gains, his position would have been much strenthened. But Prime Minister Ariel Sharon boycotted him, ridiculed him publicly as a "plucked chicken", and refused even to meet him.
Those who did not want Abbas got Hamas.
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 Preparing For The Post-Carbon Age By Doris "Granny D" Haddock Doris "Granny D" Haddock attended "Healing Mountains," the 16th annual Heartwood Forest Council, in the dwindling forests of West Virginia this Memorial Day weekend. Thank you. What must it be like, do you suppose, to be a fireman rushing though a burning building, coming across a wealthy gentleman in his grand apartment who insists that, well, this is nothing, there is often smoke in the halls this time of the week - it is likely Mrs. O'Reilly burning her biscuits again. Besides, he insists, the fire department is filled with alarmists and he will not be leaving his apartment just now, thank you, but will be calling a complaint into the mayor, whose re-election campaigns he finances. The question for environmental activists is this: can the planet be saved even if many of the people do not understand the problem or, despite the ready facts, are insistent upon staying the course of self-destruction because it profits them in the short term? Will the rising stormy seas, the spreading deserts and droughts, only prompt them to dig their heels deeper into the mud of the melting levees? And as a species, are we not waddling toward the cliff? Why has no great leader stood upon a rock with sufficient persuasion to halt the march and save the day? Are the forces now too great against mere words? Are the zombie masses, holding the hands of their children, on a Jonestown-like death march we cannot fathom or halt? Is it evolution itself we are watching, with our species automatically pre-wired for extinction when there are, say, by God's count, more Washington lobbyists than tree frogs - and with stickier fingers? It seems dark. Great electrical shovels, like invading space monsters, take apart our mountains. The monstrous machines called international corporations take apart the small farms and family businesses and democracies here and around the world, pushing people into cities and into powerless poverty, our global ecosystem and survival be damned. The great middle class employers like General Motors are purposely bankrupted by a behind-the-scenes elite so that manufacturing might move to more profitable lands without union and legal protections for human beings. The air is filled with warming poisons. Any attempt by the people to organize or even fairly vote is opposed and dismantled. Dark times. The government is now tracking our calls and putting barbed wire around us when we gather together as free men and women. A slave society, prison industries, yellow and black skies, great manipulations to kill off whole problem populations. A monstrous earth is the vision we can now imagine because, in fact, the great war between humans and the tumorous corporate monsters we let loose is raging. You will see in your lifetimes the outcome. If we can learn something useful from nature in this battle, it is this: lemmings don't get to vote. Lemmings, these days, only get to watch Fox News. They don't have a chance, in other words. We can't win this battle from inside the pack. Strategically, I can imagine two possible outcomes for this battle. One is dark and one is bright. Here is the dark one. Global catastrophe builds upon global catastrophe. Democracies become dictatorships as the masses reach for leadership and rescue from storm, pestilence and famine. Shooting wars break out between those who follow and those who oppose. A time of violence and suffering falls upon the planet. The resources that could have been spent to repair the ecosystem are needed for police security and mass imprisonment or worse. The weakened species, as a whole, finds itself in no position to survive when agricultural systems collapse and anarchy overwhelms all authority. I cannot see much past that, though there is probably much to see. Here is the bright one. Global catastrophe builds upon global catastrophe. (Yes, I know it starts out badly.) More and more people opt out of the carbon economy to join a rising society of people and communities who have moved rapidly toward an ethic of responsibility and sustainability. These communities produce the best leaders, more and more of whom are elected to national positions. Many existing national leaders begin to move toward the ethic of these communities and of sustainability. More and more towns and cities, led by goal-setting organizations dominated by young people, accept sustainable goals. The first President of the United States from such a community is elected in the same year that similar leaders are chosen in Europe, India and several other regions. The Untied Nations is rapidly reorganized around its own Universal Declaration of Human Rights and a post-carbon age economic model. Multi-national corporations are outlawed, as corporations must now be overseen by the communities that grant their limited, public purpose charters. Now, which one of these visions, among the millions we could dream up, is the more likely? Or will the future be something in-between, where there are solar cells on every roof, but every roof is a detention facility? What shall it be? Must we find caves in the far woods and set our booby traps against the storm troopers of the Empire who might come for us, or shall we get some responsible communities moving forward? Here is why the brighter scenario is the more realistic: the problems of the carbon age are not based on innate self-destructiveness, they are based on addiction, and all the enabling supports of that addiction are unsustainable and are now teetering. We who lose more environmental battles than we win are now about to win the war. We must become ready to keep that victory from turning into a new kind of hell. This carbon addiction is a nasty sort, worse than heroine. The heroine addict has, surrounding him or her, the larger society of people who are productive and loving and healthy. As compelling as the heroine addiction may be, this other world is always there, always visible, always pulling and ready for a welcoming return. Where is the saner, sustainable, more democratic, more human-scaled and human-celebrating community offering a visible and attractive alternative to the over-mortgaged, over-consuming, over-stressed carbon addict? Have we put in place the better world we would have people move toward? It is interesting to be in a region where so many people escaped that corporate lemming treadmill in the 1960s and 70s to create just such communities. Some of the places survive as small communities or weekend retreats where friends may be free and happy. The parties are good, I am told. But gray heads cannot change the world alone, and, while escapism is healthy for personal renewal, it is not revolution, and revolution is what we need. It will come from people now in junior high school and younger. Do not despair; they are but a few years from voting, if voting will mean anything. We do not have to tell them about fairness or about the value of a healthy earth or the value of freedom. But we do have to give them ways to move their ideals into effective political action. Can we help them be more effective than we have done for ourselves? I think we can, and I will get to that. First, here are a few things I hope we can do to prepare the ground for a peaceful, happy revolution. We need to make the better world visible, so the carbon addict may be drawn to it, and may see it as a place to go as nature begins to vote more often in her harsh way - and there is no way to rig her vote. We must encourage and advance the positive, human-scaled and community-based systems already in place, such as community supported agriculture, edible schoolyard programs, local economy support projects and the like. We must go far beyond these ideas. We must create political support organizations in every housing project, to assist people with their immediate needs and build a new base for progressive politics. We must work closer with labor unions, so that they see a longer view, particularly in regard to environmental issues, and so that the tremendous political power of united workers begins again to shape public policy. We need more "listening projects," to hear people and connect with their higher values. Many of you are doing precisely these things. We need a greater international reach. If some local communities in this country would partner with communities in, for example, Mexico, non-exploitive agricultural cooperatives can be established that enable people to stay in the communities they love, rather than suffer the abuses of illegal immigration. Let's create the leadership for a better world, and let's make it visible and attractive and real. As people who must transcend borders, let us transcend our own political districts. If the politicians of this area are too beholden to the money of Big Coal, for example, let us partner with the voters of districts far away, who must breath the same poisoned air but whose Members of Congress are not so beholden to Coal. I think my community in southern New Hampshire would be delighted to partner with a community here, if we can find ways to organize this idea. We have been divided and conquered, but we can undivide at will, for we all have a stake in the air and water and the earth's health and our human and democratic rights. Part of the problem of the progressive left is that we have fragmented into dozens of organizations, each of which must struggle for funds and email addresses and all the rest. We need to fold ourselves back into the Democratic Party and thoroughly invigorate it. Do not worry that we will cause the Party to marginalize itself. If the Party can base its actions on good science, effective governance, and efficient delivery of the programs the people need, it will prosper across all the left and all the middle of the American political spectrum. But by splitting ourselves off into all these good government organizations we have left the party to the selfish elites, and they don't know how to serve the people or the truth, and that means they do not know how to win. We have a great tool in the Internet, if we can keep it. Great energy is being applied to corporatize that last, great commons. If they ruin it, of course, we can and will create an alternate one in its place. It's just a matter of calling our computers into a new system that I'm sure we will all be happy to create. Let the old one try to prosper without us!
I would hope that some of the internet experts who care to keep open the commons will begin this planning, in the event that a switch-over becomes necessary. I hope the progressive funders, such as Mr. Soros's Open Society Institute, will lend some assistance. The servers of such a system may need to be in a country that still respects privacy, and the connections may need to be by satellite instead of telephone line, but we must and will keep open the lines of communication between human beings in this time of great transition.
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With Bush & Co., them that's got is them that gets... and everybody else should watch out! That's the hard lesson learned by some 1.6 million low-income workers who have not only had their tax refunds frozen in the past five years, but also have had their tax filings officially labeled "fraudulent" by the IRS. This crackdown on the poor has allowed Bush to claim that, by gollies, he's tough on tax fraud.
But the IRS's own inhouse taxpayer advocate, Nina Olson, says - wait a minute - she and her staff analyzed the returns of these accused poor folks and found that two-thirds of them were actually entitled to the tax credit they sought.... or entitled to even more money. Another 14 percent were due at least a partial refund, and of the remaining 20 percent, almost none had committed fraud, but instead had simply been confused by the complicated tax forms and made honest errors.
By the way, the average income of these supposed tax deadbeats was only $13,000. The great majority were working parents who were using the earned-income tax credit, which was first advocated by the laissez-faire guru Milton Friedman and first implemented by Ronnie Reagan. But now these good folks are being browbeat by the Bushites for crass political gain.
This is Jim Hightower saying... If you're a corporate tax cheat, the Bushites and their congressional henchmen look the other way - but if you're a working stiff, you're presumed to be a fraud... and the IRS comes down on you.
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Don't kid yourself. If you think the conviction of Ken Lay means that
George Bush is serious about going after corporate bad guys, think
again.
First, Lay got away with murder -- or at least grand larceny. Like Al
Capone convicted of failing to file his taxes, Ken Lay, though found
guilty of stock fraud, is totally off the hook for his BIG crime:
taking down California and Texas consumers for billions through fraud
on the power markets.
Lay, co-convict Jeff Skilling and Enron did not act alone. They
connived with half a dozen other power companies and a dozen
investment banks to manipulate both the stock market and the
electricity market. And though their co-conspirators have now paid $3 billion to settle civil claims, the executives of these other
corporations and banks get a walk on criminal charges.
Furthermore, to protect our President's boardroom buddies from any
further discomforts, the Bush Justice Department, just days ago,
indicted Milberg, Weiss, the law firm that nailed Enron's finance
industry partners-in-crime. The timing of the bust of this, the top
corporation-battling law firm, smacks of political prosecution -- and
a signal to Big Business that it's business as usual.
Lay and Skilling have to pay up their ill-gotten gains to Enron's
stockholders, but what about the $9-plus billion owe electricity
consumers? The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Bush's
electricity cops, have slapped Enron and its gang of power pirates on
the wrist. Could that have something to do with the fact that Ken
Lay, in secret chats with Dick Cheney, selected the Commission's
chairmen?
Team Bush had to throw the public a bone -- so they threw us Lay and
Skilling -- for the crime, note, not of ripping off the public, but
ripping off stockholders, the owner class.
This limited conviction, and the announcement of only one more
indictment -- of the crime-busters at Milberg-Weiss -- is Team Bush's
"all clear!" signal for the sharks to jump back into the power pool.
That leaves one question: if Bush's Justice Department let Ken and
company keep the California loot, what about that state's own
government? If you want to know how Californian's $9 billion went
bye-bye, read on ...
WHEN AHNOLD GOT LAY'D
Peninsula Hotel, Beverly Hills. May 17, 2001. The Financial Criminal
of the twentieth century, not long out of prison, meets with the
Financial Criminal of the twenty-first century who feared he may also
have to do hard time. These two, bond-market manipulator Mike
Millikin and Ken Lay, not-yet-indicted Chairman of Enron Corporation,
were joined by a selected group of movers and shakers -- and one
movie star.
Arnold Schwarzenegger had been to such private parties before. As a
young immigrant without a nickel to his name, he put on private
displays of his musculature for guests of his promoter. As with those
early closed gatherings, I don't know all that went on at the
Peninsula Hotel meet, though I understand Ahnold,_ this time, did not
have to strip down to his Speedos. Nevertheless, the moral undressing
was just as lascivious, if you read through the 34 page fax that
arrived at our office.
Lay, who convened the hugger-mugger, was in a bit of trouble. Enron
and the small oligopoly of other companies that ruled California's
electricity system had been caught jacking up the price of power and
gas by fraud, conspiracy and manipulation. A billion here, a billion
there, and pretty soon it was real money - $6.3 billion in suspect
windfalls in just six months, May through December 2000, for a
half-dozen electricity buccaneers, at least $9 billion for the year.
Their skim would have been higher but the tricksters thought they
were limited by the number of digits the state's power-buying
computers could read.
When Ken met Arnold in the hotel room, the games were far from over.
For example , in June 2003, Reliant Corporation of Houston simply
turned off several power plants, and when California cities faced
going dark, the company sold them a pittance of kilowatts for more
than gold, making several million in minutes.
Power-market shenanigans were nothing new in 2000. What was new was
the response of Governor Gray Davis. A normally quiet, if not dull,
man, this Governor had the temerity to call the energy sellers
"pirates_" -- in public! -- and, even more radically, he asked them
to give back all the ill-gotten loot, the entire $9 billion. The
state filed a regulatory complaint with the federal government.
The Peninsula Hotel get-together was all about how to "settle"_ the
legal actions in such a way that Enron and friends could get the
state to accept dog food instead of dollars. Davis seemed unlikely to
see things Ken's way. Life would be so much better if California had
a governor like the muscle guy in the Speedos.
And so it came to pass that, in 2003, quiet Gray Davis, who had the
cojones to stand up to the electricity barons, was thrown out of
office by the voters and replaced by the tinker-toy tough guy. The
Governator_ performed as desired. Soon after Schwarzenegger took over
from Davis, he signed off on a series of deals with Reliant, Williams
Company, Dynegy, Entergy and the other power pirates for ten to
twenty cents on the dollar, less than you'd tip the waitress. Enron
paid just about nothing.
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The sick-making hypocrisy of the Bush Regime is no surprise, of course: it's on display every minute of every day, from Dick Cheney's sermonizing at Russia about democracy on his way to schmooze oil deals out of Central Asian tyrants to Condi Rice's stern lectures to the world about "outside interference in Iraq" to all the Orwellian-tagged policy initiatives and laws ("Clean Air," "Healthy Forests," "PATRIOT Act") whose positive appellations are the opposite of their sinister substance. So common are the lies tumbling out of their mouths that it's hardly worth commenting upon them anymore; it's like pointing out that the sky is blue, or that fire is hot or, more apt in this case perhaps, that fat pigs grunt and waddle.
But sometimes a particularly choice piece of hypocrisy comes along, a wrenching juxtaposition between reality and sham righteousness so sublime in the totality of its horse-hockeyness that it cries out for special recognition. Such was the story in the New York Times today about the Pentagon's latest report on ""Military Power of the People's Republic of China."
The story, delivered with the Times' usual gray deadpan, tells us that the Pentagon is shocked - shocked - to find China is expanding its military establishment! The good militarists ensconced at the heart of the most gigantic, globe-enveloping war machine the world has ever known are puzzled by those inscrutable Orientals, declaring that "China's leadership has not satisfactorily explained its military expansion and long-term goals, even as it modernizes and expands its forces to be able to challenge foreign military forces operating in the region," as the Times puts it.
The story goes on to note that "the [Pentagon] report details trends in China's ability to deny other military forces access across the region by a combination of strike aircraft, submarines and precision missiles. In all, the report argues, these weapons 'have the potential to pose credible threats to modern militaries operating in the region.'"
The report concludes with the stirring words of Pentagon honcho Donald Rumsfeld, quoting his plaintive cry against the yellow peril at an, err, Asian security conference last year: "Why this growing investment? Why these continuing large and expanding arms purchases? Why these continuing robust deployments?"
(Rummy -- or his speechwriter -- is obviously channeling - or rather prostituting - Shakespeare:
"Why such daily cast of brazen cannon, and foreign mart for implements of war? Why such impress of shipwrights, whose sore task does not divide the Sunday from the week? What might be toward, that this sweaty haste doth make the night joint-labourer with the day? Who is't that can inform me?" But this is the typical cultural brigandage of shallow fools who try to gussy up their raw greed and third-rate intellects with magpie pluckings from their betters.
Witness the way Bush, or rather the man who has spoon-fed him most of his words, Michael Gerson, lards his speeches with stirring resonances from scripture, hymns and, in one howlingly lamebrained misappropriation, Dostoevsky. Remember the inaugural's "fire in the minds of men"? Bush and Gerson thought it referred to the universal desire for freedom; Dostoevsky, of course, was talking about the irrational lust for wanton destruction that drives the tormented minds of crippled nihilists. Then again, perhaps Bush/Gerson's borrowing here was more revealing than they intended. Or heck, maybe they did intend it. Maybe it was a code to the cognoscenti:
"We are crazier than twelve different kinds of hell and we're going to burn the whole damn planet down! How do you like them apples?")
At any rate, it staggers the mind that a man presiding over the largest military "investments" and arms purchases in the history of humanity -- not to mention a few "robust deployments" of his own - would have the chutzpah to criticize someone else for doing the exact same thing.
But perhaps we do Rummy wrong to accuse of him of hypocrisy here. For he is only enunciating the long-held diplomatic philosophy of the Bush-Cheney faction - a philosophy first developed when Cheney was Pentagon overlord under Bush I. This doctrine has two cardinal tenets. First, no nation is allowed to pursue the rampant militarism, nuclear proliferation, relentless subversion and blatant interference in the internal affairs of other nations that have been the hallmarks of American policy for more than 50 years. Second, no nation is allowed to defend itself against the encroachments of American power or to oppose in any way the ever-expanding interests of the American power elite. To do so puts a nation at risk of being labelled a "rogue state," a target for what Bush has called, with chilling candor, "the path of action."
This infantile doctrine, this knuckle-dragging stupidity masquerading as statesmanship, this ludicrous, B-movie fantasy of world domination bespeaks a near-total ignorance of human nature and history: an ignorance that will pose an ever-present threat to the life of the world - exacerbating tensions, producing more terrorism, fomenting war, pauperizing nations, beating plowshares into swords - as long as it reigns supreme on the Potomac.
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 Bush Planted Fake News Stories On American TV By Andrew Buncombe Federal authorities are actively investigating dozens of American television stations for broadcasting items produced by the Bush administration and major corporations, and passing them off as normal news. Some of the fake news segments talked up success in the war in Iraq, or promoted the companies' products. Investigators from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) are seeking information about stations across the country after a report produced by a campaign group detailed the extraordinary extent of the use of such items. The report, by the non-profit group Centre for Media and Democracy, found that over a 10-month period at least 77 television stations were making use of the faux news broadcasts, known as Video News Releases (VNRs). Not one told viewers who had produced the items. The report, by the non-profit group Centre for Media and Democracy, found that over a 10-month period at least 77 television stations were making use of the faux news broadcasts, known as Video News Releases (VNRs). Not one told viewers who had produced the items. "We know we only had partial access to these VNRs and yet we found 77 stations using them," said Diana Farsetta, one of the group's researchers. "I would say it's pretty extraordinary. The picture we found was much worse than we expected going into the investigation in terms of just how widely these get played and how frequently these pre-packaged segments are put on the air." Ms Farsetta said the public relations companies commissioned to produce these segments by corporations had become increasingly sophisticated in their techniques in order to get the VNRs broadcast. "They have got very good at mimicking what a real, independently produced television report would look like," she said. Ms Farsetta said the public relations companies commissioned to produce these segments by corporations had become increasingly sophisticated in their techniques in order to get the VNRs broadcast. "They have got very good at mimicking what a real, independently produced television report would look like," she said. The FCC has declined to comment on the investigation but investigators from the commission's enforcement unit recently approached Ms Farsetta for a copy of her group's report. The range of VNR is wide. Among items provided by the Bush administration to news stations was one in which an Iraqi-American in Kansas City was seen saying "Thank you Bush. Thank you USA" in response to the 2003 fall of Baghdad. The footage was actually produced by the State Department, one of 20 federal agencies that have produced and distributed such items. Many of the corporate reports, produced by drugs manufacturers such as Pfizer, focus on health issues and promote the manufacturer's product. One example cited by the report was a Hallowe'en segment produced by the confectionery giant Mars, which featured Snickers, M&Ms and other company brands. While the original VNR disclosed that it was produced by Mars, such information was removed when it was broadcast by the television channel - in this case a Fox-owned station in St Louis, Missouri. Bloomberg news service said that other companies that sponsored the promotions included General Motors, the world's largest car maker, and Intel, the biggest maker of semi-conductors. All of the companies said they included full disclosure of their involvement in the VNRs. "We in no way attempt to hide that we are providing the video," said Chuck Mulloy, a spokesman for Intel. "In fact, we bend over backward to make this disclosure." The FCC was urged to act by a lobbying campaign organised by Free Press, another non-profit group that focuses on media policy. Spokesman Craig Aaron said more than 25,000 people had written to the FCC about the VNRs. "Essentially it's corporate advertising or propaganda masquerading as news," he said. "The public obviously expects their news reports are going to be based on real reporting and real information. If they are watching an advertisement for a company or a government policy, they need to be told."
The controversy over the use of VNRs by television stations first erupted last spring. At the time the FCC issued a public notice warning broadcasters that they were obliged to inform viewers if items were sponsored. The maximum fine for each violation is $32,500 (17,500). |
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Bush's My Lai By Robert Parry The new U.S. atrocity in Iraq, the alleged murder of two dozen Iraqis by revenge-seeking Marines in the city of Haditha, appears likely to follow the course of other Iraq war-crimes cases, such as the prisoner abuse scandal at Abu Ghraib - some low- or mid-level soldiers will be court-martialed and marched off to prison. George W. Bush will offer some bromides about how the punishment shows that the United States honors the rule of law and how the punishment is further proof of America's civilized behavior when compared with the enemy's barbarity. It's also likely the U.S. news media won't place too much blame on Bush. But the common thread from the bloody invasion of Iraq in 2003 through Abu Ghraib to Haditha is that Bush cavalierly sent young Americans into a complex and frightening conflict with false and alarmist rhetoric ringing in their ears. Through clever juxtaposition, Bush's speeches linked Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein to the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks and later blurred the distinctions between Iraq's home-grown insurgency and the relatively small number of al-Qaeda terrorists operating in Iraq. Again and again, in 2002-2003, Bush rhetorically fused the names Saddam Hussein and Osama bin-Laden, as Bush rushed the United States into war. Then, in fall 2005 - around the time of the alleged Haditha atrocity on Nov. 19, 2005 - Bush was framing the Iraq conflict as a war to stop terrorists from creating "a radical Islamic empire that spans from Spain to Indonesia," which would threaten the American mainland. Though these claims lacked credible intelligence - Hussein and bin-Laden were bitter enemies and al-Qaeda remains a fringe player in the Muslim world - Bush's messages apparently sank in with impressionable young soldiers and Marines trying to understand why they needed to kill Iraqis. [See Consortiumnews.com's "Bush's Latest Iraq War Lies."] As a result of Bush's incessant propaganda, a poll of 944 U.S. military personnel in Iraq - taken in January and February 2006 - found that 85 percent believed the U.S. mission in Iraq was mainly "to retaliate for Saddam's role in the 9/11 attacks." Seventy-seven percent said a chief war goal was "to stop Saddam from protecting al-Qaeda in Iraq." Bush had not only misled the American public, but he had confused the American troops assigned to carry out the complicated occupation of Iraq, a nation with a history, language and culture foreign to the vast majority of U.S. soldiers. By exaggerating the threat that Iraq posed to the United States, Bush also set the conditions for atrocities. Milosevic Precedent While every soldier is responsible for his or her own actions in a war, it is the duty of the top levels of the chain of command - including the Commander in Chief - to take every possible precaution to ensure that troops on the ground do not commit war crimes. Indeed, commanders and politicians who lay the groundwork for abuses often are held responsible along with the actual perpetrators. The late Yugoslavian leader Slobodan Milosevic was put on trial at the Hague not for direct participation in the slaughter of Bosnian Muslims and Croats in the 1990s, but for aiding and abetting the crimes. Milosevic's violent rhetoric and deceptive propaganda were two factors cited in his indictment. One count alleged that the fiery Serb leader "controlled, manipulated or otherwise utilized Serbian state-run media to spread exaggerated and false messages of ethnically based attacks by Bosnian Muslims and Croats against Serb people intended to create an atmosphere of fear and hatred among Serbs." In Bush's Iraq case, his legal responsibility is parallel though the facts are far from identical. The Yugoslavian conflict was essentially a sectarian civil war which involved ethnic cleansing and massacres. Bush's Iraq invasion violated international law and longstanding principles, including the Nuremberg ban on aggressive war and a similar prohibition in the United Nations Charter to which the United States was a founding signatory. In 2002, however, claiming a unilateral American right to invade any country that may pose a threat to U.S. security in the future, Bush took the law into his own hands. He brushed aside requests from allies, even from British Prime Minister Tony Blair, to get clearance from the U.N. Security Council before launching the invasion. Bush and his neoconservative advisers judged that U.S. military preeminence in the post-Cold War world put them beyond the reach of international law - and that public acclaim for a successful conquest of Iraq would silence any remaining critics. But Bush's actions put U.S. troops in a particularly difficult and dangerous predicament. Not only would the entire U.S. chain of command be implicated in an illegal aggressive war, but there would be fewer legal safeguards in the event civilians were killed, a certainty given the level of firepower. Though rarely mentioned by the major U.S. news media, this additional danger for U.S. troops was noted by some Internet outlets, including Consortiumnews.com, which published an editorial on March 17, 2003, two days before the invasion, stating: "If George W. Bush orders U.S. forces to unleash his 'shock and awe' onslaught against Iraq without United Nations sanction, he will be opening American servicemen to a kind of double jeopardy. First, they will be risking their lives in a combat strategy far riskier than is publicly acknowledged. Second, any significant taking of civilian life could leave both officers and enlisted men liable for future war-crimes charges." Civilian Slaughter Not surprisingly, there were violations of the rules of war from the outset, such as the aerial bombing of a civilian Baghdad restaurant where faulty U.S. intelligence suggested that Hussein might be having dinner. As it turned out, Hussein was not there, but the attack killed 14 civilians, including seven children. One mother collapsed when rescue workers pulled the severed head of her daughter out of the rubble. Other U.S. bombings inflicted horrendous death and destruction on civilians. In one attack, Saad Abbas, 34, was wounded, but his family sought to shield him from the greater horror. The bombing had killed his three daughters - Marwa, 11; Tabarek, 8; and Safia, 5 - who had been the center of his life. "It wasn't just ordinary love," his wife said. "He was crazy about them. It wasn't like other fathers." [NYT, April 14, 2003] The horror of the war was captured, too, in the fate of 12-year-old Ali Ismaeel Abbas, who lost his two arms when a U.S. missile struck his Baghdad home. Ali's father, Ali's pregnant mother and his siblings were all killed. As he was evacuated to a Kuwaiti hospital, becoming a symbol of U.S. compassion for injured Iraqi civilians, Ali said he would rather die than live without his hands. The slaughter extended to the battlefield where the outmatched Iraqi army sometimes fought heroically though hopelessly against the technologically superior U.S. forces. Christian Science Monitor reporter Ann Scott Tyson interviewed U.S. troops with the 3rd Infantry Division who were deeply troubled by their task of mowing down Iraqi soldiers who kept fighting even in suicidal situations. "For lack of a better word, I felt almost guilty about the massacre," one soldier said privately. "We wasted a lot of people. It makes you wonder how many were innocent. It takes away some of the pride. We won, but at what cost?" Commenting upon the annihilation of Iraqi forces in these one-sided battles, Lt. Col. Woody Radcliffe said, "We didn't want to do this. Even a brain-dead moron can understand we are so vastly superior militarily that there is no hope. You would think they would see that and give up." In one battle around Najaf, U.S. commanders ordered air strikes to kill the Iraqis en masse rather than have U.S. soldiers continue to kill them one by one. "There were waves and waves of people coming at (the U.S. troops) with AK-47s, out of this factory, and (the U.S. troops) were killing everyone," Radcliffe said. "The commander called and said, 'This is not right. This is insane. Let's hit the factory with close air support and take them out all at once.'" [Christian Science Monitor, April 11, 2003] Bloody Occupation Three weeks into the invasion, Hussein's government collapsed, but Bush's short-sighted plan for the occupation left U.S. forces stretched thin as they tried to establish order. Sometimes, jittery U.S. soldiers opened fire on demonstrations, inflicting civilian casualties and embittering the population. In Fallujah, some 17 Iraqis were gunned down in demonstrations after U.S. soldiers claimed they had been fired upon. Fallujah soon became a center of anti-American resistance. As the Iraqi insurgency began to spread - and Americans began dying in larger numbers - military intelligence officers encouraged prison guards to soften up captured Iraqis by putting them in stress positions for long periods of time, denying sleep and subjecting them to extremes of hot and cold. Some of the poorly trained prison personnel - like those on Private Lynndie England's night shift at Abu Ghraib - added some of their own bizarre ideas for humiliating captured Iraqis, like forcing them naked into pyramids. But even some of those strange techniques, such as adorning Iraqi men with women's underwear, could be traced to wider practices against other detainees. Army Capt. Ian Fishback and two sergeants alleged that prisoners were subjected to similar treatment by the 82nd Airborne at a camp near Fallujah and that senior officers knew. [See Human Rights Watch report.] Fishback blamed the pattern of abuse on the Bush administration's vague orders about when and how Geneva Convention protections applied to detainees, a problem that extended from the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to a network of shadowy U.S. prisons around the world. "We did not set the conditions for our soldiers to succeed," said Fishback, 26, who served tours in Afghanistan and Iraq. "We failed to set clear standards, communicate those standards and enforce those standards." [NYT, Sept. 28, 2005] Rape Rooms Even Bush's boast that he closed Hussein's torture chambers and "rape rooms" lost its moral clarity. A 53-page classified Army report, written by Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba, revealed that abuses at Abu Ghraib from October to December 2003 included use of a chemical light or broomstick to sexually assault one Iraqi. Witnesses also told Army investigators that prisoners were beaten and threatened with rape, electrocution and dog attacks. At least one Iraqi died during interrogation. "Numerous incidents of sadistic, blatant and wanton criminal abuses were inflicted on several detainees," said Taguba's report. [See The New Yorker's May 10, 2004, issue.] Bush's contempt for international law has long been an open secret. On Dec. 11, 2003, when asked by a European reporter about the need for international law to govern the U.S. occupation of Iraq, Bush joked, "International law? I better call my lawyer." In 2004, Fallujah was back in the news after Iraqi insurgents killed four American security contractors and a mob mutilated the bodies. Bush ordered Marines to "pacify" the city of 300,000 people. The U.S. assault on Fallujah transformed one soccer field into a mass grave for hundreds of Iraqis - many of them civilians - killed when U.S. forces bombarded the rebellious city with 500-pound bombs and raked its streets with cannon and machine-gun fire. According to some accounts, more than 800 citizens of Fallujah died in the assault and 60,000 fled as refugees. In attacking Fallujah and in other counterinsurgency operations, the Bush administration again resorted to measures that critics argued amounted to war crimes. These tactics included administering collective punishment against the civilian population in Fallujah, rounding up thousands of young Iraqi men on the flimsiest of suspicions and holding prisoners incommunicado without charges and subjecting some detainees to physical mistreatment. But the Abu Ghraib scandal, with its graphic photos of naked Iraqis posed in fake sexual positions, became the iconic representation of American mistreatment of Iraqis. When the photos surfaced in 2004, the images fueled anti-Americanism across the Middle East and around the globe. Back in Washington, the Bush administration tried to defuse international outrage by blaming a few "bad apples." Bush said he "shared a deep disgust that those prisoners were treated the way they were treated." The Abu Ghraib scandal led to military convictions against nine reservists who were sentenced and marched off in shackles. Lynndie England, a 22-year-old single mother who had been photographed holding an Iraqi on a leash and pointing at a detainee's penis, was sentenced to three years in prison. Bush has continued to cite the Abu Ghraib case as one of a handful of mistakes that he will concede occurred during the Iraq War. At a joint press conference with Tony Blair on May 25, 2006, Bush said, "We've been paying for that for a long period of time." Haditha Atrocity Now comes the Haditha atrocity in which several Marines are alleged to have gone on a killing spree in the insurgent-dominated town on Nov. 19, 2005, after one Marine died from an improvised explosive device. According to published accounts of U.S. military investigations, the Marines retaliated for the bombing by pulling five men from a cab and shooting them, and entering two homes where civilians, including women and children, were executed. Some of the victims reportedly were praying or begging for mercy when they were shot. The Marines then tried to cover up the killings by claiming that the civilian deaths were caused by the original explosion or a subsequent firefight, according to investigations by the U.S. military and human rights groups. One senior Defense Department official told the New York Times that of the 24 dead Iraqis, the number killed by the bomb was "zero." [NYT, May 26, 2006] The Haditha killings are likely to draw comparisons with the Vietnam War's My Lai massacre on March 16, 1968, when a bloodied unit of the U.S. Army's Americal Division stormed into a village known as My Lai 4 and slaughtered 347 Vietnamese civilians including babies. Though the number of dead at Haditha is less than one-tenth the victims at My Lai, the scenarios are eerily similar: U.S. troops - fighting a confusing conflict against a shadowy enemy - lash out at a civilian population, killing unarmed men, women and children. If the Marines at Haditha are found guilty of committing the atrocity, they can be expected to receive severe punishment for murder, which under military statutes could include their own executions. Yet, while these Marines may face severe punishment for violating the laws of war, the political leadership back home - up to and including George W. Bush - remains immune from any meaningful accountability. President Bush even won sympathy from some commentators for joining Blair at the May 25 news conference at the White House where the two leaders took turns admitting a few errors in the Iraq War. Bush focused his self-criticism on a couple of tough-talking comments, including his taunt to Iraqi insurgents in 2003 to "bring 'em on." The New York Times noted that when Bush mentioned the Abu Ghraib scandal, "his voice was heavy with regret." [NYT, May 26, 2006] But the scales of justice may demand more from Bush and Blair than a few limited apologies that ignore the original crime of launching a war in violation of international law against a country that was not threatening their nations. As the war's chief instigator, Bush would seem to bear the heaviest blame. To justify the war, he also stoked up the emotions of Americans - both civilian and military - with false claims about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, Hussein's links to 9/11 and connections between Hussein's secular regime and al-Qaeda's Islamic fundamentalists. Bush's lies also didn't stop after Hussein's regime fell. On June 18, 2005, more than two years into the war, Bush used a radio address to tell the American people that "we went to war because we were attacked," continuing the subliminal connections: Saddam/Osama, Iraq/Sept. 11. False Rhetoric Bush's rhetorical excesses, though primarily designed to build and maintain a political consensus behind the war at home, had the predictable effect of turning loose a thoroughly propagandized and heavily armed U.S. military force on the Iraqi population. Pumped-up by Bush's false claims linking Iraq to 9/11 and his later warnings about al-Qaeda's scheme for a global terrorist empire, U.S. soldiers have charged into Iraqi towns and cities with revenge on their minds. Bush thus put both American soldiers and the Iraqi people in harm's way. In the three-plus years of war, nearly 2,500 U.S. soldiers have died along with tens of thousands of Iraqis. Thousands more have been grievously maimed. As the laws of war require the punishment of any individual soldier who murders civilians, international principles also call for holding accountable their superiors - both military and political - who contribute to the crime. In that sense, the atrocity at Haditha - and the tens of thousands of other unnecessary deaths in Iraq - can be laid at the door of official Washington, where some Democrats and nearly all Republicans voted to authorize the invasion and where leading news organizations uncritically transmitted administration propaganda to the American people.
But the principal blame must rest at the feet of George W. Bush, the self-proclaimed "war president" who considers himself beyond the bounds of any law. In that larger sense, Haditha and all the other carnage in Iraq can be viewed as Bush's My Lai.
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| Nobody's Laughing At Al Gore's Truths Long before the release of An Inconvenient Truth, the new film about climate change starring Al Gore, the scientific consensus had ratified the warnings he has delivered over the past two decades. Leading business executives in the insurance, investment and even the energy industries have conceded that he was right. Conservative politicians who scoffed at him have since traveled in his footsteps to the shrinking polar ice caps-and returned to Washington as fervent environmentalists. The truth that the former Vice President has been trying to tell us for most of his public career is no longer subject to serious dispute. The real questions are no longer whether climate change is occurring or whether that change is caused by human activity, but how much damage the world's rising temperature will do to civilization, and how much time we have to change course before we suffer a catastrophe. Even more impressive than Mr. Gore's mastery of this grave matter is his remarkably consistent and courageous effort to save the planet. In 1997, he went to the Kyoto conference in pursuit of a global accord, despite advisors who said his role there would jeopardize his political future. In the spring of 2000, he reissued Earth in the Balance, his 1992 book on the subject, on the eve of his Presidential nomination. Just to be sure that nobody misunderstood him, he added a new foreword and postscript emphasizing his commitment to "completely eliminating" the internal-combustion engine. Like many prophets, Mr. Gore has often been derided as an annoyance, an extremist and possibly a madman. Every great American mind of our time felt compelled to take a shot at him. Admiral James Stockdale called him a "fanatic." Dan Quayle said his views were "bizarre, detached from reality, and devoid of common sense." P.J. O'Rourke called him "nutty." Grover Norquist compared him to the Unabomber. David Frum accused him of wanting to "dismantle the American economy in the name of environmental regulation." Meanwhile, in the oil-funded think tanks as well as in the pages of the right's intellectual journals, such certified sages as Tucker Carlson and R. Emmett Tyrell Jr. firmly assured us all that the world wasn't really getting warmer, and that nobody should worry anyway. Jeff Jacoby, the resident reactionary at The Boston Globe, celebrated global warming as a boon to the economy. Indeed, Mr. Gore became a safe, easy target for every Republican politician and every right-wing commentator, who brandished Earth in the Balance as if it were The Communist Manifesto. "This is a book written by an extremist, and it's filled with extremism .... He wants to do away with the automobile as we know it today," complained Jim Nicholson, then the Republican national chairman (and now the Secretary of Veterans Affairs). What was once the most controversial recommendation in Mr. Gore's book-phasing out that infernal combustion engine-is today the official objective of the Bush administration. And, of course, the same hacks who shrieked back then about the damage this radical change would inflict on the American economy would surely praise President Bush for his farsighted leadership. The Bush Presidents, father and son, were naturally among the most intemperate critics of Mr. Gore, not only as a political opponent but because he didn't share their abject fealty to the oil bidness. During the 1992 campaign, the first President Bush raged against him incessantly and sometimes incoherently, sputtering, "Ozone Man, Ozone. He's crazy, way out, far out, man." Eight years later, Dubya tried to have it both ways, attacking Mr. Gore for environmentalist excess while promising to reduce carbon-dioxide levels in the atmosphere. Upon entering the Oval Office, he promptly abandoned that pledge, and has since flipped and flopped more times than a dying fish. As President, he has tried to suppress government data that backs the world scientific consensus, while promoting the "contrarian" opinions of quacks and mountebanks. "I read the report put out by the bureaucracy," sneered the President when asked about a study on climate change issued by the Environmental Protection Agency. He used to sneer at Mr. Gore's book too, which he never actually read, and says he "doubts" that he will bother to see An Inconvenient Truth.
Now that nearly everyone else acknowledges Mr. Gore's point, however grudgingly, those who attacked him so viciously owe him copious apologies. He would be wiser, unfortunately, to anticipate further assaults instead. The inevitable intrusion of reality has restored his stature, but the mean character of his enemies remains depressingly the same
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Media Memorial Day By Norman Solomon People who are concerned about the state of the U.S. news media in 2006 might pause to consider those who have lost their lives in the midst of journalistic neglect, avoidance and bias. We remember that while TV and radio news reports tell the latest about corporate fortunes, vast numbers of real people are struggling to make ends meet -- and many are in a position of choosing between such necessities as medicine, adequate food and paying the rent. We remember that many Americans have lost their limbs or their lives in on-the-job accidents that might have been prevented if overall media coverage had been anywhere near as transfixed with job safety as with, say, marital splits among Hollywood celebrities. We remember that the national and deadly problem of widespread obesity is in part attributable to constant advertising for products with empty calories and plenty of fat. We remember that despite public claims by tobacco companies, the ads that keep trying to glamorize smoking continue to lure millions of young people onto a long journey of addiction to cancer-causing cigarettes. We remember that superficial news reports and commentaries, routinely describing war in flat phony antiseptic terms, are helpful to the U.S. war efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq -- where the deaths of American troops, while horrific, are small in number compared to the civilian deaths as a result of daily slaughter catalyzed by U.S. military activities. We remember that each war death takes a precious life, and media outlets rarely convey more than surface accounts of the actual grief of loved ones left behind. We remember that massive amounts of front-page space and unchallenged air time on television and radio are used by the president and other top administration officials, who speak glibly about patriotism and sacrifice while their long records of deception continue to underlie insistence that sacrificed lives must be honored by sacrificing more lives. We remember that lies from the White House, widely parroted and commonly touted as credible by news media, have preceded every major U.S. military action in the last five decades, including invasions of Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, the Dominican Republic, Grenada, Panama, Afghanistan and Iraq. We remember that after the United States led the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia for 78 days in the spring of 1999, more than a few American journalists joined with Pentagon commanders to hype the fact that no American lives were lost in combat during that time -- as if the killing of people on the ground was of scarcely any human consequence. We remember that onslaughts of media spin followed by exuberant coverage of high-tech U.S. air attacks can shift public sentiment drastically almost overnight. That's why opponents of reckless and deadly policies should draw little comfort from the Pew Research Center's mid-May report that at the moment "the American public strongly prefers non-military approaches to dealing with Iran's nuclear technology program," with just 30 percent in favor of "bombing military targets in Iran." We remember that, no matter how much glorious rhetoric and how many chronic euphemisms are brought to bear on public opinion, most of war's victims are not -- by any definition -- combatants or enemies. As New York Times reporter Chris Hedges, a former war correspondent, has pointed out, "In the wars of the 1990s civilian deaths constituted between 75 and 90 percent of all war deaths." We remember that, although it received scant and fleeting U.S. media coverage when released by the Lancet medical journal in late October 2004, a study using sample-survey techniques found that about 100,000 Iraqi deaths had occurred over an 18-month period as a result of the U.S.-led invasion and occupation of Iraq -- and, according to the study's data, more than half of those who died were women and children killed in air strikes. We remember that it's easy for hot-dogging pundits to sit in TV studios or in newsrooms to cheer on the use of cutting-edge technology by the Pentagon. Those pundits leave it to others to bury the dead and to deal with the anguish of losing relatives and friends.
We remember that standard journalism fails to do much to put us in
touch with human realities of war.
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The 10,000th Haditha By Ted Rall NEW YORK--Months after Time magazine reported that U.S. Marines had carried out a My Lai-style massacre of at least two dozen innocent Iraqi civilians, the average "support our troops" American is waking up and smelling the butchery. As usual, the U.S. government tried to cover up the mass murder--it initially claimed that the victims were blown up by an insurgent IED. But, as Time reported in March, the "civilians who died in Haditha on Nov. 19 were killed not by a roadside bomb but by the Marines themselves, who went on a rampage in the village after the attack, killing 15 unarmed Iraqis in their homes, including seven women and three children." As at My Lai, the bloodlust was not easily sated. "The raids took five hours and left at least 23 people dead." Jane and Joe Sixpack are shocked. Congressional Democrats are calling for an investigation and, for once, will probably get one. Political analysts worry that the Haditha massacre could hurt U.S. propaganda efforts even more than the infamous photos of torture at its Abu Ghraib concentration camp. So far reaction to Haditha has been the reverse of what you might expect. Republicans and other pro-war types are running around like it's the end of the world. Meanwhile the streets of Arab capitals, recently ablaze over the Danish Mohammed cartoon controversy, are quiet. The reason is simple: For Iraqis, American atrocities are old news, dating back to the invasion in March 2003 and a full decade earlier. (U.S. planes dropped so many bombs on Iraqi schools, hospitals and power plants during the 1990s that they ran out of targets.) So are the boulevards of New York, San Francisco and other cities where hundreds of thousands of American lefties once marched against the invasion of Iraq. "As the war in Iraq rages on," CBS News' Dotty Lynch asks, "Where are the young people this time around? Where are the campuses? Where are the new Tom Haydens and Sam Browns and where are the Noam Chomskys, William Sloane Coffins and Daniel Berrigans?" Well, Chomsky's still around. Over a million young Americans, many of them college students, protested Iraq. They certainly had allies in the media. (Hi.) But The System is even less responsive to protest now than it was during Vietnam. State-run media made fun of antiwar activists as tattooed neo-hippies, called them treasonous and refused airtime to Administration critics. When is the last time a hard-hitting opponent of the Iraq war showed his or her face on national TV? Those of us who raised our voices against this war from the start, having fruitlessly complained about stories of battlefield abuse reported by the European media, are suffering from marginalization fatigue. Meanwhile, in the "new" Iraq, Abdel Salam al-Qubaisy of Iraq's Sunni Muslim Scholars Association says, U.S. massacres of civilians occur routinely. "The American soldier has become an expert in killing," he shrugs. Like many Iraqis, Baghdad shopkeeper Mohammed Jawdaat says that U.S. troops have never shown respect for the lives of Iraqi civilians. "Six months ago," remembers Jawdaat, "a car pulled out of a street towards an American convoy and a soldier just opened fire. The driver was shot in the head. There were no warning shots and the Americans didn't even stop." Abd Mohammed Falah, a Ramadi attorney, says: "U.S. forces have committed more crimes against the Iraqi people than appears in the media. The U.S. defense secretary and his generals should be sent to court instead of two or three soldiers who will be scapegoats." Newspapers don't bother to report when the sun rises in the east nor do they assign reporters to cover when dogs bite men. Likewise, says Baghdad newspaper boy Imad Mohammed, Iraqi newspapers haven't mentioned Haditha. Same-old, same-old massacres of Iraqis by American forces are no longer news: "The Americans see a Muslim go into a mosque and just assume he is a terrorist. They either arrest him or blow it up." Rami Khouri, editor at The Daily Star in Lebanon tells NPR that Haditha is "not a huge story [in the Middle East]. It's getting a lot of coverage in the United States, obviously, but most people in the Arab world are against what the United States did in Iraq...They say look, this was a catastrophe from the beginning and they're not surprised that this is happening. They kind of take it in stride because everything the United States is doing in Iraq is seen as morally and politically unacceptable." Most of the world's population--including virtually every Muslim and about a third Americans--always believed that the war against Iraq was a genocidal attempt to intimidate the Muslim world and extort its oil at gunpoint. They don't see a difference between Haditha and the thousands of other Iraqis killed by U.S. forces since 2003. Because the entire exercise was morally bankrupt from the outset, sold and perpetuated with countless lies, all of the 200,000-plus civilians and Iraqi soldiers who have died--whether by bomb or by bullet--were effectively murdered by the U.S. military. Haditha, where two dozen were executed, was merely the 10,000th Haditha. The morality-come-latelies still don't understand that nothing good will ever come out of the U.S. war against Iraq. Marine General Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, says that massacres of civilians by U.S. soldiers do "not happen very frequently, so there's no way to say historically why something like this might have happened." Actually, similar incidents have taken place in every war, including World War II. Pace's statement is either a dazzling display of ahistorical ignorance or a bald-faced lie--take your pick. Pace adds that if some of his men committed an atrocity at Haditha, they "have not performed their duty the way that 99.9 percent of their fellow Marines have."
That's not what the Iraqis say.
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 Heil Bush, Dear Kronanwalt Gonzales, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your threatening newspapers for outing our treason and sedition with a trip to Gitmo, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Judicial Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class with diamond clusters, presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Fuhrer Bunker" formally 'The White House' on 07-01-2006. We salute you herr Gonzales, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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HOUSTON, Texas-A Houston jury convicted both Ken Lay and Jeff Skilling, despite the fact that Kenny Boy packed his Bible to the courtroom every day.
Since it is a long and noble Texas tradition for the accused to fight all allegations by finding Jesus, this indicates a major degree of guilt. (While on trial for murder, T. Cullen Davis, the Fort Worth millionaire, not only found Jesus but also threw a big party to celebrate at the mansion, with piles of shrimp and BBQ and a soundtrack that announced over and over throughout the grounds that night, "The son of Stinky Davis has found the son of God.")
Meanwhile, Houston reacted as though the Rockets had won the NBA championship.
Many a thoughtful analyst has given us to understand that Lay and Skilling are guilty of arrogance and hubris. Actually, they were convicted of fraud-massive, overwhelming and monstrous fraud. They also stole money and looted pension funds. They rigged energy markets and almost drove California (seventh-largest economy in the world) into bankruptcy.
And all along the way, this monstrous fraud was connected to government. Enron bought the politicians who bent the rules that let them steal, con and gyp. Lay and Skilling talked state after state into following the California model and deregulating electricity. Happy summer, everyone.
And then, of course, there was the thumbing-the-nose thievery, the offshore partnerships tricked out with the clever names so insiders would know how slick they were.
As the late Rep. Wright Patman Sr. observed: "Many of our wealthiest and most powerful citizens are very greedy. This fact has many times been demonstrated."
The interesting thing about Lay and Skilling is they weren't trying to evade the rules, they were rigging the rules in their favor. The fix was in-much of it law passed by former Sen. Phil Gramm of Texas, whose wife, Wendy, served on the board of Enron.
Where does that sense of entitlement come from? What makes a Ken Lay think he can call the governor of Texas and ask him to soften up Gov. Tom Ridge of Pennsylvania on electricity deregulation? Not that being governor of Texas has ever been an office of much majesty, but a corporate robber wouldn't think of doing that if it were Brian Schweitzer of Montana or Bill Richardson of New Mexico.
The extent to which not just state legislatures but the Congress of the United States are now run by large corporate special interests is beyond mere recognition as fact. The takeover is complete. Newt Gingrich and Tom DeLay put in place a system in which it's not a question of letting the head of the camel into the tent-the camels run the place.
It has all happened quite quickly-in less than 20 years. Laws were changed and regulations repealed until an Enron can set sail without responsibility, supervision or accountability. The business pages are fond of trumpeting the merits of "transparency" and "accountability," but you will notice whenever there is a chance to roll back any of the New Deal regs, the corporations go for broke trying to get rid of them entirely.
I'm not attempting to make this a partisan deal-only 73 percent of Enron's political donations went to Republicans. But I'll be damned if Enron's No. 1 show pony politician, George W. Bush, should be allowed to walk away from this. Ken Lay gave $139,500 to Bush over the years. He chipped in $100,000 to the Bush Cheney Inaugural Fund in 2000 and $10K to the Bush-Cheney Recount Fund.
Plus, Enron's PAC gave Bush $113,800 for his '94 and '98 political races and another $312,500 from its executives. Bush got 14 free rides on Enron's corporate jets during the 2000 campaign, including at least two during the recount. Until January 2004, Enron was Bush's top contributor.
And what did it get for its money? Ken Lay was on Bush's short list to be energy secretary. He not only almost certainly served on Cheney's energy task force, there is every indication that the task force's energy plan, the one we have been on for five years, is in fact the Enron plan. Lay used Bush as an errand boy, calling the governor of Texas and having him phone Tom Ridge of Pennsylvania to vouch for what swell energy deregulation bills Enron was sponsoring in states all over the country.
It seems to me we all understand this is a systemic problem.
We need to reform the political system, or we'll lose the democracy. I don't think it's that hard. It doesn't take rocket science. We've done it before successfully at the presidential level and tried it several places at the state level. Public campaign financing isn't perfect and can doubtlessly be improved upon as we go. Let us begin.
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When I started in newspapers, I shied away from police brutality stories, letting other reporters cover them.
I knew there were cops who had no right to be cops. But I also knew, because my dad was a detective, the sort of blistering pressure men and women in uniform were under as they made snap life-and-death decisions. I'd cringed at the 60's refrain that the military and the police were "pigs."
After my dad killed a robber in self-defense - the man had tried to shoot him point-blank in the face, but that chamber of the gun was empty - he told a police psychologist that he could not swallow or eat because he felt as though he had fish bones in his throat.
So I felt sickened to hear about the marines who allegedly snapped in Haditha, Iraq, and wantonly killed two dozen civilians - including two families full of women and children, among them a 3-year-old girl. Nine-year-old Eman Waleed told Time that she'd watched the marines go in to execute her father as he read the Koran, and then shoot her grandfather and grandmother, still in their nightclothes. Other members of her family, including her mother, were shot dead; she said that she and her younger brother had been wounded but survived because they were shielded by adults who died.
It's a My Lai acid flashback. The force that sacked Saddam to stop him from killing innocents is now accused of killing innocents. Under pressure from the president to restore law, but making little progress, marines from Camp Pendleton, many deployed in Iraq for the third time, reportedly resorted to lawlessness themselves.
The investigation indicates that members of the Third Battalion, First Marines, lost it after one of their men was killed by a roadside bomb, going on a vengeful killing spree over about five hours, shooting five men who had been riding in a taxi and mowing down the residents of two nearby houses.
They blew off the Geneva Conventions, following the lead of the president's lawyer.
It was inevitable. Marines are trained to take the hill and destroy the enemy. It is not their forte to be policemen while battling a ghostly foe, suicide bombers, ever more ingenious explosive devices, insurgents embedded among civilians, and rifle blasts fired from behind closed doors and minarets. They don't know who the enemy is. Is it a pregnant woman? A child? An Iraqi policeman? They don't know how to win, or what a win would entail.
Gen. Michael Hagee, the Marine Corps commandant, who has flown to Iraq to talk to his troops about "core values" in the wake of Haditha and a second incident being investigated, noted that the effect of this combat "can be numbing."
A new A&E documentary chronicles the searing story of the marines of Lima Company, 184 Ohio reservists who won 59 Purple Hearts, 23 posthumously. Sgt. Guy Zierk recounts kicking in a door after an insurgent attack. Enraged over the death of his pals, he says he nearly killed two women and a 16-year-old boy. "I am so close, so close to shooting, but I don't." he says. "It would make me no better than the people we're trying to fight."
Retired Maj. Gen. John Batiste, one of those who called for Donald Rumsfeld's resignation, told Chris Matthews that blame for Haditha and Abu Ghraib lay with "the incredible strain bad decisions and bad judgment is putting on our incredible military."
While it was nice to hear President Bush admit he had made mistakes, he was talking mostly about mistakes of tone. Saying he wanted Osama bin Laden "dead or alive" would have been O.K. if he had acted on it, rather than letting Osama go at Tora Bora and diverting the Army to Iraq.
At his news conference with a tired-looking Tony Blair, Mr. Bush seemed chastened by Iraq, at least. But he continued to have the same hallucination about how to get out: turning things over to the Iraqi security forces after achieving total victory over insurgents and terrorists.
Stories in The Times this week show that Iraqi security forces are so infiltrated by Shiite militias, Sunni militias, death squads and officers with ties to insurgents that the idea of entrusting anything to them is ludicrous.
By ignoring predictions of an insurgency and refusing to do homework before charging into Iraq on trumped-up pretenses, W. left our troops undermanned, inadequately armored and psychologically unprepared.
It was maddening to see the prime minister of Britain - of all places - express surprise at the difficulty of imposing a democracy on a country that has had a complex and ferocious tribal culture since the Gardens of Babylon were still hanging.
... Vic Harville ...  |
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There's a Yellow Stain from Texas , in Washington DC,
He loves domestic spying, ignores the Bill of Rights
He panders to big oil, serves the rich but not the poor
He stole the Oval Office, he's trampled on our rights,
He points to "nine-eleven," and that is his excuse
Bill Clinton's Presidency sure had its share of flaws
Oh the Yellow Stain from Texas is a stain upon us all
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Parting Shots...
Mary Cheney: Blissfully Well-Adjusted Second Daughter
Mary Cheney is the daughter (technically) of Vice President Dick Cheney and Second Lady Lynne Cheney. A legacy graduate of Colorado College, Mary woke up one morning and, sometime after her second cup of coffee, decided to be a lesbian. Having carelessly made this gratuitous lifestyle choice, Miss Cheney has spent the past decade juggling the sometimes awkwardly competing lives of a shame-ravaged, hairy-legged spinster and a fabulously compensated GOP consultant who conducts election year "outreaches" to a constituency that shall remain nameless. Though fiercely private, Mary (accompanied by her public relations special envoy) is nevertheless happy to take questions about her fabulous new million dollar memoir - "Now It's My Turn" - right here on ASK THE WHITE HOUSE.
Wayne Thomas, from Omaha, NE writes:
Mary Cheney:
Mary Matalin:
Miss Cheney is also terribly sorry that you have misunderstood the genius of her father's economic policies, but is optimistic that one day soon, you might nevertheless reap the wonderful "trickle down" benefits of her million dollar book advance!
Svetlana Dukovnik, from New York, NY writes:
Mary Cheney:
Mary Matalin:
Mary Cheney:
Mary Matalin:
Mary Cheney:
Mary Matalin:
Mary Cheney:
Mary Matalin:
Mary Cheney:
Mary Matalin:
So while Mary may politely disagree with the pious, unassailable religious convictions of her esteemed fellow Republicans Alan Keyes and Jerry Falwell, she doesn't think that it would be appropriate or seemly for her to object to their prayers that she be gang-raped by lava-ejaculating demons in Hell for all eternity. Indeed, she sees it as her loyal duty to her party to join in on such prayers.
I think many famous minority-types in history could have benefited from her obsequious example. Maybe if Martin Luther King Jr. had had the same kind of clarity of vision that Mary does, he'd have cancelled all those silly "single issue" marches, registered as a Dixiecrat, and gone to work on Strom Thurmond's presidential campaign! Because Mr. King was a sad, angry "single issue" voter, notorious for his crazed obsession with how black people were treated. Frankly, Miss Cheney's obedient enough not to go down that same crazy, liberal road of being worried about one's own civil rights. You see, Mary is bright enough to know that she doesn't have the luxury of being a "single issue" voter after seeing the terms of her Halliburton inheritance.
Mary is also thankful that her father's staff took time out of their busy schedules to carefully proofread her book, excising several four-chapter typos, classifying the paragraph she actually wrote, and refreshing her wildly unreliable recollection by reminding her that her loving parents responded to her "I'm a Lesbo!" news in high school with ecstatic joy, not the jagged end of a broken Cutty Sark bottle.
Chastity Bono, from Los Angeles, CA writes:
Mary Cheney:
Mary Matalin:
Trina Van Ness, from Phoenix, AZ writes:
Mary Cheney:
Mary Matalin:
Sarah Faustmann, from Meadville, PA writes:
Mary Cheney:
And yeah, I told my dad we should nuke those fuckers. He said that's totally the plan.
Pat Johnson, from Troy, ID writes:
Mary Cheney:
Mary Matalin:
Sam Smith, from Charleston, WV writes:
Mary Cheney:
Mary Matalin:
Ann Burnett Townsent, from Cary, NC writes:
Mary Cheney:
Mary Matalin:
Sean Atwell, from Washington, DC writes:
Mary Cheney:
Mary Matalin:
Dr. Skinner, from Atlanta, GA writes:
Mary Cheney:
Mary Matalin:
Jose, from Springfield, VA writes:
Mary Cheney:
Mary Matalin: |
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Issues & Alibis Vol 6 # 22 (c) 06/02/2006
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In This Edition
Thom Hartmann demands we, "Stand Up for Democracy With Robert F. Kennedy Jr."
Uri Avnery is, "Meeting Hamas."
Frank Scott reviews, "Refugees Of Capital."
Jim Hightower reveals, "The GOP's Xenophobic Goofiness."
Cindy Sheehan explains, "The Abominations Of War From My Lai To Haditha."
Chris Floyd watches, "Goobers On Parade."
Greg Palast announces, "Godless" Is Gutless."
Robert Parry wants to know, "Is Bill O'Reilly A Nazi? Just Asking!"
Joe Conason follows as, "Bill Travels, Hillary Runs, The Media Leers."
Norman Solomon studies, "The Urbanity Of Evil."
Ted Rall says, "Pro-War Pols Don't Deserve A Political Future."
Wolf Blitzer wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award!'
Molly Ivins sees, "Bigger Problems Than Burning Flags."
Sunsara Taylor exclaims, "CDC To Women: Prepare To Give Birth!"
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department Will Durst previews, "The Bright Side Of Global Warming" but first Uncle Ernie announces, "School's Out."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Joe Heller with additional cartoons from Tom Tomorrow, Micah Wright, South Park, Steve Bradenton, Ben Sargent, Info Wars.Com and Sacred Cow Burgers.Com.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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School's Out By Ernest Stewart School's out for summer School's out with fever School's out completely School's Out --- Alice Cooper
Back to school? I learned there all I could, then burned it down!
"Ann Coulter, the woman who single-handedly put the lie to the foolish contention that the succubae were mythical." If the last six years didn't "school" you to what the Rethuglicans are all about i.e. anything for a buck and f-ck anyone or anything that gets in their way, then you sure as hell haven't been paying attention Mr. & Mrs. America! Theft and murder a.k.a. blood and oil, is what it's all about, not to mention treason, sedition, torture and the like. All done by the way, in YOUR name! How nice, eh? You know that your last chance to change it may be in November, that is providing you don't live in a state that uses Diebold, ESS and the like. Those untraceable electronic voting gimmicks brought to you by their fascist owners; who guarantee that you'll vote red whether you do or not, and the RNC. If that includes you, then you have about 5 months to demand they return your ballot back to paper or something that at least has a paper trail. Otherwise like the several serials we've run on electronic voting have pointed out, your vote will not count, the fix is in! So America you can either "tryst again like you did last summer" or you can get up off your fat American asses and do something about this outrage. Believe me folks, it's not going to be business as usual as you can already see Big Brother is here to stay. As is, we're just a short stroll away from the white box cars and the Happy Camps.* Get out, get active, raise some hell while you may! Unless you've been asleep for the last 6 years during "civics class" you know what I'm saying is true! If not for yourself, then do it for your children and your grand children. If not for them then save America and you will save the world because unlike all the former wars there will be no winners from WWIII, except, for maybe the cockroaches! In Other News... I see where the Pentagoons over at the DOD are writing the new army manual and are omitting major parts of the Geneva Convention. Well isn't that special? When recently asked about this Deputy Fuhrer Von Rumsfeld was heard to reply,
This is all done of course at the behest of our glorious Fuhrer and his puppet-master Vice Fuhrer Cheney, neither of whom know the first thing about, "What goes around comes around!" I'm afraid a lot of young American kids are going to find out all about it the hard way, thanks to the above mentioned war criminals! ***** And finally, our good friend Greg Palast released his new book... "Armed Madhouse : Who's Afraid of Osama Wolf?, China Floats, Bush Sinks, The Scheme to Steal '08, No Child's Behind Left, and Other Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Class War" ...this week. Of all the famous writers in this magazine Greg was the first to join our little band of "merry pranksters" back in January 2001 followed closely by Robert Parry whose comfirmation email arrived about 20 minutes after Greg's. I've admired Greg's brain and heart for close to twenty years now. I can't recall any political disagreements with Greg in all that time and that's really something when you realize you can't put two leftists in the same room together for 15 minutes without a fight starting! Our associate-editor Larry Martin interviewed Greg for the magazine and that interview can be found in the archives section. Greg Palast may be the most important investigative journalist in the world! Greg has this to say... " TODAY, ANN COULTER AND I BOTH LAUNCH OUR BOOKS - hers to promote the latest flavor of hate and militant ignorance; mine - 'Armed Madhouse: Who's Afraid of Osama Wolf?, The Scheme to Steal '08 and other Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Class War - the investigations, first broadcast on BBC, simply banned from US airways and print. There's no truth to the rumor Coulter chose to release her book on 06-06-06 in honor of her father's birthday. ** I'm asking you to buy (or order) 'Armed Madhouse' THIS WEEK, right NOW in fact. Why right now? Amazon and the industry have set up this Coulter vs. Palast 'launch week' as the Battle of The Books: Can progressives match the forces of darkness (they call them "conservatives")? Coulter has a million-dollar Right Wing campaign behind her - thereby allowing her and other hate-salesmen to control the media and the national discussion. The Coulter crew buys and dumps massive amounts of books, buying her way onto the bestseller list. I have only you." Greg's off on his latest tour promoting the new book. I just ordered mine and you can too, just click on the book cover below. Read Greg's thoughts on Ann's book in his column below! Armed Madhouse Tour:
Tue. June 06. San Francisco Details here  Makes the perfect 'Father's Day' gift!
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We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
** That's not what I heard Greg!
So how do you like the 2nd coup d'etat so far?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
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Stand Up for Democracy With Robert F. Kennedy Jr. By Thom Hartmann Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has written a brilliant new article about the biggest political story in the history of the United States: An American politician illegitimately took the office of president by outright theft and fraud. Although such high crimes and misdemeanors have been rumored in previous elections, none in the history of the republic have been so thoroughly documented. George W. Bush is not the legitimate president of the United States. Schoolchildren read (in the few remaining civics classes in America) about the multiple pollings and tense standoff that led to Thomas Jefferson's election as president in "the Revolution of 1800," because newspapers of the day looked into and reported on such things. But - unless we speak out - odds are that few will read about what happened in Ohio in 2004 in future history books, because modern newspaper editors are increasingly corporate appendages, and many of today's "reporters" worry more about currying favor with institutional power than investigating stories that may inconvenience or upset their "sources." Kennedy's story - "Was The 2004 Election Stolen?" - broke on Thursday, June 1, 2006, when Rolling Stone magazine put it on their website and it appeared on other websites including www.commondreams.org. It hit the newsstands soon thereafter. In the article, Kennedy lays out the details of exactly how the Republican Party, in several states but particularly in Ohio, engaged in a criminal conspiracy to both steal the 2004 election and to cover up the evidence of that theft. The subtitle of the article lays out Kennedy's foundational premise: "Republicans prevented more than 350,000 voters in Ohio from casting ballots or having their votes counted -- enough to have put John Kerry in the White House." And that's just the beginning of the story, which includes ballot-box stuffing, electronic voting machine manipulation, "caging" in defiance of a court order banning Republicans from the notorious practice, threats and intimidation of Democratic voters by imported Republican goon squads, and multiple illegal uses of the office of the Secretary of State to disenfranchise Democratic voters. The Republican rebuttals/attacks have already begun, starting with a particularly tragic hit-piece in one of the higher-profile "online magazines" that claims to authoritatively quote so-called but unnamed "experts" who doubt Kennedy's sources, and takes a clip of Ohio law so out of context as to essentially reverse its meaning in support of the Republican talking points. The day Kennedy's article came out, Republican callers began dialing into talk radio shows complaining about "massive Democrat (sic) voter fraud by registering illegal immigrants" (to quote a caller to my Air America Radio program on 6/2/06). Clearly the meme Republicans will put out if Kennedy's story gets traction in the mainstream media is that "election fraud is something both parties do," and they'll use that meme to push even harder for more Republican-helpful restrictions on voters who are old, urban, or poor enough not to have or easily acquire two forms of government-issued ID. We can't let them - this is about real crimes, and the destruction of democracy in our republic. Kennedy's article is an in-depth, on-the-ground report from Ohio about the 2004 election. In it, he acknowledges that he is building on the work of many who preceded him - this was a story not particularly difficult to uncover, even though the mainstream media has chosen to ignore it. Seminal investigations were done by Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman of the Columbus, Ohio Free Press, and by Michigan Congressman John Conyers, who held hearings in Ohio that resulted in a summary report now available in book form titled What Went Wrong In Ohio (all referenced by Kennedy). Just after the 2002 elections, I wrote an article for Common Dreams ("If You Want To Win An Election, Just Control The Voting Machines") outing Senator Chuck Hagel's odd journey from voting machine peddler to the US Senate (being elected on his own machines). Six months later, in the summer of 2003, MoveOn.org commissioned me to write a round-up article about voting machine problems which they emailed to over 2 million members, and was published on AlterNet. In both articles (and others since), I was building on the work of Bev Harris of www.blackboxvoting.org, Lynn Landes, and many others, just as Kennedy has done. It's not like the theft of the 2004 election is a secret to anybody who is looking. Mark Crispin Miller devoted an entire (brilliant) book to the topic, "Fooled Again: How the Right Stole the 2004 Election & Why They'll Steal the Next One Too (Unless We Stop Them)", and BBC investigative reporter Greg Palast lays it out in a chapter of his new book "Armed Madhouse" and articles on his website www.gregpalast.com. Kennedy, however, has a name and reputation that demands instant recognition in the mainstream American media. And he didn't just recycle the work of those who preceded him - he went to Ohio, talked with elections officials, looked over records, investigated the investigators, and only included in his story those facts he felt were sufficiently solid that they could, as he told me, "convince a jury." In fact, he is calling for criminal investigations into his evidence, for indictments of culpable Republican officials, and jury trials. Even with such a credible and high-profile figure involved, however, the response so far of America's corporate-owned mainstream media to Kennedy's article evokes echoes of the media's handling of similar Republican Party crimes in Florida in the 2000 election. >{? Although it was reported - in The New York Times, no less - that Al Gore got more votes than George W. Bush in a statewide recount of Florida "no matter what standard was chosen to judge voter intent," most Americans don't know to this day that Gore actually won the 2000 election. The reason is a small percentage of Republican spin and a large percentage of journalistic cowardice in the mainstream media following 9/11. (This cowardice is limited to the USA, by the way - the story was extensively covered in most of the rest of the world.) In the 2000 case, The New York Times, on November 12, 2001, published a story summarizing the work of the newspaper consortium that spent nearly a year counting all the ballots in the 2000 Florida election. They found that a statewide recount - the process the Florida Supreme Court had mandated and which had begun when George W. Bush sued before the US Supreme Court to stop the recount - "could have produced enough votes to tilt the election his [Gore's] way, no matter what standard was chosen to judge voter intent." The Times analysis further showed that had "spoiled" ballots - ballots normally punched but "spoiled" because the voter also wrote onto the ballot the name of the candidate - been counted, the results were even more spectacular. While 35,176 voters wrote in Bush's name after punching the hole for him, 80,775 wrote in Gore's name while punching the hole for Gore. Katherine Harris decided that these were "spoiled" ballots, and ordered that none of them should be counted. Many were from African American districts, where older and often broken machines were distributed, causing voters to write onto their ballots so their intent would be unambiguous. As the Times added in a sidebar article with a self-explanatory title by Ford Fessenden, in the 2000 election in Florida: "Ballots Cast by Blacks and Older Voters Were Tossed in Far Greater Numbers." The November, 2001, New York Times article went on to document how, in a statewide recount, there was no possible doubt that Al Gore won Florida in 2000: "If all the ballots had been reviewed under any of seven single standards [all the ones that were used by either party], and combined with the results of an examination of overvotes, Mr. Gore would have won, by a very narrow margin. For example, using the most permissive ''dimpled chad'' standard, nearly 25,000 additional votes would have been reaped, yielding 644 net new votes for Mr. Gore and giving him a 107-vote victory margin. ... "Using the most restrictive standard -- the fully punched ballot card -- 5,252 new votes would have been added to the Florida total, producing a net gain of 652 votes for Mr. Gore, and a 115-vote victory margin. "All the other combinations likewise produced additional votes for Mr. Gore, giving him a slight margin over Mr. Bush, when at least two of the three coders agreed." And yet all of this information was buried well after the 17th paragraph of the story, which carried the baffling headline "Study of Disputed Florida Ballots Finds Justices Did Not Cast the Deciding Vote." As Robert F. Kennedy Jr. pointed out to me in an interview on my radio program on June 2, the reason the Times chose to bury the lede of their story and instead imply in the headline and first few paragraphs that Bush had legitimately won the 2000 election was because just a month earlier the US had been struck on 9/11 and The Times' publisher didn't want to undermine the president's legitimacy in a time of national crisis. In a case eerily prescient of the Times' 2004 decision to delay reporting on Bush's illegal wiretapping of Americans until after the election, the Times' publisher and editors decided in November of 2001 that that wasn't a good time to reveal that Bush was an illegitimate president and that Al Gore actually had won the election, both by the majority vote and the electoral vote. (Although, to their credit, at least they reported that Gore got the most votes in Florida, as did The Washington Post, which also ran the story but buried it deep within an article that similarly seemed to imply Bush won legitimately. USA Today passed over it altogether, simply saying that Bush won.) The big question for today is whether media history will repeat itself. Will the mainstream media do any first-source on-the-ground investigative reporting into the theft of the 2004 election, or simply treat it as a political "difference of opinion"? And if they do engage in the hard work of first-source reporting as the Times and their consortium did in 2001, and the results again come back that Bush is an illegitimate president, will they again bury that fact seventeen paragraphs into a story with a misleading headline and opening as they did when, in 2001, they counted the ballots and found that Al Gore got more votes than George W. Bush did in Florida? So far, it seems that the mainstream media is going to pass on doing any of their own first-source reporting, while Kenneth Blackwell begins the process of destroying evidence, which he'll be legally authorized to do in the next few months. For example, on Friday, June 3, 2006, CNN briefly interviewed Kennedy, but treated the story as a political one rather than an example of investigative reporting. Instead of interviewing Kennedy about the details and substance of the story, Wolf Blitzer had on with Kennedy the infamous Terry Holt, spokesman for the Bush/Cheney campaign and a likely co-conspirator in the crime, instead of an investigative reporter who had examined Kennedy's evidence. Just as when Holt was confronted by Anderson Cooper in August of 2004 about the administration's manipulation of terror alerts during the campaign, Holt similarly ridiculed the idea of Republican election crimes, and Blitzer didn't challenge him - or let Kennedy finish most of his sentences. Three days after Kennedy's story broke in Rolling Stone, a Google news search shows no national "mainstream" media having picked up the story as a serious news report, or having done any follow-up reporting into the issues he raises whatsoever. An email reply from an editor at The Seattle Times, asking why they're not covering the story, is characteristic of the response from many other national newspapers: "We subscribe to many news services for our national and foreign coverage. However, Rolling Stone is not one of them." The question should not be, "Is this a story we can quote or should investigate because it was first reported in a major newspaper?" Instead, it should be, "Is there credible evidence that the election of 2004 was stolen by Republicans engaged in openly criminal activity?" And, of course, "Are they preparing to do the same in 2006 and 2008?" Our national mega-corporate-owned media - now so driven by ad dollars that sensationalized "missing white girls" trump real news - will only respond if enough of us raise enough questions with their editors and writers. Or if more of our members of congress (you can call your congressperson or senator at 202 225-3121) - particularly the "media darlings" like Joe Biden and (gulp) Chuck Hagel, who are ubiquitous on the Sunday talking-head shows - begin to speak out with the rare courage Congressman John Conyers showed when he pursued his investigation despite a virtual news blackout from the mainstream media. Let them know what you think. Democracy begins with you, after all. Tag - you're it!
Miami Herald
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Meeting Hamas By Uri Avnery SHEIKH MUHAMMAD Hassan Abu-Tir has something every politician craves: instant recognizability. His long beard dyed bright orange with henna is very conspicuous indeed. Actually it is a religious symbol: the prophet, for whom he is named, used to dye his beard the same way. The red-bearded Sheikh is better known in Israel than any other senior Hamas leader. In the most popular satirical show on Israeli TV, "A Wonderful Land", he is already impersonated by a famous humorist, who succeeds in imitating his style and body language, with his intelligent smile, and brought him into our living rooms. For many Israelis, this impersonation has almost turned him into a likable figure, even if he himself does not like it at all. (Something similar has happened to Yasser Arafat, too. A marionette representing him in a very popular TV show portrayed him as a likable, mildly humorous figure, very different from the demonic image that the official Israeli propaganda endeavored to establish.) This week, Abu-Tir was in the news for a much more serious reason. When I met him at his home, an ominous threat was hovering over him: expulsion. The Interior Minister in the Olmert government informed him and three of his colleagues, all Hamas members of the Palestinian parliament, that within one month they would have to choose: either to resign from all their positions in the Palestinian Authority or be deprived of their status as "permanent residents" in Jerusalem. That would lead to their expulsion to the occupied West Bank. HOW WAS that possible? After the 1967 "Six-day War", when the Israeli government was in a hurry to annex East Jerusalem, it drew up new borders for the city, well beyond the neighborhoods of the city itself. The intention was to annex a maximum of land with a minimum of Palestinian inhabitants. Because of this, a map of the city looks like a pre-historic monster, or an American "gerrymander". Yet, in spite of all the efforts and tricks, there was no way to avoid including a sizable Palestinian population in the "unified" city, amounting now to a quarter of a million human beings. The village of Sur-Baher, where Abu-Tir is living, is situated a short distance from the city, but was annexed along with the rest. When the annexation took place, there arose, of course, the question of the fate of these inhabitants. If it had been possible to drive them out, it would surely have been done, but under the circumstances that would not have been acceptable. The natural thing would have been to give them Israeli citizenship, as was done in 1949 when a number of Arab villages, which were not conquered by the Israeli army, were turned over to Israel by King Abdallah of Jordan in the armistice agreement. But the Israeli leaders were appalled by the idea of adding another large bloc of Palestinians to the already considerable number of Arabs in Israel, amounting to about 20% of Israeli citizens. They found a tricky way out: the Palestinians in East Jerusalem were given the status of "permanent residents" in Israel, but remained citizens of Jordan. That way they could not take part in Israeli elections, but enjoyed many other privileges (like paying Israeli taxes and social security contributions.) The government knew, of course, that the Arabs would find it difficult to object to this ploy. If they had demanded Israeli citizenship, that would have meant recognizing Israeli sovereignty over East Jerusalem - something no state in the world has yet done. Not giving citizenship to the "annexed" Arabs also served another purpose. In the course of the 1948 war, the whole population of West Jerusalem had to flee to the East of the city. They left behind them all their property, including all the beautiful homes of the Talbiyeh quarter and the land on which the Knesset, the Prime Minister's office, the Giv'at Ram campus of the Hebrew University and the Israel Museum now stand. If the owners of these properties, who now live in East Jerusalem, had been granted citizenship, they could have demanded them back. That would not have been an automatic process, but the pressure on the government would have been intense. It was safer to make them "permanent residents" only. ONE OF the differences between a "citizen" and a "permanent resident" is that it is almost impossible to revoke citizenship, but quite easy to annul the status of a "permanent resident". The Minister of the Interior is empowered to do this by a simple executive decision. The victim can, of course, appeal to the Supreme Court, but the chances of success are slim. The action of Interior Minister Ronnie Bar-On is a bad omen. If he succeeds, this will constitute a danger to all the 250 thousand Palestinians in East Jerusalem. Their status as permanent residents could be revoked, under some security pretext or other. In Israel, security can be used to justify almost everything. Innocent Israelis can always be convinced that some measure is necessary in order to protect their lives from the murderous terrorists. The abuse of the term "permanent resident" is obvious. A "permanent resident" is usually an immigrant who comes to Israel and is not able - or does not want - to become a citizen. To apply this term to families who have lived in Jerusalem since it was conquered by the Caliph Omar some 1300 years ago is a political and linguistic rape. It violates international law, which says that East Jerusalem is an occupied territory whose inhabitants are "protected persons" who cannot be expelled from their homes. It also violates the Oslo agreement, which says that the question of Jerusalem is to be decided upon in the final status negotiations, which have not even started. Oslo specifically grants the Palestinian residents of Jerusalem the right to vote for and be elected to the Palestinian parliament. Abu-Tir has been elected by the voters of the city as their deputy. The demand that he choose between resignation from parliament and expulsion from the city is a crass violation of a written agreement - by the same Israeli government that demands that Hamas accept all written agreements with Israel. There seems to be no limit to the cynicism of Olmert & Co. Moreover, when the Oslo agreement was signed, Shimon Peres also gave a written commitment on behalf of the Government of Israel that no Palestinian institution in Jerusalem would be harmed. When Ehud Olmert was still the mayor of Jerusalem, he violated this commitment by closing the "Orient House". Now he is violating it again. PERHAPS IT is worthwhile to compare the two protagonists of this affair: Ronnie Bar-On and Muhammad Abu-Tir. Bar-On was born in Tel-Aviv, two months after the official founding of the State of Israel. I am not sure whether his family came to Palestine one or two generations earlier. He was always a very right-wing person, a Herut-Likud-man from youth. He is known for his rudeness. In the Knesset and in his frequent appearances on TV talk-shows he often behaves like a real oral hooligan. He became famous mainly because of the scandal that bears his name. When the position of Attorney General, a very powerful office in Israel, became vacant, Binyamin Netanyahu appointed Bar-On. At once rumors started, alleging that this had been done in collusion with Shas leader Aryeh Deri, who was awaiting trial and was eventually sent to prison. A public storm broke out, and Netanyahu was forced to remove him after only a few days in office. As a politician, Bar-On is a complete opportunist. His right-wing views did not prevent him from jumping on the bandwagon when Sharon set up Kadima. Because of this jump, he is now Interior Minister. He never made any sacrifice for his views. Abu-Tir was born in 1951, the son of a family that is deeply rooted in the country. He was sentenced to prison for life and spent (with interruptions) 25 years - almost half his life - in prison. First he was a Fatah member, but in prison he became a pious Muslim and joined Hamas. He is admired by the people around him, an amiable person with a lively sense of humor. It's easy to talk with him and he speaks perfect Hebrew. He has a lot of influence in his party. I MET HIM first during the stormy demonstration in a-Ram, under a shower of tear gas. We agreed then that we should meet in quieter surroundings. A few days ago I visited him at his home. We exchanged views and agreed to make the fact of our meeting public, thus turning it into a political act. I asked him to find out whether conditions are ripe for a wider meeting of Israeli peace organizations and the Hamas leadership. To me, the meeting brought back old memories. 32 years ago I established the first contacts with the emissaries of Yasser Arafat, who was then considered an arch-terrorist, the leader of a terrorist organization whose charter called for the elimination of the State of Israel. These contacts led in 1982 to my meeting with Arafat in besieged Beirut. It was his first meeting with an Israeli, but the circle widened rapidly and prepared the ground on both sides for the Oslo agreement and the Two-State Solution. I believe that now it is the job of the Israeli peace movements to do the same again: build the first bridge between Israelis and Hamas and pave the way for a dialogue between the Government of Israel and the Government of Palestine. (By the way, consistency demands that those who insist on talking about the "Hamas government" should also use the term "Kadima government".) In such a process, which demands a change in the minds of millions on both sides, the first contacts are very important. The establishment and its numerous servants in the media naturally try to ignore and conceal them, the public treats them with hostility and a lack of understanding, until it gets used to the idea. But it is an essential task. More than half the population in the Palestinian territories voted for Hamas. Hamas is an existing fact. It will play a major role in any conceivable scenario. The majority of Israelis long for an end to the conflict, and so do the majority of Palestinians. Both governments must, in the end, accept this reality.
Our task is to help them cross this bridge.
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Refugees Of Capital By Frank Scott International capital crosses national borders invisibly, pursuing profits for a global minority that inflict loss on the global majority . In historic fashion but at electronic speed, It creates economic chaos, throwing peasants off the land and forcing them to illegally emigrate as low paid, unskilled labor. Barriers of language, culture and overcrowding bring with them social animosity and help create a deadly serious global problem. The American role in this international drama has seen millions fleeing here after their homelands were invaded by our finance capital. This has energized negative social forces, but also served to organize a maligned and misunderstood sector of the working class. While many see an invasion of foreigners which they liken to terrorist attacks, others see entering the country illegally and bringing down wages as perfectly reasonable. Self-righteous name calling and simplistic individualism have taken precedence over analysis of the economic forces at work, and why they should be challenged. If, as some believe, we are a nation of immigrants with doors open wide to all who would enter , how many can we welcome before asking how much room we have and how much work we can offer? There are billions of suffering souls in the world, and many owe their misery to U.S. intervention in their nation's political economy. Should we invite them all here? Even if they will only find work by innocently serving commercial interest in lowering the wages of other Americans? And where will they live? How many communities which adamantly fight against congestion and the loss of open space will gladly welcome much more of the first, and much less of the second, in order to accommodate more immigrants? Ignorance of the real impacts of our foreign policy can only increase the animosity much of the world feels towards the USA . Many find us a beacon of freedom and democracy , but many more consider us a monster, bringing death and destruction to countries like iraq, and creating economic programs like NAFTA , which all but force people to illegally migrate seeking the survival they were denied by American corporadoes in league with their own corrupt governments. Calling all critics of immigration racists is a labeling practice of equally bigoted people. Some opponents of immigration are racists, but so are many immigration supporters. It hardly takes a super sleuth to find racists in America. It's about as difficult as finding sand in the Sahara. A nation built by immigrant labor was earlier developed by slave labor, and with many descendants of slavery still confined to shameful ghettos, it is galling to hear claims of moral superiority from those with high regard for immigrants, who are oblivious to the realities of their own citizens. This can only provoke more divisions among us, when we desperately need unity. Some well intentioned people think security for undocumented immigrants is a simple matter of getting work and finding housing. Often the work is in their own homes, but the housing is rarely in their own communities . A far more difficult reality can be revealed by examining conditions in our penal colony. In these concentration camps of mostly nonwhite prisoners, latinos and blacks are often at each others throats. Their sometimes mortal combat inside mirrors their socio-economic combat outside, but is hardly noticed by many engaged in a debate which excludes the Americans most directly affected by immigration. Hostility between the heartlessly vindictive and mindlessly accepting extremes does not call for a moderate middle ground, but a radically democratic base from which to consider the very structure of the economic system that creates and profits from this chaos. We need to understand the market forces of global capital in order to stop the damage it does to all nations when it exports skilled work, imports unskilled labor , and creates inequality, pollution and debt such as has never before existed in the developed world. No less a labor hero than Caesar Chavez warned of the negative impact when business was allowed to import cheap, undocumented labor. He knew this would only hurt those he was trying to help. The farm workers organized the unorganized, but they were all legal, not illegal workers. It is madness to think we can allow selective forms of illegality in support of specific groups of immigrants, while throwing many of the native born in jail for their illegal acts, which are driven by the same economic issue: poverty. It is equal madness to think we can improve things by building walls across the border, or imprisoning people who came here illegally but to pursue an honest living. It would make as much sense to build a fence around Wall Street and jail those who employ day laborers and nannies. We must stop enriching corporate capital - and a minority which needs household help - by providing them with an army of desperate people who will work for the lowest wages, in order to send money home to replace what was lost to invading corporations.
Our problem is not poor people crossing our borders seeking work, but
rich capital crossing their borders seeking profit. A global economic
system is conducting this assault on our national environment. Its
inherent inequality and injustice requires collective action to
confront
the real criminals and not scapegoat their victims. If we stop
international finance's invasive penetration of other nation's borders,
we won't have to worry about refugees illegally crossing ours .
Industrial capitalism of the 19th century threatened so many it
provoked
a call for the workers of the world to unite . Global capitalism of the
21st century is a much greater menace to humanity's future . It may be
time to revive that call.
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It was perfect symbolism, though, for the Republican leadership has been running around in circles on the immigration issue, clownishly trying to juggle their right-wing, lock-'em-out, anti-immigrant absolutism - while also trying to dance the two-step with their big business backers who happen to profit from the cheap labor of destitute Latino laborers. So, on the one hand, these clowns want to militarize the Mexican border (including erecting a monstrous, three-tiered fence to keep Mexicans out), but on the other hand they want a bracero-style program to keep the cheap labor flowing into our country. Then, just when you thought their political posturing couldn't get any goofier than putting Bush in a dune buggy, they came up with a truly-silly act of hyperactive xenophobia: they passed a resolution declaring that English is the "national language" of the USA. Wow - that'll show those immigrants! Not since the house decreed in 2003 that French fries should be renamed "freedom fries" has our congress demonstrated such ludicrous loopiness and embarrassing ineptness. Their "speak English" bill is a hoot, for it requires more thorough testing to prove English language proficiency. Yet, the very goof-balls pushing this wouldn't know proper English if it smacked 'em in the mouth - have you ever heard George W talk? This is the mumble-mouth who routinely says things like: "Rarely is the question asked - is our children learning?" This is Jim Hightower saying... Forget remembering the Alamo - with this new law, our Texas war cry will have to be: " Remember the Cottonwood!" (c) 2006 Jim Hightower's latest book, "If The Gods Had Meant Us To Vote They Would Have Given Us Candidates," is available in a fully revised and updated paperback edition. |
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This is the most difficult article that I have ever had to write, but I have to write it anyway, unfortunately.
I and just about anyone and everyone who criticizes George Bush and this war are accused of "not supporting the troops." Since my son, Casey, was killed in Iraq because of lies and to actually make that country safe for our corporate interests, I have been saying the only way we can support our troops at this point is to get them the hell out of this illegal and immoral war.
The massacre in Haditha on November 19, 2005, is just another way to underscore the fact that our troops are being turned into war criminals in what one article called: "The Worst War Crime of the Iraq War." (Sydney Morning Herald; May 28, 2006). In a stunning display of shameless hypocrisy George Bush said of the (not uncommon) butchering of innocent civilians in Haditha:
"Our troops have been trained on core values throughout their training, but obviously there was an incident that took place in Iraq ..."
Bush also said this following a meeting of his cabinet: "The world will see a "full and complete" investigation."
Another false piece of propaganda that we are fed is that we need to support the president, especially when we are "at war." I say, "No, way!" Our kids know the difference between right and wrong before they are sucked into a military system that dehumanizes our soldiers and forces them to dehumanize the "enemy" to the point where it is apparently acceptable behavior to kill children and to cover up the murders. Can we all assume that little Georgie was never told that cold-blooded murder is wrong, seeing that his family has supported wars and their inherent crimes for at least three generations?
The double standard that our leaders have set for themselves and the troops is amoral and corrupt. I have not seen - anywhere in the discussion of this topic - acknowledgement that not only is Haditha not the worst war crime committed by American or coalition troops but that the entire war is a war crime.
The following list of illegal, immoral, and atrocious behavior is obvious and not all inclusive by any means:
* 12 years of devastating sanctions that were responsible for killing over 500,000 Iraqi children.
* Destroying antiquities and culture is a war crime and prohibited under Geneva Conventions.
* The invasion of Iraq is a preventive war of aggression against a country that was no threat to the USA or the world and was expressly prohibited by the Geneva Conventions.
* The invasion was not sanctioned or approved of by the United Nations.
* "Shock and Awe" targeted civilian centers and killed many innocent people.
* Use of chemical weapons, especially white phosphorous enhanced with napalm, particularly in the second siege of Fallujah.
* Targeting hospitals, clinics, and threatening medical doctors with execution if they treat "insurgents" (which can apparently include babies and pregnant women).
* Using highly compensated mercenaries to carry out executions and torture.
* Forcing a style of government on the citizens and manipulating the outcome of the elections.
* Dishonoring the Constitution of the United States by invading Iraq without a declaration of war by Congress and by breaking our treaties with the United Nations and the ratified Geneva Conventions.
George Bush is correct. A "full and complete" investigation needs to be made into the crimes against humanity in Iraq, and if justice prevails, this would in turn lead to the trial and conviction of George and the rest of the neo-con purveyors of torture and murder, for which the maximum penalties should be applied.
The level of accountability needs to rise higher than Specialist or Private and should reach up and down the very blackest bowels of an administration that lied through its teeth to get our country into a war of aggression and occupation. The commander in chief needs to be prosecuted: NOW!
The most difficult part of this writing is in trying to reconcile the fact that our soldiers, for one example, in Haditha, could not show conscience and restraint, qualities which may have prevented a murderous rampage. When one sees the pictures of bodies burned beyond human recognition, hears of 2 year old children being killed out of revenge, women being shot for failing to stop at a checkpoint that is in the middle of THEIR country, prisoners being tortured in despicably inhumane ways, ad immoral infinitum, one should be appalled and ashamed to call oneself an American. That some of our soldiers would stoop to the level of their leaders to commit such atrocities is unspeakable. Bush says our troops have been trained in "core values," when he as a so-called born again Christian can claim that God told him to invade Iraq and it's okay to spy on American citizens like he is some kind of sick voyeur with a penchant for death and destruction.
War, under any circumstance, is not a "core value" of humanity; in fact, it is the ultimate failure of humanity. War turns our mostly normal American youth into wanton murderers who have lost their own humanity and love of others. Haditha in this war and My Lai in another disgusting war were unfortunately not aberrations. War is the abominable aberration.
Under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, our troops are forbidden from obeying unlawful orders, and Iraq was unlawful before it ever began. Our soldiers need to start disobeying the unlawful order to even be deployed to Iraq, and not raise their weapons in appeasement to the Bush Regime, and say: "This war is the criminal, I am not. Threaten me if you will, but I am not going to be an accomplice in your crimes against humanity."
We as people working for peace have long held that the people of Iraq did not deserve the treatment that they are getting from BushCo, but it is our troops who are pulling the triggers and pushing the buttons or flushing the Koran or sexually abusing prisoners, and we know about it, so that makes us accessories to the crimes, unless we are actively trying to end the severe breach of compassion and mercy that is being carried out in the Middle East.
Yes, we have to work to end the war and to hold everyone who commits atrocities accountable, from private to president, but we also have to support our soldiers who do not want to kill. It is a tragic dichotomy in this society that one can be executed for killing someone, but also be executed or imprisoned for disobeying an order to go and take the life of another human being in war.
There are several ways that our young men and women can be supported in resisting the evil of BushCo and Iraq. The GI Rights Hotline is there to help soldiers get out of going to an illegal and immoral war, and the War Resister's League in Canada needs support to help our soldiers find sanctuary and safety. Counter-recruitment is also a powerful tool to use to prevent our children from being sucked into the evil war machine and being used as cannon fodder/weapons of mass destruction for profit.
Where can the people of Iraq go to find sanctuary and safety? They have no place to run to and they have no voice to end this war of terror that is being waged on them by the USA.
It is up to us to be the voice of the babies of Iraq and of the other people whose only crime was to be born in the wrong place at the wrong time with the additional bad luck of living on top of rich oil reserves.
Support the troops? I support only those who are NOT supporting the exploitation of the Iraqi people, and those who do not allow the war profiteers to carry on with their death and destruction all for the sake of an opulent lifestyle. I do not support those who are supporting a criminally insane and treacherous foreign policy. However I, as the mother of a slain soldier, will do anything I can to support all of them by working to shorten their stay in an unwelcoming country, and bring them home from the quagmire that their so-called commander in chief forced them into.
Also, when our troops do come home from the war, they need all of the counseling, job training and help they require to transition back to a life where most people don't even recognize that there is a war being waged.
BushCo and the war machine killed my baby. They have killed tens of thousands more.
BushCo need to be prosecuted and punished like the common criminals that they are.
We owe this to the people of Iraq, the world, and our own soldiers.
We owe it to ourselves.
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SAN ANTONIO - Lt. Col. Brian Birdwell offered a greeting to delegates to the Republican convention. "It's great to be back in the holy land," the Fort Worth native said to the cheers of the party faithful.For the 4,500 delegates at last week's biennial gathering, it was both an expression of conservative philosophy and religious faith, a melding of church and state.
At Saturday morning's prayer meeting, party leader Tina Benkiser assured them that God was watching over the two-day confab. "He is the chairman of this party," she said against a backdrop of flags and a GOP seal with its red, white and blue logo.
The party platform, adopted Saturday, declares "America is a Christian nation" and affirms that "God is undeniable in our history and is vital to our freedom...We pledge to exert our influence toward a return to the original intent of the First Amendment and dispel the myth of the separation of church and state..."
At Saturday morning's prayer meeting, ministers delivered prayers, gospel singers sang, and the Rev. Dale Young, pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Laredo, picked up the convention's dominant theme of immigration. "Lord, your words tell us there's a sign that this nation is under a curse, when the alien who lives among us grows higher and higher and we grow lower and lower," he preached.
The night before, East Texas evangelist Rick Scarborough exhorted Christians at a "values rally" to get involved in elections...Delegates sought him out, taking snapshots and having him sign his book Liberalism Kills Kids.
Can I just say, as a Southerner, from a long line of Southerners going back to the 17th century, that these people are a bunch of ignorant goobers? Back in my youth, growing up in the most conservative, traditional, church-going, Bible-believing, flag-waving, rural Heartland community imaginable, these people would have been considered freaks on the fringe, best kept under the slimy rocks they occasionally crawled out from under.
Now they are enthroned on high, in Texas, in Washington, in the White House, in the greasy-money media empires that belch their filth and their perversions of faith over the airwaves and in print in a relentless, unending stream. These people aren't Christians - imagine using the Bible, with its constant refrain of taking in the stranger, caring for the alien, the commonality of the human predictment (rain falling on the just and unjust alike) as a cudgel to beat immigrants! No, they aren't Christians, they are primitive nationalists, proto-fascists who despise democracy and human freedom, preening in self-regard, imbuing their own willfully ignorant, lovingly cultivated prejudices and fears (and their squirmy, creepy sexual obsessions) with divine sanction. They are blind guides, whited sepulchres, exalters of the self, haters of women and traitors to the God they profess to worship.
And they aren't Southerners either, not really. For one thing, a good many of these "Sun Belt" conservatives are actually transplants from outside the South, like that quintessential modern Texan, George W. Bush, a prissy prep-school cheerleader from an old-line Yankee blueblood family. The Bushes are about as authentically Southern as an igloo.
But mostly, they aren't true Southerners because every true Southerner has had to confront and incorporate the tragic dimension of the region's horrible past as part of their own character: an inescapable heritage that doesn't vitiate our love of the land that raised us up but marks it and complicates it, infuses it with a humility that acknowledges the great evil of slavery and racist violence that is inextricably worked into the cultural soil. It is this tragedy - and the acknowledgement of this tragedy - that makes genuine Southerness, and precludes the kind of witless chauvinism, raging self-righteousness, arrogant bluster and brutal condemnation of the "Other" displayed by the Texas proto-fascists and all their ilk who dishonor the South, again, with their bile.
There is a very real and great danger to the health of the Republic now that these fake Southerners with their fake Christianity and fake patriotism have been pulled out from under their muddy rocks and loosed upon the nation by cynical manipulators in the power elite, who have used them as blunt instruments to advance their own predatory agenda. This will turn out to be one of the great destructive follies of the age, comparable to the American arming, organizing, funding and training of a transnational army of violent Islamists to bait the Russian bear in Afghanistan. When the willfully ignorant and the blindly self-righteous are empowered in this fashion, no one can control the blowback or foresee what form it will take. But that there will be blowback, that there will be hell to pay, is as certain as the sunrise, as certain as the grave.
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"Godless" Is Gutless By Greg Palast Ann Coulter says we're "Godless" - we "liberals." And by "liberals," she means anyone who wants to keep the government out of our underpants, out of Iraq, and out of the business of helping Big Business shoplift America. It's time someone took on the blonde bully. Ann, I realize yesterday was special day for you, releasing your book on June 6 - 06-06-06. Going through it, I must, admit, is heavy going: 'Godless' is a 300-page brick of solid meanness and pin-head hatreds packaged like a fashion magazine: Big Brother wears Prada. You accuse those who don't sign on to your list of prejudices as the Lord's enemies. That's not original, Ann: the Taliban thought of it before you and they too were partial to dressing in black. You want to talk about Godless? OK, let's go: Would the Lord lie us into a war? Would the Lord let thousands drown in New Orleans while chilling at a golf resort? Would the Lord have removed tens of thousands of Black soldiers from the voter rolls as the Republican Party did in 2004? You talk about being "Christian" - but with all your zeal to fire up electric chairs and Abrams tanks, you sound more like a Roman. I suggest this, Ann: let's debate. Set the time, set the place, and I'll be there. Nose to nose, my facts versus your fanaticism. But I know you don't have the guts to do anything but lob idiocies from your electronic Fox-hole.
Your new book is called, "Godless." Your autobiography should be called, "Gutless."
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Is Bill O'Reilly A Nazi? Just Asking! By Robert Parry If someone else had done what Fox News star Bill O'Reilly did the other day - malign American troops who fought in the Battle of the Bulge and at Iwo Jima - it's hard to imagine how ugly the Fox News reaction would be. Think of how vicious the attacks from Fox News and right-wing commentators were on Sen. Dick Durbin for citing FBI criticism of detainee abuse at Guantanamo, or the smears against Dan Rather and other journalists who helped expose the scandal at Abu Ghraib, or the ugly campaign to boycott the Dixie Chicks for criticizing George W. Bush. If one of those "usual liberal suspects" had said something one-tenth as offensive as O'Reilly's remarks, Fox News surely would have offered up one of its loaded questions, like "Is (fill in the blank) Anti-American or Just Blinded by Hatred of Our Troops?" But it's hard to imagine any comments as outrageous as O'Reilly's loose talk about war crimes supposedly committed by U.S. Army forces fighting in Belgium and by U.S. Marines in the bloody battle at Iwo Jima. On "The O'Reilly Factor" on May 30, O'Reilly floated the argument that the alleged murder by U.S. Marines of 24 unarmed men, women and children in the Iraqi town of Haditha in November 2005 was just par for the course in wartime. "In Iwo Jima, in the Battle of the Bulge, Malmedy, all these things," O'Reilly lectured his guest, retired Army Gen. Wesley Clark. "You're a military historian. You know these happened. It happened in every war. It's happened in every army. ..." When Clark protested - "you'll have to show me and prove to me that there were ever any American soldiers in Belgium and Normandy or in Iwo Jima who murdered civilians" - O'Reilly countered with a smirk and a shake of the head. "In Malmedy, as you know, U.S. forces captured SS forces who had their hands in the air, and they were unarmed, and they shot them down," O'Reilly said referring to the Belgian town of Malmedy, which was fought over during the Battle of the Bulge. "You know that. That's on the record, been documented. In Iwo Jima, the same thing occurred. Japanese attempted to surrender, and they were burned in their caves." But O'Reilly's historical certainty was astonishingly misplaced. First, at Malmedy, the atrocity on Dec. 17, 1944, was the other way around: about 86 surrendering U.S. soldiers were massacred by German SS panzer forces in one of the most notorious war crimes on the Western Front. O'Reilly had turned the U.S. soldiers from victims into war criminals, while transforming their SS murderers from war criminals to victims. As MSNBC anchor Keith Olbermann noted on his "Countdown" program on June 1, O'Reilly made the same mistake last year in using the alleged U.S. atrocity at Malmedy - the supposed killing of unarmed SS troops by American troops - to blunt concerns about the Abu Ghraib scandal. Despite encountering demands then for a correction, O'Reilly was back abusing the facts of Malmedy on May 30, this time to dilute outrage over the alleged murders of civilians at Haditha. When challenged about his error after his May 30 program, O'Reilly didn't exactly apologize but instead insisted he was referring to supposed U.S. revenge killings after the Malmedy atrocity. But that wasn't what he actually said. (Olbermann reported that Fox News later doctored the May 30 transcript to substitute "Normandy" for "Malmedy.") Odder still, O'Reilly apparently was familiar with the actual facts about the Malmedy massacre, having cited the case in a newspaper column on June 27, 2005. That version correctly had the SS murdering U.S. troops, but O'Reilly mentioned the massacre only to set up a moral equivalence between U.S. troops and the SS - and then went on to suggest that U.S. Marines murdered helpless Japanese. "After German SS troops massacred 86 American soldiers at Malmedy in Belgium on Dec. 17, 1944, some units like the U.S. 11th Armored Division took revenge on captured German soldiers," O'Reilly wrote, adding: "In the Pacific, relatively few Japanese prisoners were taken in the brutal island fights." Yet, O'Reilly provides no specifics or documentary citations to support these war-crimes charges against Americans. While it certainly is likely that some individual American soldiers killed surrendering enemy troops, O'Reilly seems bizarrely sympathetic to the fascist forces of Germany and Japan, responsible for tens of millions of deaths. O'Reilly also engages in historical revisionism with his explanation that the small number of Japanese POWs at Iwo Jima and other Pacific battles is proof that U.S. Marines committed systematic murder. According to most historical accounts, the Americans wanted the Japanese soldiers to surrender but they chose to fight to the death. O'Reilly's historical smears against U.S. troops in World War II read almost like some pro-fascist rationalizations circulating on some ultra-right Web sites.
Indeed, if there were a Fox News network that applied Fox News standards against Fox News personalities like O'Reilly, there surely would be one segment with loaded questions like "Why Does O'Reilly Enjoy Smearing American Heroes?" or perhaps "Is Bill O'Reilly a Nazi?" Just asking.
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| Bill Travels, Hillary Runs, The Media Leers Of all possible explanations for the mainstream media's preoccupation with the Clinton marriage, the most innocuous is nostalgia for a better time, when we were able to worry less about war, corruption, catastrophe and incompetence, and more about sex. Bad news only intensifies the urge to ignore reality and focus on triviality-a predilection seemingly shared by several of America's most important journalists, as well as a legion of mindless tabloid hacks. How comforting for the hacks, who tend to feel insecure about their mental and moral shortcomings, when the august editors of The New York Times decided to publish a tabloid-style review of Bill and Hillary Clinton's private life on the May 23 front page. And how much nicer still when the "dean" of Washington political reporters, David Broder of The Washington Post, ratified that decision with a column in which he expressed a discreet yearning for more salacious details. The private lives of the Clintons, the dean informed us with his usual solemnity, will be a "hot topic" should Mrs. Clinton decide to seek higher office. In other words, with the imprimatur of the paper of record, all the usual leering and clucking on cable television and talk radio proceeded in an atmosphere of intellectual elevation. This wasn't just the usual cheap sniggering. This was serious gossip. Not that the Times story itself displayed any great depth, despite reporter Patrick Healy's claim to have conducted interviews with "some 50 people" on the subject. Stuck on numbers, he sought to measure the marital status of the Clintons by counting how many days (or nights) they've spent together since the beginning of last year. According to his calculations, the average is about 14 days per month. If only the investigative ace were a bit sharper, he might have tried to compare that figure with similar data for other Senators and members of Congress, many of whose marriages have been ruined by the demands and temptations of their jobs. The sad examples are plentiful, notably in the Republican class of 1994, which has experienced an explosion of infidelity and divorce over the past decade. The Times scribe depicted Mr. Clinton as a playboy who occupies his evenings out on the town with billionaire bachelors and other pals. Omitted somehow were salient facts about the former President's constant, exhausting travel around the planet for public service. His AIDS work in Africa, China, Russia, Eastern Europe and the Caribbean, his tsunami-relief work in South Asia, and his hurricane-relief work in the United States require many nights away from home and hearth. His foundation keeps the itineraries, and it probably wouldn't take 50 interviews to get them. But that humanitarian stuff is so boring-and clearly not what the editors wanted. No, it's the playboy theme that thrills cable-TV personalities, notably on Fox News and MSNBC. Hardball host Chris Matthews eagerly chewed over the Times investigation with various experts, including NBC bureau chief Tim Russert. The Clinton marriage, they agreed, would become a matter of prime importance if the Senator runs for President. That is exactly backward, of course: While there are many reasons to be skeptical of Mrs. Clinton's potential bid for the White House, her admirable commitment to her marriage is not among them. Reaching for relevance, Mr. Russert tried to formulate questions that "people" might ask: "Exactly what is Bill Clinton's role in a [Hillary Clinton] campaign and in a presidency? And people also would say, 'If he has a lot of free time on his hands in the White House, is [sic] that become an issue?" Sorry, but the former President has been using the "free time on his hands" to achieve more benefit to the world than the combined lifetime accomplishments of the nation's talking heads. Ultimately, this episode reveals less about the Clintons than about the decaying culture of Washington journalism. Like the Bourbons, the Washington press corps forgets nothing, forgives nothing and learns nothing. They remain utterly oblivious to their own mean-spirited hypocrisy. Is there a reason why the enduring, 30-year bond of the Clintons merits more withering scrutiny than the multiple unhappy marriages of ambitious politicians such as Senator John McCain and Rudolph Giuliani? Is there a reason why the marital privacy of elected officials should be violated, while media moguls like Rupert Murdoch can discard their wives with impunity? Meanwhile, it is reassuring to know that Mr. Healy, at least, is a high-minded professional searching for significance. As the Times reporter told the American Society of Newspaper Editors a few years ago: "The media's future depends on journalists exercising this responsibility in a way that earns them the public's trust and confidence .... The most meaningful part of being a journalist, and the reason I chose that path, is the reward of telling stories about real-life, high-stakes matters of consequence, stories that will have an impact on real people."
That says it all.
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The Urbanity Of Evil By Norman Solomon I've been thinking about Tariq Aziz a lot since the New York Times printed a front-page story on the former Iraqi deputy prime minister in late May. A color photograph showed him decked out in what the article described as "an open-necked hospital gown, with a patient's plastic identification tag on his wrist." He looked gaunt. The last time I saw Aziz, at a Baghdad meeting two months before the U.S.-led invasion began, he was still portly in one of his well-tailored business suits. If Aziz was worried, he didn't show it. Now, he's playing a part that U.S. media seem to relish. The Times headline said "Hussein's Former Envoy Gushes With Adulation on Witness Stand," but to sum up the coverage it might have just as aptly declared: "How the Mighty Have Fallen." The Times reported that Aziz defended Saddam Hussein in his May 24 testimony -- after he was not able to cut a deal with Baghdad's current legal powers-that-be. "At an earlier stage of the trial, American officials said Mr. Aziz had offered to testify against Mr. Hussein on the condition that he be released early, a proposition the Iraqi court and its American advisers say they eventually rejected." If prisoner Aziz was initially angling for better treatment in exchange for ratting on Saddam, that would be consistent with how he first behaved in the dock. On July 1, 2004, appearing before an Iraqi judge in a courtroom located on a U.S. military base near Baghdad airport, Aziz said: "What I want to know is, are these charges personal? Is it Tariq Aziz carrying out these killings? If I am a member of a government that makes the mistake of killing someone, then there can't justifiably be an accusation against me personally. Where there is a crime committed by the leadership, the moral responsibility rests there, and there shouldn't be a personal case just because somebody belongs to the leadership." Trying to extract some positive meaning from the horrors set off by the U.S. war on Iraq, journalists are inclined to return to the well of sorrows recounted in the dragged-out trial of Saddam Hussein and key subordinates in Baghdad. Along the way, the pathetic efforts by Tariq Aziz to disclaim any responsibility for the actions of the regime he served are fodder for big American media guns -- journalistic arsenals much more trained on the deadly crimes of top officials in the Hussein regime than the deadly crimes of top officials in the Bush administration. As Iraq's most visible diplomat, Aziz was a smooth talker who epitomized the urbanity of evil. Up close, in late 2002 and early the following year, when I was among American visitors to his office in Baghdad, he seemed equally comfortable in a military uniform or a business suit. Serving a tyrannical dictator, Aziz used his skills with language the way a cosmetician might apply makeup to a corpse. Aziz glibly represented Saddam Hussein's regime as it tortured and murdered Iraqi people. Yet after the invasion, news reports told us, a search of his home near the Tigris River turned up tapes of such Western cultural treasures as "The Sound of Music" and "Sleepless in Seattle." The likelihood that he enjoyed this entertainment may be a bit jarring. We might prefer to think that a bright line separates the truly civilized from the barbaric, the decent from the depraved. But the man could exhibit a range of human qualities. Reserved yet personable, he could banter with ease. His arguments, while larded with propaganda, did not lack nuance. Whether speaking with a member of the U.S. Congress, an acclaimed American movie actor or a former top U.N. official, Aziz seemed acutely aware of his audience. He would have made a deft politician in the United States. We like to believe that American leaders are cut from entirely different cloth. But I don't think so. In some respects, the terrible compromises made by Tariq Aziz are more explainable than ones that are routine in U.S. politics.
Aziz had good reason to fear for his life -- and the lives of loved
ones -- if he ran afoul of Saddam. In contrast, many politicians and
appointed officials in Washington have gone along with lethal policies
because of fear that dissent might cost them re-election, prestige, money
or power.
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Pro-War Pols Don't Deserve A Political Future By Ted Rall DENVER--The congressmen and senators who lined up to cast their yeas and nays on October 11, 2002 knew that they were casting one of the most, if not the most, important votes of their political careers. Public Law 107-243, 116 Stat. 1497-1502, the result of the vote to authorize the Bush Administration to attack Iraq, would have incalculable moral, economic and geopolitical implications for the long-term future of the United States. But not every congressman put the interests of his country ahead of his career prospects. With George W. Bush still riding high in the polls less than a year after 9/11, it took courage and foresight--the ability to see a future in which the public would sour on Bush and his wars--to defy him. As is often the case during times of crisis, when history tests the mettle of men and women, courage and foresight were in short supply. Fewer than a third--156 out of 529--dared to vote no. Four years later, the Iraq war resolution reads like a classic of embarrassingly brazen propaganda. It says that Iraq posed a "threat to the national security of the United States," something that anyone with access to a map knew couldn't possibly be true. (Iraq's longest-range missiles had a maximum range of 500 miles.) It includes the debunked statements that Iraq had "a significant chemical and biological weapons capability" and was "actively seeking a nuclear weapons capability" [presumably a reference to Bush's phony Niger yellowcake uranium claim]. It's obvious to the 59 percent of Americans who think the war was a mistake that the 296 representatives and 77 senators who voted for this ridiculous tripe showed a spectacular lack of good judgment. As a result, nearly 2500 American troops are dead. So are 200,000 Iraqis. Between 18,000 and 48,000 U.S. troops have been wounded. We have no idea how many Iraqis have been crippled--perhaps over one million. Nearly $300 billion--more than 100 times the total amount spent to protect American cities from another 9/11--has been wasted. If Iraq were a stock, it would be Enron. Thousands killed and billions spent, but what return have we received on our investment? The contempt of the entire world, radicalizing Muslims, soaring debts and the disturbing confirmation that our troops include mass murderers as well as torturers and concentration camp guards. Iraqi resistance fighters, outgunned and outmanned, own the cities and roadways. Are we losing? Only an optimist would say that. We lost before we started. This mess was predictable. In fact, I predicted it. So did many others. Still, the 374 politicians who voted for the war can reasonably argue, this dismal outcome wasn't set in stone. Smarter execution of the war--emphasizing the security of Iraqi civilians over our own troops, staying away from charlatans like Ahmed Chalabi, protecting Iraq's Sunni minority--might have mitigated some of the chaos. Only a total idiot, however, could have bought the most bald-faced lie in the 2002 war resolution: conflating Iraq with the 9/11 terrorists. Accusing Iraq of "continuing to aid and harboring terrorist organizations" like Al Qaeda, the resolution contains 19 variants of the word "terrorism" and 10 references to "September 11, 2001." But Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. Iraq couldn't have been involved because Saddam was a socialist secularist whose Iraq encouraged women to work in top jobs, whereas Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda are radical Islamists seeking to establish a medieval caliphate where the only good woman is veiled behind a burqa. Saddam and Al Qaeda were mortal enemies. Everyone knew that. Now that the political winds have changed, our wormy "leaders" are backing away from having voted for the war in October 2002. "If Congress had been asked [to authorize the war], based on what we know now, we never would have agreed," probable 2008 presidential candidate Hillary Clinton backtracked in a fundraising letter to Democrats. "Americans should argue about the war," now allows John McCain, a slimy Republican who argued on the senate floor in 2002 that "giving peace a chance only gives Saddam Hussein more time to prepare for war." Hecklers are tormenting Clinton and McCain at campaign appearances with reminders of their pro-war votes. "I think I was wrong to vote for the war," admits John Edwards, who will probably watch '08 from the sidelines in preparation for a run in 2012 or 2016. Second-tier Democratic hopeful Mark Warner, reflecting the militant moderation of state-controlled media, warns against speaking ill of the politically brain-dead: "I don't think any U.S. senator, regardless of party, if they had known there weren't WMD, that we were going to get selected leaks, I don't think they would have voted for it. Second-guessing people who made a valiant attempt at judgment is not where I am at." It ought to be. It ought to be where we're all at. Our elected representatives are paid to make the right choices for our country and its future. They deserve to be held accountable when they fail to measure up. Especially when it's important. Especially when it's easy to make "a valiant attempt at judgment."
On October 11, 2002, 156 congressmen and senators stood up for decency and common sense. The others, who proved they were too stupid and short-sighted to do the right thing when it counted, should resign. They don't deserve our votes, much less a shot at the White House.
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 Heil Bush, Dear Propaganda Ansager Blitzer, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your constant shilling for the Junta, your attack on RFK and attempted coverup of the voting fraud and sedition in the 2004 Ohio election, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Media Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Fuhrer Bunker" formally 'The White House' on 07-01-2006. We salute you herr Blitzer, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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AUSTIN, Texas -- Thank goodness the Republicans are around to tell me what to worry about. The flag-burning crisis -- here in Austin, there's that pall of smoke rising from the West every morning (it's from an area called Tarrytown, where they burn hundreds of flags daily).
You didn't know hundreds of flags were being burned daily? Actually, you can count on your hand the number of incidents reported over the last five years. For instance, there was one flag burned in 2005 by a drunken teenager and one by a protester in California in 2002. This appalling record of ravishment must be stopped. You're clearly not worried about what matters.
Gay marriage, now there's a crisis. Well, OK, so there isn't much gay marriage going on here in Texas. None, in fact. First, we made it illegal. Then, we made it unconstitutional. But President Bush is all concerned about it, so I guess we have to alter the U.S. Constitution.
Gus and Captain Call (of "Lonesome Dove" fame) will be an item -- with who knows who waiting in line right after them.
Also of great concern to Republicans is God Almighty, who, rather to my surprise, has been elected chairman of the Texas Republican Party. That's what they announced at the biannual convention in Fort Worth this week: "He is the chairman of the Party." Sheesh, the Democrats couldn't even get Superman.
Also weighing down the nation with a heavy burden is the estate tax, which the Senate will try to repeal this week. The estate tax applies to around 1 percent of Americans, and I have yet to find any record of it costing anyone a family farm or business. It affects only very, very, very rich people, of whom you are probably not one. And they don't, actually, need another tax break.
These are the things we are supposed to be worrying about, and you notice that it frees us of quite a few troubles we might otherwise fret about.
The war in Iraq? No sweat.
Impending war with Iran? We're carefree.
The economy? Hey, did you see that employment report? Well, ignore it.
Budget out of control, shipwreck ahead? Never mind -- Bush doesn't. Worst class divisions since the Gilded Age, rich so much more enormously richer than everybody else, country starting to get creepy? Don't worry, be happy. Torture, massacre, extraordinary rendition, hidden gulag of prisons in foreign countries, Guantanamo, and massive violations of international law, American law and the Constitution? Well, you can see why gay marriage is a far greater menace.
Wipe out for the environment; hundreds of regulations and laws changed to favor those who exploit and damage natural resources; all so common, no one is keeping track of them all? Let her rip.
Global warming? In the first place, it's Al Gore's issue. In the second place, it's a downer. In the third place, who cares if it's too late in a few years?
Homeland security/war on terror? With the highly excellent disposition of anti-terror funds once more judiciously applied by the Department of Homeland Security, we truly have nothing to worry about. We're ready to stop terrorist attacks in Wyoming, and there are no important cultural sites in New York City, so let's rock.
Oil crisis? Ha! What oil crisis? You want a $100 rebate you can then give the oil companies? Hey, we're going to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and that should see us through ... oh, about nine months.
Windfall profits? You think the oil companies are ripping us off for windfall profits? Who? ExxonMobil? Why, they would never!
I believe what we have here is a difference over moral values.
The Republicans are worried about the flag, gay marriage and the terrible burden of the estate tax on the rich. The rest of us are obviously unnecessarily worried about war, peace, the economy, the environment and civilization. Another reason to vote Republican -- they have a shorter list.
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Not planning on getting pregnant? The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) doesn't care. As far as it is concerned, if you are one of the 62 million U.S. women of childbearing age, you are pre-pregnant--a vessel. You are a future fetal incubator.
In April, the CDC issued a report detailing measures to be taken to intervene in the life, healthcare and behavior of all women, "from menarche [first occurrence of menstruation] to menopause ... even if they do not intend to conceive."
The CDC report calls for a radical shift in medical care so that at every point of interaction, women's doctors are to stage "interventions" to make sure they are healthy and prepared to give birth. Want to take your newborn in for a checkup or your 8-year-old in for a high fever? Expect an "intervention" into your eating habits, weight and behavioral risk factors.
Got diabetes or epilepsy and looking for the care that is best for you? Wrong approach, says the CDC: "Separating childbearing from the management of chronic health problems and infectious diseases places women, their future pregnancies, and their future children at unnecessary risk."
Noting that attitudes and behavior related to childbearing and childbearing preparedness are "influenced by childhood experiences and prevailing social norms among adults," the CDC calls for a cultural and media crusade aimed at changing "public attitudes" about "the importance of preconception health behaviors," including the risks of tobacco use, alcohol, obesity, and diet.
The report bemoans the fact that half of all pregnancies are unplanned, and focuses in on the potential harm caused to fetuses by their female incubators between the time of an unexpected conception and the recognition of pregnancy. Never mind making it easier for women to decide for themselves whether or not to become pregnant. Never mind ensuring that women have the ability to terminate unwanted pregnancies. Not once, in its entire 43 pages, does the CDC's report even mention birth control or elective abortion.
Instead, the CDC report is framed in and extends the kind of logic that has galvanized the anti-abortion movement for years. Now, not only is the developing life of a fetus--a potential human being--considered more valuable and important than the life of the mother--but the potential life of a nonexistent fetus takes precedence over the life of the woman.
But what is a fetus? It is nothing more than a potential human being. And the only way it can grow into a human, a separate social being, is by being a subordinate part of a woman's body and her biological processes for months.
It is a very sobering sign of the times that there is so much confusion over the truth that a fully formed woman's life-and her will-is more valuable than this subordinate part of her own biology. Sobering, too, is the idea of the America we're headed for should we not see a huge outpouring of rage, furious resistance and indignant, uncompromising insistence that "Women are not incubators!"
Failing that, get prepared for the religious fanatics who terrorize women at the doors of abortion clinics to broaden their harassment against women who enter bars, smoke cigarettes or eat at McDonald's. Get ready for the prosecution of women who engage in these activities for crimes against their future fetuses. And get ready for calls to weed out and even sterilize women who are deemed by the state to be unfit to bear children.
Sound too extreme? Wake up and look around!
* Already, legions of theocratic lawyers are constructing legal defenses for the fundamentalist pharmacists who refuse to fill women's prescriptions for birth control.
* Already, Louisiana has joined South Dakota in banning abortion throughout the state.
* Already, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) and others have called for the execution of abortion providers.
* Already, laws passed to "protect" fetuses have been used to jail people who, lacking safe and destigmatized access to legal abortions, either self-induced an abortion or helped a woman induce her own voluntary abortion.
* Consider that the Rev. Thomas J. Euteneuer, the leader of Virginia-based Human Life International, has called the repressive anti-abortion laws in El Salvador "an inspiration." As The New York Times Magazine said in describing the situation in El Salvador: "In the event that the woman's illegal abortion went badly and the doctors have to perform a hysterectomy, then the uterus is sent to the Forensic Institute, where the government's doctors analyze it and retain custody of her uterus as evidence against her."
* And think what it means that the born-again commander in chief, George W. Bush, has met with and lent political support to the "Snowflakes." The Snowflakes Frozen Embryo Adoption Program is a Christian conservative movement that finds women to act as incubators in an effort to bring to term every frozen embryo that would normally be discarded by fertility clinics. Then, in a sick and sinister fashion, they take the resulting babies and parade them around-including in photo ops such as one with President Bush -to crusade against stem cell research and to agitate for the position that a woman's primary function is to reproduce.
The CDC gives the appearance of being concerned about the high infant mortality rates among uninsured, poor and oppressed women. (And indeed, the need for concern is real: Mortality rates for infants born to black women in Brooklyn are comparable to the rates of many Third World countries.) Its report recommends intensive interventions into the lives of women who are at high risk, singling out race and economics as determining factors. But the "interventions" are not aimed at solving the conditions that cause women to be poor, to lack healthcare or to be trapped in abusive relationships. Instead, the report's recommendations lay a blueprint for exploiting these women's underprivileged conditions as a means of further intruding into, and even criminalizing, intimate aspects of their lives.
And when you get right down to it, this report has potentially genocidal implications. By formalizing the idea that certain women chronically put themselves at risk of being less-than-perfect potential mothers, the CDC paves the way for acceptance of the idea that certain women are unfit to reproduce.
Paranoia, you say? Let's not forget this country's long and shameful history of removing children from Native Americans who were deemed unfit to raise them. Or its history of forced sterilization of black and Puerto Rican women without healthcare who went to hospitals to give birth.*
The CDC's report takes a viciously immoral stance toward half of humanity. It needs to be answered--by scientists and doctors refuting the bases of its recommendations; by social scientists and historians bringing to light what has happened in places like Nazi Germany, where all young women were classified as breeders; and most of all by millions of outraged women and men who refuse to march forward into a real-life "Handmaid's Tale."
* Reports of this practice continued until the 1970s. See "Killing the Black Body: Race, Reproduction and the Meaning of Liberty" by Dorothy Roberts or "Maternal Mortality, Population Control, and the War in Women's Wombs: A Bioethical Analysis of Quinacrine Sterilizations" by Judith A.M. Scully, in 19 Wisconsin International Law Journal 103.
... Joe Heller ...  |
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The eastern world, it is exploding
But you tell me
Don't you understand what I'm tryin' to say
And you tell me
Yeah, my blood's so mad, feels like coagulatin'
And you tell me
Think of all the hate there is in Red China
And... tell me over and over and over and over again, my friend
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Parting Shots...
By Will Durst Oh, you're going to love this. It's the latest tripe being ground out of the ever-busy Bush Administration sausage factory of spin. Now that the evidence about global warming is pretty much nailed down, meaning every scientist on the face of the planet agrees that not only are we neck deep in the middle of it, the bottom of our earlobes are starting to tickle; turns out, no worries. It's really good for us. Yes. "Glaciers are actually growing." Well, at least one is. In spots. Some scientists say this is also due to global warming, but hey, why work yourself into a lather? You can't deny shipping will benefit due to the opening of a Northwest Passage. It's the fast-tracking of Armageddon. So what if other parts of the world are destined to suffer eternal droughts, or total submersion, or disappearing fauna and flora and coastline? That's just what you call your collateral damage. Can't have an omelet without breaking a few eggs. Just think of the future as a 12-ton boulder on a henhouse. According to Al Gore's new movie, "An Inconvenient Truth," we've got a window of about 10 years before we hit the point of no return, and let's face it: Americans are the lead dog in this Iditarod to hell. And we've got less chance of altering our gas-guzzling ways in time as a pack of Chihuahuas have of pulling a sled carrying the 101st Airborne. Wouldn't you say its just about time we weenie liberals accept the fate that God and Exxon-Mobil have mapped out for us and search for the silver lining in living on a planet speedily replicating the atmosphere of Mercury? I would. It's the point of this column. So let us take a couple of moments to band together, spray ourselves down with SPF 450 and look at the upside of overheating. THE BRIGHTSIDE OF GLOBAL WARMING * Casual Friday becomes clothing optional Friday. * Not nearly as many frog species to catalogue. * MTV's Jose Cuervo Spring Break Brought to You Live From the World Famous Beaches of Nova Scotia. * History Channel specials on picnics. * Dive the ruins of Bangladesh. * Extreme Siberian Summers. In December. * Less glaciers, more salt flats. * Wyoming coconuts. * Deteriorating ozone makes air travel too dangerous for politicians to make trips back to home districts. * Louis Vuitton full body containment suits. * A flourishing alligator sightseeing industry on Lake Michigan. * Dune buggies everywhere, dude. * Monkey wranglers; a North American growth industry. * A perfect all-around tan in less than 30 seconds. * Aged Duluth Coffee beans. * Worried about unprovoked polar bear attacks? Don't be. Ever again. * Oceanfront property in Missouri. * Antarctic pinot noir. * Real black panthers in Oakland. * Surfing + Sweden = nirvana. * So many hurricanes, your name guaranteed to cycle through the list much more often. * Backyard dwarf banana trees.
* No need to retire to Arizona; Arizona will come to you.
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Issues & Alibis Vol 6 # 23 (c) 06/09/2006
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In This Edition
Daniel Ellsberg searches for, "Iraq's Pentagon Papers."
Uri Avnery remarks with tongue-in-cheek, "Oh, What A Wonderful Plan!"
Stephen Colbert gives his, "2006 Commencement Address."
Jim Hightower explains, "The Artful Dodger Strikes Again."
Sheila Samples says, "Support The Troops."
Chris Floyd sings along with Bob in, "Gitmo Sings The Tombstone Blues."
Greg Palast reports the, "Unreported: The Zarqawi Invitation."
Robert Parry follows, "The Moon-Bush Cash Conduit."
Joe Conason finds, "Politics As Usual Instead Of Security."
Norman Solomon asks, "Why Pretend That Hillary Clinton Is Progressive?"
Eric Alterman reminds us that, "Truth Is For 'Liberals.'"
Ann Coulter wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award!'
Molly Ivins listens to, "A Ludicrous Debate."
Jeremy Brecher reports on, "Lieutenant Watada's War Against The War."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department the fabulous "Mrs. Betty Bower Reviews Miss Ann Coulter: Oh, And Her New Book, Too" but first Uncle Ernie explores, "Bush Family Values."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of David Horsey with additional cartoons from Ruben Bolling, Micah Wright, Bruce Yurgil, Tom Tomorrow, M.E. Cohen and White House.Org.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Bush Family Values By Ernest Stewart
It rubs the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again.
First one of course is our bi-sexual Fuhrer whose extra marital activity's include Jeff Gannon and Kinda Sleezy Rice. Who by his own proclamation is a follower of the obviously gay god Jesus (who ran around and slept with 12 other unmarried guys and two hookers back when the average Jew was married off at age 12 or 13 * ) and yet hates gays and wants them to live in "sin" without the benefit of marriage. As we all know heterosexual marriage ends in divorce most of the time so do explain how gays could make that any worse? Do you suppose though he might be doing it to keep them from the nightmares of marriage that the rest of us married "straights" can all testify to? Nah he's just a bigot! The real truth behind the matter has nothing to do with mythology and everything to do with equality. We either have equal rights for all or it will be just a moment before nobody has any rights at all. Today the Gays, tomorrow the Muslims, the next day the Mexicans, followed by the Blacks, then the Jews etc. etc. etc. Talk about your "slippery slope" folks! America is like no other place on Earth as we learn absolutely nothing from history. Americans come by this honestly as their entire lives they're lied to! First by mom and dad, then by the schools, then by their employers, then by the fascist owned media and finally by their government. Most American's wouldn't know the truth if it jumped up and bit them on the ass! Remember the words of Martin Niemoeller who said of another "Crime Family Bush" enterprise...
"First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out--
because I was not a communist; Don't you think it's time to speak out America for the Gays before they come for you? In Other News... I see more Bush chicanery over the House and Senate where they passed similar but not identical bills with portions forbidding the funding of permanent military bases in Iraq and with no objections, imagine that! But the conference committee that would normally reconcile the differences of the two versions instead behind closed doors, resolved those differences by deleting them, which is in violation of Congressional rules! So we'll continue building those 12 permanent bases which will have 50,000 troops manning them until the oil runs out in about 100 years regardless the intent of the House and Senate. Ergo no matter what Smirky says we're not leaving Iraq no matter what the Iraqis do. I'm not sure what the committee called their deletion decision but I call it treason, what do you call it? ***** Bye bye to bug boy who bit the Congressional big one! Tom "da hammer" Delay (I always thought that BartCop was the hammer?) said his good-byes and farewells and rode off into that polluted Taxus sunset. Ba ba Tommy don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out of the House, we need that door, it keeps the riff-raff out! One other thing, most people don't know is that Tommy's life before he came to Con-gress was used by William S. Burroughs and David Cronenberg as the prototype for the main character "Bill Lee" in the "Naked Lunch" movie. Rumor has it Hollywood's readying an offer for the next phase of Tommy's life i.e. "The Jailhouse Rock!" ***** And finally I saw the "Walrus" on TV the other day bitching once again about the UN. I wish someone would give him a bucket of cod to shut Johnny one note up! And for Zeus' sake do something about that god-awful mustache! While Herr Bolton is an ignorant, fascist, swine I've got to agree with him on one point, we've got to get rid of the current UN and design one that works or we are doomed folks. Consider almost everything they've ever done has been a disaster. From stealing land from Jordan in 1948 to give to the Zionazis and then for 58 years they sat by and watched them murder the Palestinians and everyone else in the area (which will lead no doubt to WWIII) and did nothing! Unfortunately Israel is just a drop in the bucket. I've watched in disbelief all of my life as the UN said pretty words but otherwise did nothing while tens of millions were slaughtered. From the "killing fields" of Cambodia to the plains of Darfur all they do is watch and wait. Or they may send troops but only after a certain number of innocents are turned to dust. So what good are they? They stand by mumbling platitudes about the US conquering the world while Bolton laughs in their face and tells them to go f-ck themselves. Like old Willie said in "Mac the Knife" the UN...
We get by with a little help from our friends! ******************************************** * Don't believe that statement? Put the same group in modern day San Francisco then tell me what you see?
So how do you like the 2nd coup d'etat so far?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
 Iraq's Pentagon Papers By Daniel Ellsberg A joint resolution referred to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last week by Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) calls for the withdrawal of all American military forces from Iraq by Dec. 31. Boxer's "redeployment" bill cites in its preamble a January poll finding that 64% of Iraqis believe that crime and violent attacks will decrease if the U.S. leaves Iraq within six months, 67% believe that their day-to-day security will increase if the U.S. withdraws and 73% believe that factions in parliament will cooperate more if the U.S. withdraws. If that's true, then what are we doing there? If Iraqis don't believe that we're making things better or safer, what does that say about the legitimacy of prolonged occupation, much less permanent American bases in Iraq (foreseen by 80% of Iraqis polled)? What does it mean for continued American armored patrols such as the one last November in Haditha, which, we now learn, led to the deaths of a Marine and 24 unarmed civilians? It was questions very much like these that were nagging at my conscience many years ago at the height of the Vietnam War, and that led, eventually, to the publication of the first of the Pentagon Papers on June 13, 1971, 35 years ago this week. That process had begun nearly two years earlier, in the fall of 1969, when my friend and former colleague at the Rand Corp., Tony Russo, and I first started copying the 7,000 pages of top-secret documents from my office safe at Rand to give to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. That period had several similarities to this one. For one thing, Republican Sen. Charles Goodell of New York had just introduced a resolution calling for the unilateral withdrawal of all U.S. armed forces from Indochina by the end of 1970. Unlike the current Boxer resolution, his had budgetary "teeth," calling for all congressional funding of U.S. combat operations to cease by his deadline. Two other similarities between then and now: First, though it was known to only a handful of Americans, President Nixon was making secret plans that September to expand, rather than exit from, the ongoing war in Southeast Asia - including a major air offensive against North Vietnam, possibly using nuclear weapons. Today, the Bush administration's threats to wage war against Iran are explicit, with officials reiterating regularly that the nuclear "option" is "on the table." Second, also in September, charges had been brought quietly against Lt. William Calley for the murder 18 months earlier of "109 Oriental human beings" in the South Vietnamese hamlet of My Lai 4. This went almost unnoticed until mid-November of that year, when Seymour Hersh's investigative story burst on the public, followed shortly by the first sight for Americans of color photographs of the massacre. The pictures were not that different from those in the cover stories of Time and Newsweek from Haditha: women, children, old men and babies, all shot at short range. What was it that prompted me in the fall of 1969 to begin copying 7,000 pages of highly classified documents - an act that I fully expected would send me to prison for life? (My later charges, indeed, totaled a potential 115 years in prison.) The precipitating event was not Calley's murder trial but a different one. On Sept. 30, I read in the Los Angeles Times that charges brought by Creighton Abrams, the commanding general of U.S. forces in Vietnam, against several Special Forces officers accused of murdering a suspected double agent in their custody had been dismissed by the secretary of the Army. The article, by Washington reporters Ted Sell and Robert Donovan, made clear that the reasons alleged by Secretary Stanley Resor for this dismissal were false (and that the order to dismiss the charges had most likely come directly from the White House). As I read on, it became increasingly clear that the whole chain of command, civilian and military, was participating in a coverup. As I finished the article, it hit me: This is the system I have been part of, giving my unquestioning loyalty to for 15 years, as a Marine, a Pentagon official and a State Department officer in Vietnam. It's a system that lies reflexively, at every level from sergeant to commander in chief, about murder. And I had, sitting in my safe at Rand, 7,000 pages of documentary evidence to prove it. The papers in my safe, which came to be known as the Pentagon Papers, constituted a complete set of a 47-volume, top-secret Defense Department history of American involvement in Vietnam titled, "U.S. Decision-making in Vietnam, 1945-68." I had exclusive access to the papers for research purposes and had been reading them all summer; they made it very clear that I, like the rest of the American public, had been misled about the origins and purposes of the war I had participated in - just as are the 85% of the troops in Iraq today who still believe that Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11 and that he was allied with Al Qaeda. The papers documented in stunning detail a pattern of lies and deceptions by four presidents and their administrations over 23 years to conceal their war plans - along with internal estimates of the high costs and risks of these plans (and their low probabilities of success), never meant to reach the public and provoke debate. They showed very clearly how we had become engaged in a reckless war of choice in someone else's country - a country that had not attacked us - for our own domestic and external purposes. It seemed to me that to be doing that against the intense wishes of most of the inhabitants of that country was not just bad policy but morally wrong. Moreover, it became clear to me that the justifications that had been given for our involvement were false. Vietnam was not a just war, and never had been. And if the war itself was unjust, then all the victims of our firepower were being killed without justification. That's murder. As I read the story in The Times that morning about the coverup of the Special Forces murder and compared it with what I'd been reading in the secret history, I came to see it as a microcosm of what had been happening since the war began. And I thought to myself: I don't want to be part of this lying machine anymore. I am not going to conceal the truth any longer. I called Russo, who had been fired from Rand a year earlier, in part for inconvenient field reporting about torture of prisoners by our Vietnamese allies. I asked him if he had access to a copying machine. He did. We began on Oct. 1. Night after night, I brought out batches of papers from my safe, and we copied them. I gave them first to members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, hoping that they would make the documents public. But they did not. Eventually, I gave them to the New York Times, which began publishing them Sunday, June 13, 1971. Two days later, the New York Times was ordered by a federal judge, at the request of the White House, to stop publishing - the first injunctive prior restraint of the press in U.S. history. I then gave copies to the Washington Post and, when it also was enjoined, to 17 other newspapers, while I was being sought by the FBI. On June 28, I turned myself in and was arrested and charged with violations of the Espionage Act and theft. Today, there must be, at the very least, hundreds of civilian and military officials in the Pentagon, CIA, State Department, National Security Agency and White House who have in their safes and computers comparable documentation of intense internal debates - so far carefully concealed from Congress and the public - about prospective or actual war crimes, reckless policies and domestic crimes: the Pentagon Papers of Iraq, Iran or the ongoing war on U.S. liberties. Some of those officials, I hope, will choose to accept the personal risks of revealing the truth - earlier than I did - before more lives are lost or a new war is launched. Haditha holds a mirror up not just to American troops in the field, but to our whole society. Not just to the liars in government but to those who believe them too easily. And to all of us in the public, in the administration, in Congress and the media who dissent so far ineffectively or who stand by as murder is being done and do nothing to stop it or expose it. It is past time for Americans to summon the civil courage to face what is being done in their name and to refuse to be accomplices. We must force Congress and this president, or their successors if necessary, to act upon the moral proposition that the U.S. must stop killing men, women and children in Iraq, and must not begin to do so in Iran.
Neither the lives we have lost, nor the lives we have taken, give the U.S. any right to determine by fire and airpower who shall govern or who shall die in countries we have wrongly attacked. |
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Oh, What A Wonderful Plan! By Uri Avnery NINE MONTHS before he invaded Lebanon, Ariel Sharon let me in on his grand design for solving all the problems of this region. It was mind-boggling. He did not ask me to keep it secret, just not to attribute it to him directly. I published it accordingly. Sharon, then the freshly appointed Minister of Defense, was not satisfied with modest steps for improving the situation in the country between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River. He wanted to change the face of the entire region, over four countries. The main points: To expel the Syrians from Lebanon; to establish there a Maronite-Christian dictator (Bashir Gemayel); to transfer the Palestinians from Lebanon to Syria, and from there to Jordan; to encourage a Palestinian revolution in Jordan to overthrow King Hussein and turn Jordan into a Palestinian state under Yasser Arafat; to negotiate with the Palestinian government in Amman about the future of the West Bank. One possibility: to create a situation there that would allow Israel to establish settlements all over the West Bank and the Palestinians there to vote for the parliament in Amman. This was the plan which inspired Sharon to march into Lebanon in the summer of 1982. It was not quite successful. Actually, the results were the opposite of what he expected: Israel got stuck in the Lebanese quagmire for 18 years, and in the end barely escaped. The Maronite-Christians did indeed massacre hundreds in Sabra and Shatila to frighten the Palestinians into fleeing to Syria, but they did not budge. Bashir Gemayel was appointed President unopposed but murdered soon after. The Syrians stayed in Lebanon for another 23 years, and, upon leaving, left behind Hizballah. Arafat did not go to Amman but to Tunis, returning twelve years later to Palestine, after Israel had recognized the PLO and signed the Oslo agreement. This historic fiasco sprang to mind this week when I saw the grandiose plan of another strategic genius: Major-General Giora Eiland, former chief of the Army Operations Department, until recently chief of the National Security Council, the Government department charged with formulating national strategy. LIKE SHARON, General Eiland dreams of rearranging the entire region, from the foundations up. His grand design is no less impressive than that of Sharon. Not the Separation Plan, God forbid, but the grand design I mentioned earlier. Eiland has only contempt for Sharon's Separation and Olmert's Convergence, holding both Sharon and Olmert to be mere dilettantes who know nothing about staff work and orderly deliberations, but make decisions according to their gut feelings. As he disclosed to Haaretz interviewer Ari Shavit, Eiland has a much more serious and worked-out plan, as follows: To annex to Israel 12% of the West Bank, 600 sq. km. at least, in order to safeguard the security of Israel with defensible borders. To take 600 sq. km of North Sinai from Egypt and join them to the Gaza Strip, to enable the Palestinians to build a seaport and an international airport there, as well as a city of a million people. To compensate Egypt with 150 sq. km. of Israeli land in the Negev. To allow the digging of a tunnel between Egypt and Jordan under Israeli territory near Eilat. To transfer 100 sq. km. of Jordan to the Palestinians, as compensation for the territory Israel will take from the West Bank. I have seen dozens - perhaps hundreds - of plans thought up by good people, who have wonderful ideas for the solution of the conflict. Hardly a month goes by without somebody e-mailing me another one. Eiland's plan is no worse than the other utopias. Unfortunately, it is also no better. But there is one big difference: the proud author of this plan is a man who played a central role in the highest ranks of the security establishment. His ideas may indicate something about the mental patterns prevalent there. A PERSON has to be really nave, and devoid of any political understanding, to believe that it would be possible to convince three governments - the Palestinian, Egyptian and Jordanian, not to mention the Israeli - to give up part of their territory. Worse: one needs a certain mindset to treat large numbers of human beings as if they were chess figures to be moved about from state to state, from here to there. True, in the first half of the 20th century this was indeed done. After World War I, the statesmen sat down and rearranged the map of the world, dismantling states here and putting together new ones there. Most of the results were disastrous. After World War II, Stalin did the same. He annexed to the Soviet Union a big chunk of Poland, and compensated Poland with a big chunk of Germany. Until now, it has worked. Adolf Hitler, of course, intended to do much the same in the other direction. In our reality, this idea is totally impractical. There is no chance in the world that Egypt would give up a chunk of land in return for a much smaller patch of desert. Menachem Begin already found out how sensitive the Egyptians are in this regard. It touches the deepest strings of their national soul. In the end, the Egyptians did not give up one square millimeter of their territory. Witness: the Taba affair. The chance that Jordan would sacrifice fertile land for the Palestinians is even slimmer. Like many Israeli army officers, Eiland, so it seems, has deep contempt for Jordan. Just as he does not understand the Egyptians, he does not understand the ruling class of the Hashemite Kingdom. It is - with reason - uncommonly sensitive to the dangers lurking all around it. But it enjoys, of course, the unwavering support of the United States and the United Kingdom. It is not even worthwhile considering the possibility that the United States and Europe would lend a hand to such a game of switching around people and territories. Europe sanctifies existing borders. It has learned from bloody experience that there is nothing more dangerous than moving borders. Once started, no one knows where it will end. Eiland does not burden himself with the practical details of his grandiose plans. He leaves all that, so it seems, to the politicians - the same politicians he so despises. Like the inventor who wanted to slow down the revolution of the globe, when asked how this should be done, he replies: "I have the ideas. The implementation is the job of the technicians." Years ago Boutrus Boutrus-Ghali, then the acting foreign minister of Egypt, told me with a thin ironic smile: "You Israelis have the best experts on Arab affairs in the world. They have read all the books, all the articles. They know everything -and understand nothing, because they have never lived one single day in an Arab country."
General Eiland seems to be no exception.
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 2006 Commencement Address By Stephen Colbert Stephen Colbert[Pours water into a glass at the podium, splashes face and back of neck] Thank you. Thank you very much. First of all, I'm facing a little bit of a conundrum here. My name is Stephen Colbert, but I actually play someone on television named Stephen Colbert, who looks like me, and who talks like me, but who says things with a straight face he doesn't mean. And I'm not sure which one of us you invited to speak here today. So, with your indulgence, I'm just going to talk and I'm going to let you figure it out. I wanted to say something about the Umberto Eco quote that was used earlier from The Name of the Rose. That book fascinated me because in it these people are killed for trying to get out of this library a book about comedy, Aristotle's Commentary on Comedy. And what's interesting to me is one of the arguments they have in the book is that comedy is bad because nowhere in the New Testament does it say that Jesus laughed. It says Jesus wept, but never did he laugh. But, I don't think you actually have to say it for us to imagine Jesus laughing. In the famous episode where there's a storm on the lake, and the fishermen are out there. And they see Jesus on the shore, and Jesus walks across the stormy waters to the boat. And St. Peter thinks, "I can do this. I can do this. He keeps telling us to have faith and we can do anything. I can do this." So he steps out of the boat and he walks for-I don't know, it doesn't say-a few feet, without sinking into the waves. But then he looks down, and he sees how stormy the seas are. He loses his faith and he begins to sink. And Jesus hot-foots it over and pulls him from the waves and says, "Oh you of little faith." I can't imagine Jesus wasn't suppressing a laugh. How hilarious must it have been to watch Peter-like Wile E. Coyote-take three steps on the water and then sink into the waves. Well it's an honor to be giving your Commencement address here today at Knox College. I want to thank Mr. Podesta for asking me two, two and a half years ago, was it? Something like that? We were in Aspen. You know...being people who go to Aspen. He asked me if I would give a speech at Knox College, and I think it was the altitude, but I said yes. I'm very glad that I did. On a beautiful day like this I'm reminded of my own graduation 20 years ago, at Northwestern University. I didn't start there, I finished there. On the graduation day, a beautiful day like this. We're all in our gowns. I go up on the podium to get my leather folder with my diploma in it. And as I get it from the Dean, she leans in close to me and she smiles, and she says...[train whistle] that's my ride, actually. I have got to get on that train, I'm sorry. [Heads off stage.] Evidently that happens a lot here. ...So, I'm getting my folder, and the Dean leans into me, shakes my hand and says, "I'm sorry." I have no idea what she means. So I go back to my seat and I open it up. And, instead of having a diploma inside, there's a scrap-a torn scrap of paper-that has scrawled on it, "See me." I kid you not. Evidently I had an incomplete in an independent study that I had failed to complete. And I did not have enough credits. And, let me tell you, when your whole family shows up and you get to have your picture taken with them-and instead of holding up your diploma, you hold the torn corner of a yellow legal pad-that is a humbling experience. But eventually, I finished. I got my credits and next year at Christmas time, they have mid-year graduation. And I went there to get my diploma then. They said that I had an overdue library fine and they wouldn't give it to me again. And they eventually mailed it to me...I think. I'm pretty sure I graduated from college. But I guess the question is, why have a two-time commencement loser like me speak to you today? Well, one of the reasons they already mentioned...I recovered from that slow start. And I was recently named by Time magazine one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World! Yeah! Give it up for me! Basic cable...THE WORLD! I guess I have more fans in Sub-Saharan Africa than I thought. I'm right here on the cover between Katie Couric and Bono. That's my little picture-a sexy little sandwich between those two. But if you do the math, there are 100 Most Influential People in the World. There are 6.5 billion people in the world. That means that today I am here representing 65 million people. That's as big as some countries. What country has about 65 million people? Iran? Iran has 65 million people. So, for all intents and purposes, I'm here representing Iran today. Don't shoot. But the best reason for me to come to speak at Knox College is that I attended Knox College. This is part of my personal history that you will rarely see reported. Partly because the press doesn't do the proper research. But mostly because...it is not true! I just made it up, so this moment would be more poignant for all of us. How great would it be if I could actually come back here-if I was coming back to my alma mater to be honored like this. I could share with you all my happy memories that I spent here in...Galesburg, Illinois. Hanging out at the Seymour Hall, right? Seymour Hall? You know, all of us alumni, we remember being at Seymour Hall, playing those drinking games. We played a drinking game called Lincoln-Douglas. Great game. What you do is, you act out the Lincoln-Douglas debate and any time one of the guys mentions the Dred Scott decision you have to chug a beer. Well, technically 3/5 of a beer. [groans from audience] You DO have a good education! I wasn't sure if anybody was going to get that joke. I soon learned that a frat house-oops-divided against itself cannot stand. How can I forget cheering on the team-the Knox College Knockers? The Prairie Fire. Seriously, the Prairie Fire. Your team is named after something that can get you federal disaster relief. I assume the "Flash Floods" was taken. Oh, yes, the memories are so fresh. It was as if it was just yesterday I made them up. And the history, you don't have to tell me the history of Knox College. No, your Web site is very thorough. The college itself has long been known for its diversity. I am myself a supporter of diversity. I myself have an interracial marriage. I am Irish and my wife is Scottish. But we work it out. And it is fitting, most fitting, that I should speak at Knox College today because it was founded by abolitionists. And I gotta say-I'm going to go out on the limb here-I believe slavery was wrong. No, I don't care who that upsets. I just hope the mainstream media give me the credit for the courage it took to say that today. I know the blogosphere is just going to explode tomorrow. But enough about me.... if there can be enough about me. Today is about you-you who have worked so hard to pack your heads with learning until your skulls are all plump like-sausage of knowledge. It's an apt metaphor, don't question it. But now your time at college is at an end. Now you are leaving here. And this leads me to a question that just isn't asked enough at commencements. Why are you leaving here? This seems like a very nice place. They have a lovely Web site. Besides, have you seen the world outside lately? They are playing for KEEPS out there, folks. My God, I couldn't wait to get here today just so I could take a breather from the real world. I don't know if they told you what's happened while you've matriculated here for the past four years. The world is waiting for you people with a club. Unprecedented changes happening in the last four years. Like globalization. We now live in a hyperconnected, global economic, outsourced society. Now there are positives and minuses here. And a positive is that globalization helps us understand and learn from otherwise foreign cultures. For example, I now know how to ask for a Happy Meal in five different languages. In Paris, I'd like a "Repas Heureux" In Madrid a "Comida Feliz" In Calcutta, a "Kushkana, hold the beef." In Tokyo, a "Happy Seto" And in Berlin, I can order what is perhaps the least happy-sounding Happy Meal, a "Glugzig Malzeiht." Also globalization, e-mail, cell phones interconnect our nations like never before. It is possible for even the most insulated American to have friends from all over the world. For instance, I recently received an e-mail asking me to help a deposed Nigerian prince who is looking for a business partner to recuperate his fortune. Thanks to the flexibility of global banking, a Swiss bank account is ready and waiting for my share of his money. I know, because I just e-mailed him my Social Security number. Unfortunately for you job seekers, corporations searching for a better bottom line have moved many of their operations overseas, whether it's a customer service operator, a power factory foreman, or an American flag manufacturer. They're just as likely to be found in Shanghai as Omaha. In fact, outsourcing is so easy that I had this speech today written by a young man named Panjeeb from Bangalore. If you don't like the jokes, I assure you they were much funnier in Urdu... And when you enter the workforce, you will find competition from those crossing our all-too-poorest borders. Now I know you're all going to say, "Stephen, Stephen, immigrants built America." Yes, but here's the thing-it's built now. I think it was finished in the mid-70s sometime. At this point it's a touch-up and repair job. But thankfully Congress is acting and soon English will be the official language of America. Because if we surrender the national anthem to Spansih, the next thing you know, they'll be translating the Bible. God wrote it in English for a reason! So it could be taught in our public schools. So we must build walls. A wall obviously across the entire southern border. That's the answer. That may not be enough-maybe a moat in front of it, or a fire-pit. Maybe a flaming moat, filled with fire-proof crocodiles. And we should probably wall off the northern border as well. Keep those Canadians with their socialized medicine and their skunky beer out. And because immigrants can swim, we'll probably want to wall off the coasts as well. And while we're at it, we need to put up a dome, in case they have catapults. And we'll punch some holes in it so we can breathe. Breathe free. It's time for illegal immigrants to go-right after they finish building those walls. Yes, yes, I agree with me. There are so many challenges facing this next generation, and as they said earlier, you are up for these challenges. And I agree, except that I don't think you are. I don't know if you're tough enough to handle this. You are the most cuddled generation in history. I belong to the last generation that did not have to be in a car seat. You had to be in car seats. I did not have to wear a helmet when I rode my bike. You do. You have to wear helmets when you go swimming, right? In case you bump your head against the side of the pool. Oh, by the way, I should have said, my speech today may contain some peanut products. My mother had 11 children: Jimmy, Eddie, Mary, Billy, Morgan, Tommy, Jay, Lou, Paul, Peter, Stephen. You may applaud my mother's womb. Thank you, I'll let her know. She could never protect us the way you all have been protected. She couldn't fit 11 car seats. She would just open the back of her Town & Country-stack us like cord wood: four this way, four that way. And she put crushed glass in the empty spaces to keep it steady. Then she would roll up all the windows in the winter time and light up a cigarette. When I die I will not need to be embalmed, because as a child my mother hickory-smoked me. I mean even these ceremonies are too safe. I mean this mortarboard...look, it's padded. It's padded everywhere. When I graduated from college, we had the edges sharpened. When we threw ours up in the air, we knew some of us weren't coming home. But you have one thing that may save you, and that is your youth. This is your great strength. It is also why I hate and fear you. Hear me out. It has been said that children are our future. But does that not also mean that we are their past? You are here to replace us. I don't understand why we're here helping and honoring them. You do not see union workers holding benefits for robots. But you seem nice enough, so I'll try to give you some advice. First of all, when you go to apply for your first job, don't wear these robes. Medieval garb does not instill confidence in future employers-unless you're applying to be a scrivener. And if someone does offer you a job, say yes. You can always quit later. Then at least you'll be one of the unemployed as opposed to one of the never-employed. Nothing looks worse on a resume than nothing. So, say "yes." In fact, say "yes" as often as you can. When I was starting out in Chicago, doing improvisational theatre with Second City and other places, there was really only one rule I was taught about improv. That was, "yes-and." In this case, "yes-and" is a verb. To "yes-and." I yes-and, you yes-and, he, she or it yes-ands. And yes-anding means that when you go onstage to improvise a scene with no script, you have no idea what's going to happen, maybe with someone you've never met before. To build a scene, you have to accept. To build anything onstage, you have to accept what the other improviser initiates on stage. They say you're doctors-you're doctors. And then, you add to that: We're doctors and we're trapped in an ice cave. That's the "-and." And then hopefully they "yes-and" you back. You have to keep your eyes open when you do this. You have to be aware of what the other performer is offering you, so that you can agree and add to it. And through these agreements, you can improvise a scene or a one-act play. And because, by following each other's lead, neither of you are really in control. It's more of a mutual discovery than a solo adventure. What happens in a scene is often as much a surprise to you as it is to the audience. Well, you are about to start the greatest improvisation of all. With no script. No idea what's going to happen, often with people and places you have never seen before. And you are not in control. So say "yes." And if you're lucky, you'll find people who will say "yes" back. Now will saying "yes" get you in trouble at times? Will saying "yes" lead you to doing some foolish things? Yes it will. But don't be afraid to be a fool. Remember, you cannot be both young and wise. Young people who pretend to be wise to the ways of the world are mostly just cynics. Cynicism masquerades as wisdom, but it is the farthest thing from it. Because cynics don't learn anything. Because cynicism is a self-imposed blindness, a rejection of the world because we are afraid it will hurt us or disappoint us. Cynics always say no. But saying "yes" begins things. Saying "yes" is how things grow. Saying "yes" leads to knowledge. "Yes" is for young people. So for as long as you have the strength to, say "yes." And that's The Word. I have two last pieces of advice. First, being pre-approved for a credit card does not mean you have to apply for it. And lastly, the best career advice I can give you is to get your own TV show. It pays well, the hours are good, and you are famous. And eventually some very nice people will give you a doctorate in fine arts for doing jack squat.
Congratulations to the class of 2006. Thank you for the honor of addressing you. |
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Fast forward about three hundred years from George Washington's childhood to our present president, George W. Apparently, W was not told the moral message of the cherry tree incident, or he was never absorbed it, for he can't seem to tell the truth about anything, constantly lying about things both large and small. George's latest flat out falsehood came around his naming of Hank Paulson to be the new treasury secretary. We now know that at a May 21st meeting with George at the White House, Paulson agreed to replace the incumbent secretary, John Snow. Yet, at a news conference four days later, Bush was asked the direct question of whether he had any indication that Snow would soon be leaving. "No," replied our prevaricating president, "he has not talked to me about resignation." Reporters later inquired with the White House press office about George's untruthful statement. Oh, tut-tut, they were told, it was merely "an artful attempt" by the president to keep Paulson's appointment a secret. OK, children, are we clear on the moral lesson now? When you do it, it's a lie. But when the president does it, it's "an artful attempt" to keep secrets. And throughout his life, Bush has been very, very artful at keeping secrets - from the secret about his National Guard service to the one about those weapons of mass destruction. This is Jim Hightower saying... If it had been George W instead of George Washington at the cherry tree confrontation with papa, W would've said: "I cannot tell a lie. It was done by terrorists who have hatchets of mass destruction."
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Barbara Bush, who raised her son so well. Now Dubya's out there smirkin' in God's honky tonk, Just kickin' soldiers' asses and raisin' hell. ~~apologies to Jerry Jeff Walker
During the annual photo-op, Bush reads excerpts of farewell letters allegedly from fallen soldiers and marines, all apparently honored to have died in Bush's noble cause. Their words passed on to us by Bush are eerily familiar -- stay the course -- complete the mission of ridding the world of evil -- spread freedom and democracy to the four corners of the earth. Then, after hoping that the slain heroes made peace with their Maker before being blown to bits, and a final admonishment to "support the troops," Bush cuts out until next year. The camera never strays from Bush's twitching mouth, darting eyes -- never scans the audience so we might see who these people are who applaud him so vigorously. It must be members of his administration and those legislators who follow him around like whipped pups, for I cannot imagine mothers willing to either sacrifice their children to bolster Bush's poll numbers in a barbaric slaughterhouse that grows more bloody and chaotic every day, or to cheer him on. Somehow I cannot conjure up an image of mothers offering up their sons and daughters to a pathological narcissist killer, knowing if they are returned at all it will be either in pieces or in boxes. Hiding the Troops Either way, Bush is determined to protect us from seeing the steady stream of ghastly homecomings. That's what mothers are for. Bush says he wakes up every morning trying to figure out how to protect the American people, and -- like his mother says -- folks shouldn't have to worry their beautiful minds with such depressing images. So Bush not only banned the media and the public from Dover Air Force Base in Delaware where dead soldiers are secretly shuttled back in country in the dead of night, but from military installations around the world. Bush also restricted the media from covering funerals at Arlington, apparently deciding that the best way to support the troops is to "disappear" them from our view forever. Besides, if you've seen one aluminum transfer tube covered with the old red-white-and-blue, you've seen 'em all. Why bother parading 2,500 of them past a bored, disconnected, disinterested citizenry, most of whom have no children in this fight and could care less about other people's children... General Tommy Franks, former Central Command Commander, who developed and executed the bloody Iraq fiasco, recently told the National Rifle Association that it wasn't important how many Americans died -- that those who count the increasing number of American soldiers killed in Iraq are missing the bigger picture. "What we're talking about is neither 2,400, 24,000 or 240,000 lives," Franks said. "Terrorism is a thing that threatens our way of life. It doesn't have anything to do with politics." Americans fail to realize that words mean far different things to Bush, and apparently to Franks, than they do to coherent, rational people. To Bush, "support the troops" means don't criticize him when thousands of Americans and hundreds of thousands of innocents die in an illegal, bloody mess that he lied to get us into. Bush brags that he's a war president. He says he sits in the Oval Office with war on his mind. He doesn't read --- doesn't need to because his gut makes all the decisions, and anybody who doesn't like that is aiding and abetting the terrorists. So -- stick a yellow ribbon on your vehicle, shut up, and support the troops. Supporting the Troops In the only evidence of support I am aware of, just months after getting his war on, Bush opened a new $30 million, state-of-the-art, 70,000 square-foot mortuary at Dover to support the troops, or what is left of them, when they are sneaked back to the states under cover of darkness. Since then, he has sent America's sons and daughters unprepared and unequipped into a raging guerilla insurgency with orders to kill anything that moves. Bush and his entire Iran-Contra war-criminal chickenhawk administration are devoid of ethos; incapable of empathy or compassion, and could care less about supporting troops. Bush has said on more than one occasion, "My attitude is, any time we put one of our soldiers in harm's way, we're going to spend whatever is necessary to make sure they have the best training, the best support and the best possible equipment." That may be his attitude, but it is not the reality on the ground in Iraq or Afghanistan. Far too many Americans Bush has put in harm's way are trying unsuccessfully to stay alive in soft-armored Humvees while wearing Vietnam-era flak jackets. Far too few of them have the Intercepter Vest designed in the late 1990's to protect its wearer with Kevlar lining and ceramic plates in front and back pockets to shield vital organs. Day after grinding day in the fillth and horror of a war with the "front line" anywhere the enemy decides it will be, ill-trained and ill-equipped Americans are losing the battle to stay alive -- and there is no end in sight. Most Americans neither know nor care about what is going on, but the mothers know. They are not only spending thousands of dollars sending critical armor, night-vision goggles, and other needed equipment to their children, but are sending food as well. Journalist Bob Kerr writes in The Providence Journal that Marine Nick Andoscia called and asked his mother to send food. Kerr said Nick told his mother that he and the men in his unit had shed about 10 pounds in their first few weeks in Iraq. They were pulling 22-hour patrol shifts, and were getting only two meals a day -- not meals to remember. He said they were going to the Iraqis and literally begging for food. The lack of support this administration gives its uniformed personnel is monumentally ruthless and evil. Since Bush's unprovoked attack on Iraq, nearly 12,000 soldiers have been evacuated because of disease. Some of the sickness can be attributed to Halliburton-KBR serving tainted water and rotten food in the mess halls, but most is undoubtedly from radiation poisoning due to the widespread use of the deadly Depleted Uranium. Blaming the Troops One of the more frightening things about wars, especially immoral wars like this one, is the enemy must be dehumanized so soldiers and marines can be kept under control and "up" for the killing they must do. Normal human beings can't turn cruelty on and off like a faucet; therefore, the troops must be also be dehumanized to the point of madness. They become predators without conscience -- drugged and brainwashed into a continuous white rage, not only willing, but eager to kill. Their commander-in-chief is a ruthlessly self-centered, single-layered demon whose hypnotic cadence of kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill has succeeded in turning them into the monsters they must be for his world dominance aspirations to succeed. The US military are victims of a cruel fascist regime. They are used, then tossed aside to come to terms with what they have become on their own. It is a rare soldier who returns to find professional help available. For many, the final battle with their predator leader is one too many. Because of the values they were taught from birth -- it all comes crashing down. Many can't cope with the magnitude of sheer evil that envelops them. Some commit suicide. Others become alcoholics, drug addicts, homeless, the walking dead. When torture, murder and war crimes committed by Americans in places such as Guantanamo, Haditha, Abu Ghrab, Ishaqi and Fallujah, as well as in Afghanistan, comes to light, Bush and his criminal defense department initially try to conceal the atrocities. If forced to investigate themselves, they find no wrongdoing. When all else fails, Bush comes out, blames the troops and says the few bad apples will be brought to justice. Commanders stand silent, refusing to defend or protect those for whom they are responsible -- mute acknowledgement that, as Henry Kissinger said, "Soldiers are expendable -- dumb, stupid animals to be used as pawns in foreign policy." Every single member of Congress, every single member of this filthy administration, every single commander on the ground, and every single member of the shameful corporate US media must be blamed for allowing George Bush's rampant maiming and destruction of American citizens and for the genocidal murder waged against innocent Iraqi men, women and children. Every single one of them should be forced to don Vietnam-era flak jackets, crammed into unarmored Humvees and ordered to drive across Iraq, fighting to stay alive while choking on depleted uranium dust. Then they might acknowledge who is to blame for this fiasco. Is it the troops?
No way in hell.
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I was going to write something about the prisoner suicides at Bush's Cuban concentration camp, and the Pentagon's ludicrous "explanation" that the deaths were, simultaneously, both a carefully planned act of "asymmetric warfare" and also an outburst of pure mumbo-jumbo among primitive darkies who had somehow concocted the mystical belief that if three of them died then all the prisoners would be freed.
(Sidenote: The utter contempt in which the Bush Regime holds the American people was clearly on display here: they're not even trying to make a coherent, plausible defense of the torturous limboland they've devised in Gitmo anymore. They just say anything, even if it contradicts itself, anything to muddy the waters, knowing that people -- or at least the ever-servile media -- will swallow it and move on to the next news cycle. But they also don't care if people don't swallow it; the blatant Bushist attitude toward public relations now is: "This is our story, we're sticking to it -- and what are you going to do about it if you don't like it? Nothing, punk." The self-contradictory explanation of the Gitmo suicides -- rational, deliberate, intelligent act of guerilla warfare and crack-brained hoodoo from exotic lands -- is strangely reminiscent of the Regime's take on the 9/11 attacks: an act of war so rationally and intelligently planned that not even the world's largest intelligence apparatus could detect it, much less stop it -- and a lucky shot from a bunch of half-baked kooks dreaming about 72 virgins in Heaven.)
So I was going to write about all this, and how the suicides bring home the morally corrosive nature of torture and inhumane treatment, and how the aggressive, hyper-macho bluster of insecure national leaders create the noxious atmosphere in which atrocity and dehumanization thrive....but then I remembered that Bob Dylan had covered all this more than 40 years ago, in the middle of another godforsaken military adventure that saw torture, murder and mass destruction wielded in the name of democracy and freedom, way back when George W. Bush was still a high-school creep chugging brewskis and chasing tail, long before his apotheosis as the law-transcending War Leader. It was these lines from "Tombstone Blues," from the 1965 album, Highway 61 Revisited:
Looks up at his hero the Commander-in-Chief Saying, "Tell me great hero, but please make it brief, Is there a hole for me to get sick in?"
The Commander-in-Chief answers him while chasing a fly,
But of course, Dylan wrote these lines four decades ago; this stain goes deep in our republic, it's been around a long time: the bellicose liars of the Bush Regime are only its latest manifestation.
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Unreported: The Zarqawi Invitation By Greg Palast They got him -- the big, bad, beheading berserker in Iraq. But, something's gone unreported in all the glee over getting Zarqawi ... who invited him into Iraq in the first place? If you prefer your fairy tales unsoiled by facts, read no further. If you want the uncomfortable truth, begin with this: A phone call to Baghdad to Saddam's Palace on the night of April 21, 2003. It was Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld on a secure line from Washington to General Jay Garner. The General had arrives in Baghdad just hours before to take charge of the newly occupied nation. The message from Rumsfeld was not a heartwarming welcome. Rummy told Garner, Don't unpack, Jack -- you're fired. What had Garner done? The many-starred general had been sent by the President himself to take charge of a deeply dangerous mission. Iraq was tense but relatively peaceful. Garner's job was to keep the peace and bring democracy. Unfortunately for the general, he took the President at his word. But the general was wrong. "Peace" and "Democracy" were the slogans. "My preference," Garner told me in his understated manner, "was to put the Iraqis in charge as soon as we can and do it in some form of elections." But elections were not in The Plan. The Plan was a 101-page document to guide the long-term future of the land we'd just conquered. There was nothing in it about democracy or elections or safety. There was, rather, a detailed schedule for selling off "all [Iraq's] state assets" -- and Iraq, that's just about everything -- "especially," said The Plan, "the oil and supporting industries." Especially the oil. There was more than oil to sell off. The Plan included the sale of Iraq's banks, and weirdly, changing it's copyright laws and other odd items that made the plan look less like a program for Iraq to get on its feet than a program for corporate looting of the nation's assets. (And indeed, we discovered at BBC, behind many of the odder elements -- copyright and tax code changes -- was the hand of lobbyist Jack Abramoff's associate Grover Norquist.) But Garner didn't think much of The Plan, he told me when we met a year later in Washington. He had other things on his mind. "You prevent epidemics, you start the food distribution program to prevent famine." Seizing title and ownership of Iraq's oil fields was not on Garner's must-do list. He let that be known to Washington. "I don't think [Iraqis] need to go by the U.S. plan, I think that what we need to do is set an Iraqi government that represents the freely elected will of the people." He added, "It's their country ... their oil." Apparently, the Secretary of Defense disagreed. So did lobbyist Norquist. And Garner incurred their fury by getting carried away with the "democracy" idea: he called for quick elections -- within 90 days of the taking of Baghdad. But Garner's 90-days-to-elections commitment ran straight into the oil sell-off program. Annex D of the plan indicated that would take at least 270 days -- at least 9 months. Worse, Garner was brokering a truce between Sunnis, Shias and Kurds. They were about to begin what Garner called a "Big Tent" meeting to hammer out the details and set the election date. He figured he had 90 days to get it done before the factions started slitting each other's throats. But a quick election would mean the end of the state-asset sell-off plan: An Iraqi-controlled government would never go along with what would certainly amount to foreign corporations swallowing their entire economy. Especially the oil. Garner had spent years in Iraq, in charge of the Northern Kurdish zone and knew Iraqis well. He was certain that an asset-and-oil grab, "privatizations," would cause a sensitive population to take up the gun. "That's just one fight you don't want to take on right now." But that's just the fight the neo-cons at Defense wanted. And in Rumsfeld's replacement for Garner, they had a man itching for the fight. Paul Bremer III had no experience on the ground in Iraq, but he had one unbeatable credential that Garner lacked: Bremer had served as Managing Director of Kissinger and Associates. In April 2003, Bremer instituted democracy Bush style: he canceled elections and appointed the entire government himself. Two months later, Bremer ordered a halt to all municipal elections including the crucial vote to Shia seeking to select a mayor in the city of Najaf. The front-runner, moderate Shia Asad Sultan Abu Gilal warned, "If they don't give us freedom, what will we do? We have patience, but not for long." Local Shias formed the "Mahdi Army," and within a year, provoked by Bremer's shutting their paper, attacked and killed 21 U.S. soldiers. The insurgency had begun. But Bremer's job was hardly over. There were Sunnis to go after. He issued "Order Number One: De-Ba'athification." In effect, this became "De-Sunni-fication." Saddam's generals, mostly Sunnis, who had, we learned, secretly collaborated with the US invasion and now expected their reward found themselves hunted and arrested. Falah Aljibury, an Iraqi-born US resident who helped with the pre-invasion brokering, told me, "U.S. forces imprisoned all those we named as political leaders," who stopped Iraq's army from firing on U.S. troops. Aljibury's main concern was that busting Iraqi collaborators and Ba'athist big shots was a gift "to the Wahabis," by which he meant the foreign insurgents, who now gained experienced military commanders, Sunnis, who now had no choice but to fight the US-installed regime or face arrest, ruin or death. They would soon link up with the Sunni-defending Wahabi, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was committed to destroying "Shia snakes." And the oil fields? It was, Aljibury noted, when word got out about the plans to sell off the oil fields (thanks to loose lips of the US-appointed oil minister) that pipelines began to blow. Although he had been at the center of planning for invasion, Aljibury now saw the greed-crazed grab for the oil fields as the fuel for a civil war that would rip his country to pieces: "Insurgents," he said, "and those who wanted to destabilize a new Iraq have used this as means of saying, 'Look, you're losing your country. You're losing your leadership. You're losing all of your resources to a bunch of wealthy people. A bunch of billionaires in the world want to take you over and make your life miserable.' And we saw an increase in the bombing of oil facilities, pipelines, of course, built on -- built on the premise that privatization [of oil] is coming." General Garner, watching the insurgency unfold from the occupation authority's provocations, told me, in his understated manner, "I'm a believer that you don't want to end the day with more enemies than you started with."
But you can't have a war president without a war. And you can't have a war without enemies. "Bring 'em on," our Commander-in-Chief said. And Zarqawi answered the call.
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The Moon-Bush Cash Conduit By Robert Parry Over the past quarter century, South Korean theocrat Sun Myung Moon has been one of the Bush family's major benefactors - both politically and financially - while enjoying what appears to be protection against federal investigations into evidence that his cult-like organization has functioned as a criminal enterprise. Indeed, the newest disclosure about Moon funneling money to a Bush family entity bears many of the earmarks of Moon's business strategy of laundering money through a complex maze of front companies and cut-outs so it can't be easily followed. In this case, according to an article in the Houston Chronicle, Moon's Washington Times Foundation gave $1 million to the Greater Houston Community Foundation, which in turn acted as a conduit for donations to the George H.W. Bush Presidential Library. The Chronicle obtained indirect confirmation that Moon's money was passing through the Houston foundation to the Bush library from Bush family spokesman Jim McGrath. Asked whether Moon's $1 million had ended up there, McGrath responded, "We're in an uncomfortable position. ... If a donor doesn't want to be identified we need to honor their privacy." But when asked whether the $1 million was intended to curry favor with the Bush family to get President George W. Bush to grant a pardon for Moon's 1982 felony tax fraud conviction, McGrath answered, "If that's why he gave the grant, he's throwing his money away. ... That's not the way the Bushes operate." McGrath then added, "President Bush has been very grateful for the friendship shown to him by the Washington Times Foundation, and the Washington Times serves a vital role in Washington. But there can't be any connection to any kind of a pardon." [Houston Chronicle, June 8, 2006, citing the work of private researcher Larry Zilliox.] But Moon has many other interests beyond clearing his criminal record with a presidential pardon. While it's true Moon has sought a pardon since the latter years of Ronald Reagan's administration, Moon also has counted on powerful political connections to shield his business activities from renewed federal investigation that otherwise might have pried into criminal offenses ranging from money laundering to evading the U.S. embargo on the rogue state of North Korea. Moon has achieved this remarkable insulation for his operations largely by spreading around hundreds of millions of dollars for political activities, charitable functions and the publication of one of Washington's daily newspapers, the Washington Times. The founder of the South Korean-based Unification Church has made himself particularly useful to the Bush family and other prominent Republicans who have returned the favor by speaking at his events, lavishing praise on his business operations and granting him Capitol Hill space for some of his ceremonies. Bags of Cash Faced with Moon's political clout, federal authorities have looked the other way for more than two decades even when principals within Moon's organization have made public declarations about its continuing criminal practices. For instance, Moon's former daughter-in-law, Nansook Hong, admitted to participating in money-laundering schemes by personally smuggling cash from South Korea into the United States. She also said she witnessed other cases in which bags of cash were carried into the United States and delivered to Moon's businesses. Moon "demonstrated contempt for U.S. law every time he accepted a paper bag full of untraceable, undeclared cash collected from true believers" who smuggled the money in from overseas, Nansook Hong wrote in her 1998 book, In the Shadows of the Moons. Nansook Hong's allegations were corroborated by other disaffected Moon disciples in press interviews and in civil court proceedings. Maria Madelene Pretorious, a former Unification Church member who worked at Moon's Manhattan Center, a New York City music venue and recording studio, testified at a court hearing in Massachusetts that in December of 1993 or January of 1994, one of Moon's sons, Hyo Jin Moon, returned from a trip to Korea "with $600,000 in cash which he had received from his father. ... Myself along with three or four other members that worked at Manhattan Center saw the cash in bags, shopping bags." In an interview with me in the mid-1990s, Pretorious said Asian church members would bring cash into the United States where it would be circulated through Moon's business empire as a way to launder it. At the center of this financial operation, Pretorious said, was One-Up Corp., a Delaware-registered holding company that owned many Moon enterprises including the Manhattan Center and New World Communications, the parent company of the Washington Times. "Once that cash is at the Manhattan Center, it has to be accounted for," Pretorious said. "The way that's done is to launder the cash. Manhattan Center gives cash to a business called Happy World which owns restaurants. ... Happy World needs to pay illegal aliens. ... Happy World pays some back to the Manhattan Center for 'services rendered.' The rest goes to One-Up and then comes back to Manhattan Center as an investment." The lack of federal investigative interest in these admissions of guilt was especially curious because evidence of Moon's money-laundering dated back to the late 1970s when Moon's operations came under the scrutiny of a congressional probe into a South Korean influence-buying plot called "Koreagate." Investigators discovered Moon's pattern of money transfers emanating from mysterious sources in Asia and ending up funding media, political, educational and religious activities in the United States. By the early 1980s, that federal money-laundering probe had led to the criminal charges against Moon for tax evasion, a prosecution that the new Reagan-Bush Justice Department tried to derail but couldn't because it was being handled by career prosecutors in New York City. Moon was convicted in 1982 and imprisoned for 13 months. Buying Influence But Moon's influence-buying operation was only just beginning. He launched the Washington Times in 1982 and its staunch support for Reagan-Bush political interests quickly made it a favorite of Reagan, Bush and other influential Republicans. Moon also made sure that his steady flow of cash found its way into the pockets of key conservative operatives, especially when they were most in need, when they were facing financial crises. For instance, when the New Right's direct-mail whiz Richard Viguerie fell on hard times in the late 1980s, Moon had a corporation run by a chief lieutenant, Bo Hi Pak, buy one of Viguerie's properties for $10 million. [See Orange County Register, Dec. 21, 1987; Washington Post, Oct. 15, 1989] Moon also used the Washington Times and its affiliated publications to create seemingly legitimate conduits to funnel money to individuals and companies. In another example of Moon's largesse, the Washington Times hired Viguerie to conduct a pricy direct-mail subscription drive, boosting his profit margin. Another case of saving a right-wing icon occurred when the Rev. Jerry Falwell was facing financial ruin over the debts piling up at Liberty University. But the fundamentalist Christian school in Lynchburg, Va., got a last-minute bail-out in the mid-1990s ostensibly from two Virginia businessmen, Dan Reber and Jimmy Thomas, who used their non-profit Christian Heritage Foundation to snap up a large chunk of Liberty's debt for $2.5 million, a fraction of its face value. Falwell rejoiced and called the moment "the greatest single day of financial advantage" in the school's history, even though it was accomplished at the disadvantage of many small true-believing investors who had bought the church construction bonds through a Texas company. But Falwell's secret benefactor behind the debt purchase was Sun Myung Moon, who was kept in the background partly because of his controversial Biblical interpretations that hold Jesus to have been a failure and because of Moon's alleged brainwashing of thousands of young Americans, often shattering their bonds with their biological families. Moon had used his tax-exempt Women's Federation for World Peace to funnel $3.5 million to the Reber-Thomas Christian Heritage Foundation, the non-profit that purchased the school's debt. I stumbled onto this Moon-Falwell connection by examining the Internal Revenue Service filings of Moon's front groups. The Women Federation's vice president Susan Fefferman confirmed that the $3.5 million grant had gone to "Mr. Falwell's people" for the benefit of Liberty University. The indirect funneling of money to Falwell's school paralleled the technique used a decade later to donate funds to George H.W. Bush's presidential library. [For more on Moon's funding of the Right, see Robert Parry's Secrecy & Privilege.] Bush Speeches Moon also used the Women's Federation to pay substantial speaking fees to George H.W. Bush, who gave talks at Moon-sponsored events. In September 1995, Bush and his wife, Barbara, gave six speeches in Asia for the Women's Federation. In one speech on Sept. 14 to 50,000 Moon supporters in Tokyo, Bush said "what really counts is faith, family and friends." Moon's wife, Hak Ja Han Moon, followed the ex-President and announced that "it has to be Reverend Moon to save the United States, which is in decline because of the destruction of the family and moral decay." [Washington Post, Sept. 15, 1995] In summer 1996, Bush was lending his prestige to Moon again. Bush addressed the Moon-connected Family Federation for World Peace in Washington, an event that gained notoriety when comedian Bill Cosby tried to back out of his contract after learning of Moon's connection. Bush had no such qualms. [Washington Post, July 30, 1996] In fall 1996, Moon needed the ex-President's help again. Moon was trying to replicate his Washington Times influence in South America by opening a regional newspaper, Tiempos del Mundo. But South American journalists were recounting unsavory chapters of Moon's history, including his links to South Korea's feared intelligence service and various neo-fascist organizations. In the early 1980s, Moon had used friendships with the military dictatorships in Argentina and Uruguay - which had been responsible for tens of thousands of political murders - to invest in those two countries. There also were allegations of Moon's links to the region's major drug traffickers. [For details on the drug ties, see Robert Parry's Lost History.] Heaven Sent Moon's disciples fumed about the critical stories and accused the Argentine news media of trying to sabotage Moon's plans for an inaugural gala in Buenos Aires on Nov. 23, 1996. "The local press was trying to undermine the event," complained the church's internal newsletter, Unification News. Given the controversy, Argentina's elected president, Carlos Menem, decided to reject Moon's invitation. But Moon had a trump card: the endorsement of an ex-President of the United States, George H.W. Bush. Agreeing to speak at the newspaper's launch, Bush flew aboard a private plane, arriving in Buenos Aires on Nov. 22. Bush stayed at Menem's official residence, the Olivos. As the headliner at the newspaper's inaugural gala, Bush saved the day, Moon's followers gushed. "Mr. Bush's presence as keynote speaker gave the event invaluable prestige," wrote the Unification News. "Father [Moon] and Mother [Mrs. Moon] sat with several of the True Children [Moon's offspring] just a few feet from the podium" where Bush spoke. "I want to salute Reverend Moon," Bush declared. "A lot of my friends in South America don't know about the Washington Times, but it is an independent voice. The editors of the Washington Times tell me that never once has the man with the vision [Moon] interfered with the running of the paper, a paper that in my view brings sanity to Washington, D.C." Bush's speech was so effusive that it surprised even Moon's followers. "Once again, heaven turned a disappointment into a victory," the Unification News exulted. "Everyone was delighted to hear his compliments. We knew he would give an appropriate and 'nice' speech, but praise in Father's presence was more than we expected. ... It was vindication. We could just hear a sigh of relief from Heaven." While Bush's assertion about Moon's Washington Times as a voice of "sanity" may be a matter of opinion, Bush's vouching for its editorial independence simply wasn't true. Almost since it opened in 1982, a string of senior editors and correspondents have resigned, citing the manipulation of the news by Moon and his subordinates. The first editor, James Whelan, resigned in 1984, confessing that "I have blood on my hands" for helping Moon's church achieve greater legitimacy. Ties That Bind But Bush's boosterism was just what Moon needed in South America. "The day after," the Unification News observed, "the press did a 180-degree about-turn once they realized that the event had the support of a U.S. President." With Bush's help, Moon had gained another beachhead for his worldwide business-religious-political-media empire. After the event, Menem told reporters from La Nacion that Bush had claimed privately to be only a mercenary who did not really know Moon. "Bush told me he came and charged money to do it," Menem said. [La Nacion, Nov. 26, 1996] But Bush was not telling Menem the whole story. By fall 1996, Bush and Moon had been working in political tandem for at least a decade and a half. The ex-President also had been earning huge speaking fees as a front man for Moon for more than a year. Throughout these public appearances for Moon, Bush's office refused to divulge how much Moon-affiliated organizations have paid the ex-President. But estimates of Bush's fee for the Buenos Aires appearance alone ran between $100,000 and $500,000. Sources close to the Unification Church told me that the total spending on Bush ran into the millions, with one source telling me that Bush stood to make as much as $10 million from Moon's organization. The senior George Bush may have had a political motive, too. By 1996, sources close to Bush were saying the ex-President was working hard to enlist well-to-do conservatives and their money behind the presidential candidacy of his son, George W. Bush. Moon was one of the deepest pockets in right-wing circles. North Korean Cash Moon, who has the status of a U.S. permanent resident alien, has skirted other federal laws, including prohibitions on financial relations with the hard-line communist government of North Korea. Despite Moon's history of extreme anti-communism, Moon began spreading money around inside North Korea - much as he has in other countries - while seeking business advantages during the first Bush administration, according to U.S. intelligence documents. U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency documents, which I obtained under a Freedom of Information Act request, showed Moon's organization paying millions of dollars to North Korean leaders. The payments included a $3 million "birthday present" to current communist leader Kim Jong Il and offshore payments amounting to "several tens of million dollars" to the previous communist dictator, Kim Il Sung, the partially declassified documents said. Yet, in the 1990s, while Moon was passing out money, North Korea was scrambling for the resources to develop missiles and other advanced weaponry, including a nuclear weapons capability. Moon's activities attracted the attention of the Defense Intelligence Agency because it is responsible for monitoring potential military threats to the United States. Moon negotiated one North Korean business deal in 1991, after face-to-face meetings with Kim Il Sung, the longtime communist leader, the DIA documents said. "These talks took place secretly, without the knowledge of the South Korean government," the DIA wrote on Feb. 2, 1994. "In the original deal with Kim [Il Sung], Moon paid several tens of million dollars as a down-payment into an overseas account," the DIA said in a cable dated Aug. 14, 1994. The DIA said Moon's organization also delivered money to Kim Il Sung's son and successor, Kim Jong Il. "In 1993, the Unification Church sold a piece of property located in Pennsylvania," the DIA reported on Sept. 9, 1994. "The profit on the sale, approximately $3 million was sent through a bank in China to the Hong Kong branch of the KS [South Korean] company 'Samsung Group.' The money was later presented to Kim Jung Il [Kim Jong Il] as a birthday present." After Kim Il Sung's death in 1994 and his succession by his son, Kim Jong Il, Moon dispatched his longtime aide, Bo Hi Pak, to ensure that the business deals were still on track with Kim Jong Il "and his coterie," the DIA reported. "If necessary, Moon authorized Pak to deposit a second payment for Kim Jong Il," the DIA wrote. The DIA declined to elaborate on the documents. "As for the documents you have, you have to draw your own conclusions," said DIA spokesman, U.S. Navy Capt. Michael Stainbrook. [To see two of the DIA documents, click here.] Contacted in Seoul, South Korea, Bo Hi Pak, a former publisher of the Washington Times, denied that payments were made to individual North Korean leaders and called "absolutely untrue" the DIA's description of the $3 million land sale benefiting Kim Jong Il. But Bo Hi Pak acknowledged that Moon met with North Korean officials and negotiated business deals with them in the early 1990s. Pak said the North Korean business investments were structured through South Korean entities. "Reverend Moon is not doing this in his own name," Pak said. Pak said he went to North Korea in 1994, after Kim Il Sung's death, only to express "condolences" to Kim Jong Il on behalf of Moon and his wife. Pak denied that another purpose of the trip was to pass money to Kim Jong Il or to his associates. Asked about the seeming contradiction between Moon's avowed anti-communism and his friendship with leaders of a communist state, Pak said, "This is time for reconciliation. We're not looking at ideological differences. We are trying to help them out" with food and other humanitarian needs. Samsung officials said they could find no information in their files about the alleged $3 million payment. Embargo Busting North Korean officials clearly valued their relationship with Moon. In February 2000, on Moon's 80th birthday, Kim Jong Il sent Moon a gift of rare wild ginseng, an aromatic root used medicinally, Reuters reported. Because of the long-term U.S. embargo against North Korea - eased only in 2000 - Moon's alleged payments to the communist leaders raised potential legal issues for Moon especially if some of the money stemmed from a land sale in Pennsylvania. "Nobody in the United States was supposed to be providing funding to anybody in North Korea, period, under the Treasury (Department's) sanction regime," said Jonathan Winer, former deputy assistant secretary of state handling international crime. The U.S. embargo of North Korea dated back to the Korean War. With a few exceptions for humanitarian goods, the embargo barred trade and financial dealings between North Korea and "all U.S. citizens and permanent residents wherever they are located, ... and all branches, subsidiaries and controlled affiliates of U.S. organizations throughout the world." Moon became a permanent resident of the United States in 1973, according to Justice Department records. When interviewed in 2000, Bo Hi Pak said Moon had kept his "green card" status. Though often in South Korea and South America, Moon maintained a residence near Tarrytown, north of New York City, and controlled dozens of affiliated U.S. companies. Direct payments to foreign leaders in connection with business deals also could prompt questions about possible violations of the U.S. Corrupt Practices Act, a prohibition against overseas bribery. Ironically, although Moon reportedly gave North Korea desperately needed foreign capital, Moon's Washington Times attacked the Clinton administration for failing to take a more aggressive stand against North Korea's missile program. The newspaper called the administration's policy an "abdication of responsibility for national security." Moon also was consolidating his influence with American conservatives as he was growing increasingly anti-American. While former President Bush was hailing Moon in public in the mid-1990s, Moon was calling the United States "Satan's harvest" and claiming that American women descended from a "line of prostitutes." But Moon understood one basic rule of politics that applied the world over: money talks. He knew he could get politicians to do his bidding if the bribes were big enough. In one sermon on Jan. 2, 1996, Moon was unusually blunt about how he expected his wealth to buy influence among the powerful in South America, just as it had in Washington. "Father has been practicing the philosophy of fishing here," Moon said, through an interpreter who spoke of Moon in the third person. "He [Moon] gave the bait to Uruguay and then the bigger fish of Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay kept their mouths open, waiting for a bigger bait silently. The bigger the fish, the bigger the mouth. Therefore, Father is able to hook them more easily."
For Moon, there has been no bigger fish than the powerful Bush family and its many friends in the U.S. government.
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| Politics As Usual Instead Of Security Michael Chertoff possesses the impressive rsum and aggressive bearing of a big-time official, but as Secretary of Homeland Security, he behaves more like a small-time hack. His feeble judgment in matters of policy, personnel and politics-first demonstrated in the wake of Hurricane Katrina last year-has proved that he was never qualified to protect the United States from terrorism and natural disaster. Last week, he suddenly reminded the nation of his manifest incompetence, after his department released a bizarrely skewed list of security grants to cities and counties. Municipalities that confront the most significant threats will lose many millions in funding, while those least likely to face attack will receive additional millions. Even more outrageous than the funding decisions were the explanations offered by Mr. Chertoff and his staff, who had promised to award money on the basis of actual need instead of political clout. To justify cutting New York City's grant by nearly half, the department claimed that city officials had failed to fill out the grant application properly. They also asserted that the nation's greatest city has no significant landmarks, and that the superb counterterrorism division of the New York City Police Department is somehow substandard. While the firing of Mr. Chertoff certainly is overdue, as the tabloid headlines suggest, his dismissal will not solve the department's problems. The priorities at D.H.S. have been badly distorted from the beginning, with partisan patronage and lobbyist influence taking precedence over efficiency and effectiveness. The controversial grants issued to municipalities are dwarfed by contracts awarded to private corporations, which amount to around $10 billion annually. To observe the unsavory workings of that process is to wonder whether New York, Washington and other big cities lost funding simply because they failed to hire the most connected lobbyists. The big defense, electronics and communications firms gathered at the D.H.S. trough, along with their friends from K Street and the members of Congress whose campaigns they finance, never suffer the same difficulties as the struggling cities. Whether the tens of billions awarded by D.H.S. have been well spent, however, is in grave doubt. Shipping ports, nuclear facilities and chemical plants remain poorly protected. First responders in many cities still don't have the communications and protective equipment they need. Public-health agencies are too weak and neglected to cope with the threat of an avian-flu pandemic. The wiring of D.H.S. for lobbyists-and the dominant influence of political appointees-became inevitable when President Bush appointed former Pennsylvania Governor Tom Ridge, amiable and malleable, to direct the White House Office of Homeland Security. He staffed the office with political aides and ex-lobbyists whose rsums were long on politics and short on security. When D.H.S. was established in 2003, the revolving door spun incessantly between its offices and Blank Rome-a lobbying firm that enjoyed an intimate relationship with Mr. Ridge and his associates. Blank Rome's chairman was a Bush Ranger, of course, while two other partners were Bush Pioneers. One of those partners took a year off from the firm to help set up the mammoth new department. As a result, Blank Rome has led the K Street pack in D.H.S. clients and billing. This greasy political culture seems depressingly familiar, except that the stakes at D.H.S. are so much higher than at other federal agencies where private boodling outweighs the public interest. Both firms that employed the convicted crook Jack Abramoff have represented major D.H.S. contractors, as have all of the largest lobbying outfits in the capital. There are fees aplenty-and hundreds of millions of dollars to squander on wasteful programs and boondoggles. Unfortunately, little has changed for the better since Mr. Chertoff took over. He brought along his own group of associates and cronies, notoriously including Julie Myers, the wife of his chief of staff, whose lack of relevant administrative experience didn't deter him from appointing her to direct immigration and customs enforcement. (She also happens to be the niece of Gen. Richard B. Myers, the former Joint Chiefs chairman.) Tracy Henke, the official who oversaw those weird municipal grants, is a political appointee who seems to be in far over her head.
The last time that the public demanded accountability at D.H.S., following the deadly fiasco on the Gulf Coast, Mr. Chertoff escaped by sacrificing FEMA chief Michael (Brownie) Brown. This time, he may have to go-but nobody should expect serious reform under this regime.
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Why Pretend That Hillary Clinton Is Progressive? By Norman Solomon The scheduled speech by Sen. Hillary Clinton at the "Take Back America 2006" conference in Washington on June 13 is likely to intensify discussion about her relationship with the progressive grassroots of the Democratic Party. Many weeks ago the conference sponsor, the Campaign for America's Future, sent out an email telling prospective attendees: "As in years past, we expect America's most prominent progressive leaders to attend and address the conference. Invited speakers include..." On the list was Hillary Clinton. In response, I wrote to Campaign for America's Future co-director Roger Hickey and asked what Clinton's name was doing on a list of "progressive leaders." He responded by saying that "I don't think of ALL of our speakers as 'America's most prominent progressive leaders.' In fact, I have been quoted saying very critical things about Hillary -- in the Washington Post and elsewhere. We do, however, want to ask possible presidential candidates to attempt publicly to justify their candidacy to the progressive activists." Hickey also commented that "some people do consider Hillary progressive." But the people who "do consider Hillary progressive" could mostly be divided into two categories -- those who are Fox-News-attuned enough to believe any non-Republican is a far leftist, and those who are left-leaning but don't realize how viciously opportunistic Sen. Clinton has been. Today, in keeping with her political character, she welcomes the fund-raising support of reactionary media mogul Rupert Murdoch. Unfortunately, the kind of confusion that sees Hillary Clinton as progressive is apt to get a boost from her appearance at a conference with avowedly progressive sponsorship -- particularly because the person in the best position to dispel such confusion is not on the program. The "Take Back America" schedule set aside half an hour for a speech from Clinton but not a minute for any words from Jonathan Tasini, the longtime union activist who's running -- on an antiwar and all-around progressive platform -- against Clinton in this year's Democratic primary for senator from New York. It's sad to see that the progressive conference has excluded from the podium the vigorous primary challenger Tasini while featuring a speaker who has stood against the progressive agenda consistently for more than a decade on issues ranging from NAFTA to the invasion and occupation of Iraq. Tasini points out that Hillary Clinton remains for the war in Iraq, for so-called "free trade" agreements and for the death penalty. She supported the notorious 2001 bankruptcy bill, "has never been for single-payer health insurance" and has worked hard to undermine a host of other progressive positions.
In the interests of truth-in-labeling, shouldn't Hillary Clinton be
described as anti-progressive?
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Truth Is For 'Liberals' By Eric Alterman Here we are, five and a half years into the Bush Administration, and the press corps still hasn't figured out how to handle the White House's primary tactic of media management: lying. During George W. Bush's first term, reporters had a powerful confluence of motivations for their difficulty in calling the President to task. First was tradition; mere journalists lacked the authority to call a President a liar. Second, post-9/11 they were intimidated by Bush's McCarthyite with-us-or-ag'in-us rhetoric as well as by a bloodthirsty right-wing punditocracy. (New York Times White House reporter Elisabeth Bumiller admitted that she and her colleagues found it "frightening to stand up there," and "no one wanted to get into an argument with the President at this very serious time.") Finally, though much of what Bush said during his first term was laughable, it was not easily disprovable in a normative sense. Would the poor and the middle class be the primary beneficiaries of tax cuts designed almost exclusively to enrich the extremely wealthy? Could right-wing church groups and ideology factories replace the services provided by traditional government health and welfare agencies? Does abstinence-only education based on disinformation reduce teen pregnancy? Were WMD-infested, bin-Laden-loving Iraqis eager to be "liberated" by a power that instructs them that our God is bigger than their God? "Well maybe," replied most reporters. "Time will tell." Because the mainstream media make a fetish of a particularly brainless form of objectivity, the Bush Administration has been able to deceive the American public on a dizzying array of issues, from war to economics to science to, well, you name it. Lying has usually damaged the Presidents who do it, as I argued in my book When Presidents Lie: A History of Official Deception and Its Consequences. But the media proved so timid in the face of this Administration's deceptions that the reckoning was delayed long enough for Bush to squeak into a second term. Now the results are in--and reporters, under siege from several directions, are still trapped in self-eviscerating sanctimony. Jim Lehrer explained the peculiar form of "objectivity" he and his colleagues practice to CJR Daily's Liz Cox Barrett not long ago: "I don't deal in terms like 'blatantly untrue,'" he averred. "That's for other people to decide.... I'm not in the judgment part of journalism. I'm in the reporting part of journalism." As Todd Gitlin pointed out on TPM Cafe, Lehrer's interview sounded an awful lot like Rob Corddry lecturing a befuddled Jon Stewart, "I don't have 'o-pin-i-ons.' I'm a reporter, Jon, and my job is to spend half the time repeating what one side says, and half the time repeating the other. Little thing called 'objectivity'--might wanna look it up someday." Of course, even when they did catch Bush in the occasional bald-faced, easily demonstrable lie, most Washington journalists thought it gauche to make a big deal out of it. Dana Milbank wrote the classic 2002 Washington Post article about Bush's tendency to mislead, deliberately--all without ever using the "L" word. When asked by CNN's Howard "conflict of interest" Kurtz specifically about an incontrovertible lie by Bush about why we invaded Iraq--the President claimed that Saddam Hussein would not allow inspectors in--Milbank excused the liar: "This is just the President being the President." He meant it as a compliment. Now Bush's lies are news again. When replacing his Treasury Secretary recently, he told another one that reporters have had trouble ignoring. Asked by Bloomberg's Richard Keil, "Has Treasury Secretary Snow given you any indication that he intends to leave his job anytime soon?" Bush responded, "No, he has not talked to me about resignation. I think he's doing a fine job." In fact, as Washington Post.com's Dan Froomkin reported, "Tony Snow [no relation] confirmed that Bush had offered John Snow's job to Goldman Sachs chairman Henry Paulson several days before the press conference, and the spokesman didn't deny that Bush and his treasury secretary had talked about it." Quizzed about the discrepancy, Tony Snow called Bush's response "artfully worded." By Bush Administration standards, that's sad but true. Froomkin devoted a column to the incident, brazenly titled "Bush's Lie." In it he wondered at all the reasons reporters are reluctant to call a lie a lie. He quoted his own newspaper's coverage by Peter Baker and Paul Blustein, which gave no indication of the President's purposeful mendacity. "Bush, when asked about the Treasury Secretary at his news conference last night, indicated only that he had not spoken directly with Snow and quickly changed the subject to positive economic indicators." In other words: "Thank you, sir, may I have another?" (Also writing about the incident, Slate's John Dickerson explained, mystifyingly, "I'm reluctant to call it a lie, but the President abused our trust.") Interestingly, Froomkin's attentiveness to the issue of what's true and what's false in the President's statements has earned him the reputation around the office of being an ideologue. Late last year Washington Post executive editor Len Downie spoke of his desire to "make sure people in the administration know that our news coverage by White House reporters is separate from what appears in Froomkin's column." National political editor John Harris admitted at the same time that he had "heard from Republicans" who thought Froomkin "unfair." To offer readers "balance," Post honchos demonstrated just what they consider to be the proper antidote to a twenty-year veteran reporter who submits Administration rhetoric to truth tests: In March they hired a 24-year-old former Bush/Cheney political operative named Ben Domenech, who had little (if any) experience as a journalist but plenty, it turned out, as a plagiarist.
So truth is for "liberals." Were it not for the fact that our democracy is being undermined by the liars in office, we might be flattered. But even the collapse of the President's popularity has not installed much backbone in the press corps. Bush can still lie about whatever he wants whenever he wants; treasury secretaries one day; war the next. It's "just the President being the President."
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 Heil Bush, Dear Propaganda Ansager Coulter, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your constant shilling and lying for the Junta, your insane attacks on anything liberal inccluding the 911 family survivors that has made us; by comparison, look almost normal, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Media Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Fuhrer Bunker" formally 'The White House' on 07-01-2006. We salute you herr Coulter, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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Iraq and the media, the media and Iraq -- over and over. Last week was supposed to be a good media week for Iraq -- Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was dead. Taken out, we said, by a combination of American and Iraqi troops with Jordanian intelligence.
The churlish might note this was the second time the American military had announced Zarqawi's death -- but, hey, we've announced the capture of Osama's No. 2 guy at least seven or eighth times. Others claimed Zarqawi was never that important to begin with, indeed had been built up by our side. Still, that's a goal for our side, as they say in World Cup play.
Then reality got a bit bumpy. Zarqawi wasn't exactly dead when we found him. We put him on a stretcher and cleaned him up -- the fog of war intervened.
I distinctly remember people predicting the first time we killed Zarqawi that it wouldn't make much difference, so I presume they did it again. Thus, we get to revisit the old cackle over whether we are fighting international terrorists who have flocked to Iraq or a native uprising against our occupation of the country. Can't even agree on what's going on.
I'm so used to one side saying this and the other side saying the opposite that I didn't even blink over the differences.
I did, however, come to a screeching halt over the right's reaction to news of a triple suicide at Guantanamo. A great chorus of, "How dare they?" seemed to follow this dismal news. My local paper said, "Detainees hid their plans to die ... Guantanamo officials were fooled ... Inquiry looks at how to prevent other deaths."
Now it seems to me one might have any number of reactions to news of suicides at Guantanamo, but righteous indignation is not one of them. Most of these prisoners have been held for four years now without possibility of charge, trial or parole. I should think they would be suicidal. I'm sorry we failed to prevent it, but I'm not sure that's possible. "They hid their plans to die?" Gee, the sneaks.
You know what? This is getting silly. The debate over this war is unrealistic and even ludicrous. A) It is not going well. B) It keeps getting worse. C) Yes, it is possible that if we stay there long enough, it will get better eventually. D) There is no evidence suggesting that beyond hope.
A particularly acrid growth from this fruitless debate is the contempt for and dismissal of public opinion in other countries. "So what if we have alienated public opinion in nations throughout the Middle East?" seems to be the attitude. "Who cares what they think?" If I wanted to win a global war on terror, I'd sure be concerned about what they think.
I would hope the right would at least be concerned over the damage being done to the American military by this war. Morale, my ass. Excuse me, but our government doesn't even seem to be able to pay these people on time. Not to mention stretching them past the breaking point in Iraq, leaving them without adequate mental care when they come home, endlessly extending their tours, bribing them to re-up, and so forth and so on. Then, of course, something like Haditha happens, and they all get a black eye out of it.
I think it's time the antiwar side in this country started using a few threats of its own -- specifically, about who's going to take the blame for this when it's over. Forget the liberal tradition of forgiveness. I say, hold this grudge
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In a remarkable protest from inside the ranks of the military, First Lieut. Ehren Watada has become the Army's first commissioned officer to publicly refuse orders to fight in Iraq on grounds that the war is illegal. The 28-year-old announced his decision not to obey orders to deploy to Iraq in a video press conference June 7, saying, "My participation would make me party to war crimes."
An artillery officer stationed at Fort Lewis, Washington, Watada wore a business suit rather than his military uniform when making his statement. "It is my conclusion as an officer of the armed forces that the war in Iraq is not only morally wrong but a horrible breach of American law," he said. "Although I have tried to resign out of protest, I am forced to participate in a war that is manifestly illegal. As the order to take part in an illegal act is ultimately unlawful as well, I must as an officer of honor and integrity refuse that order."
A native of Hawaii who enlisted in the Army after graduating from college in 2003, Watada differs from other military personnel who have sought conscientious-objector status to avoid deployment to Iraq.
Watada told Truthout's Sarah Olson that at first he gave the Bush Administration the benefit of the doubt as it built the case for war. But when he discovered he was being sent to Iraq, he began reading everything he could, such as James Bamford's Pretext for War. He concluded that the war was based on false pretenses, ranging from the nonexistent weapons of mass destruction to the claim that Saddam had ties to Al Qaeda and 9/11 to the idea that the United States is in Iraq to promote democracy.
His investigation led him to question the very legality of the war. In an interview with Democracy Now!, he explained that as he read articles by experts on international and constitutional law, reports from governmental and nongovernmental agencies, revelations from independent journalists, writings by the Iraqi people and the words of soldiers coming home, "I came to the conclusion that the war and what we're doing over there is illegal."
First, he concluded that the war violates the Constitution and War Powers Act, which, he said, "limits the President in his role as commander in chief from using the armed forces in any way he sees fit." Watada also concluded that "my moral and legal obligation is to the Constitution and not to those who would issue unlawful orders."
Second, he claims the war is illegal under international law. He discovered that "the UN Charter, the Geneva Convention and the Nuremberg principles all bar wars of aggression." The Constitution makes such treaties part of American law as well.
These are not wild legal claims. Watada's conclusions are supported by mountains of evidence and experts, including the judgment of UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, who in 2004 declared that the US invasion was "not in conformity with the UN Charter, and from our point of view...was illegal."
Watada said he came to recognize that the military conduct of the occupation is also illegal: "If you look at the Army Field Manual, 27-10, which governs the laws of land warfare, it states certain responsibilities for the occupying power. As the occupying power, we have failed to follow a lot of those regulations." He told ABC News that the "wholesale slaughter and mistreatment of the Iraqi people" is "a contradiction to the Army's own law of land warfare."
While ongoing media coverage of the protest debates whether Watada's action is one of cowardice or conscience, so far the seriousness of his legal claims have been largely ignored. Watada's position is different from that of conscientious objectors, who oppose all wars. "I'm not just against bearing arms or fighting people. I am against an unjustified war," he said.
Can such a claim be heard in a military court? In 2004, Petty Officer Pablo Paredes refused to board his Iraq-bound ship in San Diego Harbor, claiming to be a conscientious objector. At his court-martial, Paredes testified that he was convinced that the Iraq War was illegal. National Lawyers Guild president-elect Marjorie Cohn presented evidence to support his claim. The military judge, Lieut. Cmdr. Robert Klant, accepted Paredes's war-crimes defense and refused to send him to jail. The government prosecutor's case was so weak that Cohn, in a report published on Truthout.org, noted that Klant declared ironically, "I believe the government has just successfully proved that any seaman recruit has reasonable cause to believe that the wars in Yugoslavia, Afghanistan and Iraq were illegal."
One of Germany's highest courts heard a case last year regarding a German soldier who refused to participate in military activities as part of the US-led coalition in Iraq. The Federal Administrative Court issued a long and detailed decision in his favor, saying, "There were and still are serious legal objections to the war against Iraq ... relating to the UN Charter's prohibition of the use of violence and other provisions of international law."
Watada's case comes amid a growing questioning of the Iraq War in all levels of the military. A February Zogby poll found that 72 percent of American troops serving in Iraq think the United States should leave the country within the next year, and more than one in four say the United States should leave immediately. While the "generals' revolt" against Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld didn't challenge the legality of the war per se, many retired military leaders have strongly condemned the use of torture and other violations of international and military law.
According to USA Today, at least 8,000 service members have deserted since the Iraq War began. The Guardian reports that there are an estimated 400 Iraq War deserters in Canada, of whom at least twenty have applied for asylum. An Army spokesman says that ten other servicemen besides Watada have refused to go to Iraq.
Resistance in the military played a critical role in ending the French war in Algeria, the Israeli occupation of Lebanon and the American war in Vietnam. Such resistance not only undermines the capacity of a government to conduct wars; it also challenges the moral claims that are used to justify them and inspires others to examine their own responsibilities.
Watada's action comes as the issue of US war crimes in Iraq is inexorably creeping into the public spotlight. Senator John Warner has promised to hold hearings on the alleged Haditha massacre. The UN Committee Against Torture has declared that the United States is engaging in illegal torture at Guantanamo and elsewhere. An investigation by the European Union has found overwhelming evidence of the rendition of prisoners to other countries for torture.
Watada's highly publicized stand will no doubt lead others to ask what they are doing to halt such crimes. Unless the Army assigns him somewhere besides Iraq or permits him to resign his commission, he will now face court-martial for refusing to serve as ordered and possibly years in prison.
According to an ominous statement released by the Army commanders at Fort Lewis in response to Watada's press conference: "For a commissioned officer to publicly declare an apparent intent to violate military law by refusing to obey orders is a serious matter and could subject him to adverse action."
Watada's decision to hold a press conference and post his statements online puts him at serious risk. In theory, if the Army construes his public statements as an attempt to encourage other soldiers to resist, he could be charged with mutiny under Article 94 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, which considers those who act "with intent to usurp or override lawful military authority, refuses, in concert with any other person, to obey orders or otherwise do his duty or creates any violence or disturbance is guilty of mutiny." The conservative group Military Families Voice of Victory is already "demanding the Army prosecute Lt. Watada to the fullest extent under the Uniform Code of Military Justice."
Watada told Truthout's Olson that when he started to question the war, he he felt, like so many in and out of the military, that "there was nothing to be done, and this administration was just continually violating the law to serve their purpose, and there was nothing to stop them." But he realized that there was something he personally could do: "It is my duty not to follow unlawful orders and not to participate in things I find morally reprehensible."
"The one God-given freedom and right that we really have is freedom of choice," Watada says, echoing the profound message of Mohandas Gandhi. "I just want to tell everybody, especially people who doubt the war, that you do have that one freedom. And that's something that they can never take away. Yes, they will imprison you. They'll throw the book at you. They'll try to make an example out of you, but you do have that choice."
Even facing prison time, Watada is firm. "When you are looking your children in the eye in the future, or when you are at the end of your life, you want to look back on your life and know that at a very important moment, when I had the opportunity to make the right decisions, I did so, even knowing there were negative consequences."
Watada's recognition of his duty provides a challenge not only to those in the military but to all Americans: "We all have a duty as American citizens for civil disobedience, and to do anything we can within the law to stop an illegal war." ... David Horsey ...  |
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I saw a light, just up ahead
It's like a weight, that brings me down
Another day, another night
Robert Newman's History Of Oil
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Parting Shots...
By Betty Bowers
This week, sweet Ann Coulter released her latest in a series of pre-rehab books, entitled Godless. Naturally, the title led me to believe that it was an unexpectedly candid autobiography. Alas, she may be saving that book until after she's been strapped to a bed at Hazelden for a month. Instead of using this book to dabble in the bracing novelty of introspection, Miss Coulter turns her two-setting mind ("off" and "off her rocker") to hector us about religion. Let's be honest: Reading a book about religion from Ann Coulter is tantamount to reading a book about dieting from Michael Moore. After all, who wants to be lectured about not being Christian enough by an almost-50 year-old boozehound in a black leather miniskirt who has never been married? Count me as having a healthy skepticism over whether Miss Coulter has saved herself for marriage. Or anything, for that matter. In Godless, Miss (oh, how it pains me to refer to that serially-rejected spinster as "Miss," but something Miss Coulter usually eschews -- accuracy -- compels me) Coulter turns her shrill furnace of brayed invective, fueled by a bottomless quarry of prickly psychological damage, at the most despicable people in the world. No, not the maniacal murderers who flew planes into the World Trade Center towers, but the blameless Americans who had their flesh burned off of their bodies in those buildings -- and the inconsolable spouses they left behind. Yes, she directs an anger that shirks all management on women whose husbands were murdered on 9/11. Apparently, in Miss Coulter's religion, the meek may inherit the Earth, but not before she's had a shot at making them cry first. With a mouth so busy frothing it apparently has no time to eat, Miss Coulter claims to be livid at these opportunistic widows for being crass enough to remember the event that killed the father of their children. She also gets prickly about them being compensated as a result of the catastrophe. Frankly, I think she is simply exhibiting a fierce territoriality on behalf of herself and other Republicans who have used 9/11 to win elections and sell books. Her attitude seems to be: Exploiting 9/11 is our shtick -- find your own way to make money! This must account for why she doesn't take Lisa Beamer to task for registering "Let's Roll!(tm)" on the trinkets she sold on the Internet.
 Ann Coulter (billed as "Joan Van Ark") in a television gig preceding her current role as Sean Hannity's concubine on the Fox sitcom Hannity and Colmes Of course, Ann's every utterance is a carefully choreographed gambit to convert sensationalistic bad taste into sensationally good sales. In this way she is like another rapidly aging blond sex kitten, Madonna, someone else with no discernable talent other than getting people to ask, "Did she really say that?" Miss Coulter mocking the widows of men incinerated by burning jet fuel in the World Trade Center is just her competitive one-upmanship of Madonna showing up on a mirrored crucifix, all but screaming "Look at me! Isn't this SHOCKING?" And you have to give credit where it is due: Miss Coulter could squeeze ink out of a tombstone. But in her mercantile zeal to say what sells, Miss Coulter endeavors to create an image that has apparently had a nasty falling out with reality, leaving them no longer on speaking terms. Indeed, to hear Miss Coulter speak (in that wound up Martha Stewart-on-helium Connecticut lockjaw voice of hers), you'd think she is someone who actually embraces heartland, Christian, American values. In reality, however, she is less like June Cleaver baking pot-roast than she is like Samantha Jones baked on pot. Indeed, this is no piously serene Christian wife, but a braying loud mouth who wears super-slutty clothes, powders her bony nose more often than Lindsay Lohan (if you know what I mean), knocks back scotch with an alacrity that eludes Ted Kennedy since the advent of rheumatoid arthritis, lives only in cities filled with homos and screws anything willing to bang an anorexic skeleton. [Had I typed any of that I would have included the word "allegedly," but the Lord apparently countenances no such quibbles when He uses my keyboard to throw His voice.]
 This brings me to Miss Coulter's teen tramp wardrobe. Miss Coulter showed up to the Today show this week wearing a black cocktail dress three sizes too small. At seven in the morning, mind you. No woman in New York wears a little black dress that early in the day unless she is burying someone dead, or looks like someone dead, as she makes a Whore of Babylon predawn retreat from the previous night's licentious debauchery. This may account for why Matt Lauer told me that the poor thing smelled like an ashtray. But it wasn't the color of the dress that was so telling. No, it was the "Look! I got myself one of those Brazilian waxes!" length that spoke more to a Jackie Stallone determination to hang on to youth with knuckles no longer white but bleeding. Indeed, it seems that Miss Coulter's whole sense of self comes from thinking she is a "hot young babe" who drives, presumably myopic, men wild with a sexual desire so ardent they no longer hear the nonsense she is saying. Goodness me, who would have ever guessed that the Achilles heel for most Republican men would be the sight of pre-operative transsexuals in dresses made for someone 20 years younger? Miss Coulter suffers from an affliction I like to call Mariah Carey by Proxy. Celebrities who suffer from this debilitating disease so seldom seek help before some ruthless person takes a photograph of them. Mariah Carey by Proxy afflicts menopausal woman who think they would break the hearts of teenage boys throughout America if they ever showed up in public with a nipple-baring "Love Waits" tube-top. NOTE: Call your doctor if you find yourself wearing clothes that flash undernourished, middle-age legs and surgically-levitated bosoms, particularly when such revealing clothing is not appropriate for the occasion. Side effects may include wearing your hair like a junior high school cheerleader even though you are rapidly approaching 50.
 Miss Coulter's muse, Sylvia Miles (above). Miss Coulter has been overheard bellowing in bars the words made famous by Miss Miles in the film Midnight Cowboy: "You were gonna ask me for money? Who the hell do you think you're dealing with, some old slut on K Street? In case you didn't happen to notice it, ya big Texas longhorn bull, I'm one helluva gorgeous chick!"
 For those of you pressed for time, but still don't wish to miss out on the tedium of being regaled by one recycled thought spread out over 300-odd pages: You can finish any Coulter book in less than15 minutes by simply skipping over the word "liberals." Try it! This time saving technique is even more effective with anything typed by Sean Hannity, who has shown the bracing resourcefulness it takes to parlay basically two thoughts into an entire career. |
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In This Edition
Thom Hartmann reveals a winning stratergy, "Reclaim The Issues - 'Occupation, Not War.'"
Uri Avnery hears, "Crying Stones."
Ted Rall takes a poll, "Americans Don't And Shouldn't Care About The War On Terror."
Jim Hightower watches as, "Alito Strikes."
Robert Scheer explores, "Hillary's Shameful Straddling On Iraq."
Chris Floyd tries a heaping helping of, "Patriotic Pork."
Greg Palast sends in, "The Armed Madhouse Travel Blog."
Robert Parry reports, "Washington Post Smears War Critics, Again."
Joe Conason listens to, "A Shameful Silence On Coulter's Spewing."
Norman Solomon points out, "A Big Problem For Hillary Clinton: 'Premature Triangulation.'"
William Rivers Pitt is, "Seeking A Better Debate."
Washington Post publisher Donald Graham wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award!'
Molly Ivins asks, "Without DeLay, Has The GOP Lost Its Moral Compass?"
Dahr Jamail covers, "Operation Forward Together."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department 'The White House.Org' reveals, "President's Poll-Boosting Remarks" but first Uncle Ernie sez, "Death Walks Behind You."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Etta Hulme with additional cartoons from Derf City, Micah Wright, The White House.Org, Weakly World News, David Horsey, SoCalDem and Internet Weekly.Org.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Death Walks Behind You By Ernest Stewart
"Be a loyal plastic robot for a world that doesn't care."
The little girl next door murdered 5 people half a world away in Afghanistan. Were they terrorists? Were they tourists? Were they shopkeepers? Were they just five guys at a back yard bar-be-cue? She herself hadn't a clue but assured us several times that she was only following orders, "I held my fire until I received my orders;" spoken like a true robot. Where have I heard that before, "But Herr Hangman, I was only following ze orders?" Then she said how it really wasn't personal. Oh really? You just destroyed 5 or more families by blowing their husbands, sons, uncles, cousins etc. into tiny bits and because someone told you to, it wasn't personal? And we wonder where the next Ann Coulter's are coming from? For those of you who had wondered why those ultra violent video games are allowed to exist and why the army sends out it's own video games, now you know! Just another tiny step in the over-all brain washing of America and the world as well. Beware America, before you too end up in the eyes of a Predator and a young lady outside of Las Vegas who waits for the fire orders on you! In Other News... I see where the "The Constitution Restoration Act" is back and rearing it's ugly head once again. This is the bill that would allow our legislature to choose an official religion, make our laws as one with it and keep the courts from doing anything about it. Do I have your attention now? As you may remember I reported on this piece of treason last year. Officially it's called H.R. 1070, the Constitution Restoration Act of 2005, whose mirror in the Senate is S. 520. Both of these bills are currently before the House and Senate judiciary committees. Rather than "restore" any power to the Constitution, what these bills do is to take away the Supreme Court's ability to stop government officials from attempting to establish religion in America, or to show preference for one religion over another and paves the way for the American Taliban's ascension to total power. Are we having fun yet, or what? H.R. 1070 would amend Title 28 of the United States Code; the volume having to do with the judiciary and judicial procedure, to add a new Section 1260, "Matters Not Reviewable." That new section would read as follows: "Notwithstanding any other provision of this chapter, the Supreme Court shall not have jurisdiction to review, by appeal, writ of certiorari, or otherwise, any matter to the extent that relief is sought against an entity of Federal, State, or local government, or against an officer or agent of Federal, State, or local government (whether or not acting in official or personal capacity), concerning that entity's, officer's, or agent's acknowledgment of God as the sovereign source of law, liberty, or government." That spinning noise you may hear in the background is old Tom Jefferson in his grave who once told the Taliban in 1801 in a letter to the Danbury Baptist Association... "Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God," Jefferson stated, "that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between Church & State." What's that smell I smell coming from the 9 Sin-ators and 47 Con-gressmen who signed their names to this turkey? Smells like treason to me, what's it smell like to you? ***** Well I guess that "Wag the Fag" didn't go over too well with his fellow Sin-ators so Billy "da kitten slayer" Frist is now playing "Wag the Flag." Billy is joining up with the likes of Hillary "da Bee-otch" Clinton to try and push through a bill that will destroy the 1st amendment and place America in league with other bastions of democracy as only the forth country on the planet to have such a law. Those other countries I refer to are of course Cuba, China, and Iran! That's some company to be a part of, isn't it Mr. & Mrs. America? Do remember that, when Billy & Hilly are running for office again, won't you? Need I say anything more about this? Yes I know, why get worked up over a symbol? After all are not symbols just for the symbol minded? As someone who used to salute old Gory er Glory with more than just one finger; I too; like most, bought the bullshit behind it. Remember that once upon a time your wicked old uncle was a somewhat brain-washed storm trooper, been there done that. You know the blood and sacrifice song and dance that they give you? Somehow they never mention the real reasons for all that blood and guts having nothing what-so-ever to do with democracy and freedom but everything to do with corpo-rat profits i.e. theft, slavery and murder. I've never burned a flag before or ever wanted to but if they pass this bullshit I'm going to light a fire to every flag that I find wrapped around a politician. Burn Baby Burn! Y'all bring the Marshmallows! ***** And finally, we have an answer to that old Beatles' question... "Will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I'm sixty four?" As Paul recently found out, the answer is... "No She Won't!" ********************************************
We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
So how do you like the 2nd coup d'etat so far?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
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Reclaim The Issues - "Occupation, Not War" By Thom Hartmann Every time the media - or a Democrat - uses the phrase "War in Iraq" they are promoting one of Karl Rove's most potent Republican Party frames. There is no longer a war against Iraq. It ended in May of 2003, when George W. Bush stood below a "Mission Accomplished" sign aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln and correctly declared that we had "victoriously" defeated the Iraqi army and overthrown their government. Our military machine is tremendously good at fighting wars - blowing up infrastructure, killing opposing armies, and toppling governments. We did that successfully in Iraq, in a matter of a few weeks. We destroyed their army, wiped out their air defenses, devastated their Republican Guard, seized their capitol, arrested their leaders, and took control of their government. We won the war. It's over. What we have now is an occupation of Iraq. The occupation began when the war ended, and continues to this day. According to our own Pentagon estimates, at least ninety five percent of those attacking our soldiers are Iraqi civilians who view themselves as anti-occupation fighters. And last week both the Defense Minister and the Vice President of Iraq asked us for a specific date on which the occupation would end. The distinction between "war" and "occupation" is politically critical for 2006 because wars can be won or lost, but occupations most honorably end by redeployments. We won World War II and it carried Roosevelt to great political heights. We lost the Vietnam War and it politically destroyed Lyndon B. Johnson, Richard Nixon, and Jerry Ford. And as we fought to a draw in Korea, it so wounded Harry S. Truman politically that he didn't have a strong enough base of support to run for re-election against Dwight D. Eisenhower. American's don't like to lose or draw at a war. Even people who oppose wars find it uncomfortable, at some level, to lose, and Republican strategists are using this psychological reality for political gain. When wars are won - even when they're totally illegal and undeclared wars, like Reagan's adventure in Grenada - it tends to create a national good feeling. On the other hand, when arguably just wars, or at least legally defensible "police action" wars, like Korea, are not won, they wound the national psyche. And losing a war - like the German loss of WWI - can be so devastating psychologically to a citizenry that it sets up a nation for strongman dictatorship to "restore the national honor." On the other hand, an "occupation" is something that logically should one day end, and, if it's an expensive occupation in lives or money, will find popular support to end as soon as possible. The various colonial powers of Europe ended their occupations of most of Africa, for example, and there was no national emotional pain associated with it. Churchill's withdrawal from Uganda increased his popularity with Brits. While Americans hate to lose wars, we're generally pleased to wrap up occupations. We had no problem with ending our occupation of The Philippines, numerous South Pacific islands, and the redeployment of our troops stationed in nations conquered in World War II (Japan and Germany) from broad-based "occupation" to locally based "assistance." (Although we still have troops in Japan and Germany, neither country has been functionally "occupied" by us since the late 1940s and the "legal" occupation of both ended shortly thereafter. It should also be remembered that not a single American life was lost because of hostile fire in either brief post-war occupation.) If Democrats can succeed over the next three months in making it clear to average Americans that the "War In Iraq" ended in 2003, and that we're now engaged in an "Occupation Of Iraq," then Democratic suggestions to end or greatly diminish the occupation will take on a resonance and cogency that will both help them in an election year, and help to bring our soldiers to safety and Iraq to stability. On the other hand, if Democrats are perceived as pushing for America to "lose the war in Iraq," they will be vilified and damned by Republicans and many swing voters, and could thus lose big in 2006. The "War" is over. The Occupation has now lasted 3 years and one month - far longer than necessary. Here's a "for example" scenario - fictitious at this moment - of how Democrats should play it out: [Tim Russert]: So, Senator Reid, what do you think of this most recent news from the War In Iraq? [Senator Reid]: The war ended in May of 2003, Tim. Our military did their usual brilliant job, and we defeated Saddam's army. The Occupation Of Iraq, however, isn't going so well, in large part because the Bush Administration has totally botched the job, leading to the death of thousands of our soldiers, and dragging our nation into disrepute around the world. I'd like to see us greatly scale down the current Occupation of Iraq, redeploy our Occupation Forces to nearby nations in case we're needed by the new Iraqi government, and get our brave young men and women out of harm's way. Occupations have a nasty way of fomenting civil wars, you know, and we don't want this one to go any further than it has. [Tim Russert]: But isn't the War In Iraq part of the Global War On Terror? [Senator Reid]: Our Occupation Of Iraq is encouraging more Muslims around the world to eye us suspiciously. Some may even be inspired by our Occupation of this Islamic nation to take up arms or unconventional weapons against us, perhaps even here at home, just as Osama Bin Laden said he hit us on 9/11 because we were occupying part of his homeland, Saudi Arabia, at the Prince Sultan Air Force Base, where Bush Senior first put troops in 1991 to project force into Kuwait and enforce the Iraqi no-fly zone. The Bush policy of an unending Occupation Of Iraq is increasing the danger that people will use the tactic of terror against us and our allies, and, just like George W. Bush wisely redeployed our troops from Saudi Arabia, we should begin right now to redeploy our troops who are occupying Iraq. [Tim Russert]: But the War... [Senator Reid]: Tim, Tim, Tim! The war is over! George W. Bush declared victory himself, in May of 2003, when our brave soldiers seized control of Iraq. That's the definition of the end of a war, as anybody who's ever served in the military can tell you. Unfortunately, our Occupation Of Iraq since the end of the war, using a small military force and a lot of Halliburton, hasn't worked. We should take Halliburton's billions and give them to the Iraqis so they can rebuild their own nation, the way we helped Europeans rebuild after World War Two. And go from being an occupying power to being an ally of Iraq and the Iraqi people, like we did with Japan and Germany. [Tim Russert (bewildered)]: I can't call it a war anymore? We have to change our NBC "War In Iraq" banners and graphics? [Senator Reid (patting Russert's hand)]: Yes, Tim. The war is over. It's now an occupation, and has been for three years. And like all occupations, it's best to wrap it up so Iraq can get on with their business. I'm sure your graphics people can come up with some new logos that say "Occupation Of Iraq." It'll be a nice project for them, maybe even earn them some much-needed overtime pay. The "War In Iraq" graphics are getting a bit stale, don't you think? After all, soon we'll be able to say that we fought World War II in less time than we've been in Iraq. Wars are usually short, but occupations - particularly when they're done stupidly - can be hellish. [Tim Russert (brightening)]: Ah, so! Now I get it! I even wrote about wars and occupations in my book about my dad. Thanks for coming on the program today and clarifying this for us. If the Democrats don't shift the discussion from "war" to "occupation," the Republicans will succeed in painting them as being "in favor of losing a war," which will destroy their electoral possibilities.
Instead, every time a Republican or a member of the press uses the Rove slogan "War in Iraq," Democrats need to correct them by saying, "You mean the Occupation of Iraq..."
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Crying Stones A Lesson in Ethnic Cleansing By Uri Avnery "I COLLECTED with my bare hands the body parts of my two little sons. What mother must do that? One shell of the aggressors blew them apart. Within a second, my life was destroyed forever." The woman spoke quietly. Her third son, a boy of about eight, stood at her side and, from time to time, wiped the tears from her cheek. The well turned out woman, her hair collected in a pink kerchief, well dressed, was self-controlled but full of restrained hatred for the "aggressors" - the Serbs - who had caused her tragedy. A big wreath and the photos of the boys at the entrance of the home silently commemorated the 15th anniversary of the disaster - the first day of the siege of Sarajevo. From the moment we - Rachel and I - arrived at the airport, Sarajevo threw us into a cauldron of emotions, which we could not escape for a moment. In Sarajevo, one simply cannot be indifferent. "For the stone shall cry out of the wall," as the prophet Habakkuk (2, 11) said. Walls pockmarked by bullets, ruins that once were homes, people carrying with them blood-curdling stories as if they had happened but yesterday. A city that warms your heart and breaks your heart. For a total of four years, Sarajevo was under siege. It is hard to believe - and it happened only ten years ago. The capital city of a European state, surrounded on all sides, stricken, starved, shelled, tortured - with Europe looking on. The capital of Bosnia-Herzegovina is a beautiful town - and its very beauty became its disaster. The description of Jerusalem in Psalm 125: "The mountains are round about Jerusalem" also fits Sarajevo. It lies in a valley, surrounded by high hills on all sides. Green, wooded hills, in many places dotted with red roofs. There is almost no spot in the city where one does not see the beautiful hills. But since all the hilltops were occupied by the Serbian army that beleaguered the city, there was practically no spot in the city that was not exposed to snipers. Not for a day, a week, a month. For four long years. Sarajevo is a town of graves - dozens of graveyards are dispersed across it, small, large and very large. Thousands of white tombstones blind the eyes, mostly of uniform dimensions and with simple inscriptions, fresh wreaths at their feet. Twelve thousand of the town's inhabitants were killed during the siege, 1500 of them children under 14. The entire city is still suffering from this trauma. And in spite of that - a vibrant city. Traffic jams, old, clattering cars, roads and sidewalks scarred. The city tries to recover: many of the square houses, which look as if they had been painted by children, have been redecorated in brown, green and mustard colors, and between them are fruit trees and small garden plots with huge rosebushes. In the center of the town - a Turkish palace, built, of all people, by the Austrians when they were ruling Bosnia. It housed the state library, one of the most important in the world. It was completed destroyed by fire during the siege. Behind the imposing front, everything is burned out. A FORMER commander, with grey hair and a sunburned, plowed face, showed us the battle sites and recounted the annals of the siege. I felt as if I had been there myself. Every word reminded me of my own experiences in the war of 1948. The improvised army; the feeling that "there is no alternative"; the fear that if we lose the battle, we and our families would be massacred; the shortage of weapons; the sense of "few against many"; the breakthrough to a beleaguered city (Jewish Jerusalem); the blurring of the dividing line between soldiers and civilians. At the time, I followed the Bosnian war with the feeling that it very much resembled our own war. It was an ethnic war, a war marked by what since then is known as "ethnic cleansing". I was invited to Sarajevo to speak about precisely this subject, in an international conference of the "New Agora", which is based in Poland and whose aim is to gather intellectuals from different countries to discuss the future of the world. (In ancient Greece, the Agora was the market square where the population could assemble to discuss public matters.) An "ethnic war", in my understanding, is different from any other war. A "normal" war takes place between states, mostly for a piece of land on the border between them. Thus, Germany and France fought for centuries over Alsace. But ethnic wars are fought by two peoples over a country that both consider their homeland. In such a war, each side strives not only to conquer as much territory as possible, but also - and mainly - to drive the other people out. That's why it is always especially cruel. The 1948 Palestine war was an ethnic war between Arabs and Jews. Each side believed that the entire country belonged to it. Half of the Palestinian people were driven from their home and land, some by the fighting itself, some by a deliberate Israeli policy. For the sake of historical justice, it must be mentioned that in the areas conquered by the Arab side (true, they were small) no Jews remained either. But we conquered 78% of the country, and from these areas 750 thousand Arabs were removed, while less than 100 thousand remained. Hundreds of villages were razed after the war, and on their sites new Jewish villages were built. Entire Arab neighborhoods in the towns were emptied, and new Jewish immigrants replaced the former inhabitants. Conquest and expulsion went together. In short: ethnic cleansing. The Bosnian war was similar - except that instead of two sides, as in our war, there were three: Bosniaks (Muslim), Serbs (Orthodox Christian) and Croats (Catholic Christian). Each of the three sides fought against the other two. Terrible massacres became almost routine. As a sad Bosniak told us: "Every day a farmer plowing his field discovers a new mass grave." As in Palestine before the 1948 war, the different populations lived in Bosnia interspersed with each other. The towns were mixed (like Jerusalem and Haifa), the villages lived beside each other - villages with soaring minarets, villages with Catholic church towers, villages with the domes of Orthodox churches. Therefore, people used to think, before it happened, "it can't happen in Sarajevo." Serbs and Croats were already butchering each other in the other states of the disintegrating Yugoslavia, but in Bosnia? After all, there everybody had married everybody. There is hardly a person in Bosnia in whose veins there does not flow all three kinds of blood together. In the towns, they lived door to door. In Sarajevo there was - and still is - a large majority of Muslims, side by side with minorities of Croats, Serbs and Jews, in that order. The general who explained the battles to us, Jovan Divjak, the former deputy commander of the Bosnian army, is a Serb. He left the Yugoslav (Serbian) army in order to defend Sarajevo. The photographer who took my picture for a local magazine found it hard to explain his family tree. One grandfather, a Muslim, had married a Croat woman. The other one was himself half Serb, half Montenegrin, while his wife was Muslim. "We must all live together," he said repeatedly, "After all, there is no real difference between us!" And indeed - that is one big difference between our war and the Bosnian one. There, all three sides, who butchered each other with such relish, speak the same language. All three are the descendants of the same Slavic tribes that conquered this country in the 7th century. In the street, one cannot distinguish between a Muslim, a Croat and a Serb. Sarajevo was - and remains, in spite of everything - a model of tolerance. On one square in the center of the town there stand, next to each other, a mosque, a Catholic church, an Orthodox church and a synagogue. It is hard to believe that 10 years ago there was a terrible war raging in this country. "I can't sleep at night," the Muslim cook at a restaurant told us. "Every night the sights come back to haunt me. I want to forget, and cannot." When he was 18 years old, a tall, muscular youngster, he was drafted into the then Yugoslav army, which was dominated by the Serbs. When the war between Serbs and Croats broke out, he was enroled in a special unit and sent to Vucovar, where the Serbs carried out a terrible massacre of the Croats. "We mowed them down row after row, dozens, hundreds, men, women and children. Me too. I had no alternative. If you refused, the commander shot you in the neck. In the end I stole a truck with weapons, and deserted. I was caught and spent half a year in prison. It was hard, very hard. I escaped and reached the Croats. They put me into one of their special units, until I managed to desert and came home to Sarajevo. Now I live with my father and mother and want some day to open an inn, to have a family, and to hell with everyone." After a moment he added: "It's the politicians who are to blame for everything. If I were God, I would kill them all!" AT THE entrance of a shop in a pedestrian street in Sarajevo I saw a T-shirt with the English inscription: "I am a Muslim - don't panic!" For an Israeli, it is difficult to accept that almost all the people in the street are Muslim. They do not resemble the Muslims we know at home. They are white, Europeans. Almost all the children are blond. On the thousands of graves, over the name of the deceased and the dates of birth and death, one Arabic word is inscribed (Fatiha, the prayer for the dead), but except for the Grand Mufti, who sat next to me at a panel discussion, I did not meet anyone who knew Arabic. I also did not see anyone smoking a water-pipe, not even near one of the dozens of mosques in the city. The Grand Mufti had heard only vaguely of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem who had visited the city in World War II. "Ah, that Husseini ," he remarked dismissively. But Yasser Arafat is remembered. He met with the adored leader of the Bosnian Muslims, Aliya Izetbegovich, during the peace negotiations and advised him: "Take what you can get!" A few women cover their hair with colorful silk kerchiefs. It is rather odd to see such young women, with colorful headcovers and elegant floor-sweeping skirts, sitting in the coffee-shops with female friends and smoking cigarettes. They also walk around in mixed groups with girls who do not cover their hair and wear tight jeans and T-shirts. There seems to be no problem. Many shops in the market sell local art - artillery shell cases used as vases or salt/pepper mills, bullet cases used for pens. Everywhere pictures of Tito are on sale. Many people recall him with nostalgia. As long as he was alive, he kept the peace between the peoples of Yugoslavia. But the most interesting place in town is the tunnel. It explains how the city could hold out during the four years of the terrible siege, without starving to death or dying for lack of medicines, or surrendering for lack of ammunition. Much as we succeeded in 1948 in breaking the siege of Jewish Jerusalem by moving the boulders and creating a primitive "Burma road", the Bosniaks dug a tunnel under the Serb position to reach the free Bosniak area beyond. For five Bosnian Marka (two and a half Euros) one can get in: it's 1.60 meters high, a meter wide. Through this underground passage, food, medicines and arms were brought into the city, by half crawling, and the wounded were moved out. Now it is a museum, the pride of the town. Perhaps, some day, the tunnels of Rafah in the Gaza Strip will serve the same purpose. THE NATIONAL symbol of Bosnia is the bridge of Mostar, two hours drive by bus from the capital. The Turks, who reigned in Bosnia for 400 years and are fondly remembered, built there a unique, high stone arch bridge over the river. It remained unharmed through all wars, until the last war. When the Croats besieged Mostar, they destroyed it willfully with artillery. After the war, the bridge was rebuilt with European money, an exact replica of the ancient one. But the barbaric deed is still burning in the heart of every Bosniak. "Don't forget 1993!" demands an inscription on a stone tablet. When we visited the place, in the heart of the fascinating old town, soldiers of the international peace-keeping force were strolling around. I looked at their shoulder tags, and could not help laughing. They were Austrian soldiers. On June 28, 1914, a Serb nationalist called Gavrilo Princip murdered the Austrian heir to the throne on the main street of Sarajevo, in protest against the Austrian occupation of the country. That led directly to World War I. Now, 92 years later, the Austrian soldiers have returned to Bosnia, and the inhabitants are glad to see them there. True, many people in Bosnia believe that another war is impossible: "It can't happen again. We have learned our lesson!" But a young woman of 20, who is still carrying within her the trauma of the siege, told us: "Have no doubt - if the international soldiers leave, everything will start again!"
It is possible that the ethnic war in Bosnia, like the ethnic war in our country, is not yet over.
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Americans Don't And Shouldn't Care About The War On Terror By Ted Rall PORTLAND--Do Americans worry about terrorism? Seventy-nine percent of Americans told the most recent CNN survey of national concerns that they did. They considered the fight against terrorists "very important"--more so than Iraq, the economy, immigration or gas prices. But it isn't true. Something interesting is revealed when you turn the same poll into an open-ended question. Unlike CNN, which asks people to react to a laundry list of issues, a poll by CBS News simply asks them: "What do you think is the most important problem facing this country today?" When Americans aren't prompted, terrorism barely registers among their concerns. Worries about the Iraq war rank first, at 28%, followed by the economy and the difficulty of finding a job (15%), and illegal immigration (12%). Terrorism ranks a paltry fifth, with just 5%. More people fret over paying too much for gas (6%) than the remote possibility of getting blown up by Al Qaeda. Humans are susceptible to suggestion. Ask them if they're afraid of being bitten by a pit bull and they'll probably say yes, come to think of it, hell yes--especially after watching a barrage of hysterical news stories about a gruesome pit bull attack. But, except when prompted by pollsters and media hysteria, few people wallow in cynophobia. Only a tiny fraction of the population would list pit bulls among their top concerns. The same is true about terrorism. Few Americans worry about it in their daily lives. Which makes sense, since the odds of falling victim to a terrorist attack, or suffering the loss of a loved one, are slim to none. Of course, you wouldn't know from the news that Americans don't worry much about terrorism. Four years after 9/11, there's little relationship between real life and our all-terror-all-the-time news and politics. Smoke has cleared, grief has faded, and shock has yielded to dispassionate realism: though horrible and devastating, 9/11 wasn't the cataclysmic event we've been led to believe. Three thousand Americans were killed on 9/11. Studies indicate that the average person knows 250 people, so roughly 750,000 Americans knew someone who died. That means more than 99.8% didn't. Compared to the overall size of the economy, the fiscal impact wasn't that big a deal. The short- and intermediate-term cost of 9/11, borne disproportionately by New York City, has been estimated at between $25 and $30 billion--the same as the cost of occupying Iraq for five months. True, the collapse of the World Trade Center, which released clouds of asbestos that will kill thousands of New Yorkers for years to come, was an epic environmental disaster--but no one cares about that. The overwhelming majority of Americans were materially unaffected by 9/11.Peter Beinart, an editor at the ideologically schizophrenic New Republic, has written a book called The Good Fight: Why Liberals--and Only Liberals--Can Win the War on Terror and Make America Great Again. Reviewers may agree or disagree with Beinart's premise as laid out in the subtitle, but few are likely to question his underlying premise, which is universally accepted by the left, right and everyone in between: that the "war on terror" is and ought to be a high (perhaps our highest) national priority. Writing that "the United States again faces a totalitarian foe," Beinart equates America's post-9/11 fight against "Islamo-fascists" with the war against the Axis during World War II.Just as we must make distinctions between threats that are long-term (Saddam's Iraq, Iran) and those that are short-term (North Korea, Pakistan), a nation should know how to separate its "enemies" from its "competitors." An enemy power wants to invade your country, subjugate its citizens and steal its wealth. The last time this happened in earnest was 1812, when Great Britain tried to take back its former colonies. Even during World War II, neither Nazi Germany nor Japan had territorial designs on the United States aside from a few, relatively inconsequential, island territories in the Pacific. From this perspective, America has no "enemies." Neither Al Qaeda, nor any other known terrorist organization, nor any nation-state, wants to invade the United States and rule its people, nor could it do so if it so desired. America has competitors, not enemies. Throughout the Cold War the Soviet Union competed with the U.S. in Third World proxy wars. As I will discuss in my forthcoming book Silk Road to Ruin: Is Central Asia the New Middle East?, Russia and China are vying for influence and control over the former Soviet republics of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and other countries in the oil-rich Caspian Sea basin. Non-state actors such as Al Qaeda want to transform moderate and secular Muslim states to rule under a Wahhabi-style caliphate. These are threats to American influence abroad, not to America itself. It's easy to forget in the current media environment, but all this competition is taking place overseas. No one--neither North Korea, nor Iran, nor Al Qaeda, nor China--has lifted a finger to alter American domestic politics, culture or religion. They haven't tried to influence any nation in our hemisphere. The conclusion is simple, obvious but nevertheless counterintuitive: as Americans tell pollsters when they're asked the right way, there isn't much at stake in the war on terror. Even if Islamist fundamentalism were to sweep the Muslim world (which is its objective), it wouldn't matter much to most Americans. After all, Saudi Arabia still manages to sell us plenty of oil while beheading adulteresses. The same would likely be true of Iraq, now a battleground between the U.S. and Islamists. A Talibanized Iraq would continue to sell oil to its largest consumer. Americans worry about Iraq, not because of the nationalist insurgency conflated with "terrorism" in the press, but because it's too expensive: too many dead and crippled soldiers, too damaging to our international reputation, too hard of a hit on the treasury. The longer the Iraq war grinds on, the higher their 2009 taxes will be.
Beinart was wrong about Iraq in 2003; he supported a preemptive strike just in case Saddam had WMDs. He's wrong again now. Contrary to the counsel proffered by his DLC-influenced militant moderates, Democrats would be smarter to recognize the war on terror as a distraction from the real issues--such as jobs, inflation and healthcare--that most Americans worry about. Let the GOP have the terrorism "issue." It reinforces how out of touch the Republicans are with the everyday concerns of the American people.
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When he was nominated by Bush last year to replace Sandra Day O'Connor on the Supreme Court, practically the entire debate over this right-wing judge revolved around his stance on abortion. So, Alito and his backers worked hard to soften his record as a knee-jerk, anti-choice zealot. Enough senate Democrats and moderate Republicans were convinced, and he was confirmed. A few of us populists, however, tried to point out that the supreme court spends far more time on issues involving worker rights, pollution, consumers, and such than on abortion. We warned that Alito had sided consistently with corporate and governmental elites over ordinary citizens on these issues throughout his legal career - and would do the same on the high court. Sure enough, in his first opportunity to side with bosses over the First Amendment rights of workers, Alito jumped on it. In a May 30th decision involving a whistleblower, a bare 5-4 majority of the court ruled that public employees have no free-speech right to blow the whistle against wrongdoing by their superiors - and they have no constitutional protection against retaliation by their bosses. The deciding vote came from Alito. Had Sandra Day O'Connor still been on the bench, it's likely that the court would have ruled the other way - for the rights of whistleblowers. Unfortunately, we're now stuck with this guy for life! The lesson here - especially for Democrats - is that future nominees to all of our courts need to be vetted not only on social issues, but also grilled equally hard on whose interest they'll serve on the economic, environmental, and civil liberties cases that come before them. This is Jim Hightower saying... To learn more about this particular case, call the National Whistleblower Center: 202-342-1902.
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How do you triangulate among death, hypocrisy and stupidity? Not at all logically, which is why Hillary Clinton's dissembling on Iraq has become a fatal embarrassment not only for her but for anyone who hopes she can provide progressive leadership for the nation. If she has still not found the courage to reverse course on this disastrous war, why assume that as president she would behave any differently?
It is unconscionable that those who can accurately measure the true cost of the Iraq folly in wasted lives and resources - more than 2,500 Americans, tens of thousands of Iraqis and hundreds of billions of dollars - dare prefer her to potential 2008 presidential election rivals John Kerry, Al Gore, Russ Feingold and John Edwards, who have all come to speak honestly of this quagmire and our need to extricate ourselves from it.
If your priority is to support an inspiring female candidate to break America's ultimate glass ceiling, why not draft Barbara Boxer? Not electable? Nonsense: The California senator thrashed her conservative GOP opponent in a reelection campaign that shunned the failed strategy of Democratic hacks and instead emphasized principle over opportunism. She proved her political integrity again this past week by voting alongside Kerry and Feingold to set a date for getting out of Iraq.
Not so Sen. Clinton, who seems determined to revive the Cold War liberalism that gave us the Vietnam War - which, according to Robert McNamara, the brilliant Democratic war architect who later conceded he himself didn't believe in that enterprise, took more than 3 million lives.
"I do not think it is a smart strategy, either, for the president to continue with his open-ended commitment, which I think does not put enough pressure on the new Iraqi government," said Clinton last week at the "Take Back America" conference. "Nor do I think it is smart strategy to set a date certain. I do not agree that that is in the best interests."
This is pure gibberish designed to sound reasonable. The Bush administration has pressured the Iraqi government plenty, from trying to place its handpicked intelligence "assets" in power right after seizing Baghdad through the unseemly act of a sitting U.S. president dropping into Iraq last week uninvited and unannounced - a mockery of the claim that we have transferred sovereignty to the Iraqi people.
For more than three years, the United States has micro-managed everything from turning the American taxpayer-financed occupation into a grab fest for U.S. corporate war profiteers to the failed training of the country's new security apparatus, now dominated by Shiite fanatics. Unfortunately for the great imperial Pax Americana scheme of building a pliable, secular government in Baghdad, a goal Clinton shares with the president, the Iraqi voters soundly rejected the candidates favored by the Pentagon and CIA. They chose instead the militant Shiites nurtured in the rogue nation of Iran, ever attendant to the twisted civics lessons of the ayatollahs on both sides of the border.
Predictably, the occupation by the U.S. military of a troubled Muslim nation cobbled together by European colonialists and ruled for decades by a tyrant has unleashed religious and nationalist impulses, increased the popular appeal of extremist and terror groups and destabilized the region. More clumsy "pressure" will only lead to more violent blowback, something Clinton should have known when she voted for this unjustified war in 2002.
Like Kerry, Clinton later pitifully explained that vote as a result of being "misled" by a president whom she shouldn't have trusted for a second. Kerry, however, seems to have finally rediscovered the concern he felt as a returning combat veteran, and is outraged that young Americans again are being sent to kill and be killed in a war that makes no sense, except for companies such as Halliburton and Bechtel.
Self-proclaimed "moderate" Democrats, who defend staying in Iraq, like to pretend they are the grown-ups in the argument. In reality, they are like children who have closed their ears to avoid hearing an uncomfortable truth: The longer we've stayed, the worse things have gotten, and that will continue to be the case.
It is not the Iraqi government that needs to be pressured by Americans, but rather our own. Clinton needs to stop prattling on about getting the Iraqi government to do this or that wonderful thing before we can pull out.
The country needs an honest debate about the lies that led to this war and the true costs of its continuance. Presumably those Democrats who cheered Hillary last week are eager to win back at least one branch of Congress in the midterm election in order to revitalize our Constitution's bedrock system of checks and balances and are looking to Clinton to help get them there.
But what check or balance is Sen. Clinton presenting on the most pressing issue of the day? None.
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How Hastert benefited from sale: Planned highway could sweeten asset near Plano ... Chicago Tribune
Excerpt:...a real estate transaction in Kendall County last December left House Speaker Dennis Hastert with a seven-figure profit and in prime position to reap further benefits as the exurban region west of Chicago continues its prairie-fire growth boosted by a Hastert-backed federally funded proposed highway...
Now this is the kind of political corruption we like here at Empire Burlesque! This is good old-fashioned, down-home graft just like Mother used to make when she ran Tammany Hall. There's none of your fancy-shmancy, money-laundering, torturous transactions through cut-outs, front groups, PACs, pals, former aides, off-shore islands and what have you, like you get with your Tom DeLays and your Jack Abramoffs and your Duke Cunninghams. No sir, with Big Denny Hastert, it's all up front, just like his prodigious belly: "We gonna build this highway I pushed throught right near this land I done bought and, son, we gonna make ourselves a great big pile." That's the American way!
Despite his exalted position in the Washington firmament, Hastert has always had the air of some local pol using prisoners from the county jail to blacktop his driveway or pulling strings with the planning commission to get an industrial park built on his father-in-law's land. No doubt there are more sophisticated and sinister shadings to this Capitol rotundity, else he could not have come so far - a mere two heartbeats from the presidency. In fact, if Sibel Edmonds - the fired FBI translator and whistleblower long muffled by the Bush Regime's sovietsky application of the "state secrets act" - is ever allowed to tell her story , good ole Denny might find himself reaping the healthy benefits of the Leavenworth Diet for a certain number of years.
But for the moment, let's not mar this hymn of patriotic praise with such dark musings. For Denny's greasy land deal takes us back to a more innocent time, an earlier, more rawboned America, where political corruption meant a few sticky-fingered hacks trying to make hay while the sun shines - not a vicious, relentless, all-pervasive program to overthrow Constitutional government and institute a militarist regime based on endless war, torture, concentration camps, "extrajudicial killing," state terrorism, state secrecy, and autocratic rule by a "unitary executive" beyond the reach of law.
God Almighty, wouldn't be great if the main thing we had to worry about was just some Congressional chancer making mischief with the highway program?
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The Armed Madhouse Travel Blog By Greg Palast Thomas Friedman's Underpants [New York] Von Eckardt, our chief investigator, joined me and Krugman in the green room. She's a big fan of Paul's and couldn't wait to hear two of her favorite economics writers talk privately about the great issues of the day. "I wring them out as absolutely tight as I can," said Krugman, "and by the morning they're just a little damp but you can still wear them." I had a different technique for stretching the supply of underwear on book tours: Wear them into the shower or, in a pinch, turn them inside out. "There's one guy that has a clean pair Fed-Ex'd to him every day and he puts the dirty ones in a return envelope." The "guy," of course, had to be Thomas Friedman. Von Eckardt was fuming. "THAT'S WHAT YOU GUYS TALK ABOUT? YOUR UNDERPANTS?!" Actually, I thought it was all quite informative. Arnold's Army [San Diego] I feel so much safer. Arnold's Army is on the way to the Mexican border. One thousand National Guardsmen of California, guys with names like Sanchez, Kowalski, Huang and Gutierrez, are being sent by a guy named Schwarzenegger to stop the invasion of immigrants. OK, I'm down with that -- ever since the first Pilgrims immigrated to these shores, just about every new American has wanted to shut the Golden Door behind them. But the bogus border patrol has nothing to do with stopping illegal immigration. After all, even as dim a flashlight as our president, who ordered the governor to send the Guard to battle stations, knows that a couple hundred more professional border patrolmen would do a better job than a thousand weekend warriors marching around the desert. And besides, if the Guard actually stopped the flow, there'd be riots in West Hollywood when restaurant patrons discover they'll have to bus their own dishes. According to George Bush, there's more to this boundary buildup than stopping trans-border commuters. The president tells us the war on immigrants is just part of the War on Terror. Our borders, he tells us, are open and the bad guys can just wade right in. But if we've learned anything at all from the Sept. 11 attack, it's that al Qaeda flies business class. Make Them Steal It [Chicago] Martin Luther King III mentioned to a group of civil rights leaders that I was in the room. King had my book. "I'm going to take Greg's book and place it on my father's grave. He will be pleased." It was, I admit, hard not to tear up at that moment. Then I thought, "Don't do that! You'll get the book dirty!" And I told Martin, "I have a better idea. Let's march down to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and throw the book through the window." Jesse Jackson said, "We march, we win. Every time." Maybe. But I know this. If we don't march, we lose. How many times am I asked, "Why vote if they're going to steal the election?" That's the point: Make them STEAL it. Make them know they can't win UNLESS they steal it. Shoplift This Book [Berkeley] Cody's is closing. Just about hippest bookstore in America. It's in Berkeley on Telegraph Avenue. In another time, I was the sandwich-sign man who stood in front of the store, surrounded by poets and pot-smokers. Today, the poets are gone. And so is Cody's. It was famous for its author talks: Salmon Rushdie, Gregory Corso (you're too young to know him), Mario Savio. Cody's just hosted its last author chat (mine). I was tear-gassed in front of Cody's. It was after Nixon invaded Cambodia. Lots and lots of crazy-ass memories. But Berkeley isn't "Berzerkley" anymore. The Berzerkers have gone into real estate, third wives, hair transplants. No place for Cody's. I shared the Good Old Times with the crowd. "I used to shoplift here," I said. Andy the owner frowned. "I wish you wouldn't say that." I dawdled, browsed the shelves. Picked up a copy of Bukowski's "Confessions of a Man Insane Enough to Live with Beasts." My driver panicked about the time. Late for in-studio radio. With a crowd of fans near the front door registers, she insisted I slip out the back. Back of the limo, shooting down Telegraph, I realized I had left without paying for the Bukowski. Damn. I should call Andy and tell him I owe Cody's. I owe Cody's a lot. "Mr. Palast" [San Francisco] Ginsberg told me, "I'm old - I cry every time I hear a friend's name." Last night was the 50th anniversary of the publication of Ginsberg's "Howl" by City Lights Bookstore. It was about 11pm, but City Lights was still open so I cabbed over to catch the big crowd celebrating the event. But the place was empty. I was the only customer in the rambling shop. I figured there was nothing else to do but pick up a copy of the small chapbook. I brought the "Howl" up to the skinny kid at the register. He waved away my money. "Oh, we can't possibly charge you for that, Mr. Palast." I walked out as quickly as possible, into the North Beach midnight, fighting tears, and feeling very old. Never for Money Why am I on this plane? What the hell am I doing? I'm down for 30 flights in 30 days. Atlanta, Dublin, Albany, London. LET ME OUT OF HERE. I turn up "Home," the David Byrne's song. He's singing about the brutal aloneness of the road tour. What the hell for? Byrne says, "Never for money. Always for love."
OK, David. Where next?
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Washington Post Smears War Critics, Again By Robert Parry One might think that a newspaper which helped fan a war frenzy that got more than 2,500 American soldiers and tens of thousands of Iraqis killed might show some remorse or at least some circumspection before attacking critics of that misadventure. But that is not the way of the Washington Post. One also might think that a newspaper would have some interest in holding dishonest politicians accountable, especially when the consequences of their deceptions have been as grievous as George W. Bush's Iraq War lies. But that also is not the way of the Post. More than three years into the Iraq War, the Post's editors remain steadfast defenders of Washington's neoconservatives who pushed the dangerous doctrine that military invasion was the way to "democratize" Muslim countries in the Middle East. In 2002-2003, the Post's editors cast Iraq War skeptics out of the polite opinion-page society - and are still at it. After last week's House debate on Iraq, here is how the lead Post editorial treated Bush's critics for favoring a prompt U.S. military withdrawal: "Many Democrats, looking to exploit bad news without appearing to rejoice in it, demagogued about presidential 'lies,' obtusely denied any relationship between Iraq and the war on terrorism and called for troop withdrawal without honestly facing the consequences of such a move." [Washington Post, June 17, 2006] If you parse the Post's comment, you would have to conclude that Democratic war critics are truly despicable and crazy people. They eagerly exploit the "bad news" deaths and maiming of American soldiers and tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis, while concealing a private joy over this mayhem for crass political reasons. These Democrats also slander President Bush via the suggestion that he lied about the reasons for the Iraq War. The verb "to demagogue" means to manipulate a population by appeals to emotions or prejudices, suggesting the use of illogical or false arguments. The Post apparently buys into the administration's defense that Bush may have made statements about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction that turned out not to be true, but that he believed the claims were true at the time and therefore didn't lie. And as for Bush's misleading juxtapositions linking Iraq and al-Qaeda in speech after speech before the war, the Post is apparently accepting Bush's explanation that he didn't explicitly equate Iraq and al-Qaeda - even if he did plant that impression in the minds of most Americans, including the troops sent to Iraq. Lies & Lies But, as we have written repeatedly at Consortiumnews.com, even if one bends over backward to give Bush the benefit of every doubt - as the Post would not do for almost any other politician - there are clear cases in which Bush lied while knowing the facts. For instance, in mid-July 2003, as the administration's WMD case against Iraq was collapsing, Bush began altering the early history of the war to make his actions appear more reasonable. On July 14, 2003, Bush claimed that Saddam Hussein had barred United Nations weapons inspectors from Iraq when, in fact, they were admitted in November 2002 and given free rein to search suspected Iraqi weapons sites. It was Bush who forced the U.N. inspectors to leave in March 2003 so the invasion could proceed. But faced with growing doubts about his justifications for war - former Ambassador Joseph Wilson had challenged Bush's nuclear weapons claims about Iraq less than a week earlier - Bush began rewriting the history of the U.N. weapons inspectors. Apparently trusting in the weak memories of the American people and the timidity of the U.S. press, Bush told reporters: "We gave him [Saddam Hussein] a chance to allow the inspectors in, and he wouldn't let them in. And, therefore, after a reasonable request, we decided to remove him from power." In the following months and years, Bush repeated this claim in slightly varied forms as part of his litany for defending the invasion on the grounds that it was Hussein who "chose war," not Bush. Meeting no protest from the Washington press corps, Bush continued repeating his lie about Hussein showing "defiance" on the inspections. Even three years into the war, Bush was still citing this bogus history as he did on March 21, 2006, in response to a question from veteran White House correspondent Helen Thomas. "I was hoping to solve this [Iraq] problem diplomatically," Bush said. "The world said, 'Disarm, disclose or face serious consequences.' ... We worked to make sure that Saddam Hussein heard the message of the world. And when he chose to deny the inspectors, when he chose not to disclose, then I had the difficult decision to make to remove him. And we did." The significance of the repeated lie about Hussein denying the inspectors is that Bush can't simply blame his advisers for giving him bad information. Bush was fully aware of the U.N. inspectors and what happened to them. 'Downing Street Memo' Indeed, documentary evidence shows that Bush was determined to invade Iraq in 2002 and early 2003 regardless of what U.S. intelligence said about Iraq's WMD or what the Iraqis did to cooperate with the U.N. inspectors. The infamous "Downing Street Memo" recounted a secret meeting on July 23, 2002, involving British Prime Minister Tony Blair and his top national security aides. At that meeting, Richard Dearlove, chief of the British intelligence agency MI6, described his discussions about Iraq with Bush's top advisers in Washington. Dearlove said, "Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy." Then, at an Oval Office meeting on Jan. 31, 2003, Bush and Blair discussed their determination to invade Iraq, though Bush still hoped that he might provoke the Iraqis into some violent act that would serve as political cover, according to minutes written by Blair's top foreign policy aide David Manning. So, while Bush still was telling the American people that he considered war with Iraq "a last resort," he actually had decided to invade regardless of what positive steps Iraq might take, according to the five-page memo. The memo also revealed Bush conniving to deceive the American people and the world community by trying to engineer a provocation that would portray Hussein as the aggressor. Bush suggested painting a U.S. plane up in U.N. colors and flying it over Iraq with the goal of drawing Iraqi fire, the meeting minutes said. "The U.S. was thinking of flying U-2 reconnaissance aircraft with fighter cover over Iraq, painted in U.N. colours," the memo said about Bush's scheme. "If Saddam fired on them, he would be in breach." [See Consortiumnews.com's "Time to Talk War Crimes."] Regardless of whether any casus belli could be provoked, Bush already had "penciled in" March 10, 2003, as the start of the U.S. bombing of Iraq, according to the memo. "Our diplomatic strategy had to be arranged around the military planning," Manning wrote. According to the British memo, Bush and Blair acknowledged that no weapons of mass destruction had been found in Iraq, nor were they likely to be found in the coming weeks, but that wouldn't get in the way of the U.S.-led invasion. [NYT, March 27, 2006] Ousting the Inspectors So, Bush clearly knew that Hussein had permitted the inspectors into Iraq to search suspected weapons sites. Bush also knew that he was the one who forced the inspectors to leave so the invasion could proceed in March 2003. [For more on Bush's pretexts for war in Iraq, see Consortiumnews.com's "President Bush, With the Candlestick..."] Despite this body of evidence, the Post's editors still accuse Democrats in Congress who dare cite this history of engaging in demagoguery. According to the Post, these Democrats also "obtusely denied any relationship between Iraq and the war on terrorism." Yet, in leveling that charge, the Post ignores the fact that U.S. intelligence has long acknowledged that it had no credible evidence of operational ties between Iraq and al-Qaeda before the war - which is the point that Democrats have been making. Indeed, Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and his secular regime had ruthlessly repressed Islamic extremists. In the Muslim world, Hussein was viewed as a bitter enemy of Osama bin-Laden, not an ally. The Post's editors also must know that the Bush administration has misled the American people on this point by "cherry-picking" intelligence, such as arguing that Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi had spent time in Baghdad before the invasion. This argument resurfaced during a public confrontation between Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and former CIA analyst Ray McGovern in Atlanta on May 4, 2006. Trying to justify the Iraq invasion, Rumsfeld said, "Zarqawi was in Baghdad during the prewar period. That is a fact." McGovern countered, "Zarqawi? He was in the north of Iraq in a place where Saddam Hussein had no rule. That's also ..." "He was also in Baghdad," Rumsfeld interjected. "Yes," McGovern said, "when he needed to go to the hospital. Come on, these people aren't idiots. They know the story." In this confrontation, Rumsfeld had reverted back to pre-war talking points that the administration had used to create the false impression of a link between Hussein's government and al-Qaeda. However, no serious intelligence professional believed that Zarqawi seeking medical treatment in Baghdad - with no indication that Hussein's government even knew about the trip - proved an al-Qaeda tie-in to pre-war Iraq. Yet, instead of upbraiding Bush for this and other deceptions, the Post's editors lashed Democrats for doing what newspapers normally are expected to do: call public servants to account for misleading the public. Long Record But none of this behavior by the Post should come as any surprise. The Post's editors now have a long record of following the neocon line on Iraq and the Middle East, no matter how misguided or dishonest those positions. One Post editorial even repeated some of the Right's personal smears against Joe Wilson who dared criticize Bush for "twisting" the WMD intelligence on Iraq. [See Consortiumnews.com's "Shame of the Post's Editorial Page."] While refusing to tolerate challenges to Bush's past words and deeds, the Post's editors now insist that the United States continue to stand behind Bush as he presses ahead with an indefinite U.S. military occupation of Iraq. In the editorial, the Post denigrated congressmen who favored a U.S. withdrawal as seeking cheap political gain "predictable in an election year." The editorial then praised members of Congress who back Bush on keeping U.S. troops in Iraq indefinitely as "willing to acknowledge such [hard] truths in the face of electoral risks." In other words, anyone who favors withdrawal is a political hack, but anyone who goes along with Bush - and the Post's editors - is a profile in courage. Yet, war critics, such as Democratic Rep. John Murtha of Pennsylvania and Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, have never suggested that the options left by Bush's disastrous polices are desirable; the selection must be made among the least awful. But the Post's editors are back to the same tricks they used before the Iraq invasion, demeaning anyone who offers alternatives to Bush's approach and dismissing those people as foolish, opportunistic and dishonest. [See Consortiumnews.com's "Politics of Preemption"] So, instead of creating a diverse environment for the difficult debate that is now needed, the Post's editors instead continue funneling the decision-making into a narrow corridor leading to whatever the neocons want. As the U.S. death toll climbs past 2,500, there may come a point when the American people demand more from their news media than this manufactured consent. After all, it's likely that the Post's editors don't know many of the mostly working-class kids sent off to Iraq to kill and be killed. Editorial page editor Fred Hiatt and publisher Donald Graham certainly move in higher-brow circles where airy neoconservative theories remain in vogue.
But these young soldiers are the children of American mothers and fathers; they are the brothers and sisters of other Americans; they deserve better than to be cannon fodder for the egos of a misguided Washington elite.
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| A Shameful Silence On Coulter's Spewing With the predictable regularity of a locust plague, Ann Coulter and her enablers at the once-reputable firm of Random House have issued yet another volume of fascistic entertainment. Now the hard-drinking, trash-talking, fortysomething bachelorette bills herself as a Christian moralist, in holy battle against the liberal heathens. That whiff of brimstone in the air may only be the match she is striking for her next cigarette. But her version of "Christianity" turns out to be a strangely modern and convenient faith, which encourages heaping scorn on bereaved widows, bearing false witness against them on television and publicly gloating over the ill-gotten profits thus attained. Leaving behind the golden rule of the Gospels to "do unto others as you would have them do to you," she embodies a new rule of gold: You can never be too rich, too thin or too vicious. Too vicious, however, is the only way to categorize Ms. Coulter's attempted assassination of the 9/11 widows known as the Jersey Girls, whom she accuses of "enjoying" the horrific deaths of their husbands in the World Trade Center inferno. She harangues them as "broads," "witches" and "millionaires," guilty of being "self-obsessed" and "reveling in their status as celebrities" while they are "lionized on TV and in articles about them." Coming from an energetic publicity seeker like Ms. Coulter, who still whines bitterly about her elongated cover shot in Time magazine, those insults are an exercise in self-parody. She goes on to complain that the widows, by telling their personal stories of loss, were able to shut down their critics with sentimentality. But that charge too is obviously false, since she is now reaping profits and publicity by savaging them. She is also a hypocrite, having freely brandished the name of her late friend Barbara Olson, tragically killed on 9/11, to lend impact to her own arguments. The truth about the Jersey Girls-Kristen Breitweiser, Patty Casazza, Mindy Kleinberg and Lorie van Auken-is that they loved their husbands deeply, of course. They and their children continue to suffer from the loss that Ms. Coulter so heartlessly mocks. The truth is that in their suffering, these courageous women joined with other widows and family members to demand a serious investigation of 9/11. Together, they organized, researched and lobbied for thousands of hours to win the appointment of an independent commission, against the determined political opposition of the White House. The truth is that their success was an important victory for every American, without regard to party or ideology, and a vindication of grassroots democracy. The nation owes them all a debt of gratitude. What is most disturbing about this episode is not that these women can be victimized by a brutal bully like Ms. Coulter, nor even that the mainstream media, which abandoned traditional standards of fairness and decency years ago, would eagerly assist her. That is our hideous political culture. What is most disappointing is the abject dereliction of the prominent politicians who worked so closely with the Jersey Girls. John McCain and Joseph Lieberman, the Senate sponsors of the bill that created the 9/11 Commission, both believed that an independent investigation was essential for reasons of honor and national security. They both know that they could not have prevailed against the White House-and the Republican Congressional leadership-without the help of the widows. In the fall of 2002, when their bill passed the Senate and the House, Mr. McCain acknowledged the efforts of the widows and their comrades. "I also want to put in a special word for the families," he said after thanking his fellow statesmen. "Without their unstinting support and efforts, we would not be where we are today." In the summer of 2004, when the commission's reform recommendations were debated, Mr. Lieberman praised all of the 9/11 families, including a special acknowledgment for the Jersey Girls. "I continue to be awed and inspired by your ability to turn your personal tragedies into better public safety for this nation," said the Connecticut Senator. And in the fall of 2005, when Mr. McCain needed citizen support for his worthy amendment to ban torture in the war against terrorism, the Jersey Girls rallied to his cause. He was glad enough of their support then. But that was then, and this is now-and these two pious politicians remain silent in the face of a malevolent attack visited on their erstwhile friends. Both men know that it is a lie to call these women partisans or profiteers. Both know that these women-and the families they helped to lead-brought honor and purpose to a legislative process that is often petty and corrupt.
Shame on the silent Senators. And please, let's hear no more from either of them for a while about tolerance, respect and decency.
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A Big Problem For Hillary Clinton: "Premature Triangulation" By Norman Solomon Two years from now, Hillary Clinton might be pleased to hear the kind of boos and antiwar chants that greeted her in mid-June when she spoke at the annual Take Back America conference of Democratic activists and argued against a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq. But so much of politics is about timing. And right now, Clinton is facing a serious problem of premature triangulation. As long as she needs support from Democratic primary voters, Hillary Clinton will want to defer the media rewards of an all-out "Sister Souljah moment." Let's recall that in 1992, when Bill Clinton went out of his way to denounce the then-little-known rap singer Sister Souljah at a Rainbow Coalition conference, he'd already clinched the Democratic presidential nomination and was looking toward the general election. Bill Clinton's triangulation gambit, using Sister Souljah as a prop for his calculated move to ingratiate himself with establishment pundits, had been foreshadowed by a Washington Post article that reported the day before: "Some top advisers to Clinton argue that ... he must become involved in highly publicized confrontations with one or more Democratic constituencies." The constituency that Clinton chose to polarize with was African-American activists. These days, and from here to the horizon, there's no larger or more adamant Democratic constituency than the antiwar voters who want the U.S. military out of Iraq pronto. At this point, Hillary Clinton's pro-war position is far afield from the views of most grassroots Democrats. Clinton's foreseeable game plan is to eventually confront antiwar activists head-on as she portrays herself as a strong-on-defense Newer-Than-New Democrat. Two years from now, if she has the nomination cinched, she'll be eager to ratchet up her strategy of playing to the gallery of corporate-media journalists by presenting herself as a centrist alternative to both the Republican Party's right wing and the Democratic Party's "special interests" (a.k.a., the party's base). But first Hillary Clinton would need to win enough delegates to become the party's presidential nominee. To that end, she'll try to finesse and blur the war issue in hopes that her hawkish position won't rub too many Democratic primary voters the wrong way. It's not going to be easy. What happened at the Take Back America conference was mild compared to what Hillary Clinton has coming in primary and caucus battleground states once the presidential campaign begins in earnest. And she may encounter unexpected difficulties as her pro-war reputation grows.
If Hillary Clinton thinks she can postpone an all-out confrontation
with the antiwar movement until a time and place of her tactical choosing,
she's going to be very disappointed. And at the end of her 2008 quest,
Clinton may discover that she has triangulated herself right out of the
nomination.
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Seeking A Better Debate By William Rivers Pitt The Republican majority in Congress labored mightily last week to derail and distract any discussion of an exit strategy from Iraq. In the House of Representatives, a debate aimed at whether or not to establish a timetable for withdrawal collapsed under a rhetorical onslaught from the Right. In order to adequately describe the experience of watching the so-called House "debate" on June 15th, it is necessary to crib a line from Harper Lee: enduring that utterly empty proceeding left one with the sensation of sinking slowly to the bottom of the ocean. On the same day, the Senate saw Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) abscond with a measure soon to be proposed by John Kerry (D-Mass.) which would have virtually all American troops removed from Iraq by year's end. McConnell's theft ensured that the measure died a swift death. The debates in both chambers were redirected by strategy memos, prepared specifically for Republicans by Republicans, that outlined stay-the-course talking points. In the House, Majority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) distributed a memo that required GOP members to bring 9/11 into the discussion as often as possible while attacking Democrats as weak and vacillating. The debate was redirected in this fashion with dreary regularity. In the end, a measure to establish a timetable for withdrawal was defeated by a vote of 256-153. In the Senate, a similar strategy memo was distributed by the Pentagon in preparation for debate over the McConnell measure. The initiation of the Senate debate was unexpected, a tactical move similar to the one brought against John Murtha (D-Pa.) when he proposed a withdrawal plan this past winter. McConnell's measure was a deliberately paler shadow of the plan soon to be proposed by Kerry, which guaranteed its ultimate defeat by a vote of 93-6. The presentation of Iraq talking points delivered by the Pentagon brought a scathing denunciation from Senator Kerry. "This is disgusting proof that Republicans are thinking about the politics of Iraq instead of a real debate about the security of our troops," said Kerry in a statement released on Friday. "This is how we got into the Iraq mess in the first place. American soldiers are being killed every day in Iraq but somehow Donald Rumsfeld's crew at the Pentagon has time to write ridiculous talking points that won't do a thing for young Americans caught in the crossfire. Add this to Karl Rove's partisan cheerleading and it's pretty clear where their priorities are. Pathetic. Rumsfeld needs to get focused on our troops, not pages of hollow words and talking points." The empty debate in the House brought down a similar denunciation from Congressman Murtha. Murtha was inspired to respond after presidential adviser Karl Rove delivered a weekend speech in New Hampshire, during which he painted Democrats as cowards. "They may be with you at the first shots," said Rove, "but they are not going to be there for the last tough battles." Murtha, a decorated Marine veteran, would have none of it. "He's making a political speech," Murtha said of Rove's comments during Sunday's edition of "Meet the Press." "He's sitting in his air-conditioned office with his big, fat backside, saying, 'Stay the course.' That's not a plan. We've got to change direction, that's what we have to do. You can't, you can't sit there in the air-conditioned office and tell these troops they're carrying 70 pounds on their back inside these armored vessels and hit with IEDs every day, seeing their friends blown up, their buddies blown up, and he says, 'Stay the course.' Yeah, it's easy to say that from Washington, DC." An overwhelming majority of Americans believe that the invasion of Iraq was a colossal mistake, and further believe that a withdrawal of our forces is absolutely necessary. Anyone observing what took place in Congress last week cannot deny that the Republican majority has no intention of seeing those desires brought to fruition. The so-called "debate" was little more than an endorsement for more of the same in Iraq. So long as these people are in the majority, the dying and the waste and the immeasurable danger to our national security generated by this occupation will continue with no end in sight. Congressional Republicans felt confident in their ability to deflect any serious talk of an exit strategy last week because of division within Democratic ranks on the issue. Last week, this Republican confidence was rewarded. The division has paralyzed the Democrats on Iraq to date, and is reflected in the recent release of the Democratic platform for the upcoming midterm elections. Titled "A New Direction for America," the platform outlines plans to increase the minimum wage, fund stem-cell research, cut student-loan interest rates by half, defend a woman's right to choose, along with a variety of other line-items that will be brought to the fore should the Democrats re-take the House. "This," said minority leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) upon the release of the platform, "is a unified Democratic message." Indeed. Every item listed on this platform conforms to the basic, fundamental ideals championed by the Democrats. The word "Iraq," however, appears nowhere in the document. The closest they got to addressing the principal issue of our day was one sentence: "Focus national security strategy to nation's borders, increase port security." That was it. This week, however, is another matter entirely. Senators Jack Reed (D-RI) and Carl Levin (D-Mich.) have extended the debate with legislation calling for a phased withdrawal of troops from Iraq and a shifting of forces to other nations, with a small contingent remaining in Iraq to train Iraqi troops. The resolution requires Bush to establish a redeployment plan for troops remaining in Iraq after 2006. Senator Kerry is also pressing ahead with his resolution to have virtually all American troops withdrawn from Iraq by December 31st.
The Republican-controlled Congressional debate last week was a farce, a cruel insult delivered on the very day the number of American troops killed in Iraq reached 2,500 souls. The continuing debate this week offers far more substance, thanks entirely to those Democrats who have established a strong legislative agenda on the issue. The Democratic Party is working out how and when a withdrawal from Iraq should take place, but they are united behind the fundamental premise that an exit strategy is absolutely required. The Democratic measures being offered in Congress serve to push this all-important debate in the proper direction.
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 Don looks for a reaction to his latest lie. Heil Bush, Dear Propaganda Verleger Graham, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your constant shilling and lying for the Junta, your endless attacks on war critics and you help in covering up our many war crimes, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Media Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Fuhrer Bunker" formally 'The White House' on 07-01-2006. We salute you herr Graham, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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Austin, Texas - Gee, the Republicans seem to have lost their moral compass since Tom DeLay quit. Who knew it could get worse without that pillar of rectitude from Texas? What a snakes' nest of corruption and nastiness.
The latest involves Speaker Denny Hastert and a land deal.
Hastert had sold to a developer a 69-acre portion of a 195-acre farm that had been purchased in his wife's name. The developer also purchased an adjacent plot of roughly equal size owned in trust by Hastert and two of his "longtime supporters." The area of west of Chicago is growing madly, and Hastert - through an earmark appropriation process - dedicated $207 million in taxpayer dollars as the first appropriation on the Prairie Parkway, which will run 5.5 miles from the Hastert land. Went through in the fall of 2005. Three months later, Hastert and his partners sold the land for a $3 million total profit, $1.8 million to Hastert.
In a staggering display of brass-faced gall, Hastert is now claiming a freeway running 5.5 miles from his land is not close enough to affect the price of the farm. Then what did the developer pay the extra $3 million for? Hastert is said to be furious with the Sunlight Foundation, which broke the story, and the Chicago newspapers, which pounced on it gleefully. This is what I don't get about Republicans. Apparently they think they are genuinely entitled to get these special deals.
Also making news is California Rep. Jerry Lewis, who is in deep with a lobbying firm that is El Stinko. This wouldn't matter so much if Lewis were just another congressman, but he is chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, the one that hands out the money. Lewis' family and friends have profited nicely from contractors and lobbyists who court his favor. Such cozy arrangements.
Just for example, one Lewis aide, who had gone to work for the lobbying firm and then returned to the congressman's staff, was paid $2 million by the firm in 2004 while on the public payroll.
With a fine sense of ethical behavior, members of the House have voted to continue earmarking, including $500,000 for a swimming pool in Lewis' district (bringing the total federal money allotted for this pool to $1 million).
Meanwhile, back on the Jack Abramoff-and-related fronts (lest we forget good old Dusty Foggo, ex-No. 3 at the CIA), a letter had been found, despite initial denials by the Department of Homeland Security, from the now-convicted ex-Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham recommending that the government use the limo firm that allegedly ferried whores to the poker parties given by defense contractors who were paying off Cunningham.
Don't Democrats have scandals, too? Yes, Rep. William Jefferson of Louisiana is in deep doo-doo. Among other things, the Fibbies found $90,000 in cash in his freezer. So the Democratic caucus kicked him off his important seat on the Ways and Means Committee. Republicans just keep on trucking.
Meanwhile, the entire Department of Homeland Security is beginning to look like a Republican playground. According to The New York Times, over 90 former officials at DHS or the White House Office of Homeland Security are now "executives, consultants or lobbyists for companies that collectively do billions of dollars' worth of domestic security business." Now isn't that a dainty dish to set before the king?
Can Republicans run anything right? Where is the CEO administration that was supposed to straighten out government? It may be that Bush deserves credit for having initially opposed a DHS, knowing that Republicans would make a giant new federal agency. But he later changed his mind and supported the thing. The rest us thought we were getting an agency that would provide homeland security, but what an endless saga of misspent money, stupid decisions, waste, fraud, abuse and political logrolling-and still no port protection.
It seems to me there is a direct connection between the Republicans' inability to run anything governmental ("Heckuva job, Brownie") and the fact that they don't believe in government. The simplest purposes of government have long been defined for us - to form a more perfect union, establish justice, ensure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity. It is, or should be, a benign enterprise, making life better for citizens.
I carry no special brief for government-many years of studying the Texas Legislature will disenchant anyone. But if you are put in charge of government, the least you can do is run it well. Bill Clinton took government seriously - he was interested in how to make it work better, interested in government policy. Clinton declared the era of Big Government over and indeed pruned the federal structure and finished with a surplus. Bush is giving us fat, bloated, inefficient, corrupt government, all of it running on a huge deficit - not counting the expense and growing body count in Iraq.
As the man said - "2,500 is just a number."
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On Tuesday, June 13th, while Mr. Bush spent a brave five hours in the "green zone" of Baghdad with puppet Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, at least 36 people were killed across Iraq amidst a wave of bombings. 18 of those died in a spasm of bombings in the oil city of Kirkuk in the Kurdish north.
The minute word hit the streets in Baghdad of Bush's visit, over 2,000 supporters of Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr took to the streets in protest. The protestors chanted "Iraq is for the Iraqis," and Sadr aide Hazem al-Araji publicly condemned the peek-a-boo visit of who he referred to as "the leader of the occupation."
Day One
The very next day, not coincidentally, Maliki instituted the biggest security crackdown in the capital city since the US invaded Iraq, dubbed "Operation Forward Together." An estimated 75,000 US and Iraqi soldiers clogged the already seriously congested streets of Baghdad, using tanks and armored vehicles to man checkpoints, impose a more strict curfew in liberated Baghdad (9 p.m. - 6 a.m. as opposed to the more generous 11 p.m. - 6 a.m.) and attempt to impose a weapons ban.
Just after "The Operation" began, a car bomb detonated, killing one person while wounding five others. Major General Mahdi al-Gharrawi who commands "public order forces" under the deadly umbrella of the controversial Interior Ministry, made a statement for which George Orwell would have been proud: "Baghdad is divided according to geographical area, and we know the al-Qaeda leaders in each area," he told reporters. "We are expecting clashes will erupt in the predominantly Sunni areas." So Sunnis in Iraq, according to Gharrawi, are tied to al-Qaeda.
Lest we forget, the Iraqi "army" ran a similar draconian security crackdown in Baghdad in May 2005 called "Operation Lightning." That one, too, was tens of thousands of Iraqi "police" and "soldiers" backed by American troops and air support. That operation, rather than quell violence in the capital, effectively alienated the Sunni populations in the city due to rampant death squad activities, mass detentions and heavy-handed tactics. Civilians across Baghdad complained about the mass detentions, random violence and torture meted out by the death squads during that "operation." And we see how well that operation managed to improve security in Baghdad over the last year.
So here we go again - only this time with even more troops, raiding even more homes, manning more checkpoints, and of course more death squads operating - with backup support from American soldiers, and of course their air strikes.
Iraq's puppet prime minister, in an effort to sooth the fear in the hearts of Baghdad's residents who are concerned about more detentions, random violence and "torture by electric drill" which the US-backed Shia death squads prefer with their victims, told reporters of the operation, "The raids during this plan will be very tough ... because there will be no mercy towards those who show no mercy to our people."
The same day "Operation Forward Together" began and the day after Bush bid farewell to Baghdad, he dismissed calls for a US withdrawal as "election-year" politics. Refusing to give a timetable for withdrawal or some kind of benchmark with which to measure success that may allow troops to be brought home, Bush said simply, "It's bad policy," at a news conference in the Rose Garden. He thought it would "endanger our country" to pull out of Iraq before we "accomplish the mission." Of his visit to Baghdad, Bush said, "I sense something different happening in Iraq."
While pounding his fist on the podium set up for him at the press conference, Bush proudly repeated his mantra of propaganda: "If the United States of America leaves before this Iraqi government can defend itself and sustain itself and govern itself, it will be a major blow in the war on terror."
That morning the Pentagon announced the death of the 2,500th US soldier in Iraq.
Meanwhile, back in liberated Baghdad, also on that same day, I received an email from a very close friend of mine. It is a sobering glimpse into "Operation Forward Together" and what Bush alluded to when he said, "I sense something different happening in Iraq."
Habibi, we are divided in three houses today. I am at our home in Adhamiya. My wife and two youngest boys are at her sister's house in Bab Al-Moudam because it's safer for them. It's a mixed Sunni and Shia area, so there are no detentions. Our daughter is with her husband in their home, and my oldest son is at his house with his wife and baby, although he is not in a safe area. There is often fighting there, but not too many detentions.
Today Adhamiya is totally under occupation since early morning. None of the shops are open, the soldiers are holding up all cars and searching them, and home raids are happening. The city is a city of ghosts. This situation is the same in all the Sunni areas. Checkpoints are all over Baghdad, the highways between Baghdad and the other cities are all closed and nobody can go on them. The airports are closed, and no flights are coming in or out of Baghdad.
We cannot leave the country until the beginning of next month. By the way, three of my son's friends were killed by explosions two days ago while they were having fruits in the market. He came home crying because of that. The situation is very bad. The son of Abdul Sattar Al Kubaisy, who is in the Ministry of Interior, has been kidnapped from inside the Ministry. He was found in one of the trash cans outside the Ministry of Interior building ... so even the offices of the government are no longer safe!!!
God is with us insh'allah [God willing].
Day Two
On Friday, the second day of "Operation Forward Together," a hospital source in Fallujah reported that 8 Iraqis, some of whom were women and children from the same family, were killed and six wounded when US warplanes bombed a home in the northeastern Ibrahim Bin Ali district of the city.
That same day, a story titled "Shiite Militias Control Prisons, Officials Say," was released by the Washington Post Foreign Service.
The story reads, "Iraq's prison system is overrun with Shiite Muslim militiamen who have freed fellow militia members convicted of major crimes and executed Sunni Arab inmates, the country's deputy justice minister said in an interview." We cannot control the prisons. It's as simple as that, said the deputy minister, Pusho Ibrahim Ali Daza Yei, an ethnic Kurd. "Our jails are infiltrated by the militias from top to bottom, from Basra to Baghdad."
The story continued, "In an interview this week, Deputy Prime Minister Salam al-Zobaie, the top Sunni Arab in Iraq's new government, showed photographs taken from one recent inspection of an Interior Ministry detention center. An inmate in one of the photos held out his misshapen, limp hands for the camera. The man's hands had been broken in a beating, Zobaie said. Other inmates showed massive, dark bruises on their skin; one bore a large, open infected sore. Inmates in another photo clustered around chains hung from the middle of one of the crowded cells. The chains were used to hoist prisoners by their bound hands, Zobaie said. The practice, noted frequently in inspection reports of Interior Ministry detention centers, often results in the dislocation of prisoners' shoulders.
Ninety percent of the men crowded into Interior Ministry detention centers are Sunni Arabs, Zobaie said.
Day Three
On Saturday, according to the same Washington Post story, "A group of parliament members paid a surprise visit to a detention facility run by the Interior Ministry in Baqubah, north of Baghdad. "We have found terrible violations of the law," said Muhammed al-Dayni, a Sunni parliament member, who said as many as 120 detainees were packed into a 35-by-20-foot cell. "They told us that they've been raped," Dayni said. "Their families were called in and tortured to force the detainees to testify against other people."
"The detention facilities of the ministries of Defense and Interior are places for the most brutal human rights abuse," he added.
Despite broad US efforts to encourage the Iraqi government to improve conditions in prisons, the problem of militia control could prove particularly intractable. Shiite militias such as the Badr Organization and the Mahdi Army, loyal to cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, are backed by dozens of members of parliament whose political parties run the armed groups.
"You can't even talk to the militias, because they are the government," Yei said. "They have ministers on their side."
The evening of Day Three, two US soldiers were detained by resistance fighters just south of Baghdad. With a Bush administration that openly advocates the use of torture and props up a Shia Prime Minister in Iraq who says things like "there will be no mercy" when referencing his new "security operation," their fate is indeed a dark one.
Day Four
On Saturday, the third day of "Operation Forward Together," at least 40 people were killed, and over 80 wounded amidst a rash of bomb and mortar attacks, most of which took place in Baghdad. The deadliest attack occurred at an Iraqi police checkpoint, while another car bomb targeting the Iraqi army and police killed another 11 people. Meanwhile, 15 others were wounded at a joint Iraqi army and police checkpoint, also in Baghdad.
Day Five
Gunmen kidnap 10 bakery workers from a predominantly Shia neighborhood in Baghdad. 10 bullet-riddled bodies of men who had apparently been tortured were also found in Baghdad. A mortar round hit al-Sadiq University on Palestine Street in the capital city - five students and one teacher are wounded. The US military continues to search in vain for its two missing soldiers. Residents continue to stream out of the capital city of al-Anbar province, Ramadi, due to the threat of an all-out US assault on the city. Thousands of the refugees are wandering around the province with nowhere to go.
Coming Days, Weeks, Months, Years?
With Operation Forward Together off to a dazzling beginning, how long will the occupation be allowed to continue? Each passing day only brings the people of Iraq and soldiers serving in the US military deeper into the quagmire that the brutal, despicable, tortured occupation has become.
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As sung by Dubya and the Lame Ducks
Can't stand how my polls went d-down (I'll allow no immigration)
Say no to immigration.
My capital's d-drained away (I'll allow no immigration)
Say no to immigration.
My capital's d-drained away (I'll allow no immigration)
Say no to immigration.
Can't stand how my polls went d-down (I'll allow no immigration)
Say no to immigration.
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Parting Shots...
Remarks by the President (Rustle of military personnel patiently waiting in Green Zone hanger; a large cake is wheeled out next to podium. A hush descends.) DISHEVELED AMERICAN DIPLOMAT OF NO IMPORTANCE: Ahem. Um. Hello, soldiers! Are you ready? (Puzzled whispers.) DISHEVELED AMERICAN DIPLOMAT OF NO IMPORTANCE: Who wants to rock?! ("Radar Love" by Golden Earring begins to blare.) DISHEVELED AMERICAN DIPLOMAT OF NO IMPORTANCE: Ladies and Germs... FRESH OFF A WHIRLWIND SUPER-SECRET TRIP FROM CAMP DAVID... HEEEERE'S POOOOOOOTUS! (Flashpots and fireworks explode; The President of the United States bursts out of cake, waving small American flags.) THE PRESIDENT: Attention troops and troopettes: your Commander in Chief is inna house! WOOOP! WOOOP! WOOP! (Applause.) Boy, it's really great to be back in the Green Zone - and not just because the rest of Baghdad is such a terrifying clusterfuck, either. Hard to believe it's been almost a thousand days - and just as many flag-draped coffins - since I last slithered into this joint on my belly. Sorry I don't have any plastic turkey to hand out this time. (Laughter.) No matter though; this is still gonna be the best five hour vacation in Iraq ever! Anyway, I wanted to tell you kids how these are real historic times. Yes, this here quagmire you're helping pull off here in Vietraq is super-important for FREEDOM(r) and Liberty(tm) on account of 9/11(r) and terror and yadda blah blah blabbity blah. Oh shit, we all know this line of BS backwards and forwards, right? So how about you grunts just smile and nod and applaud so Fox News can cut together a good thirty second clip to play non-stop for the next week? (Applause.) Listen, the reason I'm here is because you fellas finally lucked out and had someone rat out that Bin Zarqawi dude so we could give him a thousand pound JDAM enema. And let me tell you, I am MEGA-PSYCHED! Chief Of Staff Not-Andrew Card told me I'm gonna get a bounce in the polls! All on account of happy little accidents! I'm sure gonna enjoy these next few days, or until Americans return their wearied gaze back to how many of you are dead and how my Administration has royally fucked up every last policy issue imaginable. Until then though, lemme tell you: prayer works! (Hoots, Applause.) Anyway, with that Abu Zar Hussein dead, I figure that means I've got 48 hours - 72 hours tops - before that nasty Iraq terrorism hydra I created spawns a new head and sends this shithole of a country right back into utter chaos. (Winks.) So start soaking up my awesomeness and filling your morale tanks boys, because I'll be bravely splitting just as soon as the sun goes down and it's safe for my luxury 747 to take off with all the lights turned off. (Applause.) Sure, some folks say I'm just coasting along at this point, on account of I'm a lame duck who doesn't have to get re-elected or anything. And well, for the most part, that's totally true. And yet, back at Yale I did major in that historical stuff, so even though I did sleep through most of my lectures, there is a teensy-weensy part of me that cares about how people will talk and think about how I did as President in the years to come. Specifically, the arrogant trustifarian megalomaniac part. (Thumbs up.) Which reminds me: I also did some actual presidenting stuff today when I swung by the new Iraqazoid Prime Minister's office. His name is Nouri al-Malla-Walla-Wikki-Wammi or something, and he was real nice - for a squirrelly little puppet fella. Too bad that sucker will probably be killeded by evildoers within a year. Maybe if he was more of a swinging-dick John Wayne tough guy like me, he could- (Sound of distant explosion.) WHAT WAS THAT??? ARE WE UNDER ATTACK? OH SWEET CHRIST, I DON'T WANNA DIIIIIIIE! SOMEBODY GET ME BACK TO CRAWFORD! PRONTO! (Frantic sobbing, tears, copious soiling of tighty whities.)
[END TRANSCRIPT] |
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In This Edition
Noam Chomsky sees a, "Solution In Sight."
Uri Avnery exclaims, "Mon Dieu, Mondial!"
John Kaminski sips, "The Wine In The Chalice."
Jim Hightower follows, "Suicidal Diplomacy."
Robert Scheer reports on, "A Disgraceful Attack On The New York Times."
Chris Floyd explains, "Beach Blanket Gonzo."
Greg Palast wonders, "Was The Invasion Of Iraq A Jewish Conspiracy?"
Robert Parry explores, "One Percent Madness."
Joe Conason finds, "A Burning Issue On Capitol Hill."
Norman Solomon compares, "Their Barbarism, And Ours."
Scott Ritter reveals the, "Three Iraq Myths That Won't Quit."
Rear Adm. Harry B. Harris Jr. wins the coveted 'Vidkun Quisling Award!'
Molly Ivins details, "An Epic Week Of Cutting And Running."
Sheila Samples with some, "Musings From Tom Joad Country."
And finally in the 'Parting Shots' department 'The Landover Baptist Church' knows what to do "If Your Child Is Born On 06-06-06" but first Uncle Ernie remembers those "Revolutionary War Daze."
This week we spotlight the cartoons of Mike Keefe with additional cartoons from Ward Sutton, Micah Wright, Ted Rall, Mike Wrathell, Lisa Casey, Dubya's World.Com, Dave Chappatte, Clay Bennett, The Whitehouse.Org, Internet Weekly.Org, Linkswende.Org and Pink & Blue Films LLC.
Plus we have all of your favorite Departments...
The Quotable Quote...
Welcome one and all to "Uncle Ernie's Issues & Alibis."
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Revolutionary War Daze By Ernest Stewart
we shall all hang separately. Ben jamin' Franklin --- July 4, 1776
My Answer Is Bring'em On
They came together in Philadelphia to take Britain's North American empire away from the British and make that empire their own, with a future eye of expanding it in all directions. There they appointed George Washington, the infamous French & Indian War criminal to lead the armies of the poor. The people weren't (as you can well understand) in all that much of a hurry to leave their farms and families and go off and shoot their uncles and cousins in a war that like any other war was waged to make the rich, richer and the poor dead! Ergo they wrote some pretty words about liberty, justice for all, etc. etc. etc. and as in every other instance scammed the people into making them all richer. Did I mention the reason why they gave an inept, war criminal like Washington command of the armies? There were far better officers than Washington around, so why chose George? Perhaps it was because of his winning smile? Or his large collection of black people? Mayhaps it was Martha's ample bosoms? All true, but mostly it was because he was the richest man in the country, imagine that! He stole his way to riches. The father of his country is one of the greatest thieves of all time! I'll grant you that the truth isn't all that romantic, it seldom is. For example that tea tossed over board in Boston harbor by a group of nuvo riche disguised as Indians belonged to their rivals in commerce the East India Company and it's submersion in the harbor had nothing to do with taxes, except as a scam. The fact was that the 'Industrial Revolution' had by this time started and the colonies were looked at much the same way American Sheeple are looked at today by our corpo-rat masters i.e. as consumers. Like lambs to the slaughter except that these sheep had to buy their own food, shelter, etc. Therefore they were much more profitable for their owners. So the scam began and it continues to this day. Britain had to go to war, even knowing as they must have that it was a war they couldn't win, there was just too much money to be lost if they didn't try. Few aggressors ever win against a guerrilla war as Bush is finding out in Afghanistan and Iraq. That is what saved the revolution, when Washington finally realized that the only way to win against Britain was to wage guerilla warfare as he did for the first time on December 24, 1776 at Trenton, New Jersey. Then there is this nonsense about we're going to loose our democracy if we don't do something about Bush. How can you loose something that you never had? This country has never, ever been a democracy, we have been since before the beginning a bloody empire. We are not based upon the Roman Republic we were based on the Roman Empire with the corpo-rats selecting the dictator instead of the Senate, something that they'd been after for twelve hundred years! Remember square one of democracy is One Person, One Vote. We don't have that now and never did. We don't have that in the election of the House or of the Senate, and don't even get me started on the Electoral College and how that violates first principles! Just remember that the 4th of July celebration, the bar-be-cue, the parades, the rockets red glare are all just bread and circuses and nothing more! Did I ruin your 4th of July celebration America? Good! In Other News... I see where Rummy's stooge Harry B. Harris Jr. whom the deputy-fuhrer appointed "Rear Admiral" over many more qualified captains for his single ability to take it up the rear, an old Bush tradition. Harry spoke up for his boss and the monkey boy after three water boarded, broom handle raped Kabul taxi drivers "hanged themselves." As the spot light once again focused on our Cuban concentration camp, their torturer; Colonel Mike "Rawhide" Bumgarner who ran the prison got called upon the carpet for bringing attention to more of Bush's and Rummy's war crimes. Harry coming to their rescue said, "I believe this was not an act of desperation, but an act of asymmetrical warfare waged against us. The inmates have no regard for life, neither ours not their own." Spoken like a true war criminal Harry! For that statement Harry wins this week's Vidkun Quisling Award! Apparently Colonel Mikie got a little carried away and broke three of his toys. Mikie should have known better, Harry gets an Iron Cross and Mikie gets the shaft. Mikie got removed as prison commander and transferred out of Gitmo to Fort Leonard Wood. I wonder how long Mikie will remain on the outside of the prison there? Do they have water boarding at the Fort Leonard Wood stockade? ***** We dodged a bullet with the failure of the flag amendment. As you may remember the 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 12th & 14th amendments have already gone down in flames due to The Traitor's oops Patriot Acts I & II and other "Acts of Treason" so it was only a matter of time before our Nazi legislature went for the "Big One" again, the 1st Amendment. By a one vote margin the measure failed. I read where one of my Sin-ators Demoncrat Debbie Stabenow voted for this treason so I sent Debbie the following message... Treason becomes you Debbie (subject line) Your words upon being elected were that you couldn't wait to get to Washington and work with the pResident and we all went, President who? Then we figured out you were talking about the seditious traitor Bush and we knew we had elected a monster and you didn't disappoint Debbie. Within a year you had put your name to the Traitors Act; a bill written by PNAC and the RNC to steal 1/3 of the Bill of Rights so no one was surprised when you voted yesterday to repeal the 1st Amendment too, pity it didn't pass, eh? You wouldn't be getting all this negative mail if we no longer had those rights to protest Foggy Bottom treason but I'm sure the Crime Family Bush, The Rethuglicans, most Demoncrats and your corpo-rat masters will figure out a way to get rid of it too. I look forward to hearing your explanations for your treason in this fall's campaigns and in the War Crime trials to come! While I think your Nazi politics sucks to say the least I must admit I do admire that spiffy new Rethuglican armband you're wearing ( did Smirky give you that?) and those shiny new Jack Boots are to die for, quite literally to die for Debbie! Heil Smirky!
Your liberal pal, If one of your Sin-ators or Con-gress persons voted for this treason why not drop them a line too and let them know how you feel about it! ***** And finally next week I'll be reviewing our good friend Paul Levy's new book, "The Madness Of George W. Bush." It's an unfolding Jungian nightmare landscape that explains why Bush and the Sheeple are the way they are. Eye opening, indeed! Also our good friends DJ Monkey have a new album coming out on the 4th of July, "3rd World War." You may remember that along with the Beethoven, Mahler, Folk and Jazz that DJ Monkey adds their considerable talent to the sound track of the new motion picture. You know the one that you've heard me ranting on about for well over a year now? "W." I'll be giving you my review of DJ Monkey's, "3rd World War" next week as well. So stay tuned America, same Bat time, same Bat channel! ********************************************
We get by with a little help from our friends! ********************************************
So how do you like the 2nd coup d'etat so far?
Until the next time, Peace Y'all! |
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Solution In Sight By Noam Chomsky The urgency of halting the proliferation of nuclear weapons, and moving toward their elimination, could hardly be greater. Failure to do so is almost certain to lead to grim consequences, even the end of biology's only experiment with higher intelligence. As threatening as the crisis is, the means exist to defuse it. A near-meltdown seems to be imminent over Iran and its nuclear programmes. Before 1979, when the Shah was in power, Washington strongly supported these programmes. Today the standard claim is that Iran has no need for nuclear power, and therefore must be pursuing a secret weapons programme. "For a major oil producer such as Iran, nuclear energy is a wasteful use of resources," Henry Kissinger wrote in the Washington Post last year. Thirty years ago, however, when Kissinger was secretary of state for President Gerald Ford, he held that "introduction of nuclear power will both provide for the growing needs of Iran's economy and free remaining oil reserves for export or conversion to petrochemicals". Last year Dafna Linzer of the Washington Post asked Kissinger about his reversal of opinion. Kissinger responded with his usual engaging frankness: "They were an allied country." In 1976 the Ford administration "endorsed Iranian plans to build a massive nuclear energy industry, but also worked hard to complete a multibillion-dollar deal that would have given Teheran control of large quantities of plutonium and enriched uranium - the two pathways to a nuclear bomb", Linzer wrote. The top planners of the Bush administration, who are now denouncing these programmes, were then in key national security posts: Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz. Iranians are surely not as willing as the West to discard history to the rubbish heap. They know that the United States, along with its allies, has been tormenting Iranians for more than 50 years, ever since a US-UK military coup overthrew the parliamentary government and installed the Shah, who ruled with an iron hand until a popular uprising expelled him in 1979. The Reagan administration then supported Saddam Hussein's invasion of Iran, providing him with military and other aid that helped him slaughter hundreds of thousands of Iranians (along with Iraqi Kurds). Then came President Clinton's harsh sanctions, followed by Bush's threats to attack Iran - themselves a serious breach of the UN charter. Last month the Bush administration conditionally agreed to join its European allies in direct talks with Iran, but refused to withdraw the threat of attack, rendering virtually meaningless any negotiations offer that comes, in effect, at gunpoint. Recent history provides further reason for scepticism about Washington's intentions. In May 2003, according to Flynt Leverett, then a senior official in Bush's National Security Council, the reformist government of Mohammad Khatami proposed "an agenda for a diplomatic process that was intended to resolve on a comprehensive basis all of the bilateral differences between the United States and Iran". Included were "weapons of mass destruction, a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the future of Lebanon's Hizbullah organisation and cooperation with the UN nuclear safeguards agency", the Financial Times reported last month. The Bush administration refused, and reprimanded the Swiss diplomat who conveyed the offer. A year later the European Union and Iran struck a bargain: Iran would temporarily suspend uranium enrichment, and in return Europe would provide assurances that the United States and Israel would not attack Iran. Under US pressure, Europe backed off, and Iran renewed its enrichment processes. Iran's nuclear programmes, as far as is known, fall within its rights under article four of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which grants non-nuclear states the right to produce fuel for nuclear energy. The Bush administration argues that article four should be strengthened, and I think that makes sense. When the NPT came into force in 1970 there was a considerable gap between producing fuel for energy and for nuclear weapons. But advances in technology have narrowed the gap. However, any such revision of article four would have to ensure unimpeded access for non-military use, in accord with the initial NPT bargain between declared nuclear powers and the non-nuclear states. In 2003 a reasonable proposal to this end was put forward by Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency: that all production and processing of weapon-usable material be under international control, with "assurance that legitimate would-be users could get their supplies". That should be the first step, he proposed, toward fully implementing the 1993 UN resolution for a fissile material cutoff treaty (or Fissban). ElBaradei's proposal has to date been accepted by only one state, to my knowledge: Iran, in February, in an interview with Ali Larijani, Iran's chief nuclear negotiator. The Bush administration rejects a verifiable Fissban - and stands nearly alone. In November 2004 the UN committee on disarmament voted in favour of a verifiable Fissban. The vote was 147 to one (United States), with two abstentions: Israel and Britain. Last year a vote in the full General Assembly was 179 to two, Israel and Britain again abstaining. The United States was joined by Palau. There are ways to mitigate and probably end these crises. The first is to call off the very credible US and Israeli threats that virtually urge Iran to develop nuclear weapons as a deterrent. A second step would be to join the rest of the world in accepting a verifiable Fissban treaty, as well as ElBaradei's proposal, or something similar. A third step would be to live up to article six of the NPT, which obligates the nuclear states to take "good-faith" efforts to eliminate nuclear weapons, a binding legal obligation, as the world court determined. None of the nuclear states has lived up to that obligation, but the United States is far in the lead in violating it.
Even steps in these directions would mitigate the upcoming crisis with Iran. Above all, it is important to heed the words of Mohamed ElBaradei: "There is no military solution to this situation. It is inconceivable. The only durable solution is a negotiated solution." And it is within reach.
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Mon Dieu, Mondial! Balls instead of Bullets By Uri Avnery IF PRESIDENT Bush wanted to deal with Iran by "bombing them back into the stone age", (as an American general once put it during the Vietnam War), now would be the time. With everybody riveted to the World Cup, who would notice? The Israeli government knows this well. In their fight against the Qassam rockets that are landing in the town of Sderot, the Air Force has been given free rein. Since the beginning of the 2006 World Cup, more than 20 Palestinians, including boys and girls, a pregnant woman, a doctor and several paramedics have been killed. It seems that nobody in the world is paying any attention. Why should they? After all, the World Cup is more important. When I come back from Jerusalem to Tel-Aviv, I generally make a slight detour to Abu Gush, an Arab village with a unique oasis: a coffee shop where mixed groups of Jewish youngsters and Arab youngsters (male only), and sometimes groups of Border Guard soldiers, Jewish and Druze, sit together on couches and fauteuils, relaxed, smoking Nargilahs (water-pipes). They devour sugary Baklava, talk, laugh and listen to the Lebanese singer Fairuz and the Oriental Israeli singer Zahava Ben. An unusual phenomenon in Israel. When I passed there this week, they were all sitting in great excitement before a large screen, fixated on the game between Argentina and the Netherlands. They got excited together, jumped up together, shouted together. A few days before, I saw the same in Sarajevo. In the coffee shops in the center of the town, lots of local youngsters, Muslims, Croats and Serbs, were sitting together, staring together, getting excited together, jumping up together, shouting together. The same is happening at the same time all over the world, from Canada to Cambodia, from South Africa to North Korea. It that good? Is that bad? I AM NOT a football fan. Like many people in the world who think of themselves as intellectuals (whatever that means), I usually dismiss this phenomenon with a condescending, slightly ironic smile, even if I catch myself nowadays looking for long minutes at the game. When I was a child, my father told me that sport was "Goyim Naches" (Yiddish from Hebrew, "pleasure of Gentiles"), and that the only Jewish sport was to ponder the philosophies of Spinoza and Schopenhauer, or, alternatively, the Talmud. Yeshayahu Leibovitch, an observant Orthodox Jew, described football teams as "eleven hooligans running after a ball." (Another Jew suggested, for the sake of peace: "Why quarrel? Give each team their own ball.") From this point of view (too), Israel has long since ceased to be a Jewish state, in the spiritual sense. The Israeli Goy is like any other Goy on earth. The World Cup proves it. A PHENOMENON that arouses such deep emotions in a billion human beings cannot be dismissed with a shrug. Here we have a profound human trait. What does it mean? Where does it come from? Konrad Lorenz, one of the founders of the science of Ethology, which deals with the behavior of animals (including the human animal), maintained that human aggressiveness is an inborn trait, a product of millions of years of evolution. Cavemen lived in tribes, each of which depended for survival on a specific territory. The aggressiveness was needed to defend this territory and drive others away. Predators in nature, which have natural weapons - such as teeth, claws or poison - are generally equipped with an inhibiting mechanism that prevents them from attacking their own kind. Otherwise they would not have survived until today. But humans have no effective natural weapon, and therefore nature has not equipped them with such a mechanism. That was a terrible mistake. True, humans have no dangerous teeth or claws, but they have something more effective than any natural weapon: the human brain which invents clubs, pikes, cannons and nuclear bombs. So human beings have a deadly combination of three attributes: inborn aggressiveness, murderous weapons and a lack of inhibitions concerning the killing of their own kind. The result: the human inclination for war. How to overcome it? Lorenz pointed to a remedy: sport, and especially football. Football is the surrogate for war. It directs human aggressiveness into harmless channels. That's why it is so important - and so positive. AGGRESSIVENESS AND nationalism go together. In this respect, too, football allows a glimpse into the recesses of the human soul. The human animal has a profound need to identify itself with a collective. It lives in a group. Ancient man lived in a tribe. Since then, social forms have changed many times. The "We" changed from time to time with the change of social structures. People lived in religious and ethnic frameworks, in feudal society, in monarchies, etc. In the modern world, they live in nations. Self-identification with a nation is an absolute necessity for modern man (with very few exceptions). Football gives expression to this identification in a way that outwardly resembles war. That's why the national flag and the national anthem play a central role in football. The masses wave flags, paint their faces with the national colors, shout nationalist slogans, give an emotional expression to this phenomenon. Sometimes this becomes downright ridiculous, as happened to us last week. Israel has no part in the World Cup, having been knocked out before it really began. But a member of the Ghana team, who plays for Hapoel Tel-Aviv, for some reason waved the Israeli flag on the field - and the whole State of Israel erupted in an outburst of joy: We are there! We are at the World Cup! A less ridiculous apparition: for the first time since the destruction of the Third Reich, masses of Germans have been waving their national flag with an enthusiasm that borders on ecstasy. Some observers speak of a rebirth of German nationalism and whatnot. Yet I believe that it is a positive thing. A nation cannot live a normal life when its citizens are ashamed of it. That can cause a collective mental disturbance and give birth to dangerous tendencies. Now, thanks to football, Germans can wave their flag. The nationalism of football overcomes all other sentiments. A classic example: at the end of the 19th century, Vienna had a mayor, Karl Lueger, who was a rabid and outspoken anti-Semite. But when the Jewish "Hakoah Vienna" played against a Hungarian team, the mayor was observed cheering the local boys. When it was pointed out to him that they were Jews, he made the famous remark: "It is I who decide who is Jewish or not." When a French-Algerian was the star of the French team, French racists cheered him on until they were hoarse. The same happened in Israel, when an Arab played on our national team. RECENTLY, A European intellectual told me: There are jokes about a Pole, a German, a Frenchman and any other European nation. But he has never heard a joke about a European, which proves that a European does not yet exist. I would apply a similar criterion to football. Every nation in Europe has a national team, but there is no European team. Until the team of Europe, under the European flag, plays against the team of Asia or Africa, there will be no popular European consciousness. (A utopian may well dream of a match between the team of Earth and the team of Mars or Planet X.) My Palestinian friend, Issam Sartawi, who was murdered 23 years ago because of his contacts with us, once said: "There will be no peace until the team of Israel plays against the team of Palestine - and we win." THERE IS, of course, a gender angle to it. A brilliant advertising copywriter has plastered Tel-Aviv with posters of a woman's note to her husband: "Itzig, let the goalie of Brazil prepare coffee for you. I am off with the girls to the drugstore. Gali." In a cartoon, a woman asks her husband, who is riveted to the World Cup on TV: "Are you sure you don't want to come with me to the book fair?" Football is a raucous guy thing, even if there are also women fans. In this respect, too, it is a substitute for war, and perhaps also for ancient man's lust for hunting. (In the United States, European football - called soccer- is preferred by women, because American football is far more violent.) In football, men dare to do things that, in other surroundings, would be taboo: they embrace each other, kiss each other, lie on top of one another. This expresses, no doubt, deep needs, and does not harm anyone.
From all these perspectives, football is a positive thing that replaces many negative ones. Provided, of course, President Bush does not use the opportunity to attack Iran, and we don't use it to bomb children in Gaza.
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 The Wine In The Chalice Sanctifying slaughter with a satisfying sip of Old Testament poison By John Kaminski Sunday morning. Sunlight streams through stained glass. Your knees hurt against the thin carpet of the altar as you contemplate the wine in the chalice as it edges slowly toward you along a line of kneeling worshippers. Finally, the Episcopal priest reaches you, and you savor the sweet burgundy that helps you pry that paper thin wafer off the roof of your mouth. Ah, the blood and body of the savior. Sunday morning coming down. Praise God. Christianity is founded on the twin principles of cannibalism and child sacrifice, on Hebrew hallucinations (according to Freud) of a burning bush, and a god who pretends to be better than all the other gods in the neighborhood. This god kills anyone who stands in his way, according to the Old Testament of the much-tampered-with Judeo-Christian Bible - which governs all but the Hindus and the Buddhists among the world's major religions. That's right. Catholics, Protestants, Muslims and Jews are all in the same boat in one sense, in that they venerate this ugly tradition of murder and robbery for any excuse they deem to be righteous. As individual human beings, we act out what we believe. And this is what we have been taught. You must kill those who worship another god. Exodus 22:20 Kill any friends or family that worship a god that is different than your own. Deuteronomy 13:6-10 Kill all the inhabitants of any city where you find people that worship differently than you. Deuteronomy 13:12-16 Kill everyone who has religious views that are different than your own. Deuteronomy 17:2-7 Kill anyone who refuses to listen to a priest. Deuteronomy 17:12-13 Kill any false prophets. Deuteronomy 18:20 People who wish to believe in a guiding spirit of the universe are paralyzed by the contradictions between believing what they know to be true in their hearts by virtue of the love that they feel for their families, but witnessing their intellectual belief systems being cut up into little pieces by credible empirical analyses that reveal the psychological deformities and contrived frauds of the world's most famous holy book. Ultimately, our intellects fail us, and we seek refuge in our old familiar paradigms. Why? Because of the obvious human existential dilemma - one day in everyone's life, we reach a point where knowledge may not go, where understanding will not bring enlightenment, and you either know or you don't, according to whatever you prefer, or whatever your parents taught you. People who don't believe in some all-encompassing external system of principles and laws are caught up in the exterior analyses of these matters and produce such irrefutable evidence of fraud, malfeasance and ulterior motive in the creation of holy scriptures that those who wish to believe can only turn away in a withered silence. Yet most of these true believers retain their knowing through the sheer power of blind faith, and refuse to be shaken out of it by facile intellectual arguments, no matter how logical they may be. The foundations of existing religions need to be attacked by sincere logic. This is not about questioning the existence of God; it's about understanding the psychological marching orders of Leviticus and Deuteronomy and beginning to realize that the very way we think is causing the destruction of the planet that sustains us. Any resemblance to the continuing extermination of innocent Iraqis and Palestinians is not purely coincidental. It was all foretold in the Old Testament, you see, with the pronouncement in Zephaniah 1:17.
"And I will bring distress upon men, that they shall walk like blind
men, because they have sinned against the Lord: and their blood shall
be poured out as dust, and their flesh as the dung."
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Since 2002, they have held some 460 Iraqi, Afghan, and other men in an autocratic, illegal netherworld galled Gitmo - a hell hole of a prison on a military base in Cuba. Even though it's clear that many of these men (and maybe most) are not guilty of terrorist plotting, the Bushites have asserted an imperious presidential right to hold and even torture the prisoners indefinitely, ruthlessly operating Gitmo as an executive dungeon that they claim is not accountable to congress, the courts, or We The People. Secret military tribunals sit in judgment of the prisoners, who are essentially held incommunicado and denied any process to prove their innocence. Deprived of all hope, dozens of these detainees have been resorting to suicide attempts - and three are now dead. The world sees Gitmo and these suicides as a stark admission that the US has abandoned its historic role as a moral beacon for the protection of human rights. That's bad. But worse, the Bushites have openly mocked the dead. The honcho of Gitmo, Rear Admiral Harry Harris, immediately branded the three suicides "an act of asymmetrical warfare against us." Excuse me, Admiral, but I think it's your humanity that's gone asymmetrical on you. Next came Colleen Graffy, an assistant secretary of state. In a slap at the Isalamic men who had just taken their own lives, she breezily declared that their suicides were nothing but "a good PR move," to advance the terrorist cause. This is Jim Hightower saying... Believe it or not, this lady is the assistant secretary for public diplomacy, a new office created by Bush to try to improve America's world image - especially in Islamic countries. Yet, Bush has made no move to reprimand Graffy, much less fire her. What kind of diplomatic message does that send to the Islamic world? (c) 2006 Jim Hightower's latest book, "If The Gods Had Meant Us To Vote They Would Have Given Us Candidates," is available in a fully revised and updated paperback edition. |
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The Bush administration's jihad against newspapers that reported on a secret program to monitor the personal-banking records of unsuspecting citizens is more important than the original story. For what the president and his spokesmen are once again asserting is that the prosecution of this ill-defined, open-ended "war on terror" inevitably trumps basic democratic rights in general and the constitutionally enshrined freedom of the press in particular.
The stakes are very high here. We've already been told that we must put up with official lies about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, the unprecedented torture of prisoners of war and a massive electronic-eavesdropping program and other invasions of privacy. Now the target is more basic - the freedom of the press to report on such nefarious government activities. The argument in defense of this assault on freedom is the familiar refrain of dictators, wannabe and real, who grasp for power at the expense of democracy: We are in a war with an enemy so powerful and devious that we cannot afford the safeguard of transparent and accountable governance.
"We're at war with a bunch of people who want to hurt the United States of America, and for people to leak that program, and for a newspaper to publish it, does great harm to the United States of America," President Bush said Monday.
The "bunch of people" Bush says we are fighting was originally believed to be those behind the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, specifically Osama bin Laden and his decentralized Al Qaeda terrorist organization. Yet Bush, prodded by the neoconservative clique, quickly expanded this war beyond what should have been a worldwide manhunt for Al Qaeda operatives into an open-ended occupation of Saddam Hussein's Iraq - which, as we know from the Sept. 11 commission report, had nothing to do with Al Qaeda or Sept. 11.
In fact, if the media, or Congress, had aggressively pursued the truth earlier, rather than being overwhelmed by the shock of Sept. 11, anti-U.S. terrorists of every stripe would not now be swarming over Iraq. Nor would the degenerating situation in Afghanistan and the enhanced power of religious fanatics throughout the Mideast, from Tehran to Gaza, pose such threats to peace if a fully informed public had held this president in check. Even today, the Bush administration continues to place the situation in Iraq in the "war on terror" framework, instead of acknowledging the primary role of religious and nationalist passions unleashed by the unwarranted U.S. invasion.
As Bush has continued to stretch it to cover all of his leadership failings, the "war on terror" has become a meaningless phrase, to be exploited for the political convenience of the moment. Terrorism, which should be treated clinically as a dangerous pathology threatening all modern societies, instead has been seized upon as an all-purpose propaganda opportunity for consolidating this administration's political power. In such a situation, the press' role as a conduit of both information and debate is more essential than ever. Freedom of the press, enshrined in our Constitution at a time when our fragile nation was besieged by enemies of the new republic, is not an indulgence to be allowed in safe periods but rather an indispensable tool for keeping ourselves safe. That is just the point that Vice President Dick Cheney, the high priest of excessive secrecy - even in domestic matters, such as refusing to reveal the content of his negotiation with Enron lobbyists in framing the administration's energy policy - is bent on obscuring.
"Some in the press, in particular The New York Times, have made the job of defending against further terrorist attacks more difficult," said Cheney, all but calling the newspaper traitorous.
How convenient to leave out The Wall Street Journal, which editorially supports the administration but which also covered this latest example of Bush's abuse of power in its news pages. The administration's attack on the Times, in fact, is not really about national security, but rather follows a domestic political agenda that requires attacking free media that dare offer criticism.
On Monday, following the pattern, Cheney also attacked the Times' earlier disclosure that the National Security Agency had simply ignored the legal requirement of court warrants in monitoring telephone calls. "I think that is a disgrace," he said of the Times winning a Pulitzer Prize for the stories.
What is truly a disgrace, though, is an administration that has consistently deceived the public about its intentions and which continues to shamefully exploit post-Sept. 11 fears to ensure its grip on the body politic.
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As usual, wise man Juan Cole has the skinny on the latest mendacious manipulation of America's carefully-stoked fears of terrorism: this time, a bunch of down-and-out, non-Muslim fringe cultists reduced to begging for water and boots, utterly incapable of carrying out any of the strikes they were allegedly planning -- dreams of violence which were encouraged and cultivated by an FBI informant posing as an al Qaeda operative. Every law enforcement agency now says the group posed no real threat, had no weapons or material to make weapons -- unlike, say, the many white supremacists nabbed over the past few years with their bristling arsenals and ready-made bombs. So why was the raid on this minor collection of wretched, self-deluded chumps trumpeted to the skies by the Bush Regime? Do you really have to ask?
Cole also touches on a larger point. The relentless and savage class war waged by the American elite against the nation's poor (and, increasingly, the middle class) during the past 30 years is creating the kind of societal rot that breeds ignorance, extremism and violence. As Cole notes, the same resentments, the same oppression and hopelessness is beginning to link the slums of Cairo, Nairobi, Manila, Rio, Mexico City and elsewhere around the world to the ghettos of Miami and Los Angeles and the ruins of New Orleans. The fire building under these ash-heaps -- seething and subterranean for now -- is like the lava that swelled for years beneath Pompeii before it blew. When the inevitable explosion comes, it's not going to be pretty, or neatly contained; it's going to be a hard rain that falls on the just and unjust alike.
The tiny sliver of wealthy elites who control the majority of America's wealth (and all of its government, corporate and Establishment institutions), an elite now personified by the junta triumvirate that rules the country -- Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld -- have never had to face the consequences of their actions. There has always been someone else to pay the bill, take the fall, someone else to fight and die to keep the Sliverites in clover. Thus the American elite have come to believe that there are no real consequences for their actions; they believe they can continue to rip American society and American democracy to shreds but that everything will go on as before. They believe -- like all the over-gorged, dull-witted elites in all the now-vanished empires before them -- that they can disembowel the golden goose and keep on collecting the eggs. Like the extinct Easter Islanders, they are devouring the source of their own sustenance -- but they are too stupid and too greedy to see it.
And anyway, the crack-up is not likely to come while the aging triumvirate is still alive to see it, so what do they care? "Apres moi, le deluge." Or as Bush once famously shrugged to Bob Woodward, when the latter asked him how history might judge his Iraq war: "History? Who knows? We'll all be dead."
Yes, but some of us -- a lot of us -- millions of us -- are going to die before our time, thanks to the ignorant and callous predations of our well-protected elites.
For more on the Bush Regime tactic of infiltrating and manipulating terrorist groups, see Into the Dark: The Pentagon Plan to Foment Terrorism and Darkness Visible: The Pentagon Plan to Foment Terrorism is Now Operative.
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Was The Invasion Of Iraq A Jewish Conspiracy? By Greg Palast Did the Jews do it? The US Congress will open hearings this week on the War in Iraq -- a wee bit late one might think. But one question at the forefront of the minds of many on both the Left and the Right is sure not to be asked: Did the Jews do it? I mean, after killing Jesus, did the Elders of Zion manipulate the government of the United States into invading Babylon as part of a scheme to abet the expansion of Greater Israel? The question was first posed to me in 2004 when I was speaking at a meeting of Mobilization for Peace in San Jose. A member of the audience asked, "Put it together- Who's behind this war? Paul Wolfowitz and Elliott Abrams and the Project for a "Jew" American Century and, and, why don't you talk about that, huh? And ...." But the questioner never had the full opportunity to complete his query because, flushed and red, he began to charge the stage. The peace activists attempted to detain the gentleman-whose confederates then grabbed some chairs to swing. As the Peace Center was taking on a somewhat warlike character, I chose to call in the authorities and slip out the back. Still, his question intrigued me. As an investigative reporter, "Who's behind this war?" seemed like a reasonable challenge-and if it were a plot of Christ-killers and Illuminati, so be it. I just report the facts, ma'am. And frankly, at first, it seemed like the gent had a point, twisted though his spin might be. There was Paul Wolfowitz, before Congress in March 2003, offering Americans the bargain of the century: a free Iraq-not "free" as in "freedom and democracy" but free in the sense of this won't cost us a penny. Wolfowitz testified: "There's a lot of money to pay for this that doesn't have to be U.S. taxpayer money." A "Free" Iraq And where would these billions come from? Wolfowitz told us: "It starts with the assets of the Iraqi people.... The oil revenues of that country could bring between $50 and $100 billion over the next two or three years." This was no small matter. The vulpine Deputy Defense Secretary knew that the number one question on the minds of Americans was not, "Does Saddam really have the bomb?" but "What's this little war going to cost us?" However, Wolfowitz left something out of his testimony: the truth. I hunted for weeks for the source of the Pentagon's oil revenue projections-and found them. They were wildly different from the Wolfowitz testimony. But this was not perjury. Ever since the conviction of Elliott Abrams for perjury before Congress during the Iran-Contra hearings, neither Wolfowitz nor the other Bush factotums swear an oath before testifying. If you don't raise your hand and promise to tell the truth, "so help me, God," you're off the hook with federal prosecutors. How the Lord will judge that little ploy, we cannot say. But Wolfowitz's little numbers game can hardly count as a Great Zionist conspiracy. That seemed to come, at first glance, in the form of a confidential 101-page document slipped to our team at BBC's Newsnight. It detailed the economic "recovery" of Iraq's post-conquest economy. This blueprint for occupation, we learned, was first devised in secret in late 2001. Notably, this program for Iraq's recovery wasn't written by Iraqis; rather, it was promoted by the neo-conservatives of the Defense Department, home of Abrams, Wolfowitz, Harold Rhode and other desktop Napoleons unafraid of moving toy tanks around the Pentagon war room. Nose-Twist's Hidden Hand The neo-cons' 101-page confidential document, which came to me in a brown envelope in February 2001, just before the tanks rolled, goes boldly where no U.S. invasion plan had gone before: the complete rewrite of the conquered state's "policies, law and regulations." A cap on the income taxes of Iraq's wealthiest was included as a matter of course. And this was undoubtedly history's first military assault plan appended to a program for toughening the target nation's copyright laws. Once the 82nd Airborne liberated Iraq, never again would the Ba'athist dictatorship threaten America with bootleg dubs of Britney Spears's "...Baby One More Time." It was more like a corporate takeover, except with Abrams tanks instead of junk bonds. It didn't strike me as the work of a Kosher Cabal for an Imperial Israel. In fact, it smelled of pork-Pig Heaven for corporate America looking for a slice of Iraq, and I suspected its porcine source. I gave it a big sniff and, sure enough, I smelled Grover Norquist. Norquist is the capo di capi of right-wing, big-money influence peddlers in Washington. Those jealous of his inside track to the White House call him "Gopher Nose-Twist." A devout Christian, Norquist channeled a million dollars to the Christian Coalition to fight the devil's tool, legalized gambling. He didn't tell the Coalition that the loot came from an Indian tribe represented by Norquist's associate, Jack Abramoff. (The tribe didn't want competition for its own casino operations.) I took a chance and dropped in on Norquist's L Street office, and under a poster of his idol ["NIXON- NOW MORE THAN EVER"], Norquist took a look at the "recovery" plan for Iraq and practically jumped over my desk to sign it, filled with pride at seeing his baby. Yes, he promoted the privatizations, the tax limit for the rich, and the change in copyright law, all concerns close to the hearts and wallets of his clients. "The Oil" on Page 73 The very un-Jewish Norquist may have framed much of the U.S. occupation grabfest, but there was, without doubt, one notable item in the 101-page plan for Iraq which clearly had the mark of Zion on it. On page seventy-three the plan called for the "privatization....[of] the oil and supporting industries," the sell-off of every ounce of Iraq's oil fields and reserves. Its mastermind, I learned, was Ariel Cohen of the Heritage Foundation. For the neo-cons, this was The Big One. Behind it, no less a goal than to bring down the lynchpin of Arab power, Saudi Arabia. It would work like this: the Saudi's power rests on control of OPEC, the oil cartel which, as any good monopoly, withholds oil from the market, kicking up prices. Sell-off Iraq's oil fields and private companies will pump oil in their little Iraqi patches to the max. Iraq, the neo-cons hoped, would crank out six million barrels of oil a day, bust its OPEC quota, flood the world market, demolish OPEC and, as the price of oil fell off a cliff, Saudi Arabia would fall to its knees. "It's a no-brainer," Cohen told me, at his office at Heritage. It was a dim little cubby, in which, in our hour or two together, the phone rang only once. For a guy who was supposed to be The Godfather of a globe-spanning Zionist scheme to destroy the Arab oil monopoly, he seemed kind of, well...pathetic. And he failed. While the Norquist-promoted sell-offs, flat taxes and copyright laws were dictated into Iraqi law by occupation chief Paul Bremer, the Cohen neo-con oil privatization died an unhappy death. What happened, Ari? "Arab economists," he hissed, "hired by the State Department ... the witches brew of the Saudi Royal family and Soviet Ostblock." Well, the Soviet Ostblock does not exist, but the Arab economists do. I spoke with them in Riyadh, in London, in California, in wry accents mixing desert and Oxford drawls. They speak with confidence, knowing Saudi Arabia's political authority is protected by the royal families -- of Houston petroleum. "Enhance OPEC" After two mad years of hunting, I discovered the real plan for Iraq's oil, the one that keeps our troops in Fallujah. Some 323 pages long and deeply confidential, it was drafted at the James A. Baker III Institute in Houston, Texas, under the strict guidance of Big Oil's minions. It was the culmination of a series of planning groups that began in December 2000 with key players from the Baker Institute and Council on Foreign Relations (including one Ken Lay of Enron). This was followed by a State Department invasion-planning session in Walnut Creek, California, in February 2001, only weeks after Bush and Cheney took office. Its concepts received official blessing after a March 2001 gathering of oil chiefs (and Lay) with Dick Cheney where the group reviewed with the Vice-President the map of Iraq's oil fields. Once I discovered the Big Oil plan, several of the players agreed to speak with me (not, to the chagrin of some, realizing that I rarely hold such conversions without secretly recording them). Most forthright was Philip Carroll, former CEO of Shell Oil USA, who was flown into Baghdad on a C-17 to make sure there would be no neo-con monkey business in America's newest oil fields. It had been a very good war for Big Oil, with tripled oil prices meaning tripled profits. In Houston, I asked Carroll, a commanding, steel-straight chief executive, about Ari Cohen's oil privatization plan, the anti-Saudi "no-brainer." "I would agree with that statement" Caroll told me, "privatization is a no-brainer. It would only be thought about by someone with no brain." Bush world is divided in two: neo-cons on one side, and the Establishment (which includes the oil companies and the Saudis) on the other. The plan the Establishment created, crafted by Houston oil men, called for locking up Iraq's oil with agreements between a new state oil company under "profit-sharing agreements" with "IOCs" (International Oil Companies). The combine could "enhance the [Iraq's] government's relationship with OPEC," it read, by holding the line on quotas and thereby upholding high prices. Wolfowitz Dammerung: Twilight Of The Neo-Con Gods So there you have it. Wolfowitz and his neo-con clique- bookish, foolish, vainglorious-had their asses kicked utterly, finally, and convincingly by the powers of petroleum, the Houston-Riyadh Big Oil axis. Between the neo-cons and Big Oil, it wasn't much of a contest. The end-game was crushing, final. The Israelites had lost again in the land of Babylon. And to make certain the arriviste neo-cons got the point, public punishment was exacted, from exile to demotion to banishment. In January 2005, neo-con pointman Douglas Feith resigned from the Defense Department; his assistant Larry Franklin later was busted for passing documents to pro-Israel lobbyists. The State Department's knuckle-dragging enforcer of neo-con orthodoxies, John Bolton, was booted from Washington to New York to the powerless post of U.N. Ambassador. Finally, on March 16, 2005, second anniversary of the invasion, neo-con leader of the pack Wolfowitz was cast out of the Pentagon war room and tossed into the World Bank, moving from the testosterone-powered, war-making decision center to the lending office for Bangladeshi chicken farmers. "The realists," crowed the triumphant editor of the journal of the Council on Foreign Relations, "have defeated the fantasists!"
So much for the Big Zionist Conspiracy that supposedly directed this war. A half- dozen confused Jews, wandering in the policy desert a long distance from mainstream Jewish views, armed only with Leo Strauss' silly aphorisms, were no match for Texas oil majors and OPEC potentates with a combined throw weight of half a trillion barrels of oil.
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One Percent Madness By Robert Parry Author Ron Suskind's account of Dick Cheney's "one percent doctrine" - the idea that if a terrorist threat is deemed even one percent likely the United States must act as if it's a certainty - supplies a missing link in understanding the evolving madness of the Bush administration's national security strategy. A one-percent risk threshold is so low that it negates any serious analysis that seeks to calibrate dangers within the complex array of possibilities that exist in the real world. In effect, it means that any potential threat that crosses the administration's line of sight will exceed one percent and thus must be treated as a clear and present danger. The fallacy of the doctrine is that pursuing one-percent threats like certainties is not just a case of choosing to be safe rather than sorry. Instead, it can suck the pursuer into a swollen river of other dangers, leading to a cascading torrent of adverse consequences far more dangerous than the original worry. For instance, George W. Bush's invasion of Iraq may have eliminated the remote possibility that Saddam Hussein would someday develop a nuclear bomb and share it with al-Qaeda. (Some intelligence analysts put that scenario at less than one percent, although Bush called it a "gathering danger.") But the U.S. military invasion of Iraq had the unintended consequence of bolstering the conviction in North Korea and Iran that having the bomb may be the only way to fend off the United States. The unending scenes of bloodshed in Iraq also have inflamed anti-American passions in other Middle East countries, including Pakistan which already possesses nuclear weapons and is governed by fragile pro-U.S. dictator Pervez Musharraf. So, while eradicating one unlikely nightmare scenario - Hussein's mushroom cloud in the hands of Osama bin-Laden - the Bush administration has increased the chances that the other two points on Bush's "axis of evil," North Korea and Iran, will push for nuclear weapons and that Pakistan's Islamic fundamentalists, already closely allied with Osama bin-Laden, will oust Musharraf and gain control of existing nuclear weapons. In other words, eliminating one "one-percent risk" may have created several other dangers which carry odds of catastrophe far higher than one percent. Bush now must decide whether to swat at these new one-plus-percent risks, which, in turn, could lead to even greater dangers. Say, for example, that Bush orders air strikes against Iran's suspected nuclear sites and kills large numbers of civilians in the process. That could trigger riots in Pakistan and lead to Musharraf's downfall, putting Islamic extremists in control of nuclear weapons immediately, instead of possibly years into the future. An attack on Iran also could backfire on the United States in Iraq, where Iranian-allied Shiite militias could retaliate against vulnerable U.S. and British troops, raising the death toll and endangering the entire U.S. mission in Iraq. Swallowing Flies In effect, Bush has found himself in a geopolitical version of "the little old lady who swallowed a fly." As the children's ditty goes, the little old lady next swallows a spider to catch the fly but soon finds that the spider "tickles inside her." So, she engorges other animals, in escalating size, to eliminate each previous animal. Eventually, she swallows a horse and "is dead of course." Similarly, if Bush seeks to eradicate a succession of one-percent threats, he could well find himself trapped within a growing web of interrelated consequences, each pulling in their own entangling complexities. The end result could leave the United States in a much worse predicament than when the process began. Charging headstrong after one-percent risks also makes you vulnerable to getting lured into traps. Al-Qaeda strategists, for instance, understood that the 9/11 attacks would lead to a furious reaction from the United States and welcomed the prospect that the American military would strike back at targets in the Islamic world. Al-Qaeda hoped that the United States would overreact and thus sharpen what al-Qaeda saw as the contradictions within the Islamic world, forcing Muslims to take sides either with the "crusaders" and their regional allies or with the revolt against those forces. Al-Qaeda's gamble was that the United States might strike a well-aimed, powerful blow that would eliminate al-Qaeda's leadership and its key supporters without alienating the larger Muslim populations. But in late November and early December 2001, the failure to cut off escape routes at Tora Bora, near the Afghan-Pakistani border allowed Osama bin-Laden to evade capture along with Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaeda's second in command. Then, Bush - prematurely celebrating victory in Afghanistan - shifted the U.S. military's focus to Iraq, which had long been an obsession with Bush and his neoconservative advisers. Bush and Cheney judged that Saddam Hussein represented another one-percent-plus danger that required eliminating. Perception Management But there remained a political problem in the United States. The American people, while strongly favoring retaliation against al-Qaeda, were less convinced about the need to launch a series of "preemptive wars" against nations that were not implicated in 9/11. Though the "one-percent doctrine" may transcend the need for any hard evidence among policymakers, it did not eliminate the political need to generate public support behind a war effort, especially when even casual observers could note that the new target country - Iraq - posed no immediate threat to the United States. So, the Bush administration saw little choice but to engage in exaggerations and outright falsehoods, what the CIA calls "perception management." Bush, Cheney and their subordinates spoke in absolute terms about evidence of the Iraqi threat, including vast stockpiles of terrifying unconventional weapons and secret work on a nuclear bomb. "Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction," Cheney told a VFW convention on Aug. 26, 2002. "There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us. And there is no doubt that his aggressive regional ambitions will lead him into future confrontations with his neighbors - confrontations that will involve both the weapons he has today, and the ones he will continue to develop with his oil wealth." It's now clear that Cheney was wildly overstating the level of confidence within the U.S. intelligence community about Hussein's WMD programs. There was little hard evidence at all, more a case of conventional wisdom about unconventional weapons than actual intelligence reporting. CIA analysts also didn't believe that Hussein had any intent of using whatever WMD he did have unless his nation was attacked or he was cornered. But intelligence took on a different dimension inside the "one-percent doctrine," a strategy that cherished action over information. In the new book, The One Percent Doctrine, Suskind describes Cheney first enunciating his new approach when he heard about Pakistani physicists discussing nuclear weapons with al-Qaeda. "If there's a one percent chance that Pakistani scientists are helping al-Qaeda build or develop a nuclear weapon, we have to treat it as a certainty in terms of our response," Cheney said. "It's not about our analysis, or finding a preponderance of evidence. ... It's about our response." Suskind reports that Cheney's new "standard of action ... would frame events and responses from the administration for years to come. The Cheney Doctrine. Even if there's just a one percent chance of the unimaginable coming due, act as if it is a certainty. ... "This doctrine - the one percent solution - divided what had largely been indivisible in the conduct of American foreign policy: analysis and action. Justified or not, fact-based or not, 'our response' is what matters. As to 'evidence,' the bar was set so low that the word itself almost didn't apply." Manipulation By making careful evaluation of the evidence irrelevant, however, the U.S. government made itself vulnerable to willful deceptions by interested parties, such as Ahmed Chalabi's Iraqi National Congress, which easily could funnel enough disinformation into the decision-making process to push decisions over the one-percent brim. American enemies also could manipulate the process by exaggerating their goals. For instance, Bush and Cheney have repeatedly defended the continuation of the U.S. military operation in Iraq by citing the supposed goal of Islamic extremists to build an empire from Spain to Indonesia. But the real prospect for such an empire is miniscule, arguably close to zero. After all, prior to 9/11, nearly all key al-Qaeda leaders had been driven from their home countries and chased to Afghanistan, one of the most remote corners of the earth. These al-Qaeda leaders had lost battles with fellow Muslims in Egypt, Algeria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and elsewhere. Though heroes to some Islamists, al-Qaeda leaders were dangerous but fringe operatives on the run. Without the clumsy intervention of the United States and Great Britain in Iraq, al-Qaeda had few prospects for any significant expansion of its power base. In an intercepted letter, purportedly written in 2005 by Zawahiri to Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in Iraq, al-Qaeda's second in command fretted about the problems that would occur if the United States military withdrew from Iraq. The "Zawahiri letter" cautioned that an American withdrawal might prompt the "mujahedeen" in Iraq to "lay down their weapons, and silence the fighting zeal." To avert this military collapse if the United States did leave, the letter called for selling the foreign fighters on a broader vision of an Islamic "caliphate" in the Middle East, although only along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean, nothing as expansive as a global empire. But the "Zawahiri letter" indicated that even this more modest "caliphate" was just an "idea" that he mentioned "only to stress ... that the mujahedeen must not have their mission end with the expulsion of the Americans from Iraq." [See Consortiumnews.com's "Bush's Latest Iraq War Lies."] Brer Rabbit In other words, assuming the "Zawahiri letter" is accurate, al- Qaeda's leaders wanted to keep the United States bogged down in Iraq because that allowed the terrorists to swell their ranks with new fighters and to use the Iraq War as a training ground to harden them into dangerous militants. The one-percent doctrine, therefore, empowers America's enemies to influence U.S. policy in ways favorable to them. It lets al-Qaeda play the role of Brer Rabbit from the Uncle Remus tales, where the wily rabbit begs not to be thrown into the briar patch when that is exactly where he wants to go. Bush has said the United States must take the word of the enemy seriously and act accordingly. But what if the enemy is exaggerating his capabilities or his goals? Do the enemy's words alone push matters beyond the one percent threshold and force the United States into responses even if they are not in America's best interests? The one-percent doctrine is also developing a domestic corollary. Any home-grown threat - no matter how unlikely - must bring down the full force of U.S. law enforcement, as happened in last week's arrest of seven young black men in Miami for a terrorist plot that one FBI official called more "aspirational than operational." On June 23, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales conceded that the men had no weapons, no equipment and no real plans. Mostly, the seven seem to have been encouraged by an FBI informant posing as an al-Qaeda operative to talk loosely about waging a "full ground war" against the United States. As absurd as this notion of a "full ground war" was - given the hapless nature of the alleged warriors - Gonzales said, "left unchecked, these homegrown terrorists may prove to be as dangerous as groups like al-Qaeda." Gonzales's domestic declaration rang with an echo of Dick Cheney's one-percent doctrine. If there is the slightest risk of terrorist activities, "it's not about our analysis, or finding a preponderance of evidence," Cheney reportedly said. "It's about our response." Obvious Flaws But another curious aspect of this one-percent doctrine is how obvious its flaws are. Wouldn't even the most dimwitted foreign policy novice recognize the absurdity of striking out at one-percent risks around the world? John Dunne wrote that "no man is an island, entire of itself," meaning that every person is connected to other people. But surely, not even George W. Bush thought that Iraq was an island, somehow disconnected from a host of intersecting regional and global relationships. The answer to that conundrum might simply be that the one-percent doctrine is less a doctrine than another excuse used by the Bush administration to justify actions, such as invading Iraq, that it always to do. If the slimmest possibility of grievous harm - such as Saddam Hussein developing nuclear weapons and then slipping one to Osama bin-Laden - can be cited to trump more circumspect policymakers, then it could be powerful way to defeat bureaucratic rivals who show up at meetings with binders of intelligence analyses under their arms. Then, when Bush and Cheney want to ignore other threats, they can simply revert to the posture of careful leaders not ready to jump hastily into an unfamiliar thicket. In other words, whether or not to invoke the one-percent doctrine gives them the ultimate debate-stopping argument.
Nevertheless, if Suskind is right and Bush is following the one-percent doctrine as his guiding light in the post-9/11 world, the American people can expect to find themselves led into an endless series of wars that only worsen the dangers.
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| A Burning Issue On Capitol Hill Sometime before the Fourth of July, the Senate will vote on a constitutional amendment to prohibit the physical desecration of the American flag. The House of Representatives already has passed the same legislation by the required two-thirds margin, and enough state legislatures would vote for the amendment to assure its approval. So the final bulwark against this historic assault on freedom of speech consists of 34 Senators with enough courage to stand up for the substance of the nation's ideals-and to resist transforming the beloved symbol of those ideals into an authoritarian fetish. That is the real danger to the flag, whose spirit the Republican majority is desecrating with a cynical partisan zeal. Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic minority leader, has scornfully suggested that the flag amendment is merely another of the "pet issues of the right wing," deployed by the Republicans to distract from their failure to address falling wages, ballooning deficits and rising energy and health-insurance costs. Not long ago, confronted with a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, he rightly asked: "Why are we being directed by the President and this Republican majority to debate an amendment to the Constitution, a document inspired more than two centuries ago? Why would we be asked to change this American masterpiece?" Those were highly pertinent questions. Perhaps he should look in the mirror when he asks them next time. Should the Senate approve the flag amendment with 67 votes, a full measure of blame will belong to Mr. Reid. He will vote "aye," even though he has denounced the bill as an election-year stunt whose sole purpose is to embarrass his Democratic colleagues. That ugly tactic has intimidated several Democratic Senators in conservative states. Of the dozen who have supported the amendment in the past, some could be excused on that basis, at least so long as there weren't enough votes for passage. Others such as Dianne Feinstein of California, who is a co-sponsor of the amendment, can make no such plea. While doing injury to the Constitution, she also insults the intelligence of her constituents by telling them that she is really protecting free speech. Fortunately, there is someone else in power who is willing to stand up for free speech, even at the risk of his own future prospects. If the Senate rejects the flag amendment and preserves the Bill of Rights from unprecedented disfigurement, a full measure of thanks will be owed to Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican whip and prospective leader. He has vowed to vote "nay," even though his party plans to use the amendment to preserve their majority. Irony abounds in the Congressional theater of the absurd, where prevailing opinion equates "support for our troops in Iraq" with a determination to keep them in peril indefinitely, and demonstrates "respect for marriage and families" by barring gay couples from the affirmation of those institutions. (Speaking of irony, the prime House sponsor of the flag amendment was none other than Randy "Duke" Cunningham, the former California Congressman and self-styled super-patriot now serving a long prison term for corruption.) It will be especially weird next fall, however, to hear the Republicans attack brave Democrats who dared to vote against the flag amendment as unpatriotic and unfit to sit in the Senate. Those same Republicans expect to elect Mr. McConnell, who has always opposed the amendment, as their new leader next year. Now both Mr. Reid and Mr. McConnell say they are acting on principle. The latter will vote against the amendment because he believes that it violates fundamental liberties, while the former will vote for the amendment because he wishes to be "consistent," having supported it in the past. Of those two arguments, liberty should win over consistency. But consistency may be the best justification that Mr. Reid can muster, since there isn't any sensible reason to approve the flag amendment beyond its atavistic emotional appeal. While nobody enjoys watching some idiot burn the flag, this has become a rare spectacle over the past two decades. Not many of those incidents were actually intended as political protest, and most violated another law and were duly punished. Displays of the Stars and Stripes by Americans of all political persuasions have increased markedly since 9/11. Like so many resolutions and acts of Congress-and like the proposed statutes to prohibit flag desecration-this misguided amendment is a "solution" without a problem. But unlike many of the stupid things that politicians do, this one is important. It is a statement of contempt for the First Amendment and a dangerous step toward further restrictions on speech and expression.
Let's hope that Mr. McConnell and at least 33 of his colleagues can resist the entreaties of those in both parties who would protect the flag by torching the Constitution.
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Their Barbarism, And Ours By Norman Solomon The Baghdad bureau chief of the New York Times could not have been any clearer. "The story really takes us back into the 8th century, a truly barbaric world," John Burns said. He was speaking June 20 on the PBS "NewsHour With Jim Lehrer," describing what happened to two U.S. soldiers whose bodies had just been found. Evidently they were victims of atrocities, and no one should doubt in the slightest that the words of horror used by Burns to describe the "barbaric murders" were totally appropriate. The problem is that Burns and his mass-media colleagues don't talk that way when the cruelties are inflicted by the U.S. military -- as if dropping bombs on civilians from thousands of feet in the air is a civilized way to terrorize and kill. When journalists maintain a flagrant double standard in their language -- allowing themselves appropriate moral outrage when Americans suffer but tiptoeing around what is suffered by victims of the U.S. military -- the media window on the world is tinted a dark red-white-and-blue, and the overall result is more flackery than journalism. Based on the available evidence from Abu Ghraib to Afghanistan to Guantanamo, anyone who claims that U.S. foreign policy does not include torture is disingenuous or deluded. Reporters for the New York Times and other big U.S. media outlets would not dream of publicly describing what American firepower does to Iraqi civilians as "barbaric." An eyewitness account from American author Rahul Mahajan, during the U.S. attack on Fallujah in April 2004, said: "During the course of roughly four hours at a small clinic in Fallujah, I saw perhaps a dozen wounded brought in. Among them was a young woman, 18 years old, shot in the head. She was having a seizure and foaming at the mouth when they brought her in; doctors did not expect her to survive the night. Another likely terminal case was a young boy with massive internal bleeding." Hundreds of civilians died in that attack on Fallujah, and many more lost their lives when U.S. troops attacked the city again seven months later. Since then, the U.S. air war has escalated in Iraq, often putting urban neighborhoods in the cross hairs. Days ago, in mid-June, independent U.S. journalist Dahr Jamail tells us, "a hospital source in Fallujah reported that eight Iraqis, some of whom were women and children from the same family, were killed and six wounded when U.S. warplanes bombed a home in the northeastern Ibrahim Bin Ali district of the city." We hear that of course the U.S. tries to avoid killing civilians -- as if that makes killing them okay. But the slaughter from the air and from other U.S. military actions is a certain result of the occupiers' war. (What would we say if, in our own community, the police force killed shoppers every day by spraying blocks of stores with machine-gun fire -- while explaining that the action was justifiable because no innocents were targeted and their deaths were an unfortunate necessity in the war on crime?) Meanwhile, routinely absent from the U.S. media's war coverage is the context: an invasion and occupation fundamentally based on deception. "The Bush strategy for victory is about to begin," author Beau Grosscup said on June 20. "U.S. and Iraqi forces have surrounded the city of Ramadi. Food and water have been cut off. Next is the 'Shock and Awe' strategic bombing of the city, to be followed by 'mop-up' operations: ground troops, snipers and aerial 'support.'" Grosscup, a professor of international relations at California State University in Chico, added: "It is the hallowed 'Fallujah' model, intended to bring 'stability' by flattening the city with civilian death and destruction. It is a 'clean' way to victory, one supported by Rep. Jack Murtha, who would withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq but continue to engage the 'enemy' from far away and from 15,000 to 30,000 feet above with air power. By October 2004, this 'clean war' had killed close to 100,000 Iraqi civilians and thousands more since. But, as any enthusiast of strategic bombing would say, it is the price of victory and somebody has to make the ultimate sacrifice. Terror from the skies, anyone?"
Without maintaining a single and consistent moral standard in their
work, journalists -- no matter how brave, skilled or hardworking -- end up
prostituting their talents in the service of a war machine.
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 Three Iraq Myths That Won't Quit By Scott Ritter It is hard sometimes to know what is real and what is fiction when it comes to the news out of Iraq. America is in its "silly season," the summer months leading up to a national election, and the media is going full speed ahead in exploiting its primacy in the news arena by substituting responsible reporting with headline-grabbing entertainment. So, as America closes in on the end of June and the celebration of the 230th year of our nation's birth, I thought I would pen a short primer on three myths on Iraq to keep an eye out for as we "debate" the various issues pertaining to our third year of war in that country. The myth of sovereignty Imagine the president of the United States flying to Russia, China, England, France or just about any other nation on the planet, landing at an airport on supposedly sovereign territory, being driven under heavy U.S. military protection to the U.S. Embassy, and then with some five minutes notification, summoning the highest elected official of that nation to the U.S. Embassy for a meeting. It would never happen, unless of course the nation in question is Iraq, where Iraqi sovereignty continues to be hyped as a reality when in fact it is as fictitious as any fairy tale ever penned by the Brothers Grimm. For all of the talk of a free Iraq, the fact is Iraq remains very much an occupied nation where the United States (and its ever decreasing "coalition of the willing") gets to call all the shots. Iraqi military policy is made by the United States. Its borders are controlled by the United States. Its economy is controlled largely by the United States. In fact, there simply isn't a single major indicator of actual sovereignty in Iraq today that can be said to be free of overwhelming American control. Iraqi ministers continue to be shot at by coalition forces, and Iraqi police are powerless to investigate criminal activities carried out by American troops (or their mercenary counterparts, the so-called "Private Military Contractors"). The reality of this myth is that the timeline for the departure of American troops from Iraq is being debated (and decided) in Washington, D.C., not Baghdad. Of course, as with everything in Iraq, the final vote will be made by the people of Iraq. But these votes will be cast in bullets, not ballots, and will bring with them not only the departure of American troops from Iraq, but also the demise of any Iraqi government foolish enough to align itself with a nation that violates international law by planning and waging an illegal war of aggression, and continues to conduct an increasingly brutal (and equally illegitimate) occupation. The myth of Zarqawi I have said all along that the poll figures showing Americans to be overwhelmingly against the war in Iraq were illusory. Only 28 percent of Americans were against the war when we invaded Iraq. The ranks have swelled to over 60 percent not because there has been an awakening of social conscience and responsibility, but rather because things aren't going well in Iraq, and there is increasing angst in the American heartland because we seem to be losing the war in Iraq, and no one likes a loser. So when the word came that the notorious terrorist, Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi, was killed by American military action, the president suddenly had a "good week," and poll numbers adjusted slightly in his favor. However, the facts cannot be re-written, even by a slavish American mainstream media. Zarqawi was never anything more than a minor player in Iraq, a third-rate Jordanian criminal whose exploits were hyped up by a Bush administration anxious to prove that the insurgency that was getting the best of America in Iraq was foreign-grown and linked to the perpetrators of the 9/11 terror attacks nonetheless. The reality of just how wrong such an assessment is (and was) has been pounded home in blood. Since Zarqawi's death, the violence has continued to spiral out of control in Iraq, with Americans continuing to die, Iraqis still being slaughtered, and Zarqawi and his organization, successor and all, still as irrelevant to reality as ever. The war against the American occupation in Iraq is being fought overwhelmingly by Iraqis. The insurgency is growing and becoming stronger and more organized by the day. This, of course, is a reality that the Bush administration cannot afford to have the American people know about in an election year, as a compliant media, having sold its soul to the devil in hyping of the virtues of an invasion of Iraq back in 2002-2003, continues to dance with the party that brought them by supporting the Republican position, by and large, that the conflict in Iraq is a winnable one for America. Good ratings, more dead Americans (and Iraqis, but who is counting?) and a war that will never end until the United States finally slinks out, defeated, its tail tucked firmly between its legs. The myth of WMD Regardless of what Sen. Rick Santorum and the lunatic neoconservative fringe want to think, no weapons of mass destruction have been found in Iraq. Citing a classified Department of Defense report that claims some 500 artillery shells have been found in Iraq by U.S. forces since the invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq in March 2003, Santorum and his cronies in the right-wing media have been spouting nonsense about how Bush got it right all along, that there were WMD in Iraq after all. He conveniently fails to report that there is nothing "secret" about this data, it has all been reported before (by the Bush administration, nonetheless), and that the shells in question constitute old artillery munitions manufactured well prior to 1991 (the year of the first Gulf War, and a time after which the government of Saddam Hussein stated -- correctly, it turned out -- that no WMD were produced in Iraq). The degraded sarin nerve agent and mustard blister agent contained in the discovered munitions had long since lost their viability, and as such represented no threat whatsoever. Furthermore, the haphazard way in which they were "discovered" (lying about the ground, as opposed to carefully stored away) only reinforces the Iraqi government's past claims that many chemical munitions were scattered about the desert countryside in remote areas following U.S. bombing attacks on the ammunition storage depots during the first Gulf War. Having personally inspected scores of these bombed-out depots, I can vouch for the veracity of the past Iraqi claims, as well as the absurdity of the claims made today by Santorum and others, who continue to hold personal political gain as being worth more than the blood of over 2,500 dead Americans.
These three myths -- WMD, Zarqawi and Iraqi sovereignty -- are what members of Congress should be debating in their halls of power, the American media should be discussing either in print or across the airwaves, and that discussion should constitute the foundation of a movement towards accountability, where the citizens of the United States finally point an accusatory finger at those whom they elected to represent them in higher office, and who have failed in almost every regard when it comes to Iraq. But then again, silly me for thinking this way, believing that there was an engaged constituency within America that knows and understands the Constitution of the United States and seeks to live each day as a true citizen empowered by the ideal and values set forth by that document. I had overlooked the Fourth Myth -- that American citizens are engaged in our national debate.
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 Rear Admiral Harris Heil Bush, Dear Nachhut Admiral Harris, Congratulations you have just been awarded the 'Vidkun Quisling Award' for 2006! Your name will now live throughout history with such past award winners as Marcus Junius Brutus, Judas Iscariot, Benedict Arnold, George Stephanopoulos, Ralph Nader, Vidkun Quisling and last year's winner Volksjudge Johnny (the Enforcer) Roberts. Without your lock-step calling for the repeal of the Constitution, your support of our two coup d'etats, your constant covering up of our war crimes down in Gitmo, Iraq and these many other profitable oil wars to come would have been impossible! With the help of our mutual friends, the other "Military Whores," you have made it possible for all of us to goose-step off to a brave new bank account! Along with this award there will be an Iron Cross first class presented by our glorious Fuhrer herr Bush at a gala celebration at "der Fuhrer Bunker" formally 'The White House' on 07-01-2006. We salute you herr Harris, Sieg Heil!
Signed, Heil Bush |
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AUSTIN, Texas-And then along comes Cut'n'Run Casey. We spend all last week listening to cut'n'run Democrats talking about their cut'n'run strategy for Iraq, and the only issue is whether they want to cut'n'run by the end of this year or to cut'n'run by the end of next year, and oh, by the way, did I mention that Republicans had been choreographed to refer to the Democrats' plans as cut'n'run?
As Vice President Dick ("Last Throes") Cheney said Thursday, redeployment of our troops would be "the worst possible thing we could do. ... No matter how you carve it-you can call it anything you want-but basically it is packing it in, going home, persuading and convincing and validating the theory that the Americans don't have the stomach for this fight."
Then right in the middle of Cut'n'Run Week, the top American commander in Iraq, Gen. George W. Casey Jr., held a classified briefing at the Pentagon and revealed his plan to reduce the 14 combat brigades now in Iraq to five or six. And here's the best part: Rather than wait till the end of this year or, heaven forefend, next year, Casey wants to start moving those troops out in September, just before whatever it is that happens in early November. They don't call him George W. Jr. for nothing.
One has to admit, the party never ends with the Bush administration. The only question about Cut'n'Run Week is whether they meant to punctuate a weeklong festival of referring to Democrats as the party of "retreat" and "the white flag" with this rather abrupt announcement of their own cut'n'run program. Was it an error of timing?
I say no. I say Karl Rove doesn't make timing mistakes. This administration thoroughly believes the media and the people have a collective recollection of no more than one day. Five days of cut'n'run, one day off and BAM, you get your own cut'n'run plan out there.
Republicans have, in fact, a well-developed sense of aesthetics. Regard the superb pairing of the decision not to raise the minimum wage with the continued push to repeal the estate tax. House Republicans had almost opened their marble hearts and raised the minimum, now at $5.15 an hour, to a whopping $7.25 an hour by 2009. (Since 1997, when they last raised it, members of Congress have hiked their own pay by $31,000 a year.)
This might have gone well with their decision to reduce the estate tax yet again, so that only the top half a percent of estates will pay it, while it will cost the treasury $602 billion over the first 10 years-but even better, no increase in the minimum wage to match the vote to decrease taxes on the very, very, very richest. Is that suave or what?
Also, very slick move on the Voting Rights Act extension. No amendments, no exemptions, the South rose again and blocked the whole deal. Which Southern state do you think will be the first to pass laws to hold down the black vote? My money is on 'Bama-for sentimental reasons.
And now, on to flag burning. What flag burning, you may well ask. Just because something doesn't happen is no reason not to outlaw it. Or, for that matter, not to amend the Constitution of the United States.
I am considering introducing an amendment to require everyone in the audience at "Peter Pan" to clap for Tinkerbell. I believe 99.8% of them do, but that's no reason not to amend the Constitution. I don't believe we should allow people to be different. If someone wants to burn a flag as symbolic political protest, I believe they should be beheaded. Also, flipping the bird at George W. should merit the same-but not flipping off Clinton, Bill or Hillary.
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I've been reading about this "grass roots" phenomenon that's sweeping the country. It must not have "swept" down this far, because I scoured the prairies and plains of Oklahoma, and the only thing I came up with was a clump or two of Johnson grass, a few scraggly buffalo and some errant loco weed...
In fact, there's not much movement of any kind in Tom Joad Country. Maybe that's because Oklahoma has always been, or at least has had the reputation of being, not only poor but backwards both intellectually and culturally. If I were so inclined, I could probably debunk this fallacy, but I'd have to start in Tulsa and move east...
People west of Tulsa aren't too concerned with politics. We get involved and come alive for only a couple of things -- A six-pack of Bud Light and OU football. Tulsa denizens like to think of themselves as "cosmopolitan" and politically hip, but they have a tendency to look at issues through an oil prism. That's why we always end up with Stupid White Men like Don Nickles, Jim Inhofe, and Tom Cole. When you think about it, I guess it serves us right...
Okies are independent and "don't want the damned government bleepin' around in their business..." Their political ideology is based on this ONE issue -- Republicans want smaller government; ergo -- they vote Republican. They also have a tendency to believe whatever it is that the last person -- usually a preacher - -says to them. Since Democrats have no voice in Oklahoma, Okies believe Republicans and vote Republican.
I do not understand, however, how the elderly -- most of whom would have starved to death if it had not been for President Roosevelt and the Democrats -- could ever vote Republican. But in Oklahoma, they do, and are dadgummed proud of it.
I do not understand how any military -- and we have a large military presence throughout the state -- could vote Republican. Most military, especially lower enlisted, are in the services as a direct result of being unable to make a living anywhere else. The US military is the largest welfare program in the world. Lifers, such as Colin Powell, have never received a paycheck that wasn't drawn on the US government. Powell, and so many others like him, would not be where they are today if it had not been for government "affirmative action."
The same with civil servants -- government paychecks and retirement bennies come directly from Uncle Sam. I should know. Like Powell, I devoted my entire working life to the government and, although I don't make out like a bandit every month, thanks to Sam I can afford to put food on my family. But in Oklahoma, most of these retired military and civilian folks enthusiastically support programs that cut their own livelihoods -- literally foreclose on their children's future -- by voting Republican...
If we have a grass roots movement in Oklahoma, it is fueled by militant Christians -- mostly southern Baptists who have no clue about the intricacies of politics, but are told by their Christian right-wing brethern that Democrats are whoremongers who think every woman should have an abortion whether she wants one or not, and the gays are coming after their children. This is enough to drive them to the polls to vote Republican.
Okies love America, they love their born-again idiot president, and they are proud to be blind and brazen warriors in God's Very Own Army. Together, they and Bush are proudly in lockstep -- insanely marching to Zion...
But that's just my opinion. I could be wrong.
--- Mike Keefe ---  |
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There once was a musical troupe
Well, the one on the right was on the left
This musical aggregation toured the entire nation
Well, the one on the right was on the left
Well the curtain had ascended
Well, the one on the right was on the bottom
Now this should be a lesson if you plan to start a folk group
Now, the one on the left works in a bank
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Parting Shots...
Christian Parenting Alert!
Freehold, Iowa - A number of panicked Christian ladies across America are scheduled to give birth on June 6th, 2006. This date raises concern among church members since the numbers of that day also identify the son of Satan, the "Beast" from the book of Revelation. No decent, Christian family wants the little red bottom of the devil's spawn perched on a limb of their family tree, taking a dump on the branches below, much less sitting in a high-chair at the dinner table listening in on family prayers while quietly finalizing plans to sodomize mommy with the family vacuum. As such, Landover Baptist Creation Scientists have put together a checklist of recommended actions one should take if their baby is being born or was born on 06-06-06.
Is My Child The Devil's Son?
A Checklist for Christian Mothers
1. Ladies, keep your legs crossed until after midnight. A True Christian(tm) lady always keeps her knees together -- and June 6 is no time to stop. As your demon child willfully pushes and kicks, causing your lady hole to dilate to the size of a drainage pipe, keep your knees locked together at all times. This will give your demanding child a wonderful, early lesson that he can't always have his way. To underscore this valuable disciplinary message, as the devil child flops around, trying to claw its way out to the human world to do Lucifer's bidding, continue to warble in a loud voice, "La la la la la la la I CAN'T FEEL YOU!"
2. If at all possible, have your Baptist doctor induce the child to be born earlier. The most reliable method known to Creation Science to get a mother to go instantly into labor is to jump in front of her when she least expects it and scare the dickens out of her. If this doesn't prove scary enough, read the Bible to her. Otherwise, FedEx a love processing gift of $2,000 to " Landover Baptist Church , Freehold, Iowa 55369." As soon as your check clears, we will send you information on how to perform a "Creation Birth Reduction." Reduction will cause the mother to give birth two or three days out from her expected due date. If you have a weak stomach, allergies to dried locusts and can not drink human urine, the Reduction is not for you.
3. If the 06-06-06 date can not be avoided, make sure that the childis kept in a chicken cage on the hospital floor, and that there are at least two full grown hogs within four feet of the cage at all times. As a Bible believing Christian, you know that demons and pigs act like the two sides of Velcro when they are around each other (Mark 5:12-13), so keeping them by your newborn's side acts as a Godly safety net. If one of the hogs starts grinning and snorting, prancing about, or just plain acting full of the Devil's business by emptying its bowels all over the hospital floor, get it out to a lake and drown it as soon as humanly possible. And you don't have to be a Christ-killing Jew to know this: Goodness gracious, don't eat the bacon!
4. Make sure you check under your child's testicles for any peculiar markings. For it is not upon the head (as the hell bound Catholics incorrectly believe and, by all other indications, should be the last ones to be wrong in this regard), but rather hidden in the rough skin on the nape under a newborn's tiny tallywhacker, or slightly inside the anal cavity that one should be looking for any signs of the Evil One. Creation Scientists have observed that the so-called "taint" (the disagreeable area between the genitals and the anus) is where demons are most likely to post messages for each other.
5. Place your child in the care of our Creation Scientists for a period of 10-days. During this period, they will perform a Bible Crawl and conduct Creation Science Experiments on your newborn to determine if it needs to be shipped off the Landover Baptist Home for the Demonically Possessed in North Dakota. The shipping charges and five years of care costs will be billed monthly to the same credit card account you use when you drop your child off with us.
6. You might decide (as many Christian families in need have before you) that it is best just to sell your child to the cause of Creation Science. Our laboratory and research center will pay $18 a pound (17 cents a pound for mixed race infants) for any child under the age of 6-months. In making this decision, you can rest assured that you are doing something for the cause of Christendom(tm). Your family will be helping Creation Scientists better understand Satan's handiwork in early childhood development. This greater understanding will better prepare us in case (God forbid we'd have to suffer) there is a post-tribulational Rapture. If that is ever the case, the more we know about the enemy, the better.
7. Buy an enormous, full Korean wig that cascades thick locks of hair down your back to your waist. June 6, 2006 is no time for a pregnant woman to be walking around looking like a young boy, lest she be mistaken for Mia Farrow. |
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