|
April 29
* Website of the Day:
What's the
Matter with Liberals? by Thomas Frank
Rebutting Gordon Brown:
The Attorney General's Legal Advice,
Government Spin and the Iraq War (Part II)
by Milan Rai
British Prime
Minister Tony Blair thinks that the controversy over the
Attorney General's legal
advice is a “damp squib.” His ministers struggle to put out the raging
fire -- which has torched their election campaign plans -– by offering up
distortions and lies. The crucial point is that in his 7 March legal
advice, Lord Goldsmith said that if there was no second UN resolution
authorizing war against Iraq, there had to be “hard evidence” of Iraqi
“non-compliance and non-cooperation” with its disarmament obligations.
(Legally, this is nonsense, but the issue is what the Government's legal
adviser told Tony Blair, and what Mr. Blair did with that advice.)
Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown has sought to defend the decision
to go to war (which he participated), by referring to a range of documents
brought before the British Cabinet on 17 March 2003. None of these
documents demonstrates that Iraq was failing to cooperate with inspectors,
or that Iraq definitely possessed weapons of mass destruction. The
documents instead demonstrated that Iraqi cooperation with the inspectors,
and Iraqi disarmament, were increasing, not decreasing, on 17 March 2003.
It was also clear that the judgment as to Iraq's cooperation should not
have been made by the British Cabinet, but by UN weapons inspectors and
the UN Security Council....(full article)
May Day: The Rise & Fall of the Middle
Class
by Jack Random
On May Day 2005, it is a good time to
reflect on the many who gave their lives in the cause of organized labor
so that future generations of workers would enjoy a living wage, an
eight-hour day, worker’s compensation, decent working conditions, basic
job security and standards of safety. Of equal and greater importance, May
Day 2005 is a critical time to consider that what has been gained through
generations of blood and sweat can easily be lost through negligence and
fear....(full article)
Conscientious Objector Status for Army
Sgt. Kevin Benderman Denied:
Ft. Stewart Command Quickly Rubber-Stamps Disapproval
by Robert S. Finnegan
Ft. Stewart, GA -- Yesterday [April 27] at
Ft. Stewart Georgia, U.S. Army Sergeant Kevin Benderman was dealt a
setback in his battle with the U.S. Army when his application for
Conscientious Objector status was denied by his command. Benderman applied
for CO status after having already served one combat tour in Iraq during
which his Captain ordered personnel in the unit to fire on Iraqi children
throwing rocks. This was one of many incidents during his deployment that
Benderman said convinced him that war is immoral and it is his duty to
refuse to kill....(full article)
Back to the Ancient Future:
Chewing Raw Grubs
with the
“Nutcracker Man”
by Joe Bageant
I
spent the middle weekend in April with a group of artists and thinkers
called the April Fools Group. Put together by Brad Blanton, psychotherapist
and creator of “radical honesty” politics and therapy, the three-day meeting
was set on a farm down the Shenandoah Valley amid the battlefields and
rolling countryside of Newmarket, Virginia. Brad, a world famous redneck
headshrinker, had put together old hippies, theoreticians, musicians, young
anarchists, beautiful brilliant women and aging writers to yap, drink and
plot against the Bush administration. So when I pulled into Brad’s driveway
to find him and a fellow named Hank parked in lawn chairs up on the roof
with a bottle of bourbon I knew this thing was off to a good start.
The gathering was an organizational meeting for Brad Blanton’s independent
run for the Virginia Seventh District U.S. House of Representatives.
Blanton’s working slogan is “America needs a good psychiatrist.” And we
got a lot accomplished in that direction, despite my intellectual
flatulence and Brad’s orneriness. Any psychotherapist who actually
gets people to pay for advice such as “Fuck’em if they can’t take a joke”
must be called ornery at the very least. And any politician who thinks he
can get elected on the basis of extreme honesty, well....(full article)
Reflections On “MADE IN PALESTINE”, “Dybbuk”,
and “The Holocaust”
by Robert Leverant
We do
unto others what was done unto us. What we do to others reveals our
personal and collective history. Primo Levi, who had been There, said,
“The Palestinians are the Jews to the Jews.” I was reminded of Primo
Levi’s statement on Sunday when I saw “MADE IN PALESTINE,” an exhibit of
Palestinian Art, at the SomArts Cultural Center in San Francisco....(full
article)
Iraq: War, Aid and Public Relations
by Norman Solomon
American
news outlets provided extensive -- and mostly laudatory -- coverage of Marla Ruzicka after she died in Baghdad on April 16. The humanitarian aid worker’s
undaunted spirit and boundless dedication had endeared her to a wide array
of people as she strived to gain acknowledgment and compensation for
civilians harmed by the war in Iraq. Ruzicka was determined
to help Iraqi victims and loved ones. “Their tragedies,” she said, “are our
responsibilities.” Her funeral, at a church in her hometown of Lakeport,
California, was a moving occasion as friends and co-workers paid tribute to
a woman whose moral energies led her to take great risks and accomplish so
much in a life of 28 years. By all accounts, she
was a wonderful and inspiring person. Yet after I left the funeral, some key
themes of the media eulogies and other testimonials kept bothering me. We
were being encouraged to celebrate Marla Ruzicka’s life, her work and her
message. But -- in the context of a continuing war -- what was her message?
(full article)
The Right Wing’s Attack on Abortion
Rights and the
Liberals’ Deafening Silence
by Sharon Smith
With ever more outlandish discourse, the
Christian Right has gained the upper hand in the battle over abortion in
Bush’s second term. But the pro-choice movement has helped pave the
way....(full article)
The Making of the Arab Menace
by Rayan El-Amine
Anti-Arabism and Islamophobia are so much a
part of the political and cultural discourse on Arabs and Muslims in
American society today that most do not even recognize it as racism. The
fear mongering of the Bush administration and the right wing media pundits
who make a living from demonizing Arabs and Muslims have inundated people
with images of the violent Arabs bent on death and destruction. For media
outlets like Fox Television, it is a way to sell their sensationalist news
programs and for the current administration, a way to sell its wars....(full
article)
May Day at Yankee Stadium
by Mickey Z.
My wife Michele and I went to the Yankee
game on May Day last year (2004). They gave out free caps. "NY" on the
front, of course...and a shiny patch on the back of the hat acknowledged
the giveaway day sponsor: Hess. The House that Ruth Built became a
moveable ad for oil (instant replays brought to you by Dodge). The seventh
inning stretch required fans to stand in honor of the “men and women in
uniform” who fight to “preserve our way of life.” Fifty thousand removed
their free caps, watched a digitized flag wave on the big screen, and held
the Hess patch over cholesterol-laden hearts while belting out “God Bless
America,” collectively choosing to ignore the blood being spilled to keep
the world safe for petroleum (Michele and I opted for a strategic bathroom
break at that point). The Yankees won and many of the fans promptly rushed
out to drive home in their ubiquitous SUVs...adorned, of course, with the
ubiquitous “support the troops” yellow ribbon sticker....(full
article)
A Time of Changes
by Hsing Lee
As most of you know, Pope John Paul II,
formerly known as Karol Wojtyla, died from organ failure after a series of
prolonged illnesses. His is a complex portrait, and one worth a glance at
this time of changes. Even as he was head of one of the most vile
institutions in human history, an institutional merger of Spirituality and
State into what we call Religion, in many ways he has been a great
reformer within that institution. Even as he chaired the death cult that
has caused more war, theft, and suffering than any other force in human
history, he fought for freedom and prayed for peace. And for all the
needless suffering his refusal to punish child molester priests has
caused, for all the needless starvation and slow death in the developing
world that his anti-birth control policies have caused, for all the AIDS
his anti-condom policies have caused, in many ways he has taken more steps
toward undoing the ravages of racism and ignorance than any Pope before
him. The man was a walking contradiction. And love him or hate him, you
have to respect the path he chose in leaving this world behind....
(full
revelation)
Your Tax Dollars At Work
by William Fisher
It’s truly comforting to know that, even in
the grip of post-9/11 paranoia, the G-men of the FBI are still using their
resources efficiently. If you have any doubts, just ask Steve Kurtz. He is
living proof that your tax dollars are hard at work....(full article)
History Lite
by Peter Kurth
Better people
than I, last week -- provided they could wade their way through all those
stories about the pope, and all the TV dramas pretending that “American
voters never knew” Franklin Roosevelt had polio -- tried to balance Bush’s
brain with Lincoln’s. All of them, so far as I know, have since run
shrieking into corners, begging for death, before another word escapes the
mouth of the Idiot-in-Chief. I refer especially to David Rossie’s piece
in The Binghamton (NY) Press and Sun-Bulletin, which pled -- no,
wept -- for Americans to wake up and see how far they’ve been duped.
Rossie did nothing but quote the respective commanders....(full article)
The Attorney General's
Legal Advice, Government Spin
and the Iraq Weapons Inspectors
by Milan Rai
The publication of UK Attorney General
Lord Goldsmith’s legal advice, presented to Prime Minister Tony Blair on 7
March 2003, before the invasion of Iraq, but not published until today (28
April 2005), marks a significant defeat for the Government, and an
important opportunity for the anti-war movement to educate the general
public about some crucial realities -- particularly about the role and
function of the UN weapons inspectors. Foreign Minister Jack Straw is
piloting a new Big Lie for the Government to cover up its dishonesty. What
does the legal advice mean? As long rumored, Lord Goldsmith's advice is
finely balanced and equivocal -- the very opposite of the black-and-white
legal certainty that military chiefs wanted and Tony Blair announced to
the world....(full article)
April 28
The Onion Eater
by Joe Bageant
It was spring 1966
and down at the end of fraternity row in the exclusive new brick high-rise
apartment building, the children of the rich and the few were partying
hard. On the second floor balcony they socialized, cooked and drank beer
with beautiful girls. The building even had a pool, a rare luxury in those
times, and was the kind of place
where only a few
high-enders could afford to live while in school. That day a homeless
person, an even rarer thing back then, shuffled by. Seeing them on the
balcony, he asked for food. His attitude was one of a supplicant at the
feet of God: “Pardon me, sirs...” The cream of American youth was moved.
They threw him a raw onion, which he ate like an apple, while they cheered
and hooted and guffawed. He was sick the rest of the day. They drove their
BMWs to class, and they laughed and told and retold the story.
Forty years
later we see those frat boys of yesterday have come into their own,
inheriting their daddies’ places in the world in the form of
George Bush and his
supporters....(full article)
They Were Young Once, and Fit
by Sheila Samples
My
dad always responded to anything that was patently obvious with, “Well,
yea-ah. Anybody with half sense and one eye knows that,” which was his way
of saying don't go with the flow, but look at facts and come to your own
conclusions. He also said, “If you're determined to show your ass, make sure
it's a clean ‘un,” or -- get those facts straight before you jump out there
and start concluding... Well,
I've looked at heaps and piles of facts about what the deranged leaders of
this nation are willing to do to the men and women who wear the US military
uniform, and I've come to two conclusions. This country's most expendable
commodity is its children and, with few exceptions, Americans appear to be
both senseless and blind....
(full article)
Why I'm Not Standing with Gringo
Vigilantes
Notes on Misplaced Autonomy
by Greg Moses
SouthWest Border Vigilantes say gringos
should drop everything they are doing and go stand shoulder to shoulder at
the Mexican border to prevent anybody from walking North. In response, I'm
not saying gringo vigilantes are altogether stupid people, because there
are most likely many areas of life where they display dignity and
intelligence. The sooner they return to those areas the better. Yet
suppose for the sake of peacemaking that we find common ground with
vigilantes in their pure anxiety about the border. What they are worried
about is a swamped labor market where more people share fewer jobs and
declining pay. That anxiety has some basis in reality. But it is
misleading to see the chief cause of the labor problem along an imaginary
line that separates the USA from Mexico. Blame America's problems on
Mexicans? The battle cry of the border vigilante is evidence that we live
in desperate and confused times....(full
article)
“We‘re Number One! We’re Number One!”
(Well, actually, number 27...)
by Dennis Rahkonen
There are as many
Americans living below the official poverty line as the combined
populations of Alabama, Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine,
Minnesota, Mississippi, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oregon, South Dakota and
Tennessee. (William Quigley, Ending Poverty as We Know it:
Guaranteeing a Right to a Job at a Living Wage, Temple University
Press, 2003) In only four of America’s 3,066 counties can a full-time
worker earning the federal minimum wage afford to pay rent and utilities
on a single-bedroom apartment. (New York Times, "Study Finds Gap in
Wages and Housing Costs," December 25, 2004) Attribute this largely to a
Wal-Martized economy where sweatshop friendly mega retailers cut the legs
out from under local, community benefiting businesses, forcing our
consequently beleaguered working class ever closer to rock bottom.
Desperation on Main Street is measured by the diminishing number of days
that even a two-breadwinner family’s paychecks last, as bills relentlessly
mount. That isn’t the better lives for their progeny our parents and
grandparents so glowingly envisioned. It represents an unacceptable
betrayal of their fondest hope, and the hallowed American Dream
itself....(full article)
In Iraq, the Center Cannot Hold
by Ken Sanders
Immediately following Iraq's elections in
January, the Bush administration and its apologists declared that the
"successful" elections in Iraq delivered a "body blow" to the insurgency.
In March, General John P. Abizaid, commander of U.S. forces in the Middle
East, and Lt. General John F. Sattler, the top Marine officer in Iraq,
both declared that the strength of the insurgency was waning thanks, in
large part, of the elections. General Abizaid even went so far as to
predict that by the end of 2005, Iraqi security forces would be leading
the fight against the insurgents. At first, it appeared that Bush & Co.
might actually have been correct. In the weeks immediately following the
elections, it did appear as though insurgent attacks were more sporadic
and less effective. In short, it seemed relatively quiet in Iraq.
Appearances, however, are often deceiving....(full
article)
A Scandal of Irony: Abramoff Used DeLay
to Fund Anti-Intifada Militia
by Joshua Frank
It shouldn't come as
much of a shock that Jack Abramoff, the infamous DC super-lobbyist who has
been accused of ripping off millions from his Native American clients, is
a rabid Zionist. Abramoff, in the late 1990s, set up a pro-Israel charity
front called the Capital Athletic Foundation. Sounds jovial enough. “The
pitch ... was hard to resist,” Michael Isikoff recently reported for
Newsweek, “a good way to get access on Capitol Hill, he told his
clients ... was to contribute to [his] worthy charity ... [which] was
supposed to provide sports programs and teach ‘leadership skills’ to city
youth. Donating to it also had a side benefit, Abramoff told his clients:
it was a favored cause of Rep. Tom DeLay.”....(full
article)
Appeals Court Nominee
Janice Rogers Brown Merits the Filibuster
by Gene C. Gerard
In
2003, President Bush nominated California Supreme Court Justice Janice
Rogers Brown to the U.S. Courts of Appeals. However, due to her
ultra-conservative judicial views, the Democrats in the Senate prevented
her nomination from going forward by use of the filibuster. Mr. Bush
re-nominated her again in February. Last week, the Senate Judiciary
Committee, in a party-line vote, approved of her nomination, with all 10
Republicans affirming her, and all eight Democrats opposing her. Unless
Republicans elect to carry out the so-called “nuclear option” of
abolishing the filibuster, Democrats will almost certainly block her
nomination again. And for good reasons....(full
article)
Abu Ghraib One Year Later:
Have Those Responsible Gotten Off?
Republican Leaders Urged to Appoint an Independent
Special Prosecutor to Investigate U.S. Torture Policy
by Kevin Zeese
When
the Abu Ghraib prison photographs emerged one year ago the Bush
Administration said: now the Iraqis will see that there is justice in the
United States. Leading Republican Senators, John Warner, Lindsay Graham
and John McCain, promised that everyone culpable would be held
accountable, no matter how senior. Hopefully, the Iraqis were not watching
too closely....
(full article)
April 26-27
Hating the Bible
by Kim Petersen
Since George W. Bush assumed the US
presidency, his regime has defied international law and wreaked murderous
havoc on developing nations. Many political pundits have pointed to the
neoconservative agenda as announced in the Project for the New American
Century’s unabashed call for a Pax Americana.
But Bush and some of his circle also claim to be taking cues from
the Christian God. If this is true, then presumably Christian teaching is
influencing the only superpower and hence the rest of the world. The Bible
forms the core of Christian thought. It is a selective compilation of
tales that has had and has stupefying transformative powers in the world.
As such, an understanding of the Bible is important. Toronto-based Tony
Malone is an accomplished musician and freethinker who devoted several
years researching rare and valuable biblical works. The result was his two
richly illustrated books
The Bible
For People Who Hate The Bible....(full
article)
An Independent Green Party Can Be the
Majority Political Party
in the United States in 20 Years
by Jerry Kann
Where do I want the Green
Party to be in 20 years? In 2025, I want the Green Party to be the
majority political party in the United States. I want most of the
members of Congress, most governors, and most members of state
legislatures, to be Greens. This is a very ambitious goal, but by no means
an unrealistic one. History has many examples of small, upstart parties
rising to majority status, notably the Republican Party under Lincoln and
the British Labour Party in the first half of the last century. The next
third party success story could be the Green Party. But people aren’t
stupid. If they see the Greens collaborating with, say, the Democratic
Party in presidential elections, people will begin to ask what makes us
Greens different. If they see us retreating from the battleground states
for fear of “taking away” votes from the Democrats -- as indeed the
official Green Party campaign did in 2004 -- they will ask the perfectly
reasonable question: Why should I bother supporting Greens if it’s just a
roundabout way of supporting Democrats?
(full article)
“It’s a Wobbly Year”: An Interview with
Paul Buhle on the IWW
by Derek Seidman
2005 marks the
centennial of the founding of the most bold, radical, and egalitarian mass
union in US history: the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW, also known
as the Wobblies). Big Bill Haywood, “The Rebel Girl” Elizabeth Gurley
Flynn, Joe Hill, Free Speech fights, the Patterson and Lawrence strikes,
“Solidarity Forever”, and so much more: the legacy of the Wobblies is one
of the most enduring things in the American radical tradition. Paul Buhle,
a professor of American Civilization at Brown University and a leading
scholar of American radical history, is co-author of the new
Wobblies!: A Graphic History of the IWW. In a recent interview
with Left Hook (www.lefthook.org)
co-editor Derek Seidman, Buhle answered some questions about the IWW, his
new book, and the Traveling Wobbly show (www.wobblyshow.org)....(full
article)
Carter Gets It -- But
Will His Electoral Commission?
by Kevin Zeese and Linda Schade
The best news coming out of the first
hearing of the Carter-Baker Commission is that the co-chairs recognize
that Americans are losing faith in their democracy, and that even in the
2004 presidential election -- among the most passionate elections in
recent history -- 40% did not vote and, increasing numbers of voters
lack confidence that their votes were counted as cast. The bad news is
that a corporate conflict of interest of one member of the Commission
raises doubts that they will recommend the common sense necessity -- voter
verified paper ballots....(full
article)
Reprieve for the Sire: A Post-Analytic
Exposé
by Rosa Faiz
“Must I argue
that a system thus marked with blood, and stained with pollution, is
wrong? No! I will not. I have better employments for my time and strength,
than such arguments would imply … At a time like this, scorching irony,
not convincing argument, is needed … The feeling of the nation must be
quickened; the conscience of the nation must be roused; the propriety of
the nation must be startled; the hypocrisy of the nation must be exposed;
and its crimes … must be proclaimed and denounced.” (Frederick
Douglass, 5 July 1852, in a speech titled
“What to the Slave is the
Fourth of July?”)
With
this statement we agree one hundred and some percent. One may in fact be
tempted to call the current era a Post-Analytic Era. Meaning, we are well
past the point where analysis alone is the primary needed catalyst to
spark a change in the hearts and minds of the truly downtrodden. One may
more efficaciously invest in growing less scared of the system by creating
autonomous institutions of our own, and thus becoming less impressed by
the system’s claims to omnipotence, and more discerning of its weaknesses.
For it can only be a supremely unstable and weekly-invested system that
needs to kill and deceive, murder and rape and insult daily for its
survival. For a demonstration of all-the-analysis-you-need, here is a
post-analytic exposé....(full article)
American Hypocracy* At
Work:
Shooting the Messenger Who Reported Human Rights
Abuses in Afghanistan
by Harold Williamson
In a report issued
to the UN Commission on Human Rights, M. Cherif Bassiouni reported on
allegations that American military forces and independent contractors in
Afghanistan acted above the law with "sexual abuse, beatings, torture, and
use of force resulting in death." As a result, the UN Commission on Human
Rights was pressured at a meeting in Geneva by U.S. diplomats to eliminate
his post that was appointed by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan last April:
the United Nation's "independent expert on human rights in
Afghanistan."....(full article)
Bush-Backed Drug Marketing Schemes
by Evelyn J. Pringle
At an FDA hearing on
the safety of psychotropic drugs on Feb 2, 2004, dozens of tortured
parents testified that their children had committed suicide or other
violent acts after being prescribed the same drugs that are being marketed
in the Bush-backed pharmaceutical industry schemes aimed at recruiting the
nation's 52 million school children as customers. In July 2003, the Bush
appointed New Freedoms Commission on Mental Health (NFC) recommended
screening all children for mental illness and designated TeenScreen as a
model program to ensure that every student receives a mental health
check-up before finishing high school. The NFC also has a preferred drug
program in place modeled after the Texas Medication Algorithm Project (TMAP),
which lists what drugs are to be used on children found to be mentally
ill. The list contains every drug that people complained about at the FDA
hearing, including Paxil, Zoloft, Celexa, Wellbutron, Zyban, Remeron,
Serzone, Effexor, Buspar, Risperdal, Zyprexa, Seroqual, Geodone, Depakote,
Adderall, and Prozac. There is little if any evidence that these drugs
work on children but, nevertheless, an estimated 10 million children in
the US are now taking these mind-altering drugs even though they have
documented side effects including suicidal ideation, mania, psychosis, and
future drug dependence....(full article)
Even Two Boots is Two Too Many
by Mark Drolette
The Eyes Wide Open
exhibition,
sponsored by the American Friends Service Committee, came to Capitol Park
in downtown Sacramento recently. I live right across the street, so it
took me about three minutes to walk to the traveling presentation on a
gorgeous California spring day. Over 1,500 pairs of combat boots were
arrayed on the lawn, symbolizing the number of reported U.S. military dead
in Iraq. Some of the footgear belonged to the deceased; the rest was
donated by a surplus store. An adjacent grassy area held about 1,000
pairs of neatly-arranged shoes, a memorial to the estimated
100,000-plus Iraqi citizens killed since America, unprovoked, attacked
their country. As people quietly wandered through the display, many
pausing to read the occasional newspaper article or note accompanying a
pair of boots, the names and ages of the dead, soldiers and civilians
alike, were read aloud by volunteers one by one, each name punctuated at
reading’s end by a woman dinging a chime. One by one, that is, except for
the periodic Iraqi appellation followed by “and 29 family members, ages
unknown” or some similar ghastly number....(full
article)
The Horowitz Gang: Nothing Short of
Fascist
by Joshua Frank
David Horowitz and
his gang never cease to amaze. From their crackpot intellectualism, to
their red baiting antics -- it's clear the folks over at
FrontPageMagazine.com are nothing short of fascist. On April 25, Ann
Coulter wannabe and FrontPage darling, Debbie Schlussel, had this
to say about the death of peace activist Marla Ruzicka, who, as I am sure
you know, was killed by a suicide bomber in Iraq earlier this month....(full
article)
What's So Funny About Peace, Love and
Armageddon?
The Arming Of India And Pakistan
by Media Lens
At the
beginning of every episode of the long running sci-fi series, The X-Files,
viewers were shown the mysterious words “I want to believe.” We were to
understand that one of the FBI investigators in the show was eager to
overcome his skepticism, to be persuaded that aliens, goblins and suchlike
really exist. When it comes to the humanity and compassion of leaders like
Tony Blair and George Bush, mainstream journalists also “want to
believe.”....(full article)
The Screams That Deaniacs Need to Hear
by Dan Raphael
He should have
stayed at Democratic Party headquarters. In a speech delivered in
Minneapolis on April 20th, Howard Dean said of the US military
occupation of Iraq, “Now that we’re there, we’re there and we can’t get
out.” He also extended his firm endorsement of George Bush’s policy of
aggression, stating “I hope the president is incredibly successful with
his policy now that he’s there.” That’s the role of “progressive”
politicians -- and their adoring fans: to endorse the murderous policies
of George Bush. The $40,000 raised for the Democratic Party as proceeds
from Dean’s speech is simply more blood money, the byproduct of the
political apparatus that makes sure the killing floor abroad is kept
busy. Perhaps this taste for blood can be explained by the fondness
Deaniacs in particular have for screams; this time, though, it is not
their pop idol who is roaring, but countless real-life people experiencing
the hard-headed realism of the likes of Howard Dean and the rest of George
Bush’s supporters....(full article)
The "Freedom" of Afghanistan's Women
by Ken Sanders
Last month, First Lady Laura Bush did
something her husband never dared -- she went to Afghanistan. While there,
Mrs. Bush went to great pains to applaud her husband and to highlight the
progress and achievements made by Afghan women. Thanks to Bush's
benevolence, the women of Afghanistan are now free. Free to walk the
streets without burqas or male supervision. Free to vote. Free to go to
school. Indeed, on May 9, 2003, President Bush boldly declared that the
days when Afghan women "were beaten in streets and executed in soccer
fields are over." According to Bush, women's human rights in Afghanistan
are a "foreign policy imperative and a cornerstone of all U.S.
humanitarian efforts in the region." If only the facts supported the
rhetoric....(full article)
Maoism is the “Greatest
Internal Security Threat”
Maoist and Muslim Insurgencies in the Philippines
by Gary Leupp
Philippines Defense Secretary Avelino Cruz stated recently that the threat
posed by the New People’s Army (NPA), the military wing of the Maoist
Communist Party of the Philippines, has made it imperative for Manila to
negotiate an agreement with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front.
The
MILF is one of two major Muslim insurgent groups in the southern third of
the archipelago. (The other, the Moro National Liberation Front, has
already signed a peace agreement.) The government of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo
has asked the U.S. State Department to
leave the MILF off of its list of international terrorist
organizations in order to promote the peace talks.
Cruz
calls the NPA “the greatest internal security threat to the country now.”
What’s significant here is that Manila is downplaying the problem
of Muslim insurgency while emphasizing that of the resurgent Maoist
People’s War, whereas the U.S. has depicted its own renewed military
presence in the islands exclusively as an effort to crush al-Qaeda-linked
Islamic terrorism....(full article)
Crusader for a Christian
Nation
Dr. D. James Kennedy may not be as well-known as Falwell, Robertson,
or Dobson, but he packs a powerful political punch in Washington
by Bill Berkowitz
In all the
hullabaloo raised by the coverage of the Terri Schiavo case and the cable
news network's fixation on the so-called miracle of Ashley Smith -- the
Atlanta woman freed by her kidnapper, after he murdered four people and
subsequent to her reading passages from Rick Warren's best selling
Christian self-help book The Purpose Driven Life to him -- few are
talking about the elephant in the room: the Christian right's vision of
transforming America into a Christian nation....(full
article)
Ghosts Don’t Exist and God is Dead!
by Gordon Johns
Today, I overheard
two regular sorts of people talking about the “Amityville Horror” movie
that was just released. One man, a large straight-laced self-proclaimed
Christian with racist tendencies stated, “that’s a bunch of garbage,
ghosts don’t exist!” In which an attractive female replied, “How do you
know?” I was staring at the two and they must have noticed because the
women asked, “what?” I blurted out some simple reply like “oh nothing”,
but then I thought about it and asked the Christian man two simple
questions that upset him greatly and instantly:....(full article)
Ratzinger’s Plan to Hide the Pedophiles
by Mike Whitney
The
U.K. Observer has produced evidence that the new Pope Benedict XVI
was directly involved in obstructing justice in the investigation of
pedophile priests.
The article, “Confidential letter reveals Ratzinger ordered Bishops to
keep allegations secret,” details how Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger “issued an
order ensuring the church’s investigations into sex abuse claims be carried
out in secret.” (The Observer, April 24, 2005) The order was sent to
American bishops in May 2001 and “asserted the church’s right to hold its
inquiries behind closed doors and keep the evidence confidential for up to
10 years after the victims reached adulthood.” (18 years old) What right would that
be? The right to protect the Catholic Church from the lawsuits of
psychologically damaged victims? Or the right to ignore the laws of the host
nation in which the pedophile priests were serving? (full
article)
A
Shriek in the Wilderness
by Minna vander Pfaltz
...But the hue and cry of
more rigorous intellectuals -- that Creationism is unfounded, poor science
-- misses the point of Creationism and the extremities of religious
intolerance: why is it being propounded? Why is it being forced, by law,
onto the rest of the American world (to begin with)? Their agenda has been
made quite plain: dominate and destroy. But there is more to it than
this....(full article)
The Senator vs. the Narc Pirates of
Highway 281
Legalizing Law Enforcement in the South Texas Drug Wars
by Greg Moses
South Texas seems an unlikely place for
boosting people's rights during an age when everywhere else people's
rights are coming down. But once you think about it, of course it makes
sense that wherever an entire geographical region is subjected to the
experience of lockdown, there might be the precise place to look for
practical resistance rising.
And if you're going to have a
Texas-sized fight between people-power and self-made mercenaries who run
around dressed in trappings of state why not have that fight in the boot
tracks of a homeland security stomping grounds, along two state highways
that shoot a hundred miles North from the Mexican border cities of Reynosa
and Matomoros? (full article)
The Nuclear Option” and the One Party
State
by Paul Street
America’s wacky
right wing party and political system doesn’t get much worse than this. On
Sunday, the Republican United States Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist
(R-Tennessee) appeared on a national evangelical Christian television show
that depicted Democrats as being against religious believers. Frist’s
remarks appeared as part of a “Justice Sunday” telecast titled “The
Filibuster Against People of Faith.” “Justice Sunday” is set up by the
Family Research Council, a Washington-D.C.-based right wing lobbying group
that is helping lead a reactionary “Christian” campaign to impose
right-wing political dominance over the federal judiciary. The Sunday
broadcast denounced the Democrats for using the 200-year old Senate
filibuster procedure to block the appointment to federal judicial
positions of nominees who oppose abortion rights as a matter of moral and
religious principle. It’s a bit of an odd role for Frist, who has not been
as strongly associated with the Christian rights as his more messianic
fellow Republican leaders House Majority Whip Tom Delay (R-Texas) and
President George W. Bush (R-Texas). “With his patrician bearing and
background in the relatively liberal Presbyterian Church,” the New York
Times noted last Friday, “Dr, Frist, a Harvard-trained transplant
surgeon, does not fit in as naturally with Christian conservatives as
President Bush.”....(full article)
April 25
Let’s Let Atheists Back into Politics
by Mike Whitney
There’s simple rule for atheists and
agnostics in America: keep your head down and your mouth shut.
I recently wrote
an article for Dissident Voice web site criticizing the new
Pope and organized religion. Boy, did the brickbats start to fly. Many
were put off by my assessment of the Pope as right-wing extremist who will
undoubtedly lead the papal caravan back to the 13th century. More were
offended by my dismissive remarks about religion. Why? Is it such a
stretch to acknowledge that someone may have an opinion that veers from
the majority? (According to the latest polls, 90% of Americans believe in
God) Or, is it simply because atheists and their unwelcome worldview offer
a real challenge to people of faith? (full
article)
Canada’s Oil Invasion
by Kim Petersen
The world’s largest known hydrocarbon
resource is neither in Iraq nor in Saudi Arabia. The oil sands in the
western Canadian province of Alberta comprise the largest known
hydrocarbon reserves -- estimated at over 300 billion barrels of currently
recoverable oil. The oil sands contain bitumen, a viscous mixture of
hydrocarbons that requires melioration into crude oil before it can be
refined into various fuels. Recovery of the oil is energy intensive,
environmentally disruptive, and expensive (although the soaring cost of
oil is making extraction more profitable). The oil sands are found in
three different deposits in northern Alberta: Athabasca, Peace River and
Cold Lake. Situated east of Peace River is the 10,000 square kilometer
traditional territory of the Lubicon Lake First Nation, a Cree community
of about 500 people. The community was overlooked when the federal
government sought treaties with First Nations in the area in 1899. Since
then, the federal government has neglected its responsibility to look
after the best interests of the Lubicon while the Alberta government began
to sell off the resources to corporate interests....(full
article)
Minuteman Project to Confront Foreign
Capital
by Seth Sandronsky
In 2005, the global
economy makes people move. They are part of a migrant job market within
and between all nations. These children, women and men seek jobs because
of poor work opportunities at home. Some call this freedom. It is not
for them but good enough for other folks. Consider some migrant laborers
who travel the U.S. Mexican border. They have been meeting a new force
there. It goes by the name of the Minuteman Project, comprised of
volunteers. The MP’s mission is to defend the U.S. border. Soon the MP
will expand its mission from intercepting foreign workers to slowing
foreign capital. This money has been flooding into the U.S. below the
political radar screen of public sentiment. The time for financial flood
control is here, according to the MP. Its mission creep is striking fear
into the hearts of overseas investors whose excess cash has been funding
the American nation’s federal deficit....(full
article)
GOP to Stake Exclusive Claim to Earth's
Sun
by Arthur Creosote
(Associated Depressed Newswire)
In
a further attempt to conserve the nation’s energy supply and to lower
skyrocketing gas prices, Tennessee Republican Senator Bill Frist has
introduced legislation in the Senate that would mandate that the Earth’s
rotation be stopped permanently so that the United States has daylight 24
hours a day, seven days a week. President George W. Bush has vowed to sign
the proposal into law if passed....
(full
article)
April 22
An Earth Day Irony:
Environmentalists Against
Nature
by Joshua Frank
Earth Day is finally here, and it's always
nice to say thank you to those enviros out there that work day in and day
out to protect our natural environment. So here's a short excerpt from
Left Out! -- and
a big thanks to the Sierra Club, for, well, not much!....(full
article)
*
Blog Entry of the Day:
Dissident Voice contributing writer Leilla Matsui has an on-line
journal,
Rage
Against the Washing Machine. Here's an entry on "conservative" nutcase
Ann Coulter that tickled our fancy....(full
slam)
Howard Dean Becomes Leader of the Other
Pro-War Party
Dean on Iraq: “We're There and We Can't Get Out”
by Kevin Zeese
It didn't take long.
The former anti-war presidential candidate has now become the
pro-occupation leader of the Democratic Party. Just when a majority of the
public is saying the Iraq War is not worth it, Howard Dean the new leader
of the Democratic Party is saying: “Now that
we're there, we're there and we can't get out.”....(full article)
Why “Inside-Outside” is
Getting Nowhere
Backing Democrats Has Pulled the
Antiwar Movement to the Right
by Elizabeth Schulte
Elizabeth Schulte explains why the antiwar
movement has to remain independent from the Democratic Party....(full
article)
What Kind of Movement Do
We Need?
Attempts to Limit Debate Only Weaken Antiwar Organizing
by Alan Maass
The U.S. occupation of Iraq, now more than
two years old, remains the defining issue in world politics. More than
100,000 Iraqi civilians are dead -- so are more than 1,500 U.S. soldiers.
The Abu Ghraib abuse scandal has exposed the U.S. government’s use of
torture around the world. Every one of George Bush’s justifications for
the invasion has been exposed as a lie, and his approval ratings have hit
a new low. So why is the antiwar movement not growing? (full
article)
April 21
The Truth About the “Ricin Cell”: There
Was No Ricin and No Cell
by Milan Rai
On 13 April, an
Algerian asylum-seeker named Kamel Bourgass was found guilty of plotting
to use poisons to cause a “public nuisance” in Britain. This rather minor
offense has been blown up into a national crisis by the British
Government, the police, the intelligence services, and the mass media, in
yet another example of “counter-terror” scaremongering. At the start of
the misnamed “ricin affair” in January 2003, the public was told that an
al Qaeda cell had been arrested before it could launch a terrorist attack
using the chemical weapon “ricin”. The public was told that the police had
discovered traces of ricin in the flat used by the cell. It has now been
established that there was no “ricin” and no “cell”....(full
article)
In Britain, An Absurdity: Persuading
People They
Have a Political Choice
by John Pilger
A familiar, if desperate media push is under
way to convince the British people that the main political parties offer
them a democratic choice in the general election on 5 May. This
demonstrable absurdity became hilarious when Tony Blair, leader of one of
the nastiest, most violent right-wing regimes in memory, announced the
existence of "a very nasty right-wing campaign" to defeat him. If only it
was that funny. If only it was possible to read the "ah but" tributes to a
"successful" Labour government without cracking a rib. If only it was
possible to read warmongers bemoaning the "apathy" of the British
electorate without one's laughter being overtaken by the urge to throw
up....(full article)
Uncle Sam Would Be a Good
Used Car Salesman:
How America Maintains its Hegemony Both Military and Economically
by Igor Volsky
Progressive policy critics
and moderate government insiders have long cautioned against a sustained
American presence in the Middle East. American encroachment, they warn,
radicalizes young Muslim fundamentalists and substantiates Bin Laden’s
message of religious Jihad. Administration officials dismiss these critics
publicly (although rare words of candor do sometimes escape -- CIA Chief
Goss admitted that the Iraqi invasion has made America less safe) but
concede their points privately. Ambitions of U.S. hegemony and supremacy
however supersede security concerns. Ideological ambition to “maintain a
lock on the world’s energy lifeline and potentially deny access to its
global competitors” (like China) is priority number one for American
policy makers. Control and access can be maintained in two ways --
military and economically....(full article)
Does the Resistance Target Civilians?
According to US Intel,
Not Really
by M. Junaid Alam
The ceaseless demonization of Iraqis
committed to ending foreign control of their country is a key ideological
crutch for maintaining the American occupation. Smearing the armed
resistance as a band of murderous thugs is well understood by American war
planners to be a crucial part of effective counter-insurgency work.
Obviously, brutal and horrific attacks on Iraqi civilians have been
carried out by some forces claiming to be a part of the resistance. But
there is strong evidence from US government and independent intelligence
data suggesting that this phenomenon has been wildly exaggerated and torn
out of context, creating a false public perception that serves to prop up
domestic support for the occupation....(full article)
How to Unpickle a Nation
(Satire)
by St-Saulte Petre
The outcries at yet another outrage by
terrorists results in sending more troops somewhere. As this was the war
whoop for Vietnam, it is no wonder that a few Army Intelligence Officers
in their plush offices deep in the bowels of the Pentagon, which was not
gutted by terrorists, are having second thoughts. As the CIA has engaged
in the use of liars, cheats, drug dealers, ex-murderers and other scum of
the earth in their never ending quest for intelligence, I suggest the
Armed Forces do the same. There is, however, no need to scour the streets
for likely suspects, they are conveniently located under one roof, as it
were: the U.S. prison system....(full article)
Opening ANWR to Development Could Lead to
“Exxon Valdez” Type of Disaster, Activist Claims
by Jason Leopold
It's
true that thousands of caribou and other types of wildlife will be
displaced if Washington D.C. lawmakers pass a measure to allow drilling in
the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. But there's an even bigger issue
floating under the radar: the very real possibility of an environmental
tragedy that could be as catastrophic as the 1989 oil spill caused by the
Exxon Valdez oil tanker if swift measures aren't taken to address severe
safety and maintenance issues plaguing drilling operations in nearby
Prudhoe Bay -- North America's biggest oil field, 60 miles west of ANWR --
and other areas on Alaska's North Slope. That's just one of many alarming
claims that employees working for BP, the parent of BP Exploration
(Alaska) Inc., the Anchorage company that runs the 24-year-old Prudhoe Bay
on behalf of Phillips Alaska Inc., Exxon Mobil and other oil companies,
have made over the years as a way of drawing attention to the dozens of
oil spills -- three of which occurred between March and April alone --
that could boil over and happen at ANWR if BP continues to neglect safety
issues and the area is opened up to further oil and gas exploration....(full
article)
++ ANOTHER
FASCIST BEHIND THE PULPIT ++
 Pope
Ratzinger: More “Pie-in-the-Sky” for
the Struggling Masses
by Mike Whitney
Marx was wrong. Religion isn’t the “opium of the masses.” Its effects are
never that benign. No, religion is a shackle clasped to the mind of man,
keeping him from utilizing the one thing that lifts him above the
primordial swamp of fear and superstition -- his inquiring mind. The
appointment of the new pope, Joseph Ratzinger, guarantees that that mental
shackle will be cinched up a notch or two, and the papal caravan that’s
winding back to the Dark Ages will steadily gain in momentum. Wherever we
look, the institutions that protect secular democracy are being uprooted
from their moorings and tossed on the slagheap. A right-wing ideologue
like Pope Benedict XVI just puts the finishing touches on a global system
that’s already dominated by Islamic fanatics, Jewish settler-extremists
and Christian fundamentalists all brandishing the same cudgel of
intolerance and all eager to force “infidels” to conform to their twisted
doctrine....(full sermon)
Pope Benedict XVI's Questionable
Qualifications
by Bill Berkowitz
If Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger's involvement
with the Hitler Youth and his stonewalling of the pedophile priests
scandal aren't enough to disqualify him from becoming pope, what would? (full
sermon)
The New Pope and Journalism’s Crisis of
Faith
by Norman Solomon
The papacy of Benedict XVI confronts
journalists with a key question: How much critical scrutiny is appropriate
when a religious leader gains enormous power?
So
far, most American media outlets seem to be walking on eggshells to avoid
tough coverage of the new pope. Caution is in the air, and some of it is
valid. Anti-Catholic bigotry has a long and ugly history in the United
States. News organizations should stay away from disparaging the Catholic
faith, which certainly deserves as much respect as any other religion. At
the same time, the Vatican is a massive global power. Though it has no
army, it is more powerful than many governments. And in the present day,
the headquarters of the Roman Catholic Church is the capital of political
reaction garbed in religiosity. Many dividing lines between theology and
ideology have virtually disappeared....(full
revelation)
The Papal Aristocracy:
Confessions of a Nonbeliever
by Jack Random
It is typically American to fawn over the
ritual pageantry of crowning a new Pope. For though, as a nation of
immigrants and usurpers, we have thrown off the yoke of royalty,
aristocracy, monarchy and most of the spectacle that attends such elitism,
it is as if we continually yearn for that lost part of ourselves that we
excised like a cancer in the war for independence. Like the melancholy
Edmund Burke, we crow in eternal sorrow, “The age of chivalry is dead!” I
do not share the obsession. I prefer the theatre of realism, the comedy of
the absurd, and the drama of existentialism to the spectacular illusions
of the Royal Court. I am no fan of the grand musicals of a forgotten time.
I do not yearn for the age of romance or chivalry or heroism for I
recognize that the very concepts were not only lies but malevolent lies
employed in the exploitation of human kind. I am frankly embarrassed by
the idolatry of the people for all things royal....(full
confession)
-- Song Lyrics of the Day --
AntiPope
by The Damned (from "Machine Gun
Etiquette", 1979)
I'm going back
to church tonight
Just like back when I was eight
But I don't mean to pray
I'm gonna nick the collection plate
I've got nothing against church
Only people who go there
and show they're
Plain ignorant and don't understand
a congregation at weekends won't change their behaviour
So many people are weak enough to have
to seek answers from the peddlers of hope
I should know
I had to go there myself
Not since the day I became antipope
There's gonna be some fun tonight
Spread the news around the town
That the vicar's a transvestite
With a fetish for robes and gowns
I've got nothing against church
Only people who go there
and show they're
Plain ignorant and don't understand
a congregation at weekends won't change their behaviour
So many people are weak enough to have
to seek answers from the peddlers of hope
I should know
I had to go there myself
Not since the day I became antipope
Religion doesn't mean a thing
Its just another way of being right wing
I think sex films are okay
I don't dig that pope no way
I've got nothing against church
Only people who go there
and show they're
Plain ignorant and don't understand
a congregation at weekends won't change their behaviour
So many people are weak enough to have
to seek answers from the peddlers of hope
I should know
I had to go there myself
Not since the day I became antipope
* * * * * Amen * * * *
Eating Profit: Frustrations of the
Salmon-Farming Industry
by Kim Petersen
In the west coast of Canada, biologist
Alexandra Morton warned about salmon farms acting as a conduit for sea
lice infestation of wild salmon. Sea lice infestation has been associated
with the annihilation of wild salmon. The salmon world is abuzz again with
corroborative research published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B
in late March. The scientific conclusions set the salmon-farming operators
back on the defensive again. "The peer-reviewed primary scientific
literature on sea lice interactions between wild and farmed salmon in
British Columbia makes the following conclusions: (1) infection rates on
wild juvenile pink salmon were greater in salmon farming regions than in
regions without salmon farms; (2) within a salmon farming region most lice
on wild juvenile pink and chum salmon originated from farmed salmon; and
(3) transmission of lice from farmed to wild salmon leads to population
growth and spread of lice in wild salmon populations. Salmon aquaculture
likely has negative impacts on wild salmon populations and the next
scientific challenge is to quantify this impact." Mary Ellen Walling,
executive director of the British Columbia Salmon Farmers Association (BCSFA),
complained in an editorial that “when public scrutiny is driven by
activist agendas with little regard for the truth, companies, communities
and consumers are the losers.” The listed order is significant: companies
are primary with consumers listed last....(full
article)
The
Anti-Empire Report
"Revolution", Imperial
Arrogance, and Questions for God
by William Blum
William Blum on "revolutions" in Eastern
Europe, the Commission on
the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of
Mass Destruction report, Cuba, Social Security reform, questions for God,
and more....(full article)
Israel's Military "Justice" in the
Occupied Territories
by Neve Gordon
An Israeli Jew and a
Palestinian meet in transit right after having been sentenced in court.
The Palestinian asks the Jew how much time he's got. "Three years," says
the Jew. "The judge was relatively lenient, though, and took into account
that the guard who tried to stop me from robbing the bank didn't die from
his wounds. How much time did you get?"
"Seven years for driving without my headlights on," says the Palestinian.
"Wow! That is a hefty punishment," the Jew exclaims.
"On the contrary, my judge was also lenient. He noted that if I had been
caught driving without headlights during the night he would have sentenced
me to fifteen years."
Black humor like this circulated in Israel during the first intifada,
functioning as a coping mechanism for liberal sabras bewildered by the
egregious violations their country was perpetrating against Palestinians.
This particular joke alludes to the discriminatory and often absurd logic
of the military court system in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, a
system that is explored in depth for the first time in Lisa Hajjar's
Courting Conflict: The Israeli Military Court System in the West Bank and
Gaza....(full article)
Hitchens for the Hall of Fame?
by Omar Waraich
The May edition of Vanity Fair
nominated The Nation magazine publisher Victor Navasaky for its
Hall of Fame, but Omar Waraich argues it should be former leftist, now
neocon windbag Christopher Hitchens....(full
article)
April 19
Of the Black Man’s Burden
and White Pathology
by Rodney Foxworth
Rodney Foxworth offers a critique of
Dissident Voice contributing writer Joe Bageant's recent essay "Let’s
Drink to the Slobbering Classes": "Bageant, whose previous works
allowed him to advocate for the white lower-income laborer, giving them
voice and cadence without invoking images of shaved-hair adolescents or
Nazi Germany, betrayed my trust with this piece, an unfortunate, though
not entirely unforeseen occurrence. A self-described “godless commie” and
Virginian, Bageant asserts several postulates that appear beneath his
intellectual capabilities; as well, it seems with this piece Bageant took
for granted the relative diversity of the progressive community, for it is
fair to say that my white colleagues (and it does seem as though the left
is overwhelmingly “white”, but this is another topic to be discussed at
another time) would have allowed this bit of unfounded diatribe to go
unchallenged."....(full article)
Voltaire on Marla Ruzicka
by Richard Estes
As many of you probably already know, Marla
Ruzicka, a young American woman known for her tireless efforts to document
civilian casualties in Iraq and obtain US compensation for them, was
killed by a suicide bomber while traveling near a convoy along the
dangerous Baghdad airport road.
Ruzicka was truly
inspiring in her willingness to take
incomprehensible risks to assist some of the victims of the US
invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. It must be said, however, that her
political approach to the war in Iraq was fundamentally misguided, either
because, as suggested within
this very informative David Corn article, she acquiesced in the
inevitability of the occupation, or actually came around to supporting the
Occupation Authority against the resistance....(full
article)
April 18
Homegrown Terrorists and Homeland
Security
by Bill Berkowitz
Ten years after Oklahoma City, why doesn't
the Department of Homeland Security see America's homegrown right-wing
terrorists as a major threat? (full
article)
The Purveyors of Violence: The NY
Times in Falluja
by Mike Whitney
Cameras aren’t
allowed in Falluja. Neither are journalists. If they were then we would
have first-hand proof of America’s greatest war crime in the last 30
years: the Dresden-like
bombardment of an entire city of 250,000. Instead, we have to rely on
eyewitness accounts that appear on the internet or the spurious reports
that sporadically surface in the New York Times and Associated
Press. For the most part, the Times and AP have shown
themselves to be undependable, limiting their coverage to the details that
support the overall goals of the occupation. For example, in the last few
weeks both the NYT and the AP ran stories on the alleged
progress being made in Falluja. The AP outrageously referred to the
battered city as “the safest place in Iraq,” a cynical appraisal of what
most independent journalists have called nearly total destruction. One can
only wonder if the editors at the AP would approve of similar
security measures if they were taken in their own neighborhoods....(full
article)
When Media Dogs Don’t Bark
by Norman Solomon
By coincidence, the conflict between General
Motors and the L.A. Times went public just as a new report
highlighted the media clout of advertisers and other powerful interests in
business and government. The media watch group FAIR (where I’m an
associate) released the results of its fifth annual “Fear & Favor” report
on “how power shapes the news.” The FAIR report, by Peter Hart and Julie
Hollar, provides context with sobering information: “A survey of media
workers by four industry labor unions found respondents concerned about
‘pressure from advertisers trying to shape coverage’ as well as ‘outside
control of editorial policy.’ In May [2004], the Pew Research Center for
the People & the Press released a survey of media professionals that found
reporters concerned about how bottom-line pressures were affecting news
quality and integrity. In their summary ... Bill Kovach, Tom Rosensteil
and Amy Mitchell wrote that journalists ‘report more cases of advertisers
and owners breaching the independence of the newsroom.’” Among the
examples in the new “Fear
& Favor” report are these gems....(full
article)
Jefferson, Mao, and the Revolution in Nepal
by Gary Leupp
....Fear of Maoist revolution greatly
exceeds Washington’s concern about Nepal’s present human rights situation.
Thus while the U.S. and most of its allies have condemned the king’s coup
and reduced aid in its wake, US Ambassador Moriarty implies sympathy with
the king’s position. “We recognize,” he states, “that as of Jan 31, Nepal
didn’t really have a functioning multi-party democracy, it had a
multi-party government. We are worried that what is happening in the
interim will make it more difficult for the king to achieve these goals.”
But meanwhile the U.S. will manufacture thousands more M16 rifles promised
to the Royal Nepalese Army (RNA), hoping the political situation will
improve well enough for their delivery, and arguing that nothing could be
worse (more “terrific”) than a Nepal under the Red Flag....(full
article)
The Nuclear Option
by Patricia Goldsmith
It’s true that those
who cited moral values as their main concern did vote overwhelmingly for
Bush (80 to 18 percent), but the difference was no greater in 2004 than in
2000 and therefore could not explain the win. As time went by, it also
came to light that some of those citing moral values were in fact
Democrats coming from an entirely different ethical universe.
Nevertheless, both the media and the leadership of the Democratic Party
have taken up the cause of moral values with great fervor since the
election. After reading one Sunday opinion column after another
excoriating Democrats for their awkwardness in dealing with private
religious matters in public settings, it’s tempting to see a causal
relationship between media harping and Democratic compliance....(full
article)
Pentagon Private Accounts
by Seth Sandronsky
Oh say can we see
record federal deficits with no end in sight. What with big tax cuts for
corporations and millionaires as Operation Iraqi Freedom continues, and
energy-rich Iran menacing the American people, the time for fiscal
prudence is now. Fortunately, I have the key to this crucial shift in
public policy that involves a change in U.S. defense
spending. Patriotically, I follow in President Bush’s footsteps as he
pitches to save Social Security with personal accounts replacing part of
the current payroll tax. Plus my solution will also please those
all-important Wall Street financial firms in America’s money democracy:
private accounts for the Pentagon....(full
article)
The Contradiction of Supporting the
Troops, While Opposing Their Actions:
A Reply to Joshua Frank’s “Contradictions of the Anti-War Movement”
by Richard Moreno
Let me preface this
article by stating that I consider myself antiwar in the sense of being an
anti-imperialist and that I approach any military conflict from an
internationalist perspective. Accordingly, I believe that in an
imperialist war that we have no country, i.e., no "fatherland." From this
viewpoint, I will analyze Joshua Frank's article titled in part "Supporting
the Troops, While Opposing Their Actions" in the hope to demarcate two
lines within the antiwar movement: one liberal and chauvinistic at its
root and the other anti-imperialist and therefore genuinely
internationalist....(full article)
April 14-15
Screw You, Paul Volker!
by Mike Whitney
Ex-Fed Chairman Paul
Volker is just the latest of the political heavyweights to signal that the
American economy is headed for the rocks. Volker’s views appeared this
week in the Washington Post and are consistent with the other
predictions of doom now circulating in the media. In an article titled “On
Thin Ice” the former Fed master pointed to the “huge imbalances” that
are creating “circumstances as dangerous and intractable as any I can
remember.” Volker is a steadfast class warrior like his protégé Alan
Greenspan and is not easily disposed to lofty rhetoric or hyperbole. If he
says we’re in for trouble, you can bet he knows what he’s talking about.
Of course, in typical patrician style, Volker wagged his finger at middle
class workers, moaning, (Baby) “Boomers are spending like there’s no
tomorrow.” True, but is that the source of the America’s financial
dilemma, diminished personal savings? Not likely....(full
article)
The Fall of Saigon 1975: An Eyewitness
Report
by John Pilger
Saigon, April 1975. At dawn I was awake,
lying under my mattress on the floor tiles, peering at my bed propped
against the French windows. The bed was meant to shield me from flying
glass; but if the hotel was attacked with rockets, the bed would surely
fall on me. Killed by a falling bed: that somehow made sense in this, the
last act of the longest-running black farce: a war that was always
unnecessary and often atrocious and had ended the lives of three million
people, leaving their once bountiful land petrified....
(full
article)
The Case Against Alan Dershowitz
Public Committee Against
Torture in Israel vs. Dershowitz
by Regan Boychuk
Alan Dershowitz is a
well-known lawyer and professor at Harvard law school, a prolific author,
and makes regular appearances in the media. When it comes to Israel, he is
particularly outspoken and taken quite seriously within certain segments
of the North American mainstream. Whether he deserves to be taken
seriously is another issue altogether. In a recent talk at York University
in Toronto, Canada, Professor Dershowitz repeated many of the
controversial claims of his recent book, but one struck me as -- even by
his standard -- exceptionally far-reaching. In the course of arguing that
Israeli authorities no longer torture Palestinians, Dershowitz claimed he
had a long conversation with the Israeli human rights organization, Public
Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI), in which PCATI not only
conceded that there was no longer any torture for them to investigate, but
that they refused to change their name because it helped them attract
media attention....(full article)
Pointless Political Parlor Game,
American-Style
by Mark Drolette
For over two centuries now, a favorite
pastime in which Americans have partaken shortly after each presidential
election has been to predict the major political parties’ standard bearers
for the next quadrennial go-round. The current version is already
underway, but because, as you know, our presidents these days are
pre-determined, it’s done now purely for nostalgia’s sake. No matter.
Detailed below are my best guesses as to who will next occupy the White
House come January 2009, but only, of course, after Americans have first
dutifully engaged in a tradition now rendered quaint (like some Geneva
Conventions): “voting,” a feel-good process consisting of utilizing
inactive screens on electronic boxes that has no actual bearing on who is
eventually declared president or king or whatever it’s called by then. The
astute observer will notice my leading picks are all members of the Bush
family....(full article)
Courting Armageddon
How the Bush Administration’s
Biological Weapons Buildup Affects You
by Heather Wokusch
News that a U.S. company recently
sent vials of a 1957 pandemic flu strain to
laboratories across the world by accident is only the latest outrage from
the billion-dollar boondoggle called the federal biological weapons
program. As you might recall, the Bush administration started its
“biodefense” spending spree following the September 2001 deadly anthrax
attacks, and one of its
first projects was to genetically engineer a
super-resistant, even more deadly version of the anthrax virus. Our
leaders are nuts.
Unfortunately,
Project Jefferson has good company. A US Army scientist in Maryland is
currently trying to
bring back elements of the 1918 Spanish flu, a virus
which killed 40 million people. And a virologist in St. Louis has been
working on a
more lethal form of mousepox (related to smallpox)
-- just to try stopping the virus once it’s been created....(full
article)
The Pathology of
Government-Funded Research
The University's Biocontainment Lab:
Coming to a Neighborhood Near You!
by Zbignew Zingh
The federal government has set out to build
a network of biodefense laboratories on the campuses of America's
universities. The Department of Health & Human Services (DHHS), the
National Institute of Health (NIH) and the National Institute of Allergy
and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) have dangled grant-bait in front of
cash-strapped universities. The goal is to build a national and regional
consortium of universities and “complementary research institutions” to
develop therapies, vaccines and diagnostics for certain “priority
pathogens and emerging infectious diseases.” From New England to
California to Hawaii, universities have been tempted with $25 million
grants to build these laboratories on their own campuses. What is
happening at the University of Washington is an example of what might be
happening at a college campus near you....(full
article)
Fallujah: Dresden in Iraq
by Ken Sanders
Although studiously ignored by the
mainstream news media, last month came reports that the U.S.
used napalm and chemical weapons in its assault upon the city of Fallujah.
The assault of November 2004 resulted in the near-total destruction of the
city, as well as the deaths of thousands of non-insurgent Iraqi civilians.
If the reports about napalm and chemical weapons are true, not only would
the U.S. be in violation of international law, it would be guilty of the
very crimes against humanity that it previously leveled against Saddam
Hussein and used as a justification for invading Iraq....
(full
article)
An Amoral
Morality Play
by James Charles
Republicans present the left with a major,
strategic and tactical problem: How to regain control of the political
process without collapsing into their own brand of fringe politics....(full
article)
How US Anti-War Activists Can Help Topple
the Empire:
Theories and Tactics for the Movement
by Virginia Rodino
At the end of last month, the Third Cairo
Conference was held in Egypt. Under a banner that read, “The International
Campaign Against the Occupation of Palestine and Iraq,” the conference
brought together an impressive swathe of political trends and groups,
including Islamists, Arab nationalists, socialists, students, elected
officials, and workers. This unity has been critical in building the local
Egyptian anti-war and globalization movement, and is a lesson often lost
with U.S. organizers. Because of the broad coalition building, it is
increasingly difficult for Mubarak’s regime to repress the Left in Egypt.
The growing strength of the Left, in turn, has given confidence to the
larger population, as can be witnessed by the several-months occupation of
workers in an asbestos factory, and the uprisings of peasants in the
countryside over land disputes. The Cairo Conference organizers
distinguished several major events in the Middle East that had occurred
since the previous conference in December 2002. These events are important
for we in the U.S. anti-war movement to also note....(full
article)
Contradictions of the
Antiwar Movement
Supporting the Troops While Opposing
Their Actions
by Joshua Frank
On
Saturday November 6, 2004, US forces pounded Fallujah and razed a civilian
hospital. “Witnesses said only a facade remained of a small Emergency
Hospital in the centre of the city,” reported the BBC News on the day of
the military blitz. “A nearby medical supplies storeroom and dozens of
houses were also damaged as US forces continued preparing the ground for
[the upcoming] major assault.” The catastrophe happened only days after
the US Presidential Election and the antiwar movement was still mourning
the triumph of George W. Bush's War Party. Needless to say, the movement
wasn't moved to action even though US troops had committed a blatant war
crime. For the Geneva Conventions are quite clear that the bombing of
hospitals constitutes as such a crime....(full
article)
Behind the Smokescreen of the Gaza
Pullout
by Tanya Reinhart
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon traveled
to the USA as a hero of peace, as if he had already evacuated Gaza and
only the follow-up remained to be worked out. What has completely
disappeared from the public agenda is what is happening meanwhile in the
West Bank. The media continue to deluge us daily with disengagement
storms, like the
Nitzanim bubble. But for now the disengagement plan exists only on
paper. On the ground, no settler has yet received compensation. Even those
who agreed to accept compensation are now waiting, because if they have a
chance to get Nitzanim -- the pearl of Israeli real estate -- why hurry?
In the meantime, three and a half months before the projected date of
evacuation, it is still not clear where the evacuees will be housed until
the discussions regarding their final relocation destination are
concluded. Contrary to the prevailing impression, no infrastructure has
been set up even for their temporary dwellings. “The Settlement Department
of the Jewish Agency, responsible for providing the ‘caravillas’ [the
caravans that were supposed to host the evacuated settlers temporarily]
has so far received no order from the government.” (Yediot Ahronot,
8 April 2005)....(full article)
Papal Shortcomings
by Igor Volsky
Igor Volsky explores the late Pope John
Paul’s shortcomings as they relate to liberation theology and the
empowerment of Latin American peasants....
(full
article)
A Pornographic Celebration of Death
by Sheila Samples
Sheila Samples on CNN's wall-to-wall
coverage of the Pope's funeral and the unsavories it glossed over, and the
gang of modern day international Pharisees led by George Bush that
gathered in hypocritical attendance....
(full
article)
UC Threatens Service Workers, Says
Planned Strike is Illegal
by Matthew Cardinale
Upper-level UC administrators have issued
intimidating statements threatening disciplinary actions against 7,300
janitors, cafeteria workers, and other AFSCME service workers at UC
campuses statewide, as these workers prepare for a joint day of strike
today, April 14, 2005....(full
article)
April 12
Let’s Drink to the Slobbering Classes
A sordid tale of work release, hyenas and liberal weakness
by Joe Bageant
The neoconservatives
have been much aided by middle class liberals who find it easier to
confront racism and homophobia than to face down their own latent class
prejudices. Liberal issue and identity politics are the best things that
ever happened to the Republican Party. It is often much easier for
liberals to empathize with poor blacks with whose experience they share
relatively little than the poor working class whites, who are just a
little too close to home.
Then too, once a
family makes it into the true middles class and is sending all of its kids
to university, etc., it is easy to become convinced that class struggle is
a thing of the past. Hell, I even managed to convince myself of that for a
few years before they kicked me out of the middle class. Again. Of course
the same pack of capitalist hyenas that have always waited in the bushes
by civilization’s roadside never went away. Now they are slinking out to
pick off the weakest among us. The sick, the uneducated, people of color.
So far though, most middle class liberals seem contented to blink and
stand back watch the hyenas feast upon the workingman. No way they are
gonna get into the thick of it, no way are they going to drink
Budweiser....(full article)
Exchange on
“Diagnosing
the Green Party”
by Scott McLarty and Joshua Frank
Joshua Frank's not-so flattering diagnosis
of the Green Party in a DV article posted in February elicited the ire of
many Green Party activists and leaders. In this exchange, Green Party
Media Coordinator Scott McLarty offers his critique of the article,
followed by Frank's reply....(full
exchange)
Undermining Civil Society:
David Horowitz's Corrosive
Projects
by Paul de Rooij
In a democratic and civil society, one
expects a free exchange of ideas, respect for the opinion of others, and
it is taken for granted that all members of society are able to air their
views without fear. It is also assumed that most members of the society
have the potential to remain well informed. Without this basis, the notion
that a society can make the least-worst collective decisions or retain a
modicum of civility will be undermined. Although the United States used
to trumpet the glory of its democracy and the related freedoms, it is
disconcerting to find many developments that are hostile to the
aforementioned assumptions. All of the following are detrimental to a
civil society: truculent right-wing radio-talk shows, the sensationalist
Springer-type talk shows, Fox News, . . . and David Horowitz's projects.
This article examines the pernicious nature of some of Horowitz's
projects, and it attempts to explain what role they may play in the United
States today. An evaluation of these projects should also put into
context Horowitz's campaign for an "academic bill of rights."....(full
article)
Thugs Attack Federal Judges!
by James Charles
No, we’re not talking about the judge shot
in Atlanta or the murder of a judge’s family in Chicago. The judiciary in
America is being mugged by Republican zealots on Capitol Hill, led by
their very own monsta rappas, Tom DeLay and John Cornyn....(full
article)
Rehearsals for the Rapture
Will Christian Zionists and radical right wing Jewish groups head to
Israel to disrupt the dismantling of Gaza settlements?
by Bill Berkowitz
In mid-February,
Israel's parliament backed Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to withdraw
from the Gaza Strip and four West Bank settlements. On March 15,
Ha'aretz, a daily Israeli newspaper, reported that "Settlers
protesting the disengagement plan brought rush-hour traffic to a
standstill in south Tel Aviv... when they blocked the Ayalon Highway at
the Kibbutz Galuyot junction and placed burning tires across the road."
(According to recent newspaper accounts, the 9,000 people affected by the
removal plan will receive nearly $900 million in compensation. But
removing the settlers will not be easy, as they have vowed to stand their
ground.) While the vote in parliament hasn't yet set off anything other
than a few disruptive demonstrations by anti-disengagement settlers and
their supporters, increased violent resistance may be in the offing.
Christian Zionists and radical right-wing Jews appear to be getting ready
to saddle up and head out to Israel to help the settlers halt the removal,
a process slated to begin in July....(full article)
TeenScreen: Angel of Mercy or Pill Pusher
by Evelyn J. Pringle
The question is what
is TeenScreen, an Angel of Mercy for suicidal teens, or a pill-pushing
front group for Pharma? After investigating the program, I'd have to say
the latter....(full article)
Unrest in Central Asia: Freedom's Shining
Hour?
by Simon Jones
March 24 saw the storming of Bishkek's
“Winter Palace” inaugurating what oppositionists there have called the
“tulip” revolution. This is a nod to Georgia's rose and Ukraine's orange
revolutions, which saw the ouster of admittedly corrupt authoritarian
regimes (Kuchma's chosen successor Yanukovitch and Georgia's
Shevardnadze). But just as Georgia quickly reverted to authoritarianism
and there is little evidence that Ukrainian corruption and stagnation are
easing (there is a Russian arrest warrant for its new PM for -- guess
what? -- corruption), Kyrgyzstan's moment of glory consisted more of
shadowy mafia figures and their paid goons attacking the President's home
and instigating the looting of a chain of stores owned by Akayev's son.
Hardly the stuff of legend....(full article)
Pope TV and the New World Media
by Mike Whitney
The 24-hour-a-day
“Pope-a-thon” shows the dramatic shift in the way that news is covered. If
a story is inoffensive to the political establishment or if it serves
their greater interests (like Schiavo) then it becomes an immediate
mega-story that swallows up most of the front page and consumes the
majority of TV time. In this way, the national dialogue is controlled by
PR firms working closely with Washington to decide what information is
suitable for public consumption. It’s perception management pure and
simple but, so far, it looks like a winning strategy. As many have already
noticed, the Iraqi bloodbath has been knocked out of the headlines and
consigned to page 14 next to the women’s lingerie adverts. In its place,
American’s are provided with diversionary Uber-stories of vegetative
housewives and dead Popes. There’s no chance that the four Marines who
died in insurgent attacks last Tuesday will appear on page one anymore,
nor will the 300,000 disgruntled Iraqis who paraded through Baghdad
yesterday calling for an end to the Occupation while burning Bush in
effigy. These are the unfortunate victims of the new media regime; a
system that dismisses inconvenient facts for the fairy-tales that support
the status quo. The new game plan is to sweep Iraq from the collective
consciousness and slow the steady erosion of public support for the
war....(full article)
Coexisting with a Rising China?
by Ivan Eland
The Bush administration is often guilty of
running a reckless, overly militaristic foreign policy but deserves
qualified praise for its recent dealings with China. The Chinese have
requested—and the United States has accepted—a regular dialogue at senior
levels to discuss security, political, and possibly economic issues. But
the administration must go farther than merely symbolic meetings in
accepting China’s rise—it must translate that new-found respect into real
world actions....(full article)
April 11
The Economic Tsunami: Sooner Than You
Think
by Mike Whitney
It seems that there
are a growing number of people who believe, as I do, that the economic
tsunami planned by the Bush administration is probably only months away.
In just five short years the national debt has increased by nearly $3
trillion while the dollar has continued its precipitous decline. The
dollar has fallen a whopping 38% since Bush took office, due largely to
the massive $450 billion per year tax cuts. At the same time, numerous
laws have been passed (Patriot Act, Intelligence Reform Bill, Homeland
Security Bill, National ID, Passport requirements etc) anticipating the
need for greater repression when the economy takes its inevitable
nosedive. Regrettably, that nosedive looks to be coming sooner rather than
later....(full article)
International Day of
Action Against Caterpillar:
A Call to Support Rachel Corrie & Her Family on April 13
by candio
Olympia friends and
supporters of Rachel Corrie and her family have called on concerned people
worldwide to join them in demonstrating on the International Day of Action
Against Caterpillar, April 13. They hope that a vigorous turnout will not
only send a strong message to Caterpillar but will also send a positive
message of solidarity with the Corrie family as they go forth with what is
sure to be a long and difficult landmark legal struggle against the
equipment manufacturer. Sustained vocal public pressure has been a key
factor in many of the smaller victories that the Corries have already won
on behalf of Rachel; and it is felt that what happens on the 13th will be
a factor in shaping the debate over corporate responsibility in the
future. On March 15, nearly two years after the killing of Rachel Corrie
under an American made, Israeli driven CAT D9 military bulldozer in the
Occupied Palestine Territories [OPT], Rachel’s parents, Craig and Cindy
Corrie, have pressed forward in their quest for accountability from
Caterpillar. With legal assistance from the Center for Constitutional
Rights [CCR], a suit was filed in U.S. District Court in Washington State
alleging that “Caterpillar Inc. violated international and state law by
providing specially designed bulldozers to Israeli Defense Forces [IDF]
that it knew would be used to demolish homes and endanger civilians.” The
Corrie family has also initiated historic lawsuits against the State of
Israel, the IDF and the Israeli Defense Ministry [IDM] for their role in
Rachel’s death....(full article)
Younger Workers and Social
Security
Privatization of the Program
Undermines their Future
by Seth Sandronsky
These are tough time
for many younger workers in the U.S. Real wages, what they can actually
buy with their pay, are falling. The costs of gas, health care and
shelter are climbing. Student loans to attend college are fueling debt for
younger workers. Meanwhile, workers age 20 to 24 got about 4% of the new
jobs created in the year ended March 2005 versus 42% for workers over age
55. Squeezed from many directions, some younger workers fear that Social
Security will not be around for their retirements. The Bush
administration is playing on that fear. It is fed by some reporting in
mass media. A Washington Post article said younger workers “have
the most to gain” from President Bush’s plan to create private accounts to
fund Social Security (3-15-05). A Christian Science Monitor article
said a change to private accounts from the current system of payroll taxes
would “sweeten the system for younger workers” (3-3-05). Both articles are
incorrect on private accounts for younger workers. How?
(full
article)
The Recruiter in Each of Us
by Susan Van Haitsma
The woman who sat
next to me during a recent Greyhound trip was a working class widow
returning to Michigan from San Antonio, Texas, where she had traveled to
attend her grandson's Air Force Academy graduation. She wore a sweatshirt
that read "Air Force Grandma" in star-spangled lettering, and she clutched
a cowboy hat, a parting gift from him. I told her that I was an Air Force
sister-in-law. When I asked why her grandson had chosen the military, she
hesitated a moment and said, "He's a good kid. His father pushed him to do
it because he was 22 and he didn't have a plan." Some enlist in the
military because it is a plan they have had for a while. But most enlist
because, like my seatmate's grandson, they don't have a clear direction in
life or there is trouble with the direction they've taken. A well-timed
pitch from a recruiter seems to provide the answers. In the United
States, where great value is placed on opportunity and personal freedom of
choice, how is it that young adults feel their options in life are so
limited, and why would they gravitate to an institution that suppresses
their own individuality? (full article)
Growling at Halliburton from the Belly of
the Beast
Houston Activists Target Shareholders Meeting in May
by Greg Moses
On April Fools Day in the
most obese and most polluted city in the USA (no wonder Houston is famous
for its cancer centers) Halliburton subsidiary KBR (Kellogg Brown & Root)
hosted an Open House for jobs. Come in they said and help yourself to a
tiny handful of cash from the billions we're scarfing up in Iraq alone.
All you have to do is switch off your conscience and give us what's left
over. In return we will fly you to the Baghdad Airport where you can join
our "Red
Neck Mafia" building Texas-style democracy for Iraqis while beating
the shit out of Mexicans that we will provide on site Easter Day. From
there you can join other mercenary forces such as security contractors
Custer Battles, Dynecorp, or Ultra Service where you will be taught
valuable skills for the new world order such as how to kill or be killed
while shredding human rights and disposing human remains. No it's not a
pretty picture, but it's a paycheck, and we have 30,000 employees over
there to prove that it can work for you....(full
article)
April 8
Destroy Abu Ghraib!
by Mike Whitney
This past weekend’s attacks on the Abu
Ghraib prison facility should be welcomed as a direct assault on the
foremost icon of Bush’s War of Terror. Abu Ghraib has the same meaning to
Iraqis as did the Bastille to the French prior to the Revolution: an
enduring symbol of arbitrary state power and cruelty. Under Saddam the
prison could be dismissed as the logical exponent of a tyrannical regime
bent on removing political opponents. Now, however, under the authority of
Bush and Rumsfeld, it has devolved into the torture-capital of the Middle
East, flaunting international law and ignoring even minimal standards of
human decency. Abu Ghraib is the epicenter of Bush’s new world barbarism,
a phenomenon that is extending its tentacles throughout the region....(full
article)
Suffer the Children
by Ken Sanders
Last week, the United States denied the
allegations of the United Nations' Special Rapporteur on the right to
food, Jean Ziegler, that the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq has doubled
malnutrition among Iraqi children. The Bush Administration criticized
Ziegler for "taking some information that in itself is difficult to
validate and juxtaposing his own views which are widely known about the
war in Iraq and suggesting the two are linked." It is, of course, richly
ironic that the Bush Administration, with an apparently straight face,
leveled such criticisms against Ziegler. After all, as most recently
reported by the presidential commission on intelligence leading up to the
Iraq invasion, the Bush Administration based its decision to invade Iraq
on information that could not be validated, principally because the
information was either blatantly false or "dead wrong.". . . . Regardless
of the Bush Administration's laughably hypocritical criticisms of
Ziegler's statements, Ziegler is not alone in blaming the U.S.-led
invasion of Iraq for increased rates of mortality and malnutrition among
Iraqis, children in particular. In fact, Ziegler's comments were not based
upon his own observations. Rather, they were based upon previous reports
by and findings of UNICEF, the World Food Program, and Johns Hopkins
University....(full article)
Calling Their Bluff: The Delay Scandal is
Not a Partisan Issue
by Joshua Frank
House Majority Leader Tom Delay of Texas is
currently taking heat for his association with Jack Abramoff, a well-known
DC lobbyist who is accused of bilking millions out of his Native American
clients. Currently Abramoff is under investigation by the Justice
Department as well as the Senate Indian Affairs Committee for the work his
lobbying gang did for seven different Indian tribes between 2000 and 2004.
Trouble is
Rep. Delay isn't the only Washington politician who has a sordid history
with Mr. Abramoff. According to federal disclosure reports, Montana
Senator Conrad Burns has received over $150,000 from the tribes during the
period Abramoff's cartel was representing their gaming interests....(full
article)
Star-Spangled America
by Walter Brasch
Jose Feliciano gave it a new beat. Roseanne
Barr shrilled it. And hundreds, maybe even thousands, of featured soloists
have bobbled it or failed to hit the high-G. “It” is the “Star-Spangled
Banner.” However, according to a recent Harris Poll, about two-thirds of
Americans don’t know all of the words or even the origin of the song that
became the National Anthem in 1931. Congress made that decision 117 years
after Francis Scott Key wrote new words for “To Anacreon in Heaven,”
written in the late eighteenth century, and which was probably an English
drinking song....(full article)
The Obliterator
by Theo Papathanasis
Among many reasons
for his being Republican, grand prize winner of the golden state of
California's zany 2004 gubernatorial game show, tinsel town glitteratus
Arnold Schwarzenegger gave: "Because Milton Friedman is right and Karl
Marx was wrong." If Friedman is right, the Bush tax cuts are great. "I am
in favor of cutting taxes under any circumstances and for any excuse, for
any reason, whenever it's possible," is how Friedman originally
promulgated a soundbite that's flowered into today's blatantly pro
commercial sector tax relief. That tax relief is the tax policy of the
Bush ownership society, a society composed, by definition, of "haves". To
use well-sampled wording from the 1997 US Space Command "Vision for 2020":
"The globalization of the world economy will also continue, with a
widening between 'haves' and 'have-nots'."....(full
article)
Bringing You the News -- Courtesy of the
Law of Opposites
and the Law of Silence
by John Pilger
Can you imagine the BBC and other major
broadcasters apologizing to a rogue regime which practices racism and
ethnic cleansing; which has "effectively legalized the use of torture"
(Amnesty); which holds international law in contempt, having defied
hundreds of UN resolutions and built an apartheid wall in defiance of the
International Court of Justice; which has demolished thousands of people's
homes and given its soldiers the right to assassinate; and whose leader
was judged "personally responsible" for the massacre of more than 2,000
people? Can you imagine the BBC saying sorry to Saddam Hussein's Iraq, or
other official demons, for broadcasting an uncensored interview with a
courageous dissident of that country, a man who spent 19 years in prison,
mostly in solitary confinement? Of course not. Yet, last month, the BBC
apologized "confidentially" to a regime with such a record, so that its
correspondent would be allowed back, having promised to abide by a system
of censorship that continues to gag the dissident. The regime is Ariel
Sharon's in Israel, whose war crimes, appalling human rights record and
enduring lawlessness continue to be granted a certificate of exemption not
only by the US-dominated west but by respectable journalism. The Blair
government's collusion with the Sharon gang is reflected in the BBC's
"balanced" coverage of a repression described by Nelson Mandela as "the
greatest moral issue of the age". Simon Wilson, the correspondent made to
apologize for a proper, important and long overdue interview with
Mordechai Vanunu, will know better in future....(full article)
April 5
--
Special Report --
Washington’s Darkest Secret
by James Charles
Until six weeks before 9/11, for nearly a
decade the CIA reportedly had a mole buried inside al Qaeda in a trusted
position close to Osama bin Laden. Suddenly, his reports stopped. The CIA
assumed that he was discovered, tortured and killed. Before he died, he
likely revealed 9/11 plans....(full
article)
Refocus Seal Intervention Where It
Belongs: Government Subsidies
by Lee Hall
Some boycott proponents,
before arriving as welfare observers at the scene of the hunt, displayed
unflattering photos and highly critical commentary about the workers who
do the killing, although these workers are subsidized to do it by the
Canadian government. And
that’s where activism belongs: squarely at the door of the government,
which sells fur skins to Norway, Greenland, Germany and other countries,
which sells seal flesh and offal to Europe and Asia, and which, since
1995, has spent tens of millions in Canadian dollars to subsidize seal
processing and develop new markets for seal products....(full
article)
A Virus Among Us
by Seth Sandronsky
Are liberals in
control? Do they really hurt the people they try to help? How you answer
depends on your definition of the “L” word. Once, to be a liberal meant to
privilege the market over people. So wrote Adam Smith, the guru of
capitalism, over two centuries ago. For him, liberalism was nations and
peoples pursuing their self-interest, or freedom, in the marketplace.
Thus freed, society would prosper. Currently, liberalism describes
policies or views that run counter to the market freedom that Smith
backed. His vision was the traditional meaning of liberalism. Today it
is actually the conservative, or free-market, approach....(full
article)
Hanoi Jane and the City of God
by John Chuckman
A while back Jane Fonda found a new ally in
her battle with being a decaying cutie-pie. Injections, face lifts, dye,
flaky philosophy, and many hours a day of aerobics were no longer enough
to hang on to even an out-of-focus resemblance to the poochy-lipped
mannequin of Roger Vadim's Barbarella. Jane found Jesus. Not just any
Jesus, but America's Jesus, the one who lets you be "born again," becoming
a child again, a strong sales point where adults are obsessed with youth
and living forever. Jane effectively committed herself to spending
eternity with the likes of Franklin Graham, Tammy Faye, and George Bush --
punishment enough I should think for far more than all her past
errors....(full article)
Executive Impunity
by Igor Volsky
On its surface, the final report of the
presidential commission on intelligence is another whitewash and rehash of
previous investigations into pre-war intelligence debacles. The president
appointed the commission reluctantly, delayed its final report
calculatingly and “did not authorize it to investigate how policy makers
had used the intelligence they received.” Yet a close read and a cursory
knowledge of modern political events still confirms the President’s role
in deliberate deception....(full article)
The Minuteman
Project: Gunning for Change but Shooting Blanks
by Joshua Frank
In an online recruiting effort that would
impress Joe Trippi, approximately 500 well- armed individuals known as The
Minutemen have come together in hopes they can guard the vast expanse of
the US-Mexican border out in Arizona. Their mission: Deter illegal
immigrants and protect these great United States of America....(full article)
Letters from Nowhere-Land
(fiction)
(Excerpt from a forthcoming novel)
by R. Faze
My Dear
Cousins,
By now you know something has
happened and not simply because it’s been a while since we wrote and even
longer since we’ve seen each other; long absences are part of life when
you are scattered around the world. So, I’ll tell you a few things about
what happened.
For the past two years, as you may have heard, I’ve been a freelance
writer. Not really much of a ‘real’ job. Definitely not something our
parents would approve of, what with the low pay, lack of benefits, the
uncertainty and all that. The newspaper that buys most of my articles, an
English language paper, called The Daily Gomi, is based in Tokyo.
The ‘gomi’ in the name means ‘garbage’; their slogan, printed in the top
left hand corner of the front page in boldface italics, in deep navy blue,
reads, “All the news that’s not, but said to be the news so we
print!”....(full essay)
The Schiavo Case's Intended and
Unintended Consequences
by Bill Berkowitz
Will the Rev. Jesse Jackson's appearance in
Florida on behalf of the Schindler family broaden the '"culture of life"
debate? (full article)
Terri Schiavo and the Battered Judiciary
by Mike Whitney
The portentous
comments of Tom Delay are critical in understanding the underlying agenda
of the Terri Schiavo affair. The Republican Congress has no more interest
in sustaining the life of a brain-dead patient on life-support than they
do of ameliorating the suffering of malnourished Iraqi children. They’re
just trying to augment Bush’s powers by bludgeoning the judiciary; that
explains why Delay and the rubber-stamp Congress have been enlisted to act
as a battering ram against so-called rogue judges. They’re simply doing
Bush’s dirty work....(full article)
Activist Judges
by Patricia Goldsmith
Whatever
else the sad case of Terri Schiavo represents, it marks the first time that
there has been mass awareness of the fact that we are living in an incipient
theocracy. Alarm bells started to ring when people saw all the big guns -- the
executive branch, Congress, the media -- pointing at one court deciding one
case in Florida. For the first time, people imagined themselves, rather than
some demonized other, clashing with an intrusive religious government --
with courts helpless to put a stop to it.
Tom DeLay’s official statement on Terri Schiavo’s death upped the ante: “The
time will come for the men responsible for this to answer for their
behavior, but not today.” DeLay obviously intends to start impeaching judges
with whom he disagrees on religious grounds, in defiance of our
constitutionally mandated separation of church of state....(full
article)
Pope John Paul II: The Full Legacy
Let us not ignore the facts in our efforts to be "politically correct"
by Katherine Brengle
Although the Pope's dedication to truly walking in the footsteps of Christ
is one of his legacies, there were many things the Pope believed and many
actions he took that do not jive with progressive politics. While many on
the left are celebrating his life and claiming progressive ideas as his
overwhelming legacy, there are quite a few facts that seem to be slipping
into the cracks....(full article)
John Paul II's
Economic Ethics
The departed Pope's vision of an alternative globalization should
challenge narrow debate about "moral values."
by Mark Engler
A steady feature in Pope
John Paul II's obituaries has been mention of his unwaveringly
conservative stances on issues such as abortion, birth control, gay
rights, and the ordination of women. While these positions were sources of
consternation for many American Catholics, they far from represent the
whole of John Paul's ethical beliefs. Particularly in his teachings about
the global economy, the Pope advanced a vision of social justice that
challenges narrow political debate about "moral values."....(full
article)
Super Duper George Bush
by Sheila Samples
So this guy
Zack says he's been watching me, and I'm at it again. He says the only
thing I'm good for is just one ad hominem attack after another on my
"favorite of scorn" (whatever that
is) -- George W. Bush. Zack says he'll give me $100 if I can write a piece
on Bush extolling a single aspect of his personality; if I can cite just
one credible attribute of his character or discuss even one good point
about Bush....(full article)
April 4
Does the US Really Need a Bigger
Military?
“Progressive” Dems Sound Like Conservative Repubs
as Draft Drums Beat Louder
by Kevin Zeese
The
debate over the size of the military inside the beltway is how to increase
the number of troops by 100,000, not whether to do so. At a recent debate
on the draft sponsored by the Center for American Progress, the views
ranged from reinstating the draft to enhancing economic incentives to
increase enlistment. Rather than questioning the administration's policy
of preemptive strikes, or the vast size of the military industrial complex
or urging cuts in the wasteful, redundant defense budget which consumes
half the federal budget's discretionary spending, the inside-the-beltway
crowd's analysis starts from the U.S. needing a larger military to achieve
its foreign policy and economic agenda. We should be asking: If the
largest military on the planet cannot achieve U.S. objectives, maybe we
need to question our objectives -- do we want the U.S. to be an empire? (full
article)
Overview: The Great Energy War
US & Allies Neutralized, World War III Ends
by John Stanton
The Treaty of
Jakarta, signed in 2045, brought an end to the global conflagration that
was World War III. That conflict saw the US, Pakistan, Israel, Japan,
Taiwan, England and Australia in bloody conflict against China, India,
Russia, France, Germany, Iran, Venezuela and Brazil. Other nations joined
the fray and formed uneasy alliances with one side or the other. For
example, Vietnam lent its considerable knowledge of combat against US
forces to China. Mexico took sides with the US and put its population
surplus at the disposal of the US military apparatus. The war killed
billions, put to waste and made uninhabitable sizeable areas of the globe,
and led to a global pandemic that killed millions more....(full article)
U.S. Human Rights Record (Flayed in
China)
by Mark Drolette
Remember when communists used to be our
mortal enemies? Now, apparently they’re our mortal friends, ‘cause if
weren’t for reds, particularly those of a Chinese bent, we’d be
hard-pressed to find anyone else to regularly
buy ever-riskier U.S. Treasury bonds to enable our continued borrowing
of over $1 billion a day to throw away on Iraq, make our aristocrats even
more aristocratic, and prop up a ridiculously unsustainable lifestyle
fostered by an infantile belief that we possess a birthright to
unrelentingly consume the world’s resources like the compulsive,
spiritually empty, wasteful automatons that we are but it still don’t
matter, dammit, ‘cause, you know, we’re, like, Americans. Plus, without
our good Chinese friends and their blessed abundance of
forced labor, not only would I not have been able to purchase about
95% of the goods I needed for my new apartment (precipitated by impending
Divorce Number Three; I plead guilty without an explanation), but the U.S.
would also be sans its new moral compass. You see, China recently issued
a report excoriating America for its human rights record. Yes, that
China....(full article)
Zimbabwe’s Very American Election
by Gene C. Gerard
Last week, the
African nation of Zimbabwe held parliamentary elections. It was viewed,
both within the country and by foreign observers, as a referendum on the
country’s elderly and dictatorial ruler, President Robert Mugabe, who has
been in power since 1980. Mr. Mugabe’s party, The Zimbabwe African
National Union-Patriotic Front, won 71 seats in the election, while the
opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change, garnered only 39.
Both the opposition party and independent observers have accused President
Mugabe of stealing the election. Morgan Tsvangarai, the leader of the
Movement for Democratic Change, said Mr. Mugabe won only through the use
of intimidation tactics and vote-rigging. The U.S. State Department called
the election “seriously flawed.” And Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice
stated, “the election was not free and fair.” Yet ironically, it appears
as if Zimbabwe’s election was very American-like, if our election in 2004
is any indication....(full article)
April 1
Website of the Week:
Against the Grain,
a radio program about politics, society and ideas. Contains audio files of
many recent and excellent programs.
Scumbag Prize of the Week:
Canada, which just kicked off its
annual massive hunt for
baby seals.
Take Action!
(video
report)
"Somehow, though,
charges of 'cruelty', 'barbarism' and the like have never quite resonated
with the sealers. Such terms have a plaintive, weepy ring that only plays
into their image of "outsiders" as soft and over-refined, and of
themselves as rugged and daring men. So this time around let us put the
point more plainly, in terms they will understand: The problem with
clubbing and skinning these most defenseless of creatures is not merely
that it is merciless. The problem is that it is low, dishonourable and
cowardly. These men are forever telling us to take a hard, unsentimental
look at the baby seals. They would do better to take a hard, unsentimental
look at themselves for once, for their country's sake and for their own."
-- Matthew Scully, former speechwriter for George W. Bush, author of
Dominion: The Power
of Man, The Suffering of Animals, and the Call to Mercy
(photo by International Fund for Animal
Welfare)
The White House Plays Extreme Dodge Ball
by James Charles
Unlike the 9/11 Commission, the presidential
commission charged to examine pre-Iraq war intelligence failures dodged
the ball. On the key, tough issues such as use of the intelligence and
White House pressure on analysts, the Silberman Commission avoided asking
the tough -- or the right -- questions. So once again, everyone is
responsible but no one is accountable....(full
article)
WMD Commission: Yet Another Intelligence
Failure
by Rahul Mahajan
The
"Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States
Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction" has done reasonably well what it
was created to do. Unfortunately, it was created to provide political
cover for the Bush administration in the middle of a scandal that dwarfs
Watergate, Iran-contra, and even Lewinsky-gate, but that, in contrast to
those events, has led to no in-depth investigation, minimal television
coverage, and hardly any calls for the heads responsible to roll. Think
back to late January 2004 and the preliminary report of the Iraq Survey
Group, which concluded that no weapons of mass destruction had been found
in Iraq. This came on top of what was by then a mounting wave of
revelations that the Bush administration had repeatedly and deliberately
deceived the American public -- and attempted to deceive the world --
about the evidence it claimed to have regarding Iraq's WMD....(full
article)
The Wild Palms of Etowah
In Praise of Holy Madness
by Joe Bageant
One
mark of our soulless New American Century is the lack of respect for
saintly madmen. By that I mean holy seers of the Blakean-Coleridge stripe
who could be found on America’s streets as recently as the hippy era. The
kind of crazy adepts and enlightened iconoclasts honored by Allen Ginsberg
and the beats, holy foolishness in the tradition of Saint Simeon with the
dead dog tied to his waist and throwing nuts at the congregation, or
Tibetan lama myonpas and India’s avadhutas. Perhaps such
holy madmen are still out there among the homeless and the crack whores.
Maybe there are legions of Zen alcoholics and the like, and maybe we have
lost the ability to see them in this season of imperial hubris, consumer
fatigue and existential numbness. But I don’t think so. I know crazy
wisdom and saintly madness in men’s eyes when I see it, and I am not
seeing it very often in America these days. It has been outlawed by the
Republicans and soundly condemned as Devil’s work by the Christian
Right....(full article)
US Intelligence “Dead Wrong”
by Joshua Frank
The
presidential Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United
States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction released its findings on March
31, and the jury is no longer undecided. The intelligence community was
“dead wrong” in almost all of its prewar claims leading up to the Iraq
invasion. Many of the failures
that the US encountered when selling the war on Iraq “are still too common”
says the report. The US government still knows “disturbingly little” about
global weapons threats, “and even less about the intentions of many of our
most dangerous adversaries.”....
(full article)
U.S. Army Sergeant Kevin Benderman Steps
Up to the Plate,
Conscientious Objector Status Pending
by Robert S. Finnegan
The ongoing saga of Sergeant
Kevin Benderman's denial regarding the legitimacy of war and his refusal
to participate in it has now crystallized into a war of words and
legalities, pitting his beliefs and first-hand battlefield knowledge
against an action by the U.S. Government and Army prosecutors who are
charging him with desertion for choosing to follow his conscience, in a
war declared illegal by U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan....(full
article)
The Starving of the Five (Hundred)
Thousand
by Ken Sanders
Ah, the hollow piety of the sanctimonious
and self-righteous. They who shout and weep, curse and pray, toot horns
and even juggle outside a Florida hospice where one very famous woman has
died, and several other less-known and therefore unimportant people,
gradually, slowly, and even painfully die. Sadly, none of them can die
peacefully so long as the circus from on high is in town....(full
article)
Terri Schiavo, 84,000 Black Men, and
Dominant Media's Selective Morality
by Paul Street
It's
instructive contrast to this short catalogue of dominant
U.S. media's savagely
selective morality: the death of Terri Schiavo versus recent reports
showing that unequal health care contributes to more than 100,000 black
Americans dying earlier than whites each year. Thanks to that media's
obsessive coverage of the Schiavo tragedy, nearly every moderately
cognizant American adult has an opinion on whether it is right for doctors
to act to release Schiavo from her dreadful vegetative state. Sadly, only
a small number of Americans have any kind of opinion on a recent report
showing that middle-aged black men are dying at nearly twice the rate as
white men of a similar age....(full article)
Lurching Toward Theocracy
by Bill Berkowitz
Are Milton Mayer's
conversations with Germany's “ordinary” Nazis, Frank Zappa's warning of a
theocratic America, and the Christian right's “Christian Nation” mantra
signs of a nation drifting towards theocracy? (full
article)
A Quarterly Report from Bush-Cheney Media
Enterprises
by Norman Solomon
The first quarter of 2005 brought
significant media dividends for the Bush-Cheney limited liability
corporation. Stakeholders received windfalls as mainstream news outlets
deferred to consolidation of power from the November election. A rollout
of new "democracy" branding -- kicked off by the State of the Union
product relaunch -- yielded at least temporary gains in psychological
market share. For instance, repackaging of images in the Middle East
implemented makeovers for several client governments. Actual democratic
threats, inimical to Bush-Cheney LLC interests, remain low....
(full
article)
More Articles
|
