A Controversial and/or Informative Site [Archive] - Page 25

Saundra Hummer

March 25th, 2008, 08:20 PM

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The Coming War on VenezuelaBy
George Ciccariello-Maher

4/03/08 "Counterpunch" --- - More than a year ago, I attended the official book release for the Venezuelan edition of Eva Golinger's Bush Versus Chávez, published by Monte Avila, and the book had previously been printed in Cuba by Editorial José Martí. I recount this to make the following point: long before the publication of Bush Versus Chávez in the current English-language edition, the book was already a crucial contribution to international debates regarding United States' efforts to destroy Venezuela's Bolivarian Revolution.

In choosing to publish the English edition of the book, Monthly Review Press has opened that debate to an entirely new audience, and for this we should be grateful. Furthermore, in an effort to streamline production, Monthly Review has further made the appendices to Bush Versus Chávez, largely composed of declassified or leaked documents, available publicly on its website, at the address: http://monthlyreview.org/bushvchavez.htm.

A New Toolbox
Golinger, a U.S.-born lawyer who has recently taken up full-time residence in Venezuela (and Venezuelan citizenship), first shot to prominence with her 2005 book The Chávez Code: Cracking U.S. Intervention in Venezuela. There, Golinger drew on a multitude of documents requested via the Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA) to thoroughly and convincingly document the role of the U.S. government in funding and sponsoring those Venezuelan opposition groups that participated in the undemocratic and illegal overthrow of Chávez in April 2002, most of which also signed the interim government's Carmona Decree which dissolved all constitutionally-sanctioned branches of Venezuelan power. All this against Condoleezza Rice's recent claim, patently preposterous, that "we've always had a good relationship with Venezuela."

In Bush Versus Chávez, Golinger continues this diabolical narrative, this time relying less on FOIA requests than on a series of other key documents and bits of testimony gleaned from anonymous sources. After the failed 2002 coup, Golinger documents how the United States changed its tack slightly, drawing upon the variety of experiences gained in the military overthrow of Salvador Allende in Chile and the electoral overthrow of the Nicaraguan Sandinistas. While it would be easy to say that this represented a "Nicaraguanization" of U.S. policy in the aftermath of the botched coup, in reality this new policy draws equally heavily on the many other elements that constituted the multifaceted war against Allende, and hence the thesis of the "Chileanization" of Venezuela remains all-too-relevant.

The key institutional devices deployed by the U.S. in its covert support for the coup remained the same in its aftermath: the neoconservative National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), both convenient mechanisms for bypassing Congressional oversight. What was new on this front, as Golinger demonstrates, was the establishment by USAID in the months following the coup of a sinister-sounding Office of Transition Affairs (OTI). Both the NED and USAID (via the OTI) immediately began to shift strategies, providing covert support for the opposition-led bosses lockout of the oil industry which crippled the Venezuelan economy for two months in late 2002 and early 2003, and when this failed, by providing direct support for efforts to unseat Chávez electorally (a là Nicaragua) in a 2004 recall referendum spearheaded by opposition "civil society" organization Súmate. Needless to say, doing so entailed continuing to support those very same organizations who had proven their anti-democratic credentials in 2002, but such things are hardly scandalous these days.

Through the popular and military support enjoyed by the Chávez government, all these efforts failed, which is unprecedented in and of itself. In response to the emptying of its traditional toolbox, the U.S. government has been forced to diversify its tactics even more drastically than ever before, and this is where Bush Versus Chávez comes in.

Domestic Continuity
In her analysis of contemporary U.S. strategies to unseat Chávez, Golinger speaks of three broad fronts: the financial, the diplomatic, and the military (43-48). But we should be extremely wary of distinguishing too cleanly between such tightly-interwoven categories: the "financial front" remains largely in the hands of the NED and USAID, agencies directly controlled by the U.S. government and the embassy in Caracas, funding the domestic side of the equation through support for destabilizing opposition organizations and even psychological operations (psyops) targeting the Venezuelan press and military.

Since 2004, the NED and USAID have seen massive budgets earmarked for activities in Venezuela: currently, some $3 million for the former and $7.2 million for the latter's OTI operation (77). Of the NED funds, most went to the very same groups that participated in the 2002 coup, the 2003-4 oil lockout, and the 2004 recall referendum. Súmate, which headed up the recall effort, and whose spokesperson and Bush confidant Maria Corina Machado had signed the Carmona Decree, was granted more than $107,000 in 2005 alone. Súmate, to which Golinger devotes a chapter, had also received $84,000 in 2003 from USAID and $53,000 in 2003 and $107,000 in 2004 from the NED, as well as an inexplicable $300,000 from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (90). All of which demonstrates, for Golinger, that "Súmate is and continues to be Washington's main player in Venezuela" (91).

While USAID's funding structure has become more secretive, a turn that Golinger deems illegal, one project in particular has been publicly discussed: the establishment of "American Corners" throughout Venezuela, institutions which even the U.S. Embassy deem "satellite consulates" (145). Aside from the patent illegality of such underground U.S. institutions, Golinger points out that their primary function is the distribution of pro-U.S. propaganda to the Venezuelan population.

Perhaps most frightening on the domestic front is the strategic transformation that such U.S. funding has undergone. Specifically, such funding has increasingly begun to target what had previously been considered core Chavista constituencies, such as the nation's Afro and Indigenous populations (77-78). What Golinger doesn't emphasize is the fact that this has occurred alongside a concerted effort by opposition political parties, notably the NED-funded Primero Justicia, to penetrate the poorest and most dangerous Venezuelan barrios, like Petare in eastern Caracas.

While this domestic element has remained shockingly continuous, with the U.S. continuing to directly fund the groups involved in Chávez's 2002 overthrow, the military and diplomatic fronts are where Golinger reveals some veritably frightening new developments.

Asymmetrical Aggression
Perhaps the most intriguing and frightening revelation in Bush Versus Chávez surrounds a 2001 NATO exercise carried out in Spain under the title "Plan Balboa." Here we should bear in mind the open support provided by then Popular Party Prime Minister José Maria Aznar for the brief coup against Chávez. And while we might be struck by the irony of naming a NATO operation after the Spanish conquistador who invaded Panama, the name is far more accurate than we might initially believe.

Plan Balboa was, in fact, a mock invasion plan for taking over the oil-rich Zulia State in western Venezuela. In thinly veiled code-names (whose coded nature is undermined by the satellite imagery showing the nations involved), it entailed a "Blue" country (the U.S.) launching an invasion of the "Black" zone (Zulia) of a "Brown" country (Venezuela), from a large base in a "Cyan" country (Howard Air Force Base, in Panama) with the support of an allied "White" country (Colombia) (95-98). The fact that a trial-run invasion was carried out less than 11 months before the 2002 coup against Chávez should further convince us that this was mere contingency planning.

But Plan Balboa would be only the beginning, and Golinger deftly documents a series of increasingly overt military maneuvers carried out in recent years by the U.S. government in an effort to intimidate the Chávez government while preparing for any necessary action. Here, Golinger rightly trains her sights on the small Dutch Antillean island of Curaçao, which she deems the U.S.'s "third frontier." Curaçao hosts what is nominally a small U.S. Forward Operating Location (FOL) as well as, not coincidentally, a refinery owned by Venezuelan national oil company PDVSA. Furthermore, it sits fewer than 40 miles off Venezuela's coast, and more specifically, off the coast of the oil-rich "Black Zone" of Plan Balboa that is Zulia State.

Until February 2005, Curaçao probably seemed to be of little concern to Venezuelan security, given that its FOL housed only 200 U.S. troops. But this all changed when the U.S.S. Saipan made its unannounced arrival. The United States' premier landing craft for invasion forces, the Saipan arrived in Curaçao with more than 1,400 marines and 35 helicopters on board (104). When the Venezuelan government responded to the hostile gesture, U.S. Ambassador William Brownfield claimed there had been a "lack of communication," while simultaneously declaring that "it is our desire to have more visits by ships to Curaçao and Aruba [only 15 miles off the Venezuelan coast] in the coming weeks, months, and years" (105).

This veiled threat would come to fruition with Operation Partnership of the Americas in April 2006. In that instance, which dwarfed the Saipan's visit, the aircraft carrier U.S.S. George Washington arrived in Curaçao with three warships. The total strength of the force was of 85 fighter planes and more than 6,500 marines (106). Were this not worrying enough, then-intelligence chief and Latin American Cold Warrior par excellence John Negroponte admitted around the same time that the U.S. had deployed a nuclear sub to intercept communications off the Venezuelan coast (100). When we factor in the Curaçao-based Operation Joint Caribbean Lion, carried out in June 2006 with the goal of capturing the mock-terrorist rebel leader "Hugo Le Grand," there can remain little doubt that at the very least, the United States is keen to prepare for the possibility of a direct invasion of Venezuelan territory.

Of Terror and Dictators
But, one might ask, what are the chances that the U.S. would actually invade Venezuela, given the predictably harsh international rebuke that such an invasion would earn? It is here that another aspect, what Golinger loosely characterizes the "diplomatic front," comes into play, and it is here that U.S. policies and strategies have seen the most striking innovations.

Here Golinger cites a document by retired U.S. Army Colonel Max G. Manwaring published by the Army's Institute for Strategic Studies in 2005 (112). This document represents above all an inversion of strategies applied to Venezuela, and one which drastically complicates the military picture: Manwaring advocates appropriating the concept of "asymmetrical warfare" that many guerrillas and rebel movements have historically used with success against the United States, and converting it into an explicit U.S. strategy. Somewhat bizarrely, Manwaring compares this employment of asymmetric warfare to the "Wizard's Chess" of Harry Potter, deeming Chávez a "true and wise enemy" who must be dealt with by a panoply of maneuvers on all levels (112-113. Central to this strategy is the deployment of psychological operations (psyops), which had been previously focused on the Venezuelan press (toward the objective of justifying a coup or electoral removal of Chávez) to the international and diplomatic arena (toward what one could presume to be an objective of direct or indirect military action).

While domestic psyops have continued, notably in the 2005 deployment of "Gypsy" (JPOSE, Joint Psychological Operations Support Element) teams to Venezuela with the objective of spreading propaganda among the Venezuelan military and keeping tabs on radical Chavista organizations (117), much of their focus has been the spreading of news stories in the international arena. These stories, as Golinger astutely documents, tend to follow "three major lines of attack":

1.) Chávez is an anti-democratic dictator
2.) Chávez is a destabilizing force in the region
3.) Chávez harbors and supports terrorism (125).
Even the briefest of glances at any mainstream newspaper in the United States, or many other countries for that matter, will show to what degree this mediatically-constructed image has been a success.

New Strategies Unfold
This international effort to discredit the Chávez regime, thereby clearing the way for future intervention, brings us to a series of recent events that have transpired since Golinger first published Bush Versus Chávez.

The first was the sudden rebirth of the Venezuelan "student movement" in early 2007, nominally in response to the non-renewal of the broadcasting license for opposition television station RCTV. I have documented elsewhere the fact that this "student movement" was by and large supported if not directed by the traditional opposition parties, but what is more relevant here is that the strategies and even imagery of the movement were adapted directly from those used in countries such as Serbia and the Ukraine. These strategies, consisting largely of "non-violent" direct action, have been formulated and disseminated through institutions such as the Albert Einstein Institution which, in an irony of ironies, Golinger shows to be directly supported by the State Department (135), and linked to prior attempts to train Colombian paramilitaries to assassinate President Chávez (136-137).

Here again we have an inversion, in which the U.S. government has adopted the very strategies that had previously been deployed against it, and in this case the audience was international: the foreign press was so eager to show a violent repression of the students that it exaggerated the response of the largely unarmed police and, in an infamous incident, transformed an armed attack by opposition students against Chavistas at the Central University into just the opposite. The objective? To discredit and isolate the Chávez regime internationally, clearing the way for more directly offensive action.

Secondly, we have seen a concrete example of such offensive action in Colombia's recent illegal cross-border raid into Ecuador. The particular players involved should not distract our attention: this was a test-run, both militarily and diplomatically, for future U.S. interventions in the region. With Colombia standing in as proxy for the U.S. and the more recently-established Correa government standing in as proxy for the Chávez government, this was above all a test of the international response.

While that response was overwhelming in Latin America, with the OAS and even right-leaning governments condemning the Colombian raid as a violation of sovereignty, the U.S.'s international psyops campaign seems to have been overwhelmingly effective within its own borders. Rather than being presented as an instance of Colombian aggression, the initial raid was immediately erased from the picture in much of the international press, with the focus being diverted to what was perceived as Venezuela's bellicose response. But such a response was a strategic necessity aimed at discouraging any possible future intervention.

Furthermore, the revelations gleaned from the FARC's magic laptop, which allegedly implicate Chávez himself in funding the FARC (a charge which Colombia, not coincidentally, eventually decided not to pursue), are also drawn straight from the playbook of Plan Balboa, which was premised upon the threat posed by an alliance between the radical sectors of the "Brown" and "White" countries. The U.S. seems to be preparing to put that plan into motion with its recent legal gestures toward declaring Venezuela a supporter of terrorism, and given recent evidence of a massive influx of Colombian paramilitaries into the "Black Zone" of western Venezuela, the danger that Plan Balboa might become a reality should not be underestimated.

What would be the international response to such an incursion? Here there is little ground for optimism. After all, during the 2002 coup against Chávez, that bastion of the American left celebrated the maneuver, declaring that "Venezuelan democracy is no longer threatened by a would-be dictator." And all this before the concerted psyops campaign deployed against the Venezuelan government in recent years. Now, one democratic candidate spurns facts to declare Chávez a "dictator" while the other, eager to demonstrate his leftist credentials, deems the massively-popular Venezuelan leader a "despotic oil tyrant," and is promptly pilloried for his soft line.

George Ciccariello-Maher is a Ph.D candidate in political theory at U.C. Berkeley, who is currently writing a people's history of the Bolivarian Revolution. He can be reached at gjcm(at)berkeley.edu

Go on-site to catch up on events and see their archives, this is a good way to see how todays events stack up and how everything ties in. Just click on the following URL:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article19602.htm +++

Saundra Hummer

March 25th, 2008, 08:41 PM

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:: :: :: :: ::Mahdi Army arrested 17 American soldiersBy
Roads To Iraq

25/03/08 "RTI" -- - Reported, Abu Al-Khasib another city close to Basra, now under Mahdi Army control, Iraqi government calls special forces from Karbala led by Maliki’s “brothers in law” to move to Basra.

Just reported from Alwasatonline reporter in Basra, Mahdi Army managed to arrest 17 American soldiers, and seizes 7 hammer military vehicles, because of these developments the Iraqi government offered to negotiates with MA but Muqtada Al-Sadr refused any negotiations, also 250 Iraqi soldiers gave themselves up to Mahdi Army.

Key bridge, connecting Basra city to Al-Kurnah is destroyed by Mahdi Army.

Sotaliraq reported that Maliki refused to meet Basra’s mayor “Mohammad Al-Walili [from Al-Fadhilah Party], the mayor threaten if he removed from his position as mayor he will burn all the oil wells around Basra.

There is also reports about American warplanes involvement in the fights, and the Green Zone was bombed again at 8 O’clock p.

There are fighting in Al-Shurta neighborhood in Baghdad in the Karkh part [East, across the river]

Update On The Fighting In Basra

By
Roads To Iraq

25/03/08 "RTI" -- - The situation right now is nothing to do with “Iraqi government” or “Iraqi Army”, it is a Shiite-Shiite war, Mahdi Army with primitive arms and “Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution” [formed by Iran] with an army and supported by the Americans.

Remember the so called Iraqi government can not start this campaign without taking accord from Iran and the U.S., I told about the there is some kind of agreement between [The U.S. and Iran] few posts before.

Just few hours ago the Sadrists issued a new statement, signed by Al-Sadr himself and it says an initiative for peace contains six points:

-To distribute Quran and olive branches on police and army check points, and ask the security forces to not involve in this fighting trick used by the occupation.

- All the political, social and religious figures to take their responsibilities to stop these attacks

- Tribal chiefs to not to be involved in the fighting and to remember that they are the grandsons of 1920 revolution

- Iraqi parliament to stand beside the Iraqi people who chose them

- Political Parties to be beside the Iraqi public and not beside the occupation

- Call for all Iraqis to demonstrate, the next step is public disobedience, as for the third step then it will be announced in later time.

As for the last point [the public disobedience], the government announced that disobedience will be charged with terrorism law, the Sadrists representatives in the parliament announced they will start the procedures to withdraw their confidence in Maliki if this law put in practice.

The fights
Mahdi Army start to attack Badr and SCIR offices in Baghdad [the media reported that the attacks are in Sadr city only but according to my mother the attacks are everywhere at least in Risafah part of Baghdad].

Mahdi Army managed to control few neighborhoods in Kut city, Al-Mahmoudiya, Al-Yousfiyah.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info

http://www.roadstoiraq.com/ :: :: :: .

Saundra Hummer

March 26th, 2008, 01:33 PM

.^^^^^^^^^MAUREEN DOWD
Hillary or Nobody?
It’s hard to imagine that after spending her whole life playing second-fiddle to a superstar pol, Hillary Clinton wants to do it again. She’s been vice president.
AP
US Senator Hillary Clinton (photo, go on-site to view)

While the cool cat’s away, the Hillary mice will play.

As Barack Obama was floating in the pool with his daughters the last few days in St. Thomas, some Clinton disciples were floating the idea of St. Hillary as his vice president.

She can’t win without him, said one Hillary adviser, and he can’t win without her.

They’re stuck with each other.

It’s one of my favorite movie formulas, driving the dynamics in such classics as “A Few Good Men,” “The Big Easy” and “Guys and Dolls”: Charming, glib guy spars and quarrels with no-nonsense, driven girl, until they team up in the last reel. He spices up her life, and she stiffens his spine. And soon they hear the pitter-patter of little superdelegate feet, who are thrilled not to be pulled in two directions anymore.

And everybody’s happy. Or are they?

A couple of weeks ago, when Hill and Bill mentioned the possibility of a joint ticket, it was an attempt to undermine Obama and urge voters and superdelegates to put Hillary on top; the implication was that this was the only way Democrats could have both their stars, and besides, it was her turn. The precocious boy wonder had plenty of time.

But with the math not in her favor, her options running out, Bill Richardson running out and her filigreed narrative of dodging bullets in Bosnia and securing peace in Northern Ireland unraveling, could Hillary actually think the vice presidency is the best she’ll do?

One Hillary pal said she wouldn’t want to go back to a Senate full of lawmakers who’d abandoned her for Obama. And even if she could get to be majority leader, would it be much fun working with Nancy Pelosi, whose distaste for the Clintons has led her to subtly maneuver for Obama?

Maybe The Terminator is thinking: if she could just get her pump in the door. Dick Cheney, after all, was able to run the White House and the world from the vice president’s residence, calling every shot while serving under a less experienced and younger president. And Observatory Circle is just up the street from where Hillary now lives.

But, aside from Barack and Michelle Obama’s certain resistance, would it fly? Many Hillary voters are hardening against Obama, and more and more Obama fans are getting turned off by the idea of dragging down the Obama brand with Clinton dysfunction.

“No drama, vote Obama” placards and T-shirts are popping up at Obama rallies, and one of his military advisers dubbed him “No Shock Barack.”

It’s hard to imagine that after spending her whole life playing second-fiddle to a superstar pol, Hillary wants to do it again. She’s been vice president.

Could the veep talk be a red herring? A ploy designed to distract attention from the Clintons’ real endgame?

Even some Clinton loyalists are wondering aloud if the win-at-all-costs strategy of Hillary and Bill -- which continued Tuesday when Hillary tried to drag Rev. Wright back into the spotlight -- is designed to rough up Obama so badly and leave the party so riven that Obama will lose in November to John McCain.

If McCain only served one term, Hillary would have one last shot. On Election Day in 2012, she’d be 65.

Why else would Hillary suggest that McCain would be a better commander in chief than Obama, and why else would Bill imply that Obama was less patriotic -- and attended by more static -- than McCain?

Why else would Phil Singer, a Hillary spokesman, say in a conference call with reporters on Tuesday that Obama was trying to disenfranchise the voters of Florida and Michigan. “When it comes to voting, Senator Obama has turned the audacity of hope into the audacity of nope,” he said, adding, “There’s a basic reality here, which is we could have avoided the entire George W. Bush presidency if we had counted votes in Florida.” So is Singer making the case that Obama is as anti-democratic as W. was when he snatched Florida from Al Gore?

Some top Democrats are increasingly worried that the Clintons’ divide-and-conquer strategy is nihilistic: Hillary or no Democrat.

(Or, as one Democrat described it to ABC’s Jake Tapper: Hillary is going for “the Tonya Harding option” -- if she can’t get the gold, kneecap her rival.)

After all, the Clintons think of themselves as The Democratic Party. When Bill and Dick Morris triangulated during the first term, it was what was best for Bill, not the party. In 1996, when Bill turned the White House into Motel 1600 for fund-raisers, it was more about his re-election than the re-elections of his fellow Democrats in Congress; in 2000, the White House focused its energies more on Hillary’s Senate win than Al Gore’s presidential run.

And even Clinton supporters know that Bill does not want to be replaced as the first black president, especially by a black president with enough magic to possibly eclipse him in the history books.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,543444,00.html I found it appealing and straightforward when Mary Matalin when on a talk show with her husband James Carville stated that Barack Obama among other things is " a force of nature", she is amazed by the man as are so many others, and it would be a pity to have this latched onto tirade by his minister be his undoing, as he is a postive force, a force for good, and it's disturbing and pitiful to what lengths those who want rid of him will go to; to accomplish just that, the lengths to which they will go to just to take him out of the picture. Then there are those of us who believe we need his influence and the hope he inspires. Let's hope we outnumber his rivals and the bigots, as this is a good man in my opinion, this force of nature, this force for good. SRH
^^^^^ .

Saundra Hummer

March 26th, 2008, 02:00 PM

. $ $ $ $ $
Wall Street Week: How Bush Rolled the PressBy
NY Observer.

“I think that one of the things in this crisis all along has been it’s like a mystery novel,” David Wessel, the economics editor for The Wall Street Journal, told The Observer last Friday. “Every time you turn the page you’re in a new chapter, and you’re being introduced to new characters and new plots that you hadn’t expected. It’s hard to understand what’s going on.”

That was what the coverage of the Bear Stearns implosion was about: a scramble to understand.

Some pulled it off magnificently, if belatedly; others opted for the comfort of hyperbole; all were, for a time at least, rolled by the Bush administration.

Luckily, regardless, the nation emerged as anyone would expect: another week older and deeper in debt.

To simply leaf through the headlines of the different sections of the March 18 Journal was to lose all faith in the American way of doing things. The terrorists must’ve been kicking themselves for not being the first to think of subprime-mortgage-backed securities as a sure way to cripple the U.S. The sky was falling; not a drill this time.

Even the mercilessly nonthreatening Personal Journal section screamed in its main story, “Is There Anywhere Safe?” Oh, dear. And the middle story on the front page—perhaps the most-read newspaper page in the entire financial universe on any given morning—led ominously: “The past six days have shaken American capitalism.”

Said who? Well, said Treasury Secretary (and former Goldman Sachs chairman) Hank Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman (and former chairman of Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers) Ben Bernanke; and a few others, including those directly involved in JPMorgan Chase’s Fed-guaranteed takeover of Bear Stearns at bargain-basement prices.

James Dimon, JPMorgan’s chief executive, was lionized in The New York Times and The Journal (and in the editorial pages of The Observer) as a sort of savior of capitalism itself. New York magazine hit newsstands on March 24 referencing the day of the sale of Bear Stearns as “the day Dimon helped save Wall Street.”

And he saved it in typical sleep-when-I’m-dead, God of Fiduciary Thunder style. From The Times on March 18: “On Sunday, Mr. Dimon, weary-eyed after three days and nights of frantic negotiations, stunned Wall Street with the news that JPMorgan would buy Bear Stearns, the troubled investment bank, for a fire-sale price of $2 a share. With that one jaw-dropping deal, Mr. Dimon, like the bank’s namesake before him, has become a principal player in the biggest financial drama of his age.”

Such coverage relied upon two things: the seeming inexplicability of it all; and the trumpeting from the likes of Messrs. Paulson, Bernanke and Dimon about its gravity.

THE ROOTS OF Bear Stearns’ collapse and of the current crisis are actually easy to grasp: The debt from subprime mortgages, which were fantastically easy to get in the housing boom’s heady days, was securitized, and those securities were traded like stocks.

Analysts touted the subprime-mortgage-backed securities even though they were inherently risky (after all, they were backed by literally subprime borrowers); and investment banks and other investors snatched them up or facilitated their snatching. When the debtors started defaulting, the crisis snowballed. Bear Stearns, to paraphrase Michael Corleone, got mixed up in the rackets and got what was coming to it.

David Leonhardt, in a front-page Times story on March 19, broke down the crisis’ roots quite well, though he wrapped his simple explanation in complication: “Raise your hand if you don’t quite understand this whole financial crisis,” his story led. (Mr. Leonhardt did not respond to e-mails for comment.) The story quickly became The Times’ most e-mailed; the unquestioned agenda-setting of the national newspaper of record ensured that the crisis’ subsequent coverage would be couched in an aura of incomprehensibility. It was all so hard to understand; leave it to the pros. They know what they’re doing.

And who were the pros? The people at the top, like Messrs. Bernanke and Paulson, who acted, according to a March 17 Times recount of an ABC News interview, because “our primary concern right now—my primary concern—is the stability of our financial system, the orderliness of the markets. And that’s where our focus is.”

The financial system—the actual nuts and bolts of American capitalism, the mechanisms and machinations that keep us, however close to teetering off, at the top of the heap and the envy of most even during tougher times at home—was never in mortal danger from one risk-addicted investment bank and its government enablers.

The coverage eventually caught up with this reality once the hyperbole had its day(s). The Journal’s Mr. Wessel, for one, had by March 20 expressed it all quite neatly in a 2A column. It calmly explained the political considerations behind the financial maneuverings that saw $30 billion in taxpayer money hand-shaken into ensuring the orderly transfer of one investment bank to another.

“It’s hard to fashion the sound bite that deflects the inevitable question,” Mr. Wessel wrote. “Why a ‘bailout’ for Wall Street, and none for homeowners?”

Mr. Wessel noted that Messrs. Paulson, Bernanke et al. are willing to try; they’ve already tried. They’ve painted the bailout of Bear Stearns as an essential—even fundamental—step in shoring up “shaken American capitalism.” And never mind the usual routes of that capitalism for companies that gamble and lose.

As The Times noted, top JPMorgan executives cut off a conference call after a disgruntled Bear Stearns investor dared suggest that he and his fellow investors would make more money if the investment bank went appropriately bankrupt rather than into the rapaciously welcoming, Fed-brokered arms of JPMorgan.

“[L]ike troubled teenagers seeking succor from Mom, when the going gets tough, these same free enterprisers frequently run to the government for instant succor,” wrote a guest blogger, Princeton economist Uwe Reinhardt, on the Financial Times’ Web site on March 21. “Watch, for example, as our investment bankers on Wall Street, a.k.a. Masters of the Universe, now run to our government for help, after the mess they have made of their companies, of our economy and, indeed, of global finance.”

And The Times on Easter Sunday, a week after the crisis coverage commenced: “Well, the economists are here to say that you can dig up the family silver and stop training the kids how to jump onto a moving train. While many who study the nation’s economic health agree that a recession has probably already begun, and that it may be long and severe, they also say the odds of a full-blown depression are almost nonexistent.”

The Economy Is Risen! Everything’s fine; or, at least, it’s not as bad as you were told just one week earlier.

SO WHY WERE you told that? Because the American economy now relies on the creation and trading of debt as its main vehicle of profit making.

We don’t manufacture too many things anymore for export; nor do we have a thriving agriculture business (we do have agribusiness, but that’s something else entirely). America does spend, spend, spend, whether we have any actual hard money to do so, and we do it better than most nations ever; thus the negative personal savings rate and the current foreclosures wave, and on up to the ballooning federal deficit and the indebtedness of even billionaires like GM Building owner (for now) Harry Macklowe.

We love creating the need for credit and the debt that follows. And the securitization of such debt—specifically subprime mortgages—sparked the current brouhaha.

The federal government reacted as it’s supposed to in this new normal: It bailed out a major Wall Street firm that gorged at a little too unseemly a level on such securitized debt. And, then, on March 18, it slashed the key short-term lending rate. It made money cheaper to get; it ensured more debt.

The system, oddly, then, worked. The Bush administration—and any administration, Democrat or Republican, would’ve had to do the same—hyped the situation over that fateful March weekend when the Bear Stearns immolation was negotiated. The media delivered the hype initially to a public reassured that it was O.K. to be confused and pliant.

(And just a quick aside: Why is it that the top national media routinely depicts Bush’s foreign policy advisers as disingenuous or naïve at best and dishonest or nefarious at worst, but credits—ha!—his top economic advisers, in the past two weeks, with the oracularity normally afforded Jesus, the Prophet Mohammed or Suze Orman?)

Only eventually did the media catch its breath. By then, of course, the bailout was in the details phase and the Fed had slashed its key interest rate. The stage was set for a repeat. So, expect one.

– By Tom Acitelli
http://www.mediachannel.org/wordpress/2008/03/26/wall-street-week-how-bush-rolled-the-press/
Go on-site to view cartoon about this topic; to see other topical issues of the day, their archives, links to other items and their comment section. Just click on the link above^. SRH
$ $ $ $ $ $ $ .

Saundra Hummer

March 26th, 2008, 03:06 PM

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* * *
The 3,999th Was Important, TooBy
Huffington Post.
Last Wednesday, on the 5th anniversary of the Iraq War which was supposed to be so short that Donald Rumsfeld got mad at people who dared suggest they have a post-invasion plan, the number of dead U.S. servicepeople in Iraq stood at 3,990. The next day, it was at 3,991. It wasn’t going to take long to get to 4,000 and everyone knew it. Probably some news organizations had special plans for how they’d commemorate that “grim milestone,” maybe different than they had commemorated the 5th year anniversary (which, I couldn’t help but notice, was quite different from how the 5th anniversary of September 11th had been commemorated — though I’m sure there are at least 4,000 families who can imagine what have been if the Iraq war had never happened).

Writer Rob Lenihan wondered who G.I. 4000might be:

“What is he or she like–bookish or a rabid sports fan? Shy and quiet or outgoing and boisterous?…Was this soldier a high school hero or one of the geeks who sat in the back row and prayed not to to be seen? Is this individual a parent whose children will never see their mother or father again?…Did he or she believe in “the mission,” as war supporters call this fiasco, or did this soldier get pulled into this quagmire due to a National Guard commitment?”

The media, it has been amply shown, has dropped off in its coverage of the war — studies prove it, war correspondents lament it — and we’ve all noticed it (here’s some year-old anecdotal evidence: the blip that was last year’s Newsweek special issue, “Voices Of The Fallen,” which uber-boss Don Graham said he thought was “the best issue of Newsweek in the 75 years of the magazine” but which got little traction online. The New York Times did the same thing yesterday, publishing excerpts of letters and journals from fallen soldiers, and one year later it was just as sad. So far it’s got 83 pickups according to Technorati, the most highly-trafficked of which are Wonkette, HuffPo and Wired’s “Danger Room” blog. It is not on the NYT “Most Emailed” list).

In the past week there’s been a spike in attention, especially due to the anniversary coinciding with the final, inexorable march to 4,000 — but for one very specified branch of the media these are the headlines that matter every day and with every number: The military media. On VetVoice, the blog arm of VoteVets.org, which have posts lamenting but looking beyond the 4,000th soldier, since its contributors and readers have been mourning each one all along. Here’s a sampling of posts: “25 Killed in Two Weeks; More Significant Number than 4,000” noting that the past two weeks have been the most violent since September 2007 and belied reports of ebbing violence; an incredulous response to Dick Cheney’s claim that “The president carries the biggest burden” in the war (”Jaw drops; gum falls in lap”); and, on a happier note, a post from a soldier who will soon be going home, to “a life raising an infant, a life I have known for only a short 25 days.” His daughter is 14 months old.

(Also on VetVoice: The trailer for the new Iraq war-themed movie, “Stop Loss” which asks its readers: “Are you all going to see it? You think you can sit through it?”, sidebar resources for PTSD and Traumatic Brain Injury, and a great poll: “John McCain: Stable or Unstable? Vote!”)

This is just one website — there are many, like IraqSlogger and Michael YonBack To Iraq and BlackFive and McClatchy’s “Inside Iraq” blog ; and, to be fair, there are also important special projects and resources from the mainstream media that stand out, like Reuters’ amazing “Iraq: Bearing Witness” special feature and WaPo’s four-part in-depth feature on IED’s and Frontline’s current documentary, “Bush’s War” and Richard Engel’s award-winning “War Zone Diary,” and I know that this is not an exhaustive list. There is a lot of material and you can get lost in it, and maybe that’s one of the reasons the coverage has dropped off, because of the sheer volume of stories to tell (4,000 dead does not include 30,000 injured, many grievously). But that’s just the stuff that’s happened until now — the war is still on, and there is more to come. When Rob Lenihan wrote his post, G.I. 4,000 was still alive.

I’m going to end with the words of the blogger at Inside My Broken Skull, an anonymous 32-year-old vet who says it better than I ever could:

I’m starting to feel a little burnt out by the fact that it seems that no one really cares about what is going on in Iraq and Afghanistan, except for a select few and the men and women fighting over there and their families.

Seems to me that it is becoming a more and more forgotten issue and will be that way until something horrible happens, which I pray never happens.

I don’t know if the American public will ever wake up and demand action or justice, seems like everyone is too pre-occupied with Britney Spears, Starbucks closing for 2 hours and American Idol then the plight of several thousand men and women of the Armed Forces.

Sometimes it makes me want to forget about trying to make a change, but I won’t stop. I’ll just keep on keeping on and hope that things will change. Because if they don’t, we as vets are screwed.

The War Endures, But Where’s The Media? [NYT]
Jon Soltz: 4000 Killed in Iraq: A Harsh Reminder [HuffPost]
A Mosaic: 4,000 Americans Dead [HuffPost]

US Papers Tuesday: 4,000 Deaths And Counting

Related from a year ago:
Newsweek’s “Voices Of The Fallen A Blip In The Blogosphere” [ETP]

RoyalBlue
Rumsfeld Threatened To Fire Anyone Who Suggested Planning For Post-Invasion Iraq [ETP]

Related In WaPo Front Pages That Juxtapose Bush Saying The War Will “Merit” 4,000 Deaths With Bush Going On An Easter Egg Hunt With A Giant Bunny: Go on-site for the numerous links and photo's

–by Rachel Sklar

SEE:

Specialist Jerry Ryen King

"I have to say that events that I have encountered here have changed my outlook on life."

Staff Sgt. Juan Campos

"I can't wait to get out of this place and return to you where I belong."

Sgt. Ryan M. Wood

"It's a losing battle... and ones ultimately paying the price."

Specialist Daniel E. Gomez

"if you're reading this, then something has happen to me and I'm sorry."

Pfc. Daniel J. Agami

I was convoyed up to northern Iraq to learn a new weapon system. It soooooooo cool..."

Pfc. Ryan J. Hill

"I can't stop asking why? The more I think the more I cry."
Seeing the photos of these men, these boys, tears at you heart. God Speed. SRH
[I]Go on-site to gain access to the NUMEROUS LINKS, and photo's. They're in Indigo and underlined in this post. Just click on the following link:
http://www.mediachannel.org/wordpress/2008/03/26/the-3999th-was-important-too/
*

Saundra Hummer

March 26th, 2008, 06:04 PM

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~~~~~~~
"I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use."

Galileo Galilei~~~
All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident."

Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860)
~~~
Often war is waged only in order to show valor; thus an inner dignity is ascribed to war itself, and even some philosophers have praised it as an ennoblement of humanity, forgetting the pronouncement of the Greek who said, "War is an evil in as much as it produces more wicked men than it takes away."

Immanuel Kant
~~~
"If a war be undertaken for the most righteous end, before the resources of peace have been tried and proved vain to secure it, that war has no defense, it is a national crime."

Charles Eliot Norton
~~~~~ .

Saundra Hummer

March 26th, 2008, 06:17 PM

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- - -
Here's the first page of a Google Search, there should be a lot here, some say they have Reverend Wright's sermon in it's entirety, SRH:

http://aolsearch.aol.com/aol/search?encquery=9111d62a9305d34f5046938a700f4163a5 6b8cccc38db0d26506325ddc95dd84682bcd860ccedcc175c0 2cb2b27fdacd&invocationType=keyword_rollover&ie=UTF-8

*******
Christian Universalism- The Beautiful Heresy: Reverend Wrigh...
Reverend Wright's Sermon in its entirety. Just in case you want to hear it for yourself. I just listened to the Christmas 2007 sermon that Reverend Wright ...

christian-universalism.blogs.com/thebeautifulher... - 37k - Similar pages

http://christian-universalism.blogs.com/thebeautifulheresy/2008/03/reverend-wright.html
» Obama Questioned On Rev. Wright’s AIDS Sermon
Obama Questioned on Rev. Jeremiah Wright's AIDS Sermon - Denies Evidence of Genocidal ... in its entirety, on Google called In Lies We Trust: The CIA, ...

rinf.com/alt-news/top-stories/obama-questioned-o... - 58k - Similar pages

http://rinf.com/alt-news/top-stories/obama-questioned-on-rev-wrights-aids-sermon/2692/
Barack Obama : : Change We Can Believe In | His Own Words
The profound mistake of Reverend Wright's sermons is not that he spoke about racism in our society. It's that he spoke as if our society was static; ...

my.barackobama.com/page/content/hisownwords/ - 35k - Similar pages

http://my.barackobama.com/page/content/hisownwords/
CNN, MSNBC, CBS, ABC & Fox News LIED about pastor Jeremiah W...
Mar 21, 2008 ... Now, having seen this clip of Reverend Wright’s sermon, ..... Anyway, the sermon has to be heard in its entirety - this is true at my church ...

baldeagle08.wordpress.com/2008/03/21/cnn-msnbc-c... - 124k - Similar pages

http://baldeagle08.wordpress.com/2008/03/21/cnn-msnbc-cbs-abc-fox-news-lied-about-pastor-jeremiah-wright-see-911-sermon-in-context/
The Savvy Sista: Rev. Jeremiah Wright's 9/11 Sermon
His sermon was on point and very truthful. Please listen to it in it's entirety below. ... Watch Rev. Jeremiah Wright's 9-11 sermon in context ...

thesavvysister.blogspot.com/2008/03/rev-jeremiah... - 109k - Similar pages

http://thesavvysister.blogspot.com/2008/03/rev-jeremiah-wrights-911-sermon.html
Faultline USA: Jeremiah Wright’s 9/11 Sermon “In Context”
The whole sermon can be found here: http://essence.typepad. com/news/2008/03/listen-to-rev-j.html. It's around 35 minutes in length ...

faultlineusa.blogspot.com/2008/03/jeremiah-wrigh... - 134k - Similar pages

http://faultlineusa.blogspot.com/2008/03/jeremiah-wrights-911-sermon-in-context.html
In Easter Sermon, New Obama Pastor Charges Rev. Wright Victi...
Be educated my American countrymen… listen to Rev. Wright’s sermons in entirety before you pass judgement, instead of only listening to the snipets played ...

elections.foxnews.com/2008/03/23/in-eastor-sermo... - 108k - Similar pages

http://elections.foxnews.com/2008/03/23/in-eastor-sermon-trinity-united-pastor-compares-rev-wright-to-jesus/comment-page-15/
Mark Thompson - Sirius Talk Left, played the entire Rev. Wri...
Mark Thompson - Sirius Talk Left, played the entire Rev. Wright sermon ... It's a very powerful sermon. He had me wanting to jump up and shout, OregonBlue ...

www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph... - 34k - Similar pages

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x3055856
Erikka Yancy: More Fox Lies: Jeremiah Wright -- the Whole Se...
Sean Hannity has had it in for Reverend Wright since he appeared on his "show" several .... Mr. Wright's sermon deserves a listen in it's entirety as well. ...

www.huffingtonpost.com/erikka-yancy/more-fox-lie... - 171k - Similar pages

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/erikka-yancy/more-fox-lies-jeremiah-w_b_92850.html
Congregation Defends Obama's Ex-Pastor
Mar 18, 2008 ... CHICAGO -- The Rev. Jeremiah Wright spent 36 years teaching this ... interpretation: It is Wright, and black theology in its entirety, ...

www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/17/A... - Similar pages

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/17/AR2008031702796_pf.html
More Sponsored Links For: christian counseling, christian matchmaking, christian homeschoolingAOL Search Result Page:1 2 3 4
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Saundra Hummer

March 26th, 2008, 06:46 PM

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v^v^v^v^v^vUS Moves Towards Engaging Iran
By M K Bhadrakumar

26/03/08 "Asia Times" -- -- The coming few weeks are going to be critical in the standoff between the United States and Iran as the upheaval in the Middle East reaches a turning point. And all options do remain on the table, as the George W Bush administration likes to say, from military conflict to a de facto acceptance of Iran's standing as the region's dominant power.

One thing is clear. The time for oratorical exercises is ending. A phase of subtle, reciprocal, conceptual diplomatic actions may be beginning. An indication of this is available in the two radio interviews given by Bush last weekend and beamed into Iran, exclusively aimed at reaching out to the Iranian public on the Persian New Year Nauroz.

Significantly, ahead of Bush's interviews, former secretary of state Henry Kissinger spoke. Kissinger, incidentally, is a foreign policy advisor to the Republican Party's presidential nominee, Senator John McCain. For the first time, Kissinger called for unconditional talks with Iran. That is a remarkable shift in his position. Kissinger used to maintain that the legacy of the hostage crisis during the Iranian revolution in 1979 and "the messianic aspect of the Iranian regime" represented huge obstacles to diplomacy, and combining with "Persian imperial tradition" and "contemporary Islamic fervor", a collision with the US became almost unavoidable. Interestingly, Kissinger's call was also echoed by Dennis Ross, who used to be a key negotiator in the Middle East, and carries much respect in Israel.

Bush's interviews with the government-supported Voice of America and Radio Farda, especially the latter, were a masterly piece in political overture. He held out none of the customary threats against Iran. This time, there was not even the trademark insistence that "all options are on the table". There were no barbs aimed at President Mahmud Ahmadinejad. Least of all, there were no calls for a regime change in Tehran. Bush simply said something that he might as well have said about Saudi Arabia or Egypt. As he put it, "So this is a regime and a society that's got a long way to go [in reform]."

Bush spoke of the evolution of the Iranian regime's character rather than its overthrow. The criticism, if any, of Iranian government policies approached nowhere near the diatribes of the past. There was none of the boastful claims that the US would work toward isolating Iran in its region and beyond. In fact, Bush acknowledged, "There's a chance that the US and Iran can reconcile their differences, but the [Iranian] government is going to have to make different choices. And one [such choice] is to verifiably suspend the enrichment of uranium, at which time there is a way forward."

Bush assured that in return the US would be "reasonable in our desire to see to it that you have civilian nuclear power without enabling the government to enrich [uranium]". Here again, he pointed out that the problem is that "they [Iranian governments] have not told the truth in the past, and therefore it's very difficult for the United States and the rest of the world - or much of the rest of the world - to trust the Iranian government when it comes to telling the truth".

Bush elaborated, "Well, one thing is to reiterate my belief that the Iranians should have a civilian nuclear-power program. It's in their right to have it. The problem is that the government cannot be trusted to enrich the uranium because, one, they've hidden programs in the past and they may be hiding one now - who knows? And, secondly, they've declared they want to have a nuclear program to destroy people - some - in the Middle East. And that's unacceptable and it's unacceptable in the world. But what is acceptable to me is to work with a nation like Russia to provide the fuel so that the plant can go forward. Which therefore shows that the Iranian government doesn't need to learn to enrich."

Arguably, Bush's interviews signify that "unconditional talks" may have begun with Iran. Everything - almost everything - he said indeed had a caveat. But then, isn't that how negotiations commence without loss of face between any two stubborn adversaries?

Any number of reasons could be attributed to the Bush administration finally jettisoning a war strategy toward Iran. First and foremost comes the unbearable financial cost of waging a war with Iran, which would have to be underwritten by China, Saudi Arabia and Japan. As Nobel Laureate and US economist Joseph Stiglitz stated last week, the impact of the subprime crisis in the US will persist for two to three years, and only after that time could the US economy hope to recover. Stiglitz blamed the Iraq war for dragging down the US economy. "It has proven to be an enormous error," he said, stressing that the Iraq war has been "a disaster in every way".

If in 2001 the US spent about US$4.4 billion a month on military operations in Iraq, the figure had jumped to $8.4 billion by 2007. By the end of the current year, the financial costs of the Iraq war could rise above $650 billion. The human costs have been equally unacceptable. The number of US troops fallen in Iraq now exceeds 4,000. Over 29,000 soldiers have been wounded. The brand "America" has taken a beating that will take years to repair. The horrific images of Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, Fallujah, Haditha, Mahmudiya and Bagram will linger in memory for a long time.

An ABC News/Washington Post poll in March shows that 63% of Americans feel the Iraq war was not worth fighting and only a slight majority of Americans believe now that the war will one day succeed. Clearly, there is no stomach for yet another war in the remaining term of the Bush presidency.

Equally, everything is up in the air on the warfronts in Afghanistan and Iraq. The Bush administration has its hands full. The sudden visit of US Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte, accompanied by Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Richard Boucher, to Islamabad on Tuesday, no sooner than the newly elected Pakistani government assumed office, underscores the gravity of the crisis facing the Bush administration in Afghanistan.

What is at stake now is Pakistan's willingness to continue as an ally in the "war on terror". At the very minimum, the terms of engagement will have to be renegotiated, which, of course, is going to take time and a lot of patience and give-and-take. That is, assuming the Pakistani leadership will show the grace to take the Bush administration as anything other than a lame duck.

This became apparent when soon after meeting the US officials in Islamabad on Tuesday, former prime minister Nawaz Sharif - who is emerging as Pakistan's number one politician - alleged publicly that the people of Pakistan are being "mercilessly" killed in the name of the "war on terror".

"We should not kill our own people for the sake of others," he said. He sought a review of the entire war strategy. "The basic issue is that just as the US wants to be safe from terrorism, we don't want to see bombs and missiles flying in our villages, we want our people to be safe and we don't want blood to flow in our streets," Sharif insisted.

He was virtually endorsing a call by the Pashtun nationalist Awami National Party, which is forming the government in the sensitive North-West Frontier Province bordering Afghanistan, for a negotiated solution to the alienation in Pakistan's tribal areas. Clearly, with hardly a week to go for the 60th anniversary summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization summit in Bucharest, Romania, the agenda of the Afghan war has become much more than an issue of the alliance's force levels.

The status of the Iraq war, too, hangs in balance. After what appeared to be a descending calm, the security situation is showing signs of fragility. Sunday's mortar strikes on Baghdad's fortified Green Zone, which is home to the Iraqi government and the US Embassy, underline the pretence behind the Bush administration's claims of "success" of the so-called "surge" strategy. It does seem as if someone just thought of shaking up the dream world that Washington sought to create.

Again, the southern Basra region has gone under curfew following fighting among Shi'ite political parties and their militias. Most ominous, the Mahdi Army, loyal to Muqtada al-Sadr, is showing signs of becoming restive. Its self-imposed ceasefire was one main reason why the graph of violence had dipped in recent months.

The Bush administration's priority will be to leave it to the next president in the White House to decide on any major reduction of troops in Iraq. But that means the Iraqi situation will remain in focus all through the period of the presidential campaign till November. The Bush administration needs to count on Tehran's tacit cooperation with the US to use its formidable influence with Iraqi groups. Belligerence toward Iran is hardly the way the Bush administration can realize this objective.

But after a recent visit to Iran, prominent US author and commentator Selig Harrison wrote in The Boston Globe newspaper, "Tehran is seething over what it sees as a new 'divide and rule' US strategy designed to make Iraq a permanent US protectorate". He was referring to the current US strategy of building up rival Sunni militias - euphemistically called the "Sunni Awakening" - so as to fence in the Shi'ite-dominated government in Baghdad.

The Sunni militias presently number some 90,000 US-equipped fighters, each paid $300 per month. But, as Harrison recounted his conversations in Iran, "The message was clear: Unless [US General David] Petraeus drastically cuts back the Sunni militias, Tehran will unleash the Shi'ite militias against US forces again."

Sunday's violence, conceivably, may be a harbinger of things to come unless the US accommodates Iranian interests. It may have displayed that Iran has the will and the capacity to remain the dominant influence in Iraq with or without a stable government in Baghdad and with or without US acquiescence. The Bush administration has no real choice in the matter. Conversely, what the Bush administration could do is to build on the convergence of interests with Tehran in keeping the Iraqi security situation from degenerating in the critical months ahead in US domestic politics.
Harrison sums up his impressions following talks with interlocutors in the Iranian government: "Iran and the US have a common interest in a stable Iraq ... Before cooperating to stabilize Iraq, however, Iran wants assurances that the US will not use it as a base for covert action and military attacks against the Islamic Republic and will gradually phase out its combat troops. Cooperation will endure only if Washington lets the Shi'ites enforce the terms for the new ethnic equation in Iraq and, above all, if it recognizes Iran's right by virtue of geography and history to have a bigger say in Iraq's destiny than its other immediate neighbors, not to mention the faraway United States."

Evidently, the crucial ingredient henceforth of the Bush administration's Iraq policy is no longer a withdrawal schedule but a political and diplomatic underpinning for a military strategy. Hence the importance of US Vice President Dick Cheney's current tour of the Middle East. Quite uncharacteristically, Cheney eschewed any strident anti-Iran rhetoric during his tour. (The Iranians, on their part, reciprocated by ignoring Cheney's presence in the region.)

But what multiplies the "Iranian challenge" is the grim reality that Tehran may have withstood all attempts by the Bush administration to create dissensions within the Iranian regime. Following the recent parliamentary elections in Iran on March 14, the regime has greatly consolidated. The Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), custodians of the Iranian revolution of 1979, are finally on the threshold of consolidating their political power in addition to the considerable economic and administrative power they already enjoy.

The so-called "reformist" platform - comprising 21 moderate parties that included the allies of former presidents Mohammad Khatami and Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and former parliament speaker Mehdi Karroubi - could together muster only less than 20% of seats in the new Parliament. The "reformist" coalition was the Bush administration's best hope.

In effect, the "reformist' coalition has become a spent force and is now likely to disintegrate. Already by end-February, Rafsanjani seems to have sensed this defeat of "black Shi'ism" by "red Shi'ism". He quickly changed tack and made up with Ahmadinejad. The ultimate clincher, of course, was the extraordinary gesture of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to publicly voice support of Ahmadinejad. Addressing the powerful Assembly of Experts (headed by Rafsanjani) on February 26, Khamenei praised the role of Ahmadinejad for "great success" on the nuclear issue. Later in the evening on the same day, Rafsanjani visited Ahmadinejad.

The IRGC has cadres numbering 10 million. Late spiritual leader ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini had envisaged the IRGC to be the core of the Iranian revolution. The parliamentary elections have created a new power calculus devolving on the IRGC. The high turnout at the elections - over 60% - lends unquestionable legitimacy to this extraordinary political transformation of the Iranian regime, returning it, as it were, to its revolutionary moorings.

But it has not been the kind of "regime change" the Bush administration sought. Khamenei has emerged more powerful than ever and Ahmadinejad has considerably strengthened his political standing. Khamenei has risen above nitpicking by senior clerical conservatives. Thus, from Washington's perspective, the new Iranian Parliament will have a preponderant share of "hardliners" and will be more radical and more "loyal" to the regime - to use Western cliches. Bush's interviews on the occasion of Nauroz are a grudging admission of the emergent political alignment in Tehran. The Bush administration is pragmatic enough to estimate the need to engage Iran.

The real issue now is whether the emboldened leadership in Tehran shares the Bush administration's sense of urgency. It will carefully weigh its options. Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki announced on Monday that Tehran "recently requested for membership" of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO). Ahmadinejad will be attending the SCO's summit in Dushanbe, Tajikistan. Meanwhile, Iran's proposal to Russia to form a gas cartel is set to take off at a meeting of gas-producing countries in Moscow in June.

Tehran will surely estimate that Russia-US disputes are hard to settle; that Russia has major commercial interests in Iran; that Moscow needs Iran's endorsement of a multinational arrangement to exploit the Caspian Sea's energy resources. At the same time, Tehran estimates that a viable US exit from Iraq is still a long way off and in the run-up to the US presidential election, the Iraq war looms as a contentious domestic issue.

Besides, Tehran remains on the lookout for a shift in the US stance on the Nabucco gas pipeline sourcing Iranian gas via Turkey for the European market. Last week, Switzerland's Elektrizitaetshesellschaft Laufenburg signed a 25-year deal with the National Iranian Gas Export Company for the delivery of 5.5 billion cubic meters of Iranian gas annually. The agreement was signed during the visit of the Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey to Tehran.

Without Nabucco, the US strategy to reduce Europe's dependence on Russian gas supplies will remain a pipedream, and without Iranian gas, Nabucco itself makes little sense, while Nabucco will be Iran's passport to integration with Europe.

Conceivably, Cheney, who takes a keen interest in energy diplomacy, would have kept Nabucco at the back of his mind in Ankara on Monday during his Middle East tour, on a day when Turkmenistan President Gurbangulu Berdimuhammedov also happened to be visiting the Turkish capital. An unnamed Turkmen official had earlier mentioned that Nabucco would be on the agenda of Berdimuhammedov's talks.

M K Bhadrakumar served as a career diplomat in the Indian Foreign Service for over 29 years, with postings including India's ambassador to Uzbekistan (1995-1998) and to Turkey (1998-2001).

Go on-site to gain access to this article and other issues of the day as well as war stats, human and monetary by clicking on the following link.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info

v^v^v^v^v .

Saundra Hummer

March 26th, 2008, 07:18 PM

.x x x x x x xThe Iraq War,
From Beginning to No End

By
pmcarpenter
Created 03/26/2008 - 5:21am
THE FIFTH COLUMNIST
by P.M. Carpenter

Successive U.S. administrations that sucked us into Vietnam may have been colossally wrongheaded, but at least their explanation for doing so was clear and consistent: We must prevent the communist dominoes from falling. Increasingly Americans disagreed with the explanation, nonetheless it was what it was, and at least comprehensible.

Yet, although our intervention in Iraq was of equal if not greater wrongheadedness, the explanations for launching it, and then staying the course, remain a matter of national bewilderment. I can think of no other U.S. intervention that amounted to what seemed like a whim, nor one whose official rationale ever changed so vigorously over time.

First, and at first in toto, there were of course those ghastly weapons of mass destruction that required our attention, for their owner -- whose middle name seemed to be "9/11" -- posed an imminent threat. When those proved elusive, a thorough "regime change" became the sole explanation of our casus belli. But soon, after making short work of that objective, the better angels of our humanitarianism were called upon; that, we were told, was why we were there -- to save Iraqi lives, as we whacked them by the thousands.

Also came, in time, the stirring explanation of the need to spread democracy, which lasted until this administration realized that Iraqis' democratic beau ideal was more Bill Tweed than Tom Jefferson. Tossed into this mix, from time to time, were also the explanations of some needed Middle East map redrawing, the bold defense of the U.N.'s integrity, and the occasional and murky reference to guarding against the wicked designs of Iraq's neighbors.

If I failed to properly order the chronology of that explanatory mess, not to worry. It isn't important, because the official explanations were utter bullshit to begin with, as evidenced by their pick-and-choose metamorphoses. They were only tossed out for public consumption in answer to the sporadically posed query: Say, what is it, again, that we're doing over there? Some administration official would then say something that sounded good and we'd all be content for a while; until, once again, we saw the explanation made no sense. So we asked for another, and promptly got another.

Now, five years later, we still have no honest idea of why we went, but at least the forthcoming explanations for staying are down to one: We're there because we shouldn't leave. At least it has a certain simplicity. And slowly, if opinion polls are to be believed, we seem to be buying it, just like we did for years on end with those theoretical dominoes.

Our gradual acceptance isn't that surprising, really, given that the war is less and less a living room affair. There are plenty of other shiny new news stories to keep us amused, and what noteworthy death and destruction does take place over there is sold as a sure sign of improvement. All that getting shot at just shows we have "them" on the run, whoever they are, so we can't leave now. And the flip side? Once "they're" pacified, we can of course stay even longer. But before we stay longer, we must stay long enough.

The same Catch-22 logic is deployed in defense of how many "we," vs. "they," are there. "We have every desire to continue with the withdrawal of forces" this summer, said one military official this week [1]. However, and this is a good one, "although ... U.S. troop strength at that point should be about where it was before a 'surge' in deployments began last spring -- approximately 130,000 -- the military official said the net number remaining may be larger." Hence the number of troops on the ground is inversely proportionate to the number of troops withdrawn.

Yet I trust that's unproblematic for the troops themselves, since their commander in chief -- He of the Original Whim -- told their uniformed contemporaries in Afghanistan that their getting shot at, dodging roadside bombs and picking up the pieces of their buddies is "in some ways romantic." One strains mightily to imagine such wretched stupidity coming out of the mouth of an Abraham Lincoln or Franklin Roosevelt -- or for that matter, even a Lyndon Johnson or Richard Nixon. But one's strain is unproductive.

Meanwhile, "in congressional testimony next month, [Gen. David Petraeus is] expected to describe continued but slow improvement in military and political conditions," as military conditions, after five years, worsen and political conditions, after five years, remain a stagnated free-for-all.

Petraeus' ambassadorial sidekick, Ryan Crocker, will be joining in the testimonial headfakes, while conceding, as he did in mid-March, that the whole, endless mess is, "like everything else here, still very much under development." After five years.

But if our staying seems bewildering, it holds not a candle to the original mystery. After 4,000 dead Americans and anywhere from 100,000 to 600,000 dead Iraqis, we still don't know why we went there in the first place. And as American wars go, that's a historic first in itself.

Please respond to the commentary by leaving comments below and sharing them with the BuzzFlash community. For personal questions or comments you can contact P.M. at fifthcolumnistmail@gmail.com [2]
Go on-site to gain access to this and numerous other articles, just click on the following link:

http://www.buzzflash.com/articles/node/4726/print x x x x x .

Saundra Hummer

March 26th, 2008, 07:33 PM

.
X X X X X
The Secret American-Iranian Security Deal In IraqHow it connects to McCain’s visit to Israel
By
Roads To Iraq

26/03/08 "RTI" -- --- -Arab online newspaper published in London, is the only newspaper to report this a week ago but I waited few days to see if there is any development provides evidence to the newspaper claims, and the military campaign in Basra was what i am waiting for.
Arab online says that there are secret Iranian – American negotiations at Ahmadinejad’s visit to Iraq [please remember there were other developments in this week period, like the U.S. embassy refused to meet the Iranian delegation…etc]

The report contains details and names of people who attended the meeting from both sides which we don’t need here, so this is what the newspaper said in short:

Ahmadinejad offered to calm the situation in Iraq, using the three days attacks-free visit to Iraq as a demonstration of what can Iran do, the second offer is to accept the long term Iraqi – American agreement

To remove Iraq from the 1546 U.N. resolution, which gives the permission for the “Coalition Forces” to use force any Iraq’s neighboring country, if intelligence reports give evidence that the country exporting terrorism to Iraq, there is also a chapter allowing American forces to use Iraqi territory to attack another countries.

- To end all American – European political and logistic support for the Iranian opposition, especially Iran’s Resistance Council Organization, Pijac Kurdish organization, and other small opposition groups [Arabs, Turkmen, Azari…etc].

- Stop the secret and public American administration incitement of toppling the Iranian regime.

- End the U.S. and Europe campaign to push for the Iranian Jews immigration to Israel.

- To put an end to the campaign of the need to for pre-emptive strikes against selective and sensitive intelligence, military and nuclear Iranian sites.

The most important part of these negotiations is; What Iran can do for the U.S. in Iraq:

Ahmadinejad mentioned that he is negotiating with a previous blessing from Ayatollah Khamenei, and that’s reassured the Americans about the seriousness of the negotiations.

So, Ahmadinejad commitments are:

- Intelligence cooperation in Iraq and the region, wihle Washington gives Iran a space to maneuver internationally, easing the international pressure and the embargo, as a result, Tehran to postpone uranium enrichment operations for a period of two years, with the approval of Iran’s nuclear programme by the inspection teams of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

- Full cooperation between Tehran and Washington in all areas, and Iran to ensure the submission of several laws in Washington’s favour by the Shiite coalition blocs and Iraqi Kurdistan Alliance, including oil and gas law, the provinces a law, as opposed to because the American President George Bush to use his powers delegated by the military gives him the right to selective attacks on Iranian sites sensitive, to ensure the security of the American forces and the Iraqi people.

This “Iran - American” deal raised concerns in Israel therefore they invited McCain, the Republican candidate to visit Tel Aviv and asked him to visit Baghdad to be informed about what has been achieved talking with the Iranians, promised him that if the mission is successful, then he will get the support of Tel Aviv and the Zionist lobby in America presidential election.

Click on "comments
Go on-site to participate and read what others are thinking, just click on the followoing link:http://www.informationclearinghouse.info
X X X X X X X .

Saundra Hummer

March 27th, 2008, 12:37 AM

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^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^
Without Empathy or Remorse

By Jamala Rogers
Black Commentator.com
bc Editorial Board

~THEY HAVE OPERATED IN A FASHION THAT IS WAY PAST IRRESPONSIBLE; IT IS CRIMINAL. IMPEACHMENT IS IN ORDER~

The American Heritage Dictionary defines psychopath as “a person with an antisocial personality disorder, manifested in aggressive, perverted, criminal, or amoral behavior without empathy or remorse.” Without empathy or remorse.

The word psychopath came to mind when I heard Dick Cheney’s response to Martha Raddatz from ABC News last week on the Iraq war. She told Cheney that “two-thirds of Americans say it's not worth fighting." Cheney snapped back in his dispassionate, dead voice, "So?" Without empathy or remorse.

There have been a bunch of psychopaths in the White House running this country. It accurately describes Bush, Dick, Condi, Karl, Scooter and the rest of their crew. They have operated in a fashion that is way past irresponsible; it is criminal. Impeachment is in order.

Bush and his warmongers have put US troops in harm’s way through an illegal war; they have put us all in the crosshairs of the so-called war on terrorism.

I was captivated by the Winter Soldier testimonies of veteran soldiers who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan. Their riveting stories about murderous actions and unnecessary destruction re-affirmed why we must bring the troops home. Not in 100 years, but now!

~IF THEY KEEP SAYING THE TROOP SURGE IS WORKING THEN THE AMERICAN PEOPLE WILL COME TO BELIEVE IT~

PBS’s Frontline 2-part special on Bush’s War takes an indepth look at how Bush took this country into war. The special lays bare the deceptive tactics and military machinations used to confuse and convince the American public that an invasion of Iraq was necessary and justified. These exposés are a troubling punctuation to the 5th anniversary of Bush’s war. The Iraq war is now the second-most expensive and second-longest war in US history.

According to the National Priorities Project, over $500 billion dollars has been spent on this war. That’s about $275 million a day and over $5 billion for each month. Over 4000 US soldiers have been killed and more than 60,000 wounded. Many of these injuries will have permanent emotional and physical consequences for individual soldiers, their families and their communities. Without empathy or remorse.

The Bushite slogan to “Support our troops” is as empty as our savings accounts. Troops are getting deployed to war zones for two, three, and even four tours of duty escalating combat stress and exhaustion leading to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Troops are being exposed to depleted uranium, dangerous inoculations and infectious diseases and then find minimal support when they return home to an under-funded system of care. Without empathy or remorse.

Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz has said that not only has the Iraq war cost the US 50-60 times more than the Bush administration predicted, the war was also a critical factor in the sub-prime banking crisis whose impact is reverberating around the world. Stiglitz believes the war costs are closer to $3 trillion when you add in all the costs such as medical, family support, etc.

On the Iraqi side - a side which almost is never discussed in US corporate media - is the massive destruction of the country’s infrastructure and upheaval of its governance. 700,000 Iraqi people have been killed and 4 million have been displaced from their homes. Without empathy or remorse.

~PEACE ACTIVISTS MUST GET SMARTER AND BOLDER ABOUT OUR ANTI-WAR STRATEGY.
WE MUST GET LOUDER AND MORE CREATIVE ABOUT OUR MESSAGE~

Bushites, including presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McClain, are holding on to the belief that if they keep saying the troop surge is working then the American people will come to believe it.

A Pew Research poll suggests that those of us who prefer peace over war must step up our game. Their poll reports that media coverage on Iraq has declined and with that comes a drop in public awareness about the war. Only about 30% of those polled knew the current casualty numbers. The unjust and illegal invasion of Iraq has slipped from the minds of many US citizens as we struggle to fill our gas tanks, keep a roof over our heads, put food on the table and get affordable health care.

Peace activists must get smarter and bolder about our anti-war strategy. We must get louder and more creative about our message. We have let a bunch of psychopaths alter our future and destroy lives without empathy, remorse or consequence. They must be stopped.

BlackCommentator.com Editorial Board member Jamala Rogers is the leader of the Organization for Black Struggle in St. Louis and the Black Radical Congress National Organizer. Click here to contact Ms. Rogers.
http://www.blackcommentator.com/270/270_without_empathy_remorse_rogers_ed_bd.html
Home
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Your comments are always welcome.
^ ^ ^ .

Saundra Hummer

March 27th, 2008, 04:13 PM

.~~~~~~~ "He is the freeman whom the truth makes free, And all are slaves besides"

William Cowper
~~~
"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves"

William Pitt, Earl of Chatham
~~~
"In questions of power, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution"

Thomas Jefferson

~~~~~
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Saundra Hummer

March 27th, 2008, 04:26 PM

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* * * A
VIDEO
Dead Remembered, Living Ignored

Occupations Are Not Won. They Are Ended
By John Perry
Five years, four thousand dead troops, more than one million dead Iraqis.

And not only are we still waiting to hear what the "noble cause" is, but we have yet to hear a definition of victory, or how we'll know when we've achieved it.

What's happening in Iraq is NOT a war. It's an illegal occupation following the illegal invasion of a country that posed no threat to the United States.

Occupations are not won. They are ended. Which is why the Bush administration is calling it a war.

LINK/URL: http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article19622.htm

Please check out the links and pass it on. THIS INSANITY MUST END.

2006 Johns Hopkins Iraq mortality study, conducted in conjunction with Al Mustansiriya University in Baghadad

http://www.jhsph.edu/publichealthnews...

Just Foreign Policy site - Numbers updated, approximate running total of Iraqi deaths
http://www.justforeignpolicy.org

ORB Study -- Updated January 2008
http://www.opinion.co.uk:80/Newsroom_...

Iraq Veterans Against the War -- Winter Soldier page

http://www.ivaw.org/wintersoldier

The Real News -- Check out their Winter Soldier Coverage and get on their mailing list
http://ww.therealnews.com

Click for Home Page:
http://www.informationclearinghouse
* .

Saundra Hummer

March 27th, 2008, 07:14 PM

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$ $ $ $ $ $ $
The Little Administration That Couldn't Rebuilding the American Economy, Bush-Style

By
Tom Engelhardt
TomDispatch.com
Thursday 27 March 2008

No one was prepared for the storm when it hit. The levees meant to protect us had long since been breached and key officials had already left town. The well-to-do were assured of rescue, but for everyone else trapped inside the Superdome in a fast-flooding region, there was no evacuation plan in sight. The Bush administration, of course, claimed that it was in control and the President was already assuring his key officials that they were doing a heck of a job.

No, I'm not talking about post-Katrina New Orleans. That was so then. I'm talking about the housing and credit crunches, as well as the Bear Stearns bailout, that have given the term "bear market" new meaning.

Now, don't get me wrong - when it comes to the arcane science of economics, like most Americans, I'd benefit from an "Economics for Dummies" course. What I do know something about, though, is history, a subject that hasn't been on the Bush administration's course curriculum since the President turned out not to be Winston Churchill and conquered Iraq refused to morph into occupied Germany ‘n Japan 1945.

History may not repeat itself, but the administration's repetitive acts these past seven years make an assessment of our economic situation possible, even if you are an economics dummy.

Just consider the record: Administration officials proved incapable of rebuilding two countries that their military occupied and damaged. In Afghanistan and Iraq, while talking up the President's "freedom agenda," they were the equivalent of a natural disaster, a whirlwind of destruction.

In the case of Iraq, in disbanding its military, its government, and even its economy, they were literal nation-wreckers. On taking Baghdad, their first act of omission was to let the capital be looted. ("Stuff happens," commented Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld at the time.) Soon after, the administration's new viceroy in Baghdad, L. Paul Bremer III, promptly plunged the country into the equivalent of the Great Depression - without a Bear Stearns bailout in sight.

In the case of Afghanistan, only a staggering boom in opiate growing - the country now supplies an estimated 93% of the global market in illegal opiates, bringing about four billion dollars into the country - has slightly offset the disaster of "liberation." By just about any other measure, Afghanistan is a wreck.

In the case of New Orleans, the Bush administration not only couldn't rebuild an American city that nature (and the Army Corps of Engineers) damaged, but turned a natural disaster into a man-made catastrophe that has yet to end.

Despite a reputation for being the most disciplined, tough, and focused administration in memory, Bush's men and women couldn't even secure their fondest inside-the-Beltway dream: constructing a generation-long Pax Republicana in Washington. In fact, it looks suspiciously as if Republicans in the House and Senate, fleeing Congress as if it were New Orleans - it's politely called "retirement," not cutting and running - could even be swept into minority status for a generation.

And now, with a mere ten "lame duck" months to go, comes the American economy ...

You don't faintly need to understand economics to grasp the immediate danger. The people overseeing the handling of this crisis have done little these last years but hand money over to the rich, while running American power into the dirt.

Let me review our history lesson for a moment: No to nation-rebuilding, no to city-rebuilding, no to Congressional majority-building ...

Who dares imagine that the people who brought you Iraq, the war, could begin the rebuilding of an economy, or even successfully caulk the cracks in the levees of a system that, in its complexity, puts Iraq's feeble economy to shame?

In some ways, an administration - whatever its periodic changes of personnel - can be compared to an individual. At a certain age, its urges become predictable, its habits set, its limits largely known. While change may be possible, you wouldn't want to bet your house on it.

So what exactly has the Bush administration proven itself good at? The twin skills of destruction and looting would stand at the top of any list. Perhaps that's because it chose to put its "eggs" in only two baskets - those of the U.S. military and crony corporations.

Awed by the shock-and-awe force of forces that fell into their hands, administration officials moved to transfer as many powers of civil governance as possible to the Pentagon. From diplomacy to disaster relief, nation-building to intelligence gathering, an organization built only to destroy was designated as the go-to outfit for activities normally associated with those who have building in mind.

At the same time, the government was being staffed, top-to-bottom, with ill-prepared political pals, while a small set of crony corporations, of which Halliburton is certainly the best known, was given the nod in every rebuilding situation. It really didn't matter where you looked, they were the ones camped out, making money, on the landscape of destruction. With their no-bid, cost-plus contracts, these companies ran up the hours and then tended to jump ship when the going got bad. The same corporations that had essentially looted Iraq - it was labeled "reconstruction" - were the first ones called in when New Orleans went down. (Of the initial six contracts the Bush administration offered for the reconstruction of the city, five went to companies previously involved in Iraq's reconstruction program.)

Unsurprisingly, the Bush administration has proved serially incapable of building anything, even - in the long run - their own machine. And, from the Enron moment to the Bear Stearns one, whenever it looked like the Titanic might have hit an iceberg, it was a lock that those passengers assigned to the limited places in the lifeboats wouldn't be from steerage (or be weighed down with subprime mortgages).

So rebuilding. No. Saving people who aren't already friends. No. Doing a heck of a job in a crisis. No. Now, our latest and greatest crisis is upon us, the sort that, in a matter of weeks, has sent media commentators and pundits from reluctant discussions of whether we might be heading into a recession straight to references to the "d" word, "1929," and the Great Depression. And they're not alone. A recent USA Today/Gallup poll indicates that a startling 59% of Americans already believe we're heading for a long-term depression, not a recession (and 79% are worried about the possibility). Leave the definitional details to the experts. Most Americans have undoubtedly assessed the Bush administration's proven incapacity in perilous times and drawn the logical conclusions.

Ten months is a long, long time when only their hands are near the pilot's wheel of the ship of state and water's already seeping through the hull. It's an eon for an administration capable of sinking New Orleans in a matter of days, and Iraq in little more than months. Or, thought of another way, it's plenty of time if your expertise happens to lie in deconstruction. After all, barring a miracle, you're talking about the little administration that couldn't, no matter how hard Ben Bernanke may try.

So, even if you, like me, know next to nothing about economics, you already know enough to be afraid, very afraid.

Tom Engelhardt, who runs the Nation Institute's TomDispatch.com, is the co-founder of the American Empire Project. His book, "The End of Victory Culture" (University of Massachusetts Press), has been updated in a newly issued edition that deals with victory culture's crash-and-burn sequel in Iraq.
Go on-site to gain access to the green underlined links within this article and more.
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/032708S.shtml
$ $ $ .

Homer

March 28th, 2008, 10:22 AM

Scientist Demands Apology From ABC for Global Warming Hit Piece
http://newsbusters.org/files/user_pics/picture-26.jpg
Photo of Noel Sheppard.
By Noel Sheppard | March 28, 2008 - 11:40 ET

As NewsBusters reported, ABC's "World News" aired a disturbing global warming hit piece on Sunday that disrespectfully attacked an esteemed scientist and emeritus professor, referring to his work as "fraudulent nonsense" that is "going to cost lives, and cause us lost species, and cost major economic damage around the world."
http://a.abcnews.com/images/WNT/abc_wn_global_warming_denial_080323_ms.jpg

The subject of the report, Dr. S. Fred Singer, has been receiving well wishes of support from across the globe since this segment aired, including at ABC News's website where virtually all of the currently 128 comments submitted have been highly critical of this story and the way Singer was treated.

With this in mind, Singer has formally asked ABC for an apology and a retraction (presented with permission):

LETTER TO ABC NEWS

TO: Felicia Biberica Fiona Conway
Producer Executive director
ABC News ABC News
212-456-3634 77 W. 66th St.
cell 201-647-7966 New York City 10023
< Felicia.Biberica@abc.com >

Dear Ms Biberica and Ms Conway March 25, 2008

I share the anger expressed in nearly 100 postings (so far) at the shoddy handling of my interview aired on March 23: It was an appalling display of bias, unfairness, journalistic misbehavior, and a breakdown of ethical standards. It used prejudicial language, distorted facts, libelous insinuations, and anonymous smears. I urge you to read the postings; only one person offered any support to ABC, as far as I can see.

I put the following account on my website www.sepp.org:

1. Interviewer Dan Harris used a man from Greenpeace who spouted conspiracy theories about me, showing someone's diagram that 'connects' me to groups alleged to be financed by oil companies. The only purpose I can think of is to suggest to viewers that I am in the pay of oil companies and that therefore my science is somehow tainted and not credible. First, the suggestion is completely false. I am not financed or supported by oil companies or by any industry. Then, Harris tried to suggest that I misrepresented by denying oil company support but admitting receiving an unsolicited donation. I draw a distinction --as would any reasonable person -- between being 'supported' and between a single charitable donation (constituting a tiny fraction of 1%) of all donations received. Finally, the word 'connected' is imprecise, and can mean anything from being on a mailing list to holding a position and receiving a salary. In my case it is definitely the former.

2. Dan Harris also referred to unnamed scientists from NASA, Princeton and Stanford, who pronounced what I do as 'fraudulent nonsense.' [The ABC website changed it to 'fabricated' nonsense - perhaps on advice of ABC's lawyers.] They are easily identified as the well-known Global Warming zealots Jim Hansen, Michael Oppenheimer, and Steve Schneider. They should be asked by ABC to put their money where their mouth is and have a scientific debate with me. [I suspect they'll chicken out. They surely know that the facts support my position -- so they resort to anonymous slurs.] Hansen is no longer the careful scientist he was but has turned into an ideologue willing to publish junk 'research'. Oppenheimer, who may still be on the payroll of Environmental Defense, an activist lobbying group, has negligible credentials. Schneider has not published significant research in years. Both Hansen and Oppenheimer could be labeled as ‘Contrarians’ since they disagree with important conclusions of the UN-IPCC.

3. Dan Harris did mention my doubts about the lung-cancer effects of Second-Hand Smoke, about the danger of toxic waste (spent nuclear fuel), and about 'Nuclear Winter.' All true -- Dan did his research but withheld the full story. On SHS, I simply quoted from the experts (see attached review article from a noted medical doctor, specializing in lung disease). Nuclear fuel presents no technical problems, only political ones. France and Britain handle its disposal; why don't we? 'Nuclear Winter' (which burst onto the scene in 1983 -- and disappeared quickly) was basically a fraud, invented to shore up an ideological position. We disposed of it in a debate moderated by Ted Koppel on ABC-Nightline. But Harris left the audience with the impression that I am a ‘career skeptic’, and therefore my skepticism about manmade GW should be ignored.

4. Yours is supposed to be a news program not an opinion journal. Dan Harris completely ignored the new scientific evidence against anthropogenic (human-caused) global warming (AGW) and the fact that 100 other scientists presented papers that support this view. The Heartland Conference in NY had an attendance of more than 500, practically all of them AGW skeptics. That’s news, but ABC ignored it.

Conclusion: ABC owes it to its audience and to me to make appropriate corrections -- an apology and retraction by Dan Harris on the World News program.

Sincerely,

S. Fred Singer, PhD (Physics, Princeton)
Professor Emeritus, University of Virginia
Fellow, American Geophysical Union
Fellow, American Physical Society

Will ABC respond accordingly? Stay tuned.

Saundra Hummer

March 28th, 2008, 10:49 AM

.
^ ^ ^ ^ ^Is Wright Right About Racism?
By David Sirota
Creators Syndicate, 3/28/08
Since the 1960s, bigotry has undergone an aesthetic makeover. Today, the most pernicious racists do not wear pointy hoods, scream epithets and anonymously burn crosses from behind masks. They don starched suits, recite sententious bromides and stage political lynchings before television cameras. For proof, behold the mob stalking Barack Obama's former pastor, Jeremiah Wright.

Wright has long delivered fiery (and occasionally outrageous)
sermons, to little fanfare. Now, though, a gang of thugs is
inflicting a guilt-by-association blow to Obama by excoriating his
spiritual adviser for three specific declarations.

Sean Hannity, Fox News' own George Wallace, turned a fire hose on Wright for his church's focus. " is all about the black
community," Hannity thundered, claiming that means Wright supports "a black-separatist agenda."

Pat Buchanan billy-clubbed Wright for saying, "God damn America." The MSNBC commentator, who avoided the draft, implied that Wright, a former Marine, lacks sufficient loyalty to country. Out of context, Wright's exclamation was admittedly offensive. But remember: It punctuated a speech about segregation. Buchanan, nonetheless, unleashed, deriding "black hustlers" and insisting descendants of those "brought from Africa in slave ships" owe whites a thank you. "Where is the gratitude?" he asked.

Fox's Charles Krauthammer berated Wright for saying the 9/11 attacks were "chickens coming home to roost." Krauthammer labeled the pronouncement "vitriolic divisiveness" despite our government acknowledging the concept of "blowback" or retaliation Wright was referencing. The CIA knows that when it supports foreign dictatorships, there can be blowback from radicals. While blowback is often immoral and undeserved, its existence is undisputed. Yet, Krauthammer alleged that Wright takes "satisfaction in the deaths of 3,000 innocents."

In promoting the Wright "controversy," most media outlets joined this mob and embraced "colorblind racism," says Duke University's Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, author of "Racism Without Racists."

It is polite pinstriped prejudice shrouding bigotry in feigned
outrage against extremism the operative word being "feigned." After all, John McCain solicited the endorsement of John Hagee the pastor who called the Catholic Church "a great whore." Similarly, according to Mother Jones magazine, Hillary Clinton belongs to the "Fellowship" a secretive group "dedicated to 'spiritual war' on behalf of Christ." She is also friendly with Billy Graham, the reverend caught on tape spewing anti-Semitism. But while Wright's supposed "extremism" blankets the news, McCain and Clinton's relationships with real extremists receive scant attention.

Why is it "controversial" for one pastor to address the black
community, racism and blowback, but OK for another pastor to slander an entire religion? Why is it news that one candidate knows a sometimes-impolitic clergyman, but not news that his opponent associates with an anti-Semite? Does the double standard prove the dominant culture despises a black man confronting taboos, but accepts whites spewing hate? Does the very reaction to Wright show he's right about racism?

Clinton seems to think so. Her aides have been calling the states they believe Obama will lose their political "firewall." That's campaign-speak for "race wall" one built with bricks like
Pennsylvania and Indiana. These aren't the near-purely white states where racial politics is often muted (and Obama won). They are the slightly diverse states where racial politics simmers and where the black vote is too small to offset a motivated racist vote. This race wall is now being fortified.

ABC News reports that Clinton's campaign is "pushing the
Wright story" ahead of the Pennsylvania and Indiana primaries. The crasstactic is designed to motivate the racist vote by reminding whites of Obama's connection to the African-American community. Put another way, Clinton's message has become simply: Obama Is Black.

Wright probably expected this brouhaha. He says our government is "controlled by rich white people" and our culture afflicted by racism. Though these statements are also deemed distasteful by the Establishment, they are truisms. You can see their veracity in the collected portraits of white millionaires commonly called the congressional photo directory. Or, just turn on your television and watch the mob continue stoking the Wright "controversy." . . . . .http://www.creators.com/opinion/david-sirota/is-wright-right-about-racism.html^ ^ ^
.

1/2 Baked, Not Fried

March 28th, 2008, 11:48 AM

A few things that really aren’t in dispute:

1. There is a direct correlation between surface temperatures on Earth and the volume of greenhouses gasses in the atmosphere.

2. The volume of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere, particularly CO2, is increasing at unprecedented levels.

3. The earth’s surface temperatures are also increasing at unprecedented levels, at rates that directly correspond with the increase in CO2.

4. 75% of the mass of the atmosphere, including most greenhouse gasses, exist in a layer ranging from 5 to 13 miles from the Earth’s surface.

5. There is a finite amount of carbon in the Earth system.

I want to elaborate on points 4 and 5, because I believe they are important in helping to understand global warming. Regarding point #4, I firmly believe that one of the biggest reasons people dispute global warming is their mistaken view of the atmosphere as vast and limitless. Intuitively, when we look to the sky, we see something that appears to dwarf the Earth around us, as though the Earth is a pea surrounded by a basketball-sized atmosphere. No way we could ever fill that up, regardless of how much we pollute, I believe the thinking goes.

In reality, most of the mass of the Earth’s atmosphere is contained in an incredibly narrow band, ranging in altitude from roughly 5 miles, at the poles, to perhaps 12 or 13 miles at the equator. At its shortest, this is lower than most commercial aircraft fly. At its highest, it’s barely twice the height of our world’s tallest mountains (or, if you live in NYC, it’s about the distance from Greenwich Village to the Bronx). In reality, this band of atmosphere, in relation to the Earth, is more like the very thin skin of a very large apple, the Earth being the apple. When we understand just how thin this layer is, it becomes much easier to understand how our actions on Earth indeed could affect the composition of this layer.

Point #5 is also important, in that I don’t believe most of us spend much time thinking about the carbon cycle. What’s important to understand, I believe, is that it is a closed system. In other words, there is only so much carbon, and all of it already exists in our system. We do not generate new carbon, nor receive it from any outside source, such as the sun. The only real question, then, is where the carbon is being stored. Basically, it is stored in one of four places—(1) below the surface, in a fossilized form, (2) on the surface, in the form of organic life, (3) in the oceans, and (4) in the atmosphere. In order for carbon to increase in any one of these places, i.e., the atmosphere, it has to come from one of the other three reservoirs. And it is. By burning fossil fuels, we are essentially taking megatons of carbon which have been stored in the Earth for millennia, converting it to gas, and pumping it into the atmosphere at a rate that far exceeds anything that would otherwise occur naturally.

I’m not trying to attack Homer or anyone else, and I hope I haven’t insulted anyone’s intelligence with the Climatology 101 lesson. It’s just that I believe people are skeptical of global warming because they don’t understand it, and that understanding a few basic concepts is all that’s needed to realize that global warming is actually incredibly intuitive, not counterintuitive, as it may initially seem.

Thanks for reading.

Saundra Hummer

March 28th, 2008, 02:00 PM

1/2 Baked 1/2 Fried, no, not an insult, not at all.

The thing is, we can't hop on a rocket and hitch a ride to a live planet once we destroy too much of our own, this earth of ours. Caution and programs to protect it should be of the utmost importance to all of us.

It's been said that finding ways to keep this planet healthy could be a growth industry, research and solutions could make us all prosperous and allow us to continue to prosper.

We know without a doubt we are polluting this earth, our waters, and the very air we breathe. How and why should we expect this earth, and our atmosphere, to keep taking it all in without some major hiccups?

They can argue all they want about what a fallacy global warming is. Fact or Fallacy? Give us a break. We know enough about how we are polluting the whole planet to get over and rid of this protectionism of the industrial and corporate entities that rule us. We have more than a desparate need to insist that strides be taken to stop it while we are still able to prevent such damage; damage which is massive.

Global warming or not, there are other environmental catastrophies happening. We're all aware of them, or most of them, these environmental events which are terribly destructive, and if they should go hand in hand with global warming, global warming being a reality, then look out world, we're in for some challenging times. Some say they've already begun. It's already time to start paying the piper.

Saundra Hummer

March 28th, 2008, 04:58 PM

.:: :: :: :: :: ::
42 Democrats Vow a Drawdown in Iraq If They Win Seats
By
Paul Kane
Washington Post Staff Writer

28/03/08 " Washington Post " -- - More than three dozen Democratic congressional candidates banded together yesterday to promise that, if elected, they will push for legislation calling for an immediate drawdown of troops in Iraq that would leave only a security force in place to guard the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad.

Rejecting their party leaders' assertions that economic troubles have become the top issue on voters' minds, leaders of the coalition of 38 House and four Senate candidates pledged to make immediate withdrawal from Iraq the centerpiece of their campaigns.

"The people inside the Beltway don't seem to get how big an issue this is," said Darcy Burner, a repeat candidate who narrowly lost to Rep. Dave Reichert (R-Wash.) in 2006.

The group's 36-page plan does not set a specific deadline for when all combat troops must be out of Iraq. "Begin it now, do it as safely as you can and get everyone out," Burner said.

The starkest difference between the group's proposal, dubbed a "Responsible Plan to End the War in Iraq," and those embraced by many senior Democrats and the party's presidential candidates is that it rejects the idea of leaving U.S. troops on the ground to train Iraqi security forces or engage in anti-terrorism operations. The group instead calls for a dramatic increase in regional diplomacy and the deployment of international peacekeeping forces, if necessary.

One of the signatories, Donna F. Edwards, who bested Rep. Albert R. Wynn in his Prince George's County-centered district in the Democratic primary on Feb. 12, said the candidates are offering "real leadership." She also gave credit to "some in the Congress who are prepared to demonstrate the political will" to end the war, signaling that she disagrees with Democratic leaders who have been thwarted in their legislative efforts to reshape President Bush's Iraq policies.

The antiwar candidates include several challengers who are highly touted by Democratic leaders, including Burner and Eric Massa, who is running a second race against Rep. John R. "Randy" Kuhl Jr. (R-N.Y.). A few are running in Democratic-leaning districts and, should they win their primaries, are likely to win in November. Many more are, for now, longer-shot candidates running against veteran Republican incumbents.

Democratic leaders said the new candidate coalition does not signal a divide in the party's war policy.

"Democrats are united in our need to bring change in Iraq," said Doug Thornell, spokesman for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. "It's up to the individual candidates to determine how to best do that for their district."

© 2008 The Washington Post Company

http://www.informationhouse.info :: :: ::

Saundra Hummer

March 28th, 2008, 05:05 PM

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~~~~~~~
"It is sheer folly to expect justice from the unprincipled"

Proverb
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"Much law, but little justice"

Proverb
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"Where might is master, justice is servant"

Proverb
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"Justice is itself the great standing policy of civil society; and any eminent departure from it, under any circumstances, lies under the suspicion of being no policy at all"

Edmund Burke

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"We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people"

Martin Luther King Jr.
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"Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity"

Martin Luther King, Jr.

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Saundra Hummer

March 28th, 2008, 05:13 PM

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:: :: :: :: :: :: ::
Was Polonium-210 Being Smuggled for a Dirty Bomb?
By
Paul Craig Roberts
28/03/08 "ICH " -- - -In the recently published thriller, The Shell Game, Steve Alten weaves a tale of a neoconservative plot to attack Iran. To overcome resistance, a black op group associated with a Republican administration arranges for nuclear devices to be exploded in two American cities, with planted evidence pointing to Iran. Recent developments make one wonder if fact is following fantasy.

The Bush regime’s propaganda against Iran is going full blast and obviously has a purpose. The foreign press reports that the reason for Cheney’s latest trip abroad is to cajole, threaten, and purchase support for a US attack on Iran.

The Israeli government continues to see an Iranian nuclear weapon on the horizon and to agitate for US action against Iran.

According to John McGlynn in Japan Focus (March 22, 2008), the Bush regime is already attacking Iran with Treasury Department actions to cut off Iran’s banking system from all international banking relationships, thereby preventing Iran from importing and exporting. McGlynn calls the US Treasury’s action a "US declaration of war on Iran."

Cheney’s trip shows that the Bush regime is undeterred by the National Intelligence Estimate’s conclusion that Iran abandoned several years ago any nuclear weapons program that it might have had. The International Atomic Energy Agency has never found evidence of an Iranian nuclear weapons program. Despite all the facts and without evidence, the Bush Regime continues to assert that Iran has a nuclear weapons program that warrants an American attack on Iran.

Gen. David Petraeus, commander of US forces in Iraq and a member of the Cheney/neocon team, blamed Easter Sunday’s bombardment of the "secure" Green Zone in Baghdad on Iran. Petraeus says the attack is "in complete violation of promises made by President Ahmadinejad and the other most senior Iranian leaders." Petraeus’s claims are part of the neocon propaganda campaign to build support for an attack on Iran.

Central Command chief Admiral William Fallon is reported to have declared that there would be no attack on Iran on his watch. With his recent resignation effective the end of March, Fallon has been moved out of the picture. According to news reports, Fallon derided Petraeus as a "sycophant" and told him to his face that he considered him to be "an ass-kissing little chickenshit."

That it is Fallon who is gone and the ass-kissing little chickenshit who remains tells you all you need to know about the US military under the Cheney/Bush/neocon regime. It is an ass-kissing, yes boss, military.

On his Web site, University of Michigan professor and Middle East expert Juan Cole has an article by Vanity Fair contributing editor Craig Unger, author of The Fall of the House of Bush. Unger makes the point that the US attack on Iraq was not the result of "mistaken intelligence." It was a direct result of a plot by neoconservative conspirators, who fabricated "evidence" and spread propaganda that deceived Congress, the media, and the American people.

A conspiracy that would launch a war on the basis of forged "intelligence" and false allegations is a conspiracy that believes strongly in its agenda. Such a conspiracy would not be content with only partial achievement of its agenda. As we should all know by now, the neoconservative agenda is for the US to overthrow Iraq, Iran, and Syria at a minimum. As neoconservative Norman Podhoretz has formulated the agenda, the goal is to overthrow the regimes in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan in addition, and to clear Hezbollah out of Lebanon.

The difficulties of securing Iraq and Afghanistan have not dented the neocons’ faith in their agenda, but time might be running out for the neocons if we assume that Bush will step down and not utter the two words – catastrophic emergency – that transform him into a dictator, and that a war weary voting public will not elect "Bomb bomb bomb Iran" McCain.

A McCain presidency would give the neocons four more years to orchestrate an attack on Iran. Jeffery St. Clair in CounterPunch, March 24, notes that Hillary’s vaulting ambition could cause her to split and defeat the Democrats by playing the race card against Obama so that she can run against McCain in four years before she is too old for the game.

A conspiracy willing to launch an invasion of a country on false pretenses would not hesitate to pull off a false flag event if it would further their agenda. The massive human, financial and diplomatic cost of the Iraq invasion is a good indication that neoconservatives are willing for America to pay any price for establishing their agenda of achieving American/Israeli hegemony over the Middle East.

We will likely never know, but a neoconservative false flag operation might lie behind what appears to have been the accidental poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko by a rare and tightly controlled radioactive isotope, Polonium-210. Litvinenko, a former member of KGB counterintelligence, operated in the shadowy world of "security consultants" on a fake passport given to him by the British government. Litvinenko left Russia when his patron, oligarch Boris Berezovsky fled to escape fraud charges.

The British government and websites financed by Berezovsky blamed Litvinenko’s mysterious death on the Russian Federal Security Service, which allegedly sent an agent to put Polonium-210 in Litvinenko’s tea. On its face, the tale is far-fetched, but it served to divert attention from the fact that Polonium-210 had somehow got into private hands.

Where had the Polonium come from? No one knows, but nuclear physicist Gordon Prather noted at the time that Litvinenko had recently been to Israel and that Israel’s nuclear reactors are not subject to international safeguards.

For what purpose was Polonium being smuggled? No one knows, but Prather notes that Polonium-210 has a short shelf-life that would turn any stored weapon into a dud within months.

According to knowledgeable people, Polonium-210 would be useful for a dirty bomb that would do little real damage but would create enough fear and hysteria for the neocons to start another war.

Steve Alten was more alert than the media. He saw what might be the real story behind Litvinenko’s death by Polonium-210. Realizing that fantasy is one route by which Americans can be brought to the facts, and hoping to preclude any such real world event, Alten wrote a thriller predictive of our future between now and 2012.

Paul Craig Roberts a former Assistant Secretary of the US Treasury and former associate editor of the Wall Street Journal, has been reporting shocking cases of prosecutorial abuse for two decades. A new edition of his book, The Tyranny of Good Intentions, co-authored with Lawrence Stratton, a documented account of how Americans lost the protection of law, is forthcoming from Random House in March, 2008

Go on site to gain access to this article and others regarding this administration and the world, war stats, military, civilian and monetary.
Just click on the following URL/LINK:

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info:: :: :: :: :: .

Saundra Hummer

March 29th, 2008, 02:01 PM

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$ $ $ $ $ Treasury Department Plan Would Give Fed Wide New Power
By
Edmund L. Andrews
The New York Times
Saturday 29 March 2008

Washington - The Treasury Department will propose on Monday that Congress give the Federal Reserve broad new authority to oversee financial market stability, in effect allowing it to send SWAT teams into any corner of the industry or any institution that might pose a risk to the overall system.

The proposal is part of a sweeping blueprint to overhaul the nation's hodgepodge of financial regulatory agencies, which many experts say failed to recognize rampant excesses in mortgage lending until after they set off what is now the worst financial calamity in decades.

Democratic lawmakers are all but certain to say the proposal does not go far enough in restricting the kinds of practices that caused the financial crisis. Many of the proposals, like those that would consolidate regulatory agencies, have nothing to do with the turmoil in financial markets. And some of the proposals could actually reduce regulation.

According to a summary provided by the administration, the plan would consolidate an alphabet soup of banking and securities regulators into a powerful trio of overseers responsible for everything from banks and brokerage firms to hedge funds and private equity firms.

While the plan could expose Wall Street investment banks and hedge funds to greater scrutiny, it carefully avoids a call for tighter regulation.

The plan would not rein in practices that have been linked to the housing and mortgage crisis, like packaging risky subprime mortgages into securities carrying the highest ratings.

The plan would give the Fed some authority over Wall Street firms, but only when an investment bank's practices threatened the entire financial system.

And the plan does not recommend tighter rules over the vast and largely unregulated markets for risk sharing and hedging, like credit default swaps, which are supposed to insure lenders against loss but became a speculative instrument themselves and gave many institutions a false sense of security.

Parts of the plan could reduce the power of the Securities and Exchange Commission, which is charged with maintaining orderly stock and bond markets and protecting investors. The plan would merge the S.E.C. with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which regulates exchange-traded futures for oil, grains, currencies and the like.

The blueprint also suggests several areas where the S.E.C. should take a lighter approach to its oversight. Among them are allowing stock exchanges greater leeway to regulate themselves and streamlining the approval of new products, even allowing automatic approval of securities products that are being traded in foreign markets.

The proposal began last year as an effort by Henry M. Paulson Jr., secretary of the Treasury, to make American financial markets more competitive against overseas markets by modernizing a creaky regulatory system.

His goal was to streamline the different and sometimes clashing rules for commercial banks, savings and loans and nonbank mortgage lenders.

"I am not suggesting that more regulation is the answer, or even that more effective regulation can prevent the periods of financial market stress that seem to occur every 5 to 10 years," Mr. Paulson will say in a speech on Monday, according to a draft. "I am suggesting that we should and can have a structure that is designed for the world we live in, one that is more flexible."

Congress would have to approve almost every element of the proposal, and Democratic leaders are already drafting their own bills to impose tougher supervision over Wall Street investment banks, hedge funds and the fast-growing market in derivatives like credit default swaps.

But Mr. Paulson's proposal for the Fed echoes ideas championed by Representative Barney Frank, the Massachusetts Democrat who is chairman of the House Financial Services Committee.

Both see the Fed overseeing risk across the entire financial spectrum, but Mr. Frank is likely to favor a stronger Fed role and to subject investment banks to the same rules that commercial banks now must follow, especially for capital reserves.

The Treasury plan would let Fed officials examine the practices and even the internal bookkeeping of brokerage firms, hedge funds, commodity-trading exchanges and any other institution that might pose a risk to the overall financial system.

That would be a significant expansion of the central bank's regulatory mission.

When Fed officials agreed this month to rescue Bear Stearns, once the nation's fifth-largest investment bank, they pointedly noted that the Fed never had the authority to monitor its financial condition or order it to bolster its protections against a collapse.

In two unprecedented moves, the Fed engineered a marriage between JPMorgan Chase and Bear Stearns, lending $29 billion to JPMorgan to prevent a Bear bankruptcy and a chain of defaults that might have felled much of the financial system.

For the first time since the 1930s, the Fed also agreed to let investment banks borrow hundreds of billions of dollars from its discount window, an emergency lending program reserved for commercial banks and other depository institutions.

But Mr. Paulson's proposal would fall well short of the kind of regulation that Democrats have been proposing. Mr. Frank and other senior Democrats have argued that investment banks and other lightly regulated institutions now compete with commercial banks and should be subject to similar regulation, including examiners who regularly pore over their books and quietly demand changes in their practices.

In a recent interview, Mr. Frank said he realized the need for tighter regulation of Wall Street firms after a meeting with Charles O. Prince III, then chairman of Citigroup.

When Mr. Frank asked why Citigroup had kept billions of dollars in "structured investment vehicles" off the firm's balance sheet, he recalled, Mr. Prince responded that Citigroup, as a bank holding company, would have been at a disadvantage because investment firms can operate with higher debt and lower capital reserves.

Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, has taken a similar stance.

"Commercial banks continue to be supervised closely, and are subject to a host of rules meant to limit systemic risk," Mr. Schumer wrote in an op-ed article on Friday in The Wall Street Journal. "But many other financial institutions, including investment banks and hedge funds, are regulated lightly, if at all, even though they act in many ways like banks."

Mr. Paulson's proposal is likely to provoke bruising turf battles in Congress among agencies and rival industry groups that benefit from the current regulations.

Administration officials acknowledged on Friday that they did not expect the proposal to become law this year, but said they hoped it would help frame a policy debate that would extend well after the elections in November.

In a nod to the debacle in mortgage lending, the administration proposed a Mortgage Origination Commission to evaluate the effectiveness of state governments in regulating mortgage brokers and protecting consumers.

The bulk of the proposal, however, was developed before soaring mortgage defaults set off a much broader credit crisis, and most of the proposals are geared to streamlining regulation.

This plan would consolidate a large number of regulators into roughly three big new agencies.

Bank supervision, now divided among five federal agencies, would be led by a Prudential Financial Regulator, which could send examiners into any bank or depository institution that is protected by either federal deposit insurance or other federal backstops. It would eliminate the distinction between "banks" and "thrift institutions," which are already indistinguishable to most consumers, and shut down the Office of Thrift Supervision.

Any effort to merge the Commodity Futures Trading Commission with the S.E.C. is likely to provoke battles.

Yet another proposal would, for the first time, create a national regulator for insurance companies, an industry that state governments now oversee.

Administration officials argue that a national system would eliminate the inefficiencies of having 50 different state regulators, who have jealously guarded their powers and are likely to fight any federal encroachment.

Arthur Levitt, a former S.E.C. chairman who has long pushed for stronger investor protection, said his first impression of the plan was positive. Even though the S.E.C.'s powers might be reduced, Mr. Levitt said, the plan would create a broader agency to regulate business conduct in all financial services.

"It's a thoughtful document," he said. "I'm intrigued by the fact that it puts an emphasis on investor protection, and that it establishes an agency specifically for that purpose, which would operate across all markets. I think that's a very constructive first step."
http://www.truthout.comStronger investor protections seems like a much needed addition to the way things are now. Is this a wise move or ? Seems to be to me, but then I would hardly know. What are your thoughts on this? SRH$ $ $ $ $ $ $

Saundra Hummer

March 29th, 2008, 04:10 PM

.*^*^*^*^*Freed Alabama Ex-Governor Sees Politics in His Case By
Adam Nossiter
The New York Times
Saturday 29 March 2008
Montgomery, Alabama - Former Governor Don Siegelman of Alabama, released from prison today on bond in a bribery case, said he was as convinced as ever that politics played a leading role in his prosecution.

In a telephone interview shortly after he walked out of a federal prison in Oakdale, La., Mr. Siegelman said there had been "abuse of power" in his case, and repeatedly cited the influence of Karl Rove, the former White House political director.

"His fingerprints are smeared all over the case," Mr. Siegelman said, a day after a federal appeals court ordered him released on bond and said there were legitimate questions about his case.

Mr. Rove has strenuously denied any involvement in the conviction of the former governor, who was sentenced to serve seven years last June after being convicted in 2006. He could not immediately be reached for comment today.

Mr. Siegelman served nine months while his lawyers appealed a federal judge's refusal to release him on bond, pending the ex-governor's appeal of his conviction. That refusal was overturned by the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit on Thursday.

The former governor, a Democrat, said he would "press" to have Mr. Rove answer questions about his possible involvement in the case before Congress, which has already held a hearing on Mr. Siegelman. On Thursday, the House Judiciary Committee signaled its intention to have Mr. Siegelman testify about the nature of his prosecution.

In June of 2006 he was convicted by a federal jury here of taking $500,000 from Richard M. Scrushy, the former chief executive of the HealthSouth corporation, in exchange for an appointment to the state hospital licensing board. The money was to retire a debt from Mr. Siegelman's campaign for a state lottery to pay for schools, and the ex-governor's lawyers have insisted that it was no more than a routine political contribution.

On the telephone outside the prison today, Mr. Siegelman said he had confidence that the federal appeals court, which will now consider his larger appeal, would agree with his view of the case - that he was convicted for a transaction that regularly takes place in American politics.

Otherwise, Mr. Siegelman said, "every governor and every president and every contributor might as well turn themselves in, because it's going to be open season on them."

His case has become a flash point for Democratic contentions that politics influenced decisions by the Justice Department, fueled by testimony from an Alabama campaign operative that suggested Mr. Rove may have had some involvement.

In Alabama, the Siegelman case has inflamed partisan passions, with Republicans insisting that Mr. Siegelman's term from 1998 to 2002 was deeply corrupted, and Democrats furious over what they depict as a years-long political witch-hunt.

Before his release earlier in the day, the ex-governor completed his prison chores for the day - mopping a barracks area - and waited for his wife and son to pick him up for the eight-hour drive to his home in Birmingham, Ala.

"It feels great to be out," Mr. Siegelman said. "I wish I could say it was over. But we're a long way from the end of this."

http://www.truthout.org *^*^*^* .

Saundra Hummer

March 29th, 2008, 04:23 PM

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$ $ $ $ $ $ $Report Sketches Crime Costing Billions: Theft From Charities By
Stephanie Strom
The New York Times
Saturday 29 March 2008

The volunteer treasurer of the Madison County Humane Society in Indiana was charged this month with using $65,000 of the charity's money to buy jewelry and makeup. In San Francisco, the chief financial officer of the Music Concourse Community Partnership was fired after he was accused of taking $3.6 million of the organization's money to play the stock market.

Nonprofit leaders tend to shrug off such cases as evidence of "just a few bad apples." But a new report, trying to identify the scope of such thefts for the first time, suggests otherwise.

The report, by four professors who specialize in nonprofit accounting, found that the typical theft from a charity was committed by a female employee with no criminal record who earned less than $50,000 a year and had worked for the nonprofit at least three years. The amount she stole was less than $40,000.

The most costly cases, the study found, involved male executives earning $100,000 to $149,000 a year. The thieves in such cases had typically been with the organization the longest.

But what is getting the attention of nonprofit leaders is the report's estimate of the overall cost, which the authors put at $40 billion for 2006, or some 13 percent of the roughly $300 billion given to charity that year.

"It's a surprisingly large number," said Paul C. Light, a professor of public service at New York University who does surveys of public confidence in charities. "We really need to take a good hard look at what's going on in these organizations."

The new report is based on data from the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners, which, the report said, found that "all organizations," whether government, for-profit or nonprofit, "lose on average 6 percent of their revenue to fraud every year." Applying that percentage to nonprofits' total 2006 revenue of $665 billion - donations, government payments and other income - the authors came up with the $40 billion estimate.

"Determining how much theft and embezzlement takes place has been the holy grail of the sector," said Jack B. Siegel, a tax lawyer who specializes in nonprofit matters.

If the $40 billion figure is accurate, then the money lost to fraud equaled the combined giving by corporations and foundations in 2006, said Diana Aviv, president and chief executive of the Independent Sector, which represents nonprofit groups.

But Ms. Aviv expressed skepticism about the report, noting that it relied on the fraud examiners association's estimate of overall fraud across all sectors, including government and corporate.

"They're lumping all those sectors together, and it could be that the for-profit sector experiences a higher level of fraud, while the nonprofit sector and government experience lower levels," Ms. Aviv said.

Nonetheless, she said, "even if the figure is $20 billion, that's still a huge amount and needs to be addressed."

The report, published in the December 2007 issue of Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, found that losses to fraud among the 58 cases reported to the fraud examiners association in a random survey of nonprofits ranged from $200 to $17 million, with the median fraud costing $100,000.

"Most of these things are not caught by routine audits," said Gary Snyder, who tracks nonprofit fraud in his newsletter, Nonprofit Imperative. "They're usually done by someone in the financial area - the treasurer, the bookkeeper, the signer of checks - who knows how to avoid getting caught."

Almost 95 percent of the reported frauds entailed loss of cash, and a majority of those involved false or inflated invoices, billing for expenses that were never incurred and check tampering.

"I gave a talk to a group of nonprofit executives a few weeks ago, and every single one of them had a fraud story to tell," said one of the report's authors, Janet S. Greenlee, an associate professor of accounting at the University of Dayton. "This has been going on for years, but there's a feeling that it shouldn't be discussed," because of the effect it might have on donations.

Professor Greenlee - joined in the report by Mary Fischer of the University of Texas at Tyler, Teresa P. Gordon of the University of Idaho and Elizabeth K. Keating of Boston College - said the failure of organizations to punish those who steal from them was perhaps one of the biggest reasons for fraud in the sector. She said she had worked at organizations that refused to dismiss employees caught stealing.

Professor Light, at N.Y.U., said some 70 percent of respondents to a new survey among the general public thought charities wasted "a great deal" or "a fair amount."

"Donors have already indicated," he added, "that they don't have a great deal of faith in the way these groups handle money."

But it will now be harder for charities to hide fraud, because beginning with tax forms they must file for 2008, the Internal Revenue Service has added a question requiring them to disclose whether they have experienced theft, embezzlement or other fraud during the year.

"Not only will that eventually give us a much better idea of how widespread fraud is with these groups, it also gives them an incentive to have better financial controls," said Mr. Siegel, the tax lawyer, who is credited with the idea of adding the question to the tax forms.

Mr. Siegel used to track cases of fraud among charities but "got bored," he said, because there were so many of them.

Newspapers routinely report incidents of nonprofit fraud in their communities, but the amounts tend to be small and thus go unnoticed at a national level.

Mr. Snyder, the tracker of nonprofit fraud in his newsletter, said that through use of databases and other searches, he had stumbled across more than $700 million in fraud already this year among government agencies and nonprofits, including church-related organizations.

Asked about his favorite example of nonprofit fraud, Mr. Snyder was initially stumped.

"There are so many," he said.

He eventually settled on the embezzlement of some $25 million from Goodwill Industries of Santa Clara County in California.

It started in the 1970s and continued until one of the participants blew the whistle in 1998. Merchandise donated to the organization was sold outside the Goodwill shops by the perpetrators, who kept the proceeds. One of the embezzlers committed suicide before arrest, and six others, all related, pleaded guilty, were fined and, in some cases, were sent to prison.

The thieves had given more than $800,000 to the organization's president and chief executive, who parked the money in accounts in Switzerland, in Austria and on the Isle of Man and then escaped to Guatemala as investigators closed in, according to the authorities. Guatemala sent him home in 2003, but he ultimately pleaded guilty to only one charge - of tax evasion unrelated to the scandal at Santa Clara Goodwill - and walked out of the courtroom.

"I like that one," Mr. Snyder said, "because it's an extreme example of something typical: that no one gets in trouble for this."

Professor Greenlee said she saw signs that charities were now trying harder to deal with fraud.

"They're creating audit committees and adopting the provisions of Sarbanes-Oxley as best practices," she said of the 2002 law that imposed stricter accountability on corporate governing, though not on charities.

"Boards are becoming tougher," she said, "because they know that as fiduciaries, they are at risk of, at the very least, embarrassment."
http://www.truthout.org
We know of a local deputy sheriff who raises dogs who kept over $300 dollars of donated food meant for the Humane Society. It was the more costly "Science Diet" dog food which had been donated by their feed sales represenative. He kept 350 pounds for his own animals. A drop in the bucket, but illegal is illegal. A Bureau of Land Management employee we knew had sacks and sacks of government fertiliizer stacked up in his feed shed, higher than my head. He used it on his hay fields, and so he had a lot of it. It was clearly marked. This is common practice, or so we hear, and we, of course, are the ones to pay for it.
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Saundra Hummer

March 29th, 2008, 06:27 PM

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*+*+*+*+* FAULTY INTELLIGENCE?

ONE CAN ONLY HOPE.

SRH

Russian Intelligence
Sees
U.S. Military Buildup on Iran Border
By
RIA Novosti

29/03/08 -- - MOSCOW, March 27 (RIA Novosti) - Russian military intelligence services are reporting a flurry of activity by U.S. Armed Forces near Iran's borders, a high-ranking security source said Tuesday.

"The latest military intelligence data point to heightened U.S. military preparations for both an air and ground operation against Iran," the official said, adding that the Pentagon has probably not yet made a final decision as to when an attack will be launched.

He said the Pentagon is looking for a way to deliver a strike against Iran "that would enable the Americans to bring the country to its knees at minimal cost."

He also said the U.S. Naval presence in the Persian Gulf has for the first time in the past four years reached the level that existed shortly before the invasion of Iraq in March 2003.

Col.-Gen. Leonid Ivashov, vice president of the Academy of Geopolitical Sciences, said last week that the Pentagon is planning to deliver a massive air strike on Iran's military infrastructure in the near future.

A new U.S. carrier battle group has been dispatched to the Gulf.

The USS John C. Stennis, with a crew of 3,200 and around 80 fixed-wing aircraft, including F/A-18 Hornet and Superhornet fighter-bombers, eight support ships and four nuclear submarines are heading for the Gulf, where a similar group led by the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower has been deployed since December 2006.

The U.S. is also sending Patriot anti-missile systems to the region.
Go on-site to gain access to other topical issues, war stats, military, civilian and monetary. 4,005 reported dead in our own military and battles are raging across the whole country of Iraq right now. Pity those who are caught up in it, as many of them will be maimed for life or die in this illegal war. SRH
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info
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Saundra Hummer

March 29th, 2008, 07:00 PM

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* * * Murdering Iranians By Lew Rockwell
29/03/08 "Lew Rockwell" -- - Terrible rumors from Russia continue to swirl around the Middle East that the Cheney-Bush junta has decided to bomb Iran on April 4th or 6th, targeting not only nuclear-power research facilities but ships, planes, antiaircraft installations, and the Iranian pentagon. Apparently the nuclear-power reactor being built by Russian companies will be spared, but not much else.
Will it happen? Certainly the neocon hate network is working overtime to make it so. Bush fired the anti-neocon Admiral Fallon. One thing we know for sure: it will be the typical Bush administration snafu, with horrific consequences for the region and the world, not to speak of the Iranian people, and reap much trouble for the US empire. Indeed, it could mark the end of the empire if, as Bill Lind worries, the Iranians in retaliation cut off water-food-ammo supply routes to US troops in Iraq, and, with the help of Shiite militians, capture large numbers of them. Need I mention that Ron Paul, our champion of peace, is the leading opponent of war on Iran?
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info

REMEMBER: The PNAC Manifesto was full of talk of Baby Nukes being used by us, along with any number of other WMD's of our own.

Here it comes?

We have to work to prevent such as this from happening. I have to believe we can, that is if it isn't too late due to too many failed policies and saber rattling on our part which is all to often inciting others to violence in the area. SRH

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Saundra Hummer

March 29th, 2008, 07:18 PM

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~~~~~~~
“I BELIEVE that God wants me to be president.”

George W. Bush~~~
"I would like to thank Providence and the Almighty for choosing me of all people to be allowed to wage this battle for Germany,"

Adolf Hitler
~
Berlin March, 1936
~~~
God is not on the side of any nation, yet we know He is on the side of justice. Our finest moments [as a nation] have come when we faithfully served the cause of justice for our own citizens, and for the people of other lands.

George W. Bush
~~~
"If we pursue this way, if we are decent, industrious, and honest, if we so loyally and truly fulfill our duty, then it is my conviction that in the future as in the past the lord God will always help us"

Adolf Hitler
At the Harvest Thanksgiving Festival
on the
Buckeburg
3 Oct. 1937
~~~
“freedom and fear, justice and cruelty have always been at war, and we know that God is not neutral between them.”

George W. Bush
~~~
"Never in these long years have we offered any other prayer but this: Lord, grant to our people peace at home, and grant and preserve to them peace from the foreign foe!"

Adolf Hitler
~
Nuremberg
Sept. 13, 1936
~~~~~ .

Saundra Hummer

March 29th, 2008, 09:14 PM

.<<<<<o>>>>> Will Cheney Ever Sleep on a Concrete Bed?
Justice and the Monsters of War
By
Missy Compley Beattie

29/03/08 "Counterpunch" -- -- On Thursday, CNN's Kyra Phillips, broadcasting from Iraq, gave viewers a tour of Saddam Hussein's last residence before he was hanged-a prison cell in Baghdad where he was held under US guard in a structure built during his reign. As Phillips observed, there was no luxury. The dictator, who had once lived in splendor, slept on concrete next to a toilet and basin.

A military officer showed Phillips the cell and talked with her about Hussein's final days. He related that Hussein kept a journal. Included among the voluminous entries were poems. Some of the writings reflected an obsession with his legacy. Afraid that history would inaccurately portray him, Hussein desperately wanted to be perceived as a man who went to his death with a clear conscience. He never mentioned his use of torture.

Outside Hussein's cell was a small garden, one he'd requested. He spent his last days tending this garden, smoking cigars, and writing.

While imprisoned, Hussein was called VIC, an acronym for very important criminal.

The CNN segment ended with a photograph of Saddam Hussein, taken not long before his death. Phillips remarked that Hussein appeared angry.

Of course, he was angry-for damn good reason. His country was bombed in a shameful campaign called "Shock and Awe." He was overthrown and condemned to die, based on lie after lie after lie. George Bush and Dick Cheney were the "very important" finger pointers who erroneously connected Iraq to 9/11 and, also, falsely told the world that Saddam was poised to use his arsenal of weapons to vaporize our cities.

These monsters of war, whose catastrophic damage has caused the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and more than 4,300 coalition troops, are the real proprietors of weapons of mass destruction. They, like Saddam, as far as we know, don't write about torture, but they endorse it. Bush and Cheney should each be called MOC-master of carnage. They should share the name and the dishonor. A concrete bed next to a toilet is more than they deserve.

I am a taxpayer who does not want my money to purchase crimes against humanity. To pay for occupations. For Dick Cheney's mobile ambulance. For Bush excursions to other countries, mugging and shaking his booty. For Guantanamo. For speechwriters who create arrogant, aggressive 'axis of evil' threats and skits like Bush's obscene search for WMD under his desk. I could go on and on and on.

I am more than willing, though, to shell out for the arrest of these mass murderers, their trials, convictions, and sentences. And to see them locked up in small cells with concrete beds next to their toilets.

To paraphrase Bob Dylan, I'd stand o'er their graves 'til I'm sure that they're dead.

Missy Beattie lives in New York City. She's written for National Public Radio and Nashville Life Magazine. An outspoken critic of the Bush Administration and the war in Iraq, she's a member of Gold Star Families for Peace. She completed a novel last year, but since the death of her nephew, Marine Lance Cpl. Chase J. Comley, in Iraq on August 6,'05, she has been writing political articles. She can be reached at: Missybeat@aol.com

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info Her palpable disgust as well as her anger is something most of us can understand, no one should be put in such a position, one she, and thousands of others, have had to endure. To end up feeling this way is not hard to grasp. <<<o>>>
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Saundra Hummer

March 30th, 2008, 03:02 PM

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^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^
Ag News
From rice in Peru to miso in Japan, food prices are rising
By
KATHERINE CORCORAN
Associated Press Staff Writer
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MEXICO CITY — If you’re seeing your grocery bill go up, you’re not alone.

From subsistence farmers eating rice in Ecuador to gourmets feasting on escargot in France, consumers worldwide face rising food prices in what analysts call a perfect storm of conditions. Freak weather is a factor. But so are dramatic changes in the global economy, including higher oil prices, lower food reserves and growing consumer demand in China and India.
.The world’s poorest nations still harbor the greatest hunger risk. Clashes over bread in Egypt killed at least two people last week, and similar food riots broke out in Burkina Faso and Cameroon this month.

But food protests now crop up even in Italy. And while the price of spaghetti has doubled in Haiti, the cost of miso is packing a hit in Japan.

“It’s not likely that prices will go back to as low as we’re used to,” said Abdolreza Abbassian, economist and secretary of the Intergovernmental Group for Grains for the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization. “Currently if you’re in Haiti, unless the government is subsidizing consumers, consumers have no choice but to cut consumption. It’s a very brutal scenario, but that’s what it is.”

No one knows that better than Eugene Thermilon, 30, a Haitian day laborer who can no longer afford pasta to feed his wife and four children since the price nearly doubled to $0.57 a bag. Their only meal on a recent day was two cans of corn grits.
.“Their stomachs were not even full,” Thermilon said, walking toward his pink concrete house on the precipice of a garbage-filled ravine. By noon the next day, he still had nothing to feed them for dinner.

Their hunger has had a ripple effect. Haitian food vendor Fabiola Duran Estime, 31, has lost so many customers like Thermilon that she had to pull her daughter, Fyva, out of kindergarten because she can’t afford the $20 monthly tuition.

Fyva was just beginning to read.

In the long term, prices are expected to stabilize. Farmers will grow more grain for both fuel and food and eventually bring prices down. Already this is happening with wheat, with more crops to be planted in the U.S., Canada and Europe in the coming year.

However, consumers still face at least 10 years of more expensive food, according to preliminary FAO projections.

Among the driving forces are petroleum prices, which increase the cost of everything from fertilizers to transport to food processing. Rising demand for meat and dairy in rapidly developing countries such as China and India is sending up the cost of grain, used for cattle feed, as is the demand for raw materials to make biofuels.

What’s rare is that the spikes are hitting all major foods in most countries at once. Food prices rose 4 percent in the U.S. last year, the highest rise since 1990, and are expected to climb as much again this year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

As of December, 37 countries faced food crises, and 20 had imposed some sort of food-price controls.

For many, it’s a disaster. The U.N.’s World Food Program says it’s facing a $500 million shortfall in funding this year to feed 89 million needy people. On Monday, it appealed to donor countries to step up contributions, saying its efforts otherwise have to be scaled back.

In Egypt, where bread is up 35 percent and cooking oil 26 percent, the government recently proposed ending food subsidies and replacing them with cash payouts to the needy. But the plan was put on hold after it sparked public uproar.

“A revolution of the hungry is in the offing,” said Mohammed el-Askalani of Citizens Against the High Cost of Living, a protest group established to lobby against ending the subsidies.

In China, the price hikes are both a burden and a boon.

Per capita meat consumption has increased 150 percent since 1980, so Zhou Jian decided six months ago to switch from selling auto parts to pork. The price of pork has jumped 58 percent in the past year, yet every morning housewives and domestics still crowd his Shanghai shop, and more customers order choice cuts.

The 26-year-old now earns $4,200 a month, two to three times what he made selling car parts. And it’s not just pork. Beef is becoming a weekly indulgence.

“The Chinese middle class is starting to change the traditional thought process of beef as a luxury,” said Kevin Timberlake, who manages the U.S.-based Western Cattle Company feedlot in China’s Inner Mongolia.

At the same time, increased cost of food staples in China threatens to wreak havoc. Beijing has been selling grain from its reserves to hold down prices, said Jing Ulrich, chairwoman of China equities for JP Morgan.

“But this is not really solving the root cause of the problem,” Ulrich said. “The cause of the problem is a supply-demand imbalance. Demand is very strong. Supply is constrained. It is as simple as that.”

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao says fighting inflation from shortages of key foods is a top economic priority. Inflation reached 7.1 percent in January, the highest in 11 years, led by an 18.2 percent jump in food prices.

Meanwhile, record oil prices have boosted the cost of fertilizer and freight for bulk commodities — up 80 percent in 2007 over 2006. The oil spike has also turned up the pressure for countries to switch to biofuels, which the FAO says will drive up the cost of corn, sugar and soybeans “for many more years to come.”

In Japan, the ethanol boom is hitting the country in mayonnaise and miso, two important culinary ingredients, as biofuels production pushes up the price of cooking oil and soybeans.

A two-pound bottle of mayonnaise his risen about 10 percent in two months to as much as 330 yen (nearly $3), said Daishi Inoue, a cook at a Chinese restaurant.

“It’s not hurting us much now,” he said. “But if prices keep going up, we have no choice but to raise our prices.”

Miso Bank, a restaurant in Tokyo’s glitzy Ginza district, specializes in food cooked with miso, or soybean paste.

“We expect prices to go up in April all at once,” said Miso Bank manager Koichi Oritani. “The hikes would affect our menu. So we plan to order miso in bulk and make changes to the menu.”

Italians are feeling the pinch in pasta, with consumer groups staging a one-day strike in September against a food deeply intertwined with national identity. Italians eat an estimated 60 pounds of pasta per capita a year.

The protest was symbolic because Italians typically stock up on pasta, buying multiple packages at a time. But in the next two months pasta consumption dropped 5 percent, said farm lobbyist Rolando Manfredini.

“The situation has gotten even worse,” he said.

In decades past, farm subsidies and support programs allowed major grain exporting countries to hold large surpluses, which could be tapped during food shortages to keep prices down. But new trade policies have made agricultural production much more responsive to market demands — putting global food reserves at their lowest in a quarter century.

Without reserves, bad weather and poor harvests have a bigger impact on prices.

“The market is extremely nervous. With the slightest news about bad weather, the market reacts,” said economist Abbassian.

That means that a drought in Australia and flooding in Argentina, two of the world’s largest suppliers of industrial milk and butter, sent the price of butter in France soaring 37 percent from 2006 to 2007.

Forty percent of escargot, the snail dish, is butter.

“You can do the calculation yourself,” said Romain Chapron, president of Croque Bourgogne, which supplies escargot. “It had a considerable effect. It forced people in our profession to tighten their belts to the maximum.”

The same climate crises sparked a 21 percent rise in the cost of milk, which with butter makes another famous French food item — the croissant. Panavi, a pastry and bread supplier, has raised retail prices of croissants and pain au chocolat by 6 to 15 percent.

Already, there’s a lot of suspicion among consumers.

“They don’t understand why prices have gone up like this,” said Nicole Watelet, general secretary at the Federation of French Bakeries and Pastry Enterprises. “They think that someone is profiting from this. But it’s not us. We’re paying.”

Food costs worldwide spiked 23 percent from 2006 to 2007, according to the FAO. Grains went up 42 percent, oils 50 percent and dairy 80 percent.

Economists say that for the short term, government bailouts will have to be part of the answer to keep unrest at a minimum. In recent weeks, rising food prices sparked riots in the West African nations of Burkina Faso, where mobs torched buildings, and Cameroon, where at least four people died.

But attempts to control prices in one country often have dire effects elsewhere. China’s restrictions on wheat flour exports resulted in a price spike in Indonesia this year, according to the FAO. Ukraine and Russia imposed export restrictions on wheat, causing tight supplies and higher prices for importing countries. Partly because of the cost of imported wheat, Peru’s military has begun eating bread made from potato flour, a native crop.

“We need a response on a large scale, either the regional or international level,” said Brian Halweil of the environmental research organization Worldwatch Institute. “All countries are tied enough to the world food markets that this is a global crisis.”

Poorer countries can speed up the adjustment by investing in agriculture, experts say. If they do, farmers can turn high prices into an engine for growth.

But in countries like Burkina Faso, the crisis is immediate.

Days after the riots, Pascaline Ouédraogo wandered the market in the capital, Ouagadougou, looking to buy meat and vegetables. She said a good meal cost 1,000 francs (about $2.35) not long ago. Now she needs twice that.

“The more prices go up, the less there is to meet their needs,” she said of her three children, all in secondary school. “You wonder if it’s the government or the businesses that are behind the price hikes.”

IrGene Belem, a 25-year-old with twins, struggles to buy milk, which has gone up 57 percent in recent weeks.

“We knew we were poor before,” she said, “but now it’s worse than poverty.”

Katherine Corcoran is based in Mexico City. AP correspondents worldwide contributed to this report.
http://www.agweekly.com/articles/2008/03/30/news/ag_news/news43.txt
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Saundra Hummer

March 30th, 2008, 04:13 PM

.* * * * * The Smart Way Out of a Foolish War
By
Zbigniew Brzezinski
The Washington Post
Sunday 30 March 2008

Both Democratic presidential candidates agree that the United States should end its combat mission in Iraq within 12 to 16 months of their possible inauguration. The Republican candidate has spoken of continuing the war, even for a hundred years, until "victory." The core issue of this campaign is thus a basic disagreement over the merits of the war and the benefits and costs of continuing it.

The case for U.S. disengagement from combat is compelling in its own right. But it must be matched by a comprehensive political and diplomatic effort to mitigate the destabilizing regional consequences of a war that the outgoing Bush administration started deliberately, justified demagogically and waged badly. (I write, of course, as a Democrat; while I prefer Sen. Barack Obama, I speak here for myself.)

The contrast between the Democratic argument for ending the war and the Republican argument for continuing is sharp and dramatic. The case for terminating the war is based on its prohibitive and tangible costs, while the case for "staying the course" draws heavily on shadowy fears of the unknown and relies on worst-case scenarios. President Bush's and Sen. John McCain's forecasts of regional catastrophe are quite reminiscent of the predictions of "falling dominoes" that were used to justify continued U.S. involvement in Vietnam. Neither has provided any real evidence that ending the war would mean disaster, but their fear-mongering makes prolonging it easier.

Nonetheless, if the American people had been asked more than five years ago whether Bush's obsession with the removal of Saddam Hussein was worth 4,000 American lives, almost 30,000 wounded Americans and several trillion dollars - not to mention the less precisely measurable damage to the United States' world-wide credibility, legitimacy and moral standing - the answer almost certainly would have been an unequivocal "no."

Nor do the costs of this fiasco end there. The war has inflamed anti-American passions in the Middle East and South Asia while fragmenting Iraqi society and increasing the influence of Iran. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's recent visit to Baghdad offers ample testimony that even the U.S.-installed government in Iraq is becoming susceptible to Iranian blandishments.

In brief, the war has become a national tragedy, an economic catastrophe, a regional disaster and a global boomerang for the United States. Ending it is thus in the highest national interest.

Terminating U.S. combat operations will take more than a military decision. It will require arrangements with Iraqi leaders for a continued, residual U.S. capacity to provide emergency assistance in the event of an external threat (e.g., from Iran); it will also mean finding ways to provide continued U.S. support for the Iraqi armed forces as they cope with the remnants of al-Qaeda in Iraq.

The decision to militarily disengage will also have to be accompanied by political and regional initiatives designed to guard against potential risks. We should fully discuss our decisions with Iraqi leaders, including those not residing in Baghdad's Green Zone, and we should hold talks on regional stability with all of Iraq's neighbors, including Iran.

Contrary to Republican claims that our departure will mean calamity, a sensibly conducted disengagement will actually make Iraq more stable over the long term. The impasse in Shiite-Sunni relations is in large part the sour byproduct of the destructive U.S. occupation, which breeds Iraqi dependency even as it shatters Iraqi society. In this context, so highly reminiscent of the British colonial era, the longer we stay in Iraq, the less incentive various contending groups will have to compromise and the more reason simply to sit back. A serious dialogue with the Iraqi leaders about the forthcoming U.S. disengagement would shake them out of their stupor.

Ending the U.S. war effort entails some risks, of course, but they are inescapable at this late date. Parts of Iraq are already self-governing, including Kurdistan, part of the Shiite south and some tribal areas in the Sunni center. U.S. military disengagement will accelerate Iraqi competition to more effectively control their territory, which may produce a phase of intensified inter-Iraqi conflicts. But that hazard is the unavoidable consequence of the prolonged U.S. occupation. The longer it lasts, the more difficult it will be for a viable Iraqi state ever to reemerge.

It is also important to recognize that most of the anti-U.S. insurgency in Iraq has not been inspired by al-Qaeda. Locally based jihadist groups have gained strength only insofar as they have been able to identify themselves with the fight against a hated foreign occupier. As the occupation winds down and Iraqis take responsibility for internal security, al-Qaeda in Iraq will be left more isolated and less able to sustain itself. The end of the occupation will thus be a boon for the war on al-Qaeda, bringing to an end a misguided adventure that not only precipitated the appearance of al-Qaeda in Iraq but also diverted the United States from Afghanistan, where the original al-Qaeda threat grew and still persists.

Bringing the U.S. military effort to a close would also smooth the way for a broad U.S. initiative addressed to all of Iraq's neighbors. Some will remain reluctant to engage in any discussion as long as Washington appears determined to maintain its occupation of Iraq indefinitely. Therefore, at some stage next year, after the decision to disengage has been announced, a regional conference should be convened to promote regional stability, border control and other security arrangements, as well as regional economic development - all of which would help mitigate the unavoidable risks connected with U.S. disengagement.

Since Iraq's neighbors are vulnerable to intensified ethnic and religious conflicts spilling over from Iraq, all of them - albeit for different reasons - are likely to be interested. More distant Arab states such as Egypt, Morocco or Algeria might also take part, and some of them might be willing to provide peacekeeping forces to Iraq once it is free of foreign occupation. In addition, we should consider a regional rehabilitation program designed to help Iraq recover and to relieve the burdens that Jordan and Syria, in particular, have shouldered by hosting more than 2 million Iraqi refugees.

The overall goal of a comprehensive U.S. strategy to undo the errors of recent years should be cooling down the Middle East, instead of heating it up. The "unipolar moment" that the Bush administration's zealots touted after the collapse of the Soviet Union has been squandered to generate a policy based on the unilateral use of force, military threats and occupation masquerading as democratization - all of which has pointlessly heated up tensions, fueled anti-colonial resentments and bred religious fanaticism. The long-range stability of the Middle East has been placed in increasing jeopardy.

Terminating the war in Iraq is the necessary first step to calming the Middle East, but other measures will be needed. It is in the U.S. interest to engage Iran in serious negotiations - on both regional security and the nuclear challenge it poses. But such negotiations are unlikely as long as Washington's price of participation is unreciprocated concessions from Tehran. Threats to use force on Iran are also counterproductive because they tend to fuse Iranian nationalism with religious fanaticism.

Real progress in the badly stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace process would also help soothe the region's religious and nationalist passions. But for such progress to take place, the United States must vigorously help the two sides start making the mutual concessions without which a historic compromise cannot be achieved. Peace between Israel and Palestine would be a giant step toward greater regional stability, and it would finally let both Israelis and Palestinians benefit from the Middle East's growing wealth.

We started this war rashly, but we must end our involvement responsibly. And end it we must. The alternative is a fear-driven policy paralysis that perpetuates the war - to America's historic detriment
Zbigniew Brzezinski was national security adviser to President Jimmy Carter. His most recent book is "Second Chance: Three Presidents and the Crisis of American Superpower." Go on-site to view more topical issues of the day, to check out their archives and much more. Just click on the following URL/LINK:
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/033008Z.shtml] * * * * * .

Saundra Hummer

March 31st, 2008, 06:00 PM

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"Read, every day, something no one else is reading. Think, every day, something no one else is thinking. Do, every day, something no one else would be silly enough to do. It is bad for the mind to continually be part of unanimity."

Gotthold Ephraim Lessing
1729-1781
German Dramatist
~~~
"Everything we shut our eyes to, everything we run away from, everything we deny, denigrate or despise, serves to defeat us in the end. What seems nasty, painful, evil, can become a source of beauty, joy, and strength, if faced with an open mind."

Henry Miller
1891-1980
American writer
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"The path of least resistance and least trouble is a mental rut already made. It requires troublesome work to undertake the alternation of old beliefs. Self-conceit often regards it as a sign of weakness to admit that a belief to which we have once committed ourselves is wrong. We get so identified with an idea that it is literally a "pet" notion and we rise to its defense and stop our eyes and ears to anything different."

John Dewey
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Saundra Hummer

March 31st, 2008, 06:10 PM

X X X
A Third American War Crime in the Making
By
Paul Craig Roberts

31/03/08 "ICH" -- -- The US Congress, the US media, the American people, and the United Nations, are looking the other way as Cheney prepares his attack on Iran.

If only America had an independent media and an opposition party. If there were a shred of integrity left in American political life, perhaps a third act of naked aggression--a third war crime under the Nuremberg standard--by the Bush Regime could be prevented.

On March 30, the Russian News & Information Agency, Novosti, cited “a high-ranking security source: “The latest military intelligence data point to heightened US military preparations for both an air and ground operation against Iran.” : http://en.rian.ru/russia/20070327/62697703.html

According to Novosti, Russian Colonel General Leonid Ivashov said “that the Pentagon is planning to deliver a massive air strike on Iran’s military infrastructure in the near future.”

The chief of Russia’s general staff, Yuri Baluyevsky, said last November that Russia was beefing up its military in response to US aggression, but that the Russian military is not “obliged to defend the world from the evil Americans.” : http://www.mnweekly.ru/national/20071115/55289883.html

On March 29, OpEdNews cited a report by the Saudi Arabian newspaper Okaz, which was picked up by the German news service, DPA. The Saudi newspaper reported on March 22, the day following Cheney’s visit with the kingdom’s rulers, that the Saudi Shura Council is preparing “national plans to deal with any sudden nuclear and radioactive hazards that may affect the kingdom following experts’ warnings of possible attacks on Iran’s Bushehr nuclear reactors.” : http://empireburlesquenow.blogspot.com/2008/03/worried-yet-saudis-prepare-for-sudden.html

And Admiral William “there will be no attack on Iran on my watch” Fallon has been removed as US chief of Central Command, thus clearing the way for Cheney’s planned attack on Iran.

The Iranians don’t seem to believe it, despite the dispatch of US nuclear submarines and another aircraft carrier attack group to the Persian Gulf. To counter any Iranian missiles launched in response to an attack, the US is deploying anti-missile defenses to protect US bases and Saudi oil fields.

Two massive failures by the American media, the Democratic Party, and the American people have paved the way for Cheney’s long planned attack on Iran. One failure is the lack of skepticism about the US government’s explanation of 9/11. The other failure is the Democrats’ refusal to begin impeachment proceedings against President Bush for lying to the Congress, the American people, and the world and launching an invasion of Iraq based on deception and fabricated evidence.

If an American president can start a war exactly as Adolf Hitler did with pure lies and not be held accountable, he can get away with anything. And Bush and his evil regime have.

Hitler launched World War II with his invasion of Poland after staging a “Polish attack” on a German radio station. On the night of August 31, 1939, a group of Nazis disguised in Polish uniforms seized a radio station in Germany. Hitler announced that “last night Polish troops crossed the frontier and attacked Germany,” a claim no more true than the Bush Regime’s claim that “Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destruction.” Hitler’s lie failed, because his invasion of Poland, which began the next day allegedly in reprisal for the Polish attack, had obviously been planned for many months.

Iran is a beautiful and developed country. It is an ancient civilization. It has attacked no one. Iran is a signatory to the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty. Iran is permitted by the treaty to have a nuclear energy program. The Bush Regime’s case against Iran is based on the Bush Regime’s desire to deny Iran its rights under the treaty.

The International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors have repeatedly reported that they have found no evidence of an Iranian nuclear weapons program. Despite all the disinformation from US Gen. Petraeus and other Bush Regime military lackeys, Iran is not arming the Iraqis who are resisting the American occupation.

If Iran were arming insurgents, the insurgents would have two weapons that would neutralize the US advantage in the Iraqi conflict: missiles to knock down US helicopter gunships and rocket-propelled grenades that knock out American tanks. The insurgents do not have these weapons and must construct clumsy anti-tank weapons out of artillery shells. The insurgents are helpless against US air power and cannot mass forces to take on the American troops.

Indiscriminate American violence has reduced Iraq to rubble. The civilian infrastructure is essentially destroyed--electricity, water and sewer systems, medical care and schools. Depleted uranium is everywhere poisoning everyone, including US troops. There is no economy, and half or more of Iraqis are unemployed. Literally no Iraqi family has escaped an injury or a death as a consequence of the US invasion. Millions of Iraqis have become displaced persons. A developed country with a professional middle class has been destroyed because of lies told by the President and Vice President of the US. The Bush Regime’s lies are echoed by a neoconservative media, and have gone unchallenged by the opposition party and an indifferent American public.

In Afghanistan, death and destruction rains on even the smallest village from the air. America’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are wars against the civilian populations.

Just as the world could not believe Hitler’s next horror and thus was always unprepared, the Iranians despite all the evidence cannot believe that even the Great Satan would gratuitously attack Iran based on nothing but lies about non-existent nuclear weapons.

Iran’s only chance would be to strike before the US delivers the first blow. Instead of using its missiles to take out the Saudi oil fields and to sink the US aircraft carriers, instead of closing the Strait of Hormuz, instead of arming the Iraqi Shi’ites and moving them to insurgency, Iran is perched like a sitting duck in denial even as the US and its Iraqi puppet Maliki move to eliminate Al Sadr’s Iraqi Shi’ite militia in order to avoid supply disruptions and a Shi’ite rebellion in Iraq when the US attack on Iran comes.

It is important to emphasize that Iran is making no moves toward war. Having tamed, blackmailed, and purchased Congress, the US media, and US allies and puppets, Cheney might delight in the arrogance with which he can now attack Iran free of any restraint or fabricated provocation. On the other hand, he might cover himself by orchestrating an “Iranian provocation” to justify his attack as a response. But like Hitler’s planned attack against Poland, Cheney’s attack on Iran has long been in the works.

On March 29 the Associated Press reported that Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi “poured contempt on fellow Arab leaders” at the Arab summit that day. Gadhafi told the Arab “leaders,” many of whom are on the American payroll, that their American masters would turn on them all, just as America turned on Saddam Hussein after using him to fight a proxy war against Iran.

Saddam had once been an ally of Washington, Gadhafi reminded the Arabs, “but they sold him out.” Gadhafi told the American puppets, “Your turn is next.”

Gadhafi asked, “Where is the Arabs’ dignity, their future, their very existence?” If Arabs remain disunited, he predicted, “they will turn themselves into protectorates. They will be marginalized and turn into garbage dumps.”

Indeed, it is this disunity that permits the US to bomb and murder at will in the Middle East.

Paul Craig Roberts a former Assistant Secretary of the US Treasury and former associate editor of the Wall Street Journal, has been reporting shocking cases of prosecutorial abuse for two decades. A new edition of his book, The Tyranny of Good Intentions, co-authored with Lawrence Stratton, a documented account of how Americans lost the protection of law, is forthcoming from Random House in March, 2008.
Go on-site to gain access to the comments viewers have made, just click on the Link/URL:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article19658.htm x x x x x .

Saundra Hummer

March 31st, 2008, 06:19 PM

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Ancient Gold Necklace Discovered in Peru
By
RANDOLPH E. SCHMID
03.31.08, 7:31 PM ET
Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The earliest known gold jewelry made in the Americas has been discovered in southern Peru. The gold necklace, made nearly 4,000 years ago, was found in a burial site near Lake Titicaca, researchers report in Tuesday's issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The discovery "was a complete shock," said Mark Aldenderfer, an anthropologist at the University of Arizona.

"It was not expected in the least," he said in a telephone interview. "It's always fun to find something and go, 'Wow, what is that doing here?'"

In the past, it had been assumed that a society needed to be settled to produce agricultural surpluses that can support activities such as making ornamental objects, he explained.

But the people living in this region at the time were still primarily hunter-gatherers, he said. "They were on their way to becoming settled peoples, but they were not quite there yet."

Someone, though, had the time and knowledge to make this ornament, which he speculates is a sign of importance.

"These folks are obtaining this by their effort, accumulating more wealth and using objects for prestige," Aldenderfer said. It says: "Pay attention to me, I'm successful."

There is no evidence at the site that shows how it was made, he said. But it looks like a nugget of native raw gold, which occurs near the area, was pounded flat in a stone mortar and pestle.

Then the gold was probably wrapped around a piece of wood and pounded until it was folded into a tube, he said.

The researchers restrung the necklace, alternating nine small gold tubes with a series of round stones, identified as either greenstone or turquoise, with holes in them that were found in the same grave.

The next oldest gold ornaments found in this hemisphere, also located in Peru but farther north, date to about 600 years later than this necklace, Aldenderfer said.

Scott Raymond, an archaeologist at the University of Calgary, Canada, said the date of the necklace is "remarkably early for that region to have something of that order."

He said he had not previously seen any substantial evidence from that period of the kind of ceremonialism that developed later.

The oldest previously known worked gold was found in highland Peru and dated to about 3,500 years ago, said Raymond, who was not part of the research team.

Heather Lechtman of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology called the design "very interesting for such a very early piece of jewelry."

Lechtman, who was not part of the research team, said it was not surprising that early people used gold because it is available in that area and easy to work.

The research was funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation and the University of Missouri

Copyright 2008 Associated Press.
All rights reserved.
http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2008/03/31/ap4836470.html ^_^_^_^ .

Saundra Hummer

March 31st, 2008, 06:38 PM

.~~~~~~~Chelsea Clinton Criticizes Bush in N.C.
By
ERIN GARTNER
03.31.08,
8:13 PM ET
Associated Press

RALEIGH, N.C. - Chelsea Clinton returned Monday to North Carolina, telling college students that the world will "breathe a sigh of relief" once President Bush leaves office. Clinton spoke Monday during a town hall meeting with students at North Carolina State University. She later moved on to Peace College in Raleigh to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Clinton told about 250 people at N.C. State that her mother, New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, would work to repair the nation's reputation abroad.

"I think the world will breathe a sigh of relief when this president is gone," Clinton said, criticizing Bush for pulling out of various accordings, including the Kyoto Protocol on global warming.

She urged the crowd to register to vote and to listen to past debates between her mother and rival Illinois Sen. Barack Obama.

She also couldn't avoid questions about her father, good or bad.

An audience member at N.C. State also pressed Clinton to discuss the Monica Lewinsky scandal. Clinton declined to discuss her father's relationship with the White House intern, drawing applause when she told the young man that it was none of his business.

Clinton had a similar exchange last week at Butler University.

And in Chapel Hill, she was asked whether a vote for Hillary Clinton was a vote for Bill Clinton.

"Is a vote for Hillary a vote for Bill? No. A vote for Hillary is a vote for Hillary," she said. "I'm really proud of what my father did in the '90s, but I don't think you should vote for or against my mother based on my father."

Also in Chapel Hill, Clinton pinned a light blue ribbon to her blazer in memory of Eve Carson, the UNC student body president who was killed March 5.

"It was always Eve's dream to have a presidential campaign come to campus," said student body vice president Mike Tarrant. But in September, when the school contacted the campaigns, "North Carolina didn't really matter," he said.

"It was a great feeling to kind of see her dream come true."

In response to a question about NASA funding, Clinton said the budgets of many scientific programs have either stayed flat or been cut. She pointed to Bush's veto of stem cell research bills.

"We don't know what we have lost under this administration," she said.

Both Hillary Clinton and Obama have started to campaign heavily in North Carolina in preparation for the state's May 6 primary.

Joe Delpapa, a 19-year-old business major at N.C. State, said the primary gives voters a chance to hear the platforms of the candidates and what they think.

"This'll make history," Delpapa said. "How often will you get to see, this close, a race and see things that really matter?"

Chelsea Clinton also campaigned in North Carolina on Saturday, speaking at the state convention of Young Democrats.

Copyright 2008 Associated Press.
All rights reserved. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ .

Saundra Hummer

March 31st, 2008, 06:58 PM

.
X X X No One is Leading

By Mark A. Goldman
31/03/08 "ICH" -- - The American people have no one leading the charge for the restoration of the Constitution and the rule of law.

My point is not that few Americans are engaged and energized in doing good things, but simply that there is no individual who is leading… no one with whom you and a great many others are willing stand and fight in order to defend your country and your heritage.

Vying for political leadership are the two principal nominees hoping to be the Democratic candidate for President of the United States. And there’s also the Presidential candidate for the Republicans. But none of these candidates have made the ongoing perpetration of crimes — against our Constitution and the American people — an issue or a cause worth fighting for.

I'm not going to recount here all the ways that the Constitution and the rule of law have been trampled upon in recent years. A Google search on "Bush crimes" might be time well spent for anyone who needs a review.

Apparently most citizens have been talked out of their patriotism by the mainstream media, the two main political parties, and our elected officials — those traitors who conveniently forgot their oath of office while the Constitution was being so denigrated.

One issue in the upcoming election under discussion is the ending of the war in Iraq. But on close inspection we see that that, in and of itself, would be a bogus issue. The real issue is whether we are going to recognize the illegitimacy of the war, the crimes that were committed to instigate the war, and the ongoing crimes against the Constitution and innocent people in the administration of the war. The war itself was a direct attack on the Constitution and the American people... and of course on the people of Iraq and Afghanistan.

The real issue is whether we are a nation of laws… i.e., do we believe in the rule of law… or have we simply given up on the American Experiment and the Constitution itself. If we acknowledge that the war was illegal — that egregious crimes were committed in its execution — then it will follow that we must end the war. But what follows is much more than that.

Just talking about ending the war and bringing our troops home, without addressing the shredding of the Constitution, is a betrayal of every American and every soldier who ever fought in this war or any other. Are we going to reclaim ourselves as a Constitutional republic or have we given up trying to be the America that was originally conceived into being by the Framers?

Beyond the war and its illegality, are the following travesties that need to be addressed: the illegitimate elections that fraudulently put criminals in charge of our government and kept them there.

The ongoing destruction of government itself by the purposeful evisceration of nearly every oversight function of government. Lies permeate government offices everywhere. That’s why the economy is failing, why we have no energy policy, why our educational system is behind the rest of the developed world, why all citizens do not have access to affordable health care, why our food supply is at risk, why our children are at risk even when they play with toys, why our infrastructure is in a state of decay, why inflation is stealing from every paycheck, why the over-bloated military industrial complex is bankrupting our country, why Congress no longer works as a body representing real people… and the list goes on and on.
when and how are we going to recognize and take responsibility for the crimes we have committed against other members of our human family?
If we refuse to acknowledge the crimes, and if we refuse to find and stand with a leader who is willing and able to honorably seek justice in their resolution, we will be surrendering our rights, our freedoms, and our heritage to the true enemies of our republic — we will be surrendering to ignorance, arrogance, cowardice, and greed. I invite you to review the following links as you consider your response.

http://www.gpln.com/

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article19654.htm X X X X X .

Saundra Hummer

March 31st, 2008, 07:11 PM

.
^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^Senate's Dodd:
Paulson plan "not even close"
By
Kevin Drawbaugh
Mon Mar 31, 2:51 PM ET
The Democratic chairman of the U.S. Senate Banking Committee on Monday called the Treasury Department's plan to overhaul financial regulation "a wild pitch" that fails to address the housing market crisis.

Sen. Christopher Dodd of Connecticut said he welcomed the plan offered by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, but questioned its relevance in addressing falling home prices, rising foreclosures and the imminent threat of recession.

"To talk about overhauling the regulatory system is a wonderful idea. But frankly it doesn't relate to the issues we're grappling with," Dodd said on a conference call.

"I would call this a wild pitch. ... It's not even close to the strike zone," he said, drawing upon American baseball imagery to criticize Paulson's proposal.

Amid a deepening crisis in housing and credit markets, Paulson on Monday issued a sweeping plan that calls for giving the Federal Reserve more authority over Wall Street, cracking down on mortgage brokers, reshuffling the duties of some agencies and setting up a federal insurance regulator.

Although the plan has been under development for many months, Dodd said he had not been asked for input on it.

Noting that some of the ideas in the Paulson plan have been under discussion for years, Dodd said reorganizing the government was not the problem.

"The failure of the administration to utilize the tools they've been given over the years. ... That's the problem, not reorganization," he said.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said on the same conference call with reporters that he plans to seek a procedural vote on the Senate floor on Tuesday on a foreclosure prevention bill that Republicans blocked in February.

The bill, drafted by Democrats, would let judges erase some of the mortgage debt of homeowners in bankruptcy, a contentious proposal backed by homeowner advocates but opposed by bankers.

It would also devote more federal money to fixing abandoned properties and funding debt counseling, as well as give hard-hit homebuilders a tax break.

The White House has threatened to veto the bill, calling it too costly and a bailout for lenders and speculators.

Reid said recent months have shown the Bush administration's hands-off approach to markets "simply doesn't work." The Nevada Democrat said the Paulson plan "is certainly a step in the right direction."

But he added, "Anything he's talking about doing will impact the future ... We feel the White House should direct their attention to what needs to be done now, not what needs to be done in the future."

(Reporting by Kevin Drawbaugh; Editing by Jonathan Oatis)
Copyright © 2008 Reuters Limited.
All rights reserved.
^ ^ ^ ^ ^ .

Saundra Hummer

March 31st, 2008, 07:24 PM

.
*?*?*?*?*
Dave Zweifel: How do rich televangelists get away with it?
Dave Zweifel
—
3/31/2008 5:53 am

Iowa's Sen. Chuck Grassley, the ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, is raising more than a few eyebrows these days by asking some tough questions of a number of TV evangelists.

The senator is concerned about how the money these preachers are raising is being used, considering the fact that it's all tax-free contributions from viewers and others who believe in their message.

Grassley has made it his mission to challenge how institutions, from churches to charitable foundations, are handling the dollars that the government allows them to raise and distribute while being exempt from the tax codes.

Federal law does prohibit religious leaders from collecting "unreasonable compensation."

So how come, the senator has asked, some of these folks are driving Rolls-Royces and flying in private jets?

According to a recent issue of Newsweek, Grassley is investigating the affairs of six well-known televangelists who preach that "God wants his followers to be rich both spiritually and materially." He has sent them detailed requests seeking information about everything from credit card spending to offshore banking accounts.

"It is the same thing I have been trying to accomplish with all of my investigations," he told the magazine, "and that's to make sure that tax laws are complied with."

Besides, he wants to make sure that their followers aren't being "played for suckers."

He's asked Joyce Meyer, a St. Louis televangelist, about her acceptance of personal gifts of money and jewelry. He wants the Revs. Ceflo and Taffi Dollar of World Changers Church International in College Park, Ga., to explain how they've come into possession of two Rolls-Royces.

Others on his list are Kenneth Copeland Ministries of Newark, Texas; Without Walls International Church of Tampa; Eddie Long of Georgia; and Benny Hinn Ministries of Grapevine, Texas. The churches have responded that Grassley is overstepping his bounds and that if there is an issue, it's the IRS that should be involved, not Congress.

The Iowa senator responded that his investigations have everything to do with Congress because it writes the tax laws.

"Is the money that's donated being used for legitimate nonprofit purposes?" he asked.

Newsweek said the televangelists often cite Deuteronomy 8:18, which says, "But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth."

Meanwhile, mainstream Protestant ministers derisively describe the tactics of the TV preachers as "blab it and grab it" and cite the gospel of Matthew: "Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal."

Dave Zweifel is editor emeritus of The Capital Times.
Dave Zweifel — 3/31/2008 5:53 am http://www.madison.com/tct/opinion/column/279530 *?*?*?* .

Saundra Hummer

March 31st, 2008, 08:33 PM

.
* * * * * * *Toward a Humanist Foreign Policy
By
Carl Coon
31/03/08
"The Humanist " -- -- President George W. Bush has proved to be as much of a disaster on foreign affairs as on domestic issues. More, if possible. And not just on Iraq. On many other issues, including global warming, missile defense, population growth, and now Iran, he has been just as flagrantly wrong as he was on the supposed weapons of mass destruction held by Saddam Hussein. It’s not just that he’s getting bad advice: his narrow worldview is upside-down to begin with. Combine that with his desire to seek advice only from people who will fortify his prejudices, rather than from the ones who know and understand the issues, and you get a dangerous combination.

It was a national tragedy that we had this kind of person at the helm when the terrorists struck on September 11, 2001. Bush used the attack to justify a foreign policy aimed at world domination, accompanied by an even more systematic and thorough attack on our civil liberties, all in the name of “protecting” us against further terrorist assaults. As a result we are no longer admired abroad–we are feared and hated–while on the home front we face an erosion of our rights, an extraordinary accession of executive power, and an assault on the wall separating church and state.

I think it was Henry Kissinger who once observed that absolute security for any one country meant absolute insecurity for its neighbors. The Bush response to a serious, but not existential terrorist threat, has been entirely disproportionate. We built up our conventional military forces and then used them against Iraq, a country that wasn’t even threatening us. Meanwhile, al-Qaeda continues to regroup in the frontier regions of Afghanistan and Pakistan while we stride across the globe like some modern colossus, threatening anyone who disagrees with us, turning a deaf ear to their arguments.

There has to be a better way, and of course there is. We need to lead by example, not threats. We need to listen to others, learn what their problems are, and exercise our talents and ingenuity toward finding solutions that help everyone to the extent possible. We need to take the dawning environmental crisis seriously and show that we’re willing to make our share of needed sacrifices. Above all, we need to recognize that we have to sacrifice some of our national sovereignty if we are to cooperate effectively on global problems with the rest of the world.

This last point is critical and is least understood, not only by Bush and his accomplices, but by many, if not most, Americans. The fact of the matter is that we can’t have it both ways. We can’t insist on total security for us and us alone, and expect full cooperation from everyone else. Cooperation requires some sacrifices, some concessions, from each of the partners.

LIBERTY VS. SECURITY

The tradeoff between liberty and security is as old as humanity itself. Any human society that endures has rules that constrain its members in ways that make cooperation possible. So we prize liberty but fear anarchy. We are all for free choice but insist that everyone should respect the law of the land. We recognize that there’s a contradiction, or at least a tradeoff, between our yearning for as much individual freedom as possible, and the maintenance of public order, but we also believe that a just society can have its cake and eat it too. We admire societies, including our own, to the extent they have worked out institutions and attitudes and principles that maintain order while maximizing freedom. We deplore both failed states, where chaos reigns, and dictatorships, where order is maintained only by force. Isn’t that what democracy is all about?

Until now, there has been no such thing as a global society. The most complex societies have been nation-states. There is a global authority, the United Nations, but it has no teeth. On the most important issues, a sovereign nation can ignore any UN attempt to constrain or control its behavior. It’s true that many international and regional organizations, buttressed by treaties and conventions, bring a modicum of law and order into specific areas of international relations. They are useful and respond to real needs. But on the most important issues, any member of the UN can defy its authority, and the only recourse the UN has is to try to persuade other nations to put pressure on the miscreant. This sometimes works with small and powerless countries, but the big ones can behave as they please. When the chips are down, the current global society resembles Dodge City from the mythology of the cowboy movie, where victory goes to the fastest draw.

EVOLUTION OF A GLOBAL SOCIETY

Humanity is now in a transitional phase, moving reluctantly from Dodge City to a global society ruled by law. We’ve seen this kind of transition before, on more limited scales. Some combination of circumstances alters the environment and the existing social order comes under great stress. People get desperate enough to commit to a substantially different order that involves cooperating with former competitors, even enemies, in a larger society. There are problems of adjustment but eventually almost everyone is integrated into the new order and few want to go back to the old one. Our own nation’s history tells the story: thirteen colonies, each of them filled with pride at its particular history and character, hesitantly agreed to form a confederation. From that, the tighter bonds of a federal republic were created and now here we are. Who wants to go back?

Our history of morphing from thirteen small societies into a subcontinental giant was extraordinary. Usually the process involves more trauma, more false steps (I say this even while acknowledging that our civil war was a thoroughly traumatic affair). European history is more typical in that respect. How many wars have been fought on European soil since the Roman Empire collapsed? And how difficult is it still, when all the disadvantages of narrow nationalism have been revealed, and all the blessings of union are being unveiled, for the several national parties to agree on the institutions and modalities of union?

All this suggests that creating some kind of law and order that will include the whole globe will be an enormously complicated task, one that certainly will not be fully accomplished during the lifetime of anyone alive today. But it’s equally plausible that some such order will evolve eventually, if humanity is to survive at all. Right now we are living in a fool’s paradise, based on an uneasy equilibrium backed up not by an effective international rule of law but by a balance of terror, known as mutually assured destruction. No nation-state is mad enough to use nuclear weapons first, not so far at least, and all are concerned lest some of those weapons fall into terrorist hands. But is this the best guarantee of stability that we can leave to our grandchildren? If this is the best we can do, will there be that many grandchildren left to receive our inheritance?

HUMANISM’S ROLE

I think there is a special role in all of this for the humanist worldview. There are other voices being raised on this theme of world togetherness, like the descendants of the old world federalists, and some environmental groups. We can welcome their interest and cooperate with them as the situation demands, but we need to keep our own voice and perspective. Most humanists would support the view that the world needs a stronger UN and more effective means of controlling conflicts, and especially nuclear weapons. But we need more. I envision an active, explicitly humanist policy centered on a renewed dedication to certain basic rules of good conduct and an insistence that they apply to interstate relations much as they do to relations within the family, community, or nation.

Support for the concept of universal human rights is already an integral part of the humanist worldview, as is opposition to genocide. But for the most part, our concern has been directed at governments mistreating their own citizens. What I propose here is more general and more inclusive. I think humanists should judge the way all nation-states deal with each other by the same basic rules of good conduct as the ones that operate at lower levels of social organization. That is to say, the rules and taboos that make societies at all levels function harmoniously and efficiently. At the level of the family and the community, they can be defined loosely as: Don’t kill people, especially if they belong to your own group. Don’t try to cheat them, or steal from them, or run off with their spouse. Share, when you can, with the less fortunate … sound like the Golden Rule? Of course, for these are basic rules governing human social behavior that evolved long before religion–though religions falsely claim them as their own.

There are many different ways of formulating these rules. They take different forms when applied at the family level, for instance, as opposed to the state. And they are culture-bound to a great extent. But there is some form of them in every society that exists above the level of anarchy. They provide the social glue that keeps most people behaving decently toward other members of the group. They operate parallel to more explicit codes and institutions–the law, police, courts, and jails–that enforce the unwritten codes and back them up with explicit penalties for cheaters.

But how do we translate “do not kill people, or cheat them, or steal from them” into the language of interstate relations? Allow me to make a very preliminary stab at it here:

Do Not Kill:
• No nation shall go to war against another nation unless first attacked in a clear act of aggression. No state shall join in a war except when authorized to do so by responsible global authority (in contemporary terms, the UN Security Council).
• Genocide shall be considered a crime against humanity and its authors shall be tried and prosecuted accordingly.
• Targeted political assassinations shall be considered crimes and both the leaders authorizing them and the persons carrying them out should be treated accordingly.

Do Not Cheat or Steal:

• “Black” propaganda is a form of cheating and shall be condemned as such. “White” propaganda, where authorship is correctly attributed, comes under the heading of freedom of speech, and should be allowed.
• Bribery is inherently a form of corruption.
• Elections should be open and certifiably fair.

Fairness, and Helping the Less Fortunate:

• The disparity between the wealth of the rich nations and the poverty of the poorest should be of concern to all, and addressed through bilateral and other aid programs and other measures.
• Development of resources in common areas, especially the deep seas, Antarctica, and outer space, should be regulated through international agreements and controlled by impartial international authority.

LIBERTY AND SECURITY FOR ALL

If Americans can rise above selfish, chauvinistic nationalism and recognize that global problems demand global cooperation, we ought to be able to agree that we have to have an international rule of law with teeth. Furthermore, if we honestly believe democracy is better than dictatorship, we should hold as a very high priority the objective of achieving a future world order that achieves peace and harmony, primarily because people everywhere want peace and harmony and are willing to sacrifice some of their narrowly nationalistic interests, when necessary, to make that possible. In other words, we don’t want some highly coercive world government telling everyone what they can and cannot do, even if it’s one we initially impose ourselves. What we do want is a more orderly global system based primarily on shared values and arrived at freely, through consensus. We want nation-states to cooperate primarily because they know it’s the right thing to do, not because someone threatens to punish them if they don’t.

Getting there will be a long and laborious task, but we humanists can start now by insisting that the same basic ethical principles that govern human behavior in families and communities should be binding on our country in conducting its affairs with other nations. If we can set an example in this regard, who knows, an enlightened public might follow. In the end, our country’s moral authority could be multiplied. In time, this seed could blossom into a universal moral code for the planet. Perhaps this is too visionary, but it is consistent with the broad pattern of social evolution we have seen in human society. Therefore, in the long run, this serves as the most practical possible alternative.

A world at peace is and should be the primary long-term goal of our movement. Using criteria such as those previously listed, humanists can establish a collective position on topical international issues, particularly those that involve U.S. foreign policy. Those criteria may not provide explicit answers, but it is better to have general guidelines than none at all. Most of the rest of humanity is floundering at this point, too involved in parochial concerns to see the big picture. We humanists are unencumbered by religious prejudices and as open to objective consideration of interstate ethical principles as most. Let’s get out in front with a clearly defined, well recognized posture in favor of a world at peace, governed by law and not brute force, with the values we hold most dear undergirding that law, and shared by all.

Carl Coon is the vice president of the American Humanist Association and a former ambassador to Nepal.
© 2008 The Humanist
Go on-site below to read or post comments , just click on the Link/URL:

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article19655.htm * * * * * .

Saundra Hummer

March 31st, 2008, 10:07 PM

.
~.~.~.~.~.~The Decline And Coming Fall Of US Hegemony
By
K Gajendra Singh
"History is ruled by an inexorable determinism in which the free choice of major historical figures plays a minimal role", Leo Tolstoy
31/03/06 "ICH" -- -When I went back to Ankara in late 1992 to head the Indian Embassy, many of my friends from the Turkish Foreign Office from my 1969-73 tenure as First Secretary, were going out as ambassadors to newly independent states in Central Asia and the Baltic, following the breakup of the Soviet Union. Looking at the creation of so many new missions, a cheeky young Turkish diplomat in the Foreign Ministry said rather mischievously than hopefully, that only if United States of America broke up into 50 independent states, could he ever hope to head like them a Turkish Embassy, in north America. Turkish diplomats trace their traditions and archives to six centuries of Ottoman rule over an empire from which more than two dozen nations have emerged.

But the wish of the young diplomat is not going to be fulfilled any time soon, if ever. But still—

An editorial titled ' Collapse of U.S. economy ' in Belleville Intelligencer of 27 Feb, 2008 confirms , by now generally accepted ill health of US economy . Harry Koza in the Globe and Mail recently quoted Bernard Connelly, the global strategist at Banque AIG in London, that the likelihood of a Great Depression is growing by the day. Martin Wolf of U.K.'s Financial Times cited Dr. Nouriel Roubini of the New York University's Stern School of Business, who outlines how the losses of the American financial system will grow to more than $1 trillion, an amount equal to all the assets of all American banks.
The next domino to fall will be credit card defaults, and after that... who knows? There are so many exotic funds out there, with trillions of dollars in paper - or rather computer-screen money - all carrying assorted acronyms, and all about to disintegrate into nothingness. Over the next couple of years, scores of banks that have thrived on these devices, based on quickly disappearing equities, will fail.

The most frightening forecast so far comes from the Global Europe Anticipation Bulletin (GEAB), "The end of the third quarter of 2008 (thus late September, a mere seven months from now) will be marked by a new tipping point in the unfolding of the global systemic crisis.
"At that time indeed, the cumulated impact of the various sequences of the crisis will reach its maximum strength and affect decisively the very heart of the systems concerned, on the front line of which (is) the United States, epi-centre of the current crisis.

"In the United States, this new tipping point will translate into - get this - a collapse of the real economy, (the) final socio-economic stage of the serial bursting of the housing and financial bubbles and of the pursuance of the U.S. dollar fall. The collapse of U.S. real economy means the virtual freeze of the American economic machinery: private and public bankruptcies in large numbers, companies and public services closing down."

"We are not experiencing a "remake" of the 1929 crisis nor a repetition of the 1970s oil crises or 1987 stock market crisis. What we will have, instead, is truly a global momentous threat - a true turning point affecting the entire planet and questioning the very foundations of the international system upon which the world was organized in the last decades."

After the end of the cold war in the wake of the two World Wars ,the decline of western hegemony over the East and South during the last few centuries ,first exercised by rapacious and brutal European colonialists and then from Washington ,is now likely to morph into a fall because of the new forces unleashed by the US led invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq .The two debt financed wars have brought US economy close to a recession ( Indian economy including the realty sector would also be affected ,Indian officials and media still remain oblivious if not dishonest in spite of the fall in Indian Sensex). Forces and changes have been set into motion which will completely alter the existing international financial and strategic structures and result in a new dynamics. Unless of course the irresponsible leadership of USA, still with colossal powers of destruction at its command or say a reckless Israel, bomb Iran and hurl the world towards a rapid general warfare between Israel & West vs Muslim nations and masses, leading to even a nuclear holocaust and Armageddon. Verily , it would then be the last Crusade vs Jihad !

Contrary to the self proclaimed congratulatory triumphalism of neo-liberals after the collapse of Communism and Socialism in end 1980s, celebrated from house tops by the so called philosophers , think tanks and analysts with delusions of permanent world domination of Western financiers and corporate houses based on dubious theories of 'the End of History 'or 'the Clash of Civilizations' and even claims of Washington- the new Rome with absolute control planned in the 'Project for American Century ' by arrogant and historically ignorant Straussian neo-cons and their supporters ; the religious , economic , scientific and historic forces and currents unleashed during the last few centuries are coalescing towards a major East-West conflagration , which will bring about results quite opposite to those dreamed up in Washington , London and Paris.

The importance of petroleum in warfare and economy had become obvious even before the Second World War. By 1940s , the British who dominated the Middle East and still ruled over India, realising the importance of oil and the strategic importance of Middle East as lifeline to India, had created military alliances with most of the countries of the Middle East including Iran to protect oil wells from the Soviet Union. The British created a weak and dependent Pakistan as a bulwark against any USSR overture into the Gulf. After the Second WW, USA was formally anointed the leader of the Western Christian nations although after the end of the First WW the financial power centre had started shifting towards the Wall Street from the City of London, but the latter still has great leverage for manipulation.

From 1950s onwards , USSR made inroads into many Arab states led by secular, and nationalist leaders like Gamal Nasser of Egypt. West used religion and conservative and hereditary rulers to counter the egalitarian waves of socialism sweeping the Middle East, Asia and Africa. The battle lines for influence and control between the West and USSR ( and China) saw many ups and downs . An epochal change occurred when Iran was lost in 1979 and US ally the Shahenshah was overthrown by Khomeini led Shia revolution , threatening the Sheikhdoms and Kingdoms in the region. Western world and its frightened allies in the region, taken aback , encouraged and helped financially and militarily Saddam Hussein to douse the leaping flames from the volcano of Shia revolution with its belief in martyrdom. Iran and Iraq lost over a million young men ; the 1980s Iraq –Iran war only protected the vested interests of the West and its allies in the region.

From the Middle East , Western strategic lever to manipulate and control the region and its resources extended into South Asia through an axis between the USA, Saud dynasty, obscurantist Wahabi clerics and Pakistan military. This axis along with support from other Muslim countries and even China fathered , nurtured , trained and financed with arms and billions of dollars ,the present monster of militants and Jihadis to battle and force out the Soviet forces from Afghanistan .The nurseries of terrorism were left behind intact which morphed into Al Qaeda and Talebans , the latter with full support from Pakistan and the Gulf's Arab rulers and US acquiescence , which wanted a 'stable' Afghanistan for its Multinationals' pipelines to carry energy from central to South Asia and beyond. That project remains unfulfilled.

For his cooperation ,Pakistan President Gen Zia- ul- Haq was suitably rewarded with money and military aid which emboldened Islamabad to carry out an invasion in Kargil in India .With abundance of arms ,Pakistan acquired a Kalashnikov culture of violence while increased opium production in Afghanistan , with Pakistan as an exit route left millions of it citizens addicted to the drug. Gen Zia Islamised Pak polity and completed nuclear bomb program with acquiescence and even support form the West.

But Al Qaeda chief Osama Ben Laden , chosen for the Jihad in Afghanistan by the Saudi rulers nurtured dreams of taking over Muslim states gone astray and conquer other peoples too. The victims were India and newly independent central Asian states like Tajikistan , Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan and Arab states which had supported and sent volunteers to fight in Afghanistan.

In its strategy to defeat the Christian West and the Crusaders in the Middle East , even on the sacred soil of Arabia after the 1991 US led war on Iraq , Al Qaeda first attacked US missions in East Africa .But the stunning events of 9/11 showed up the fundamental contradictions in the US-Saudi –Pak axis , with 14 of the 19 hijackers being of Saudi origin ,led by an Egyptian and Al Qaeda's octopus like tentacles deeply embedded in Pak military, ISI and the establishment .

The hyper power USA then mounted an invasion of Afghanistan , the objective being to control the region and extending into central Asia with its resources . But the strains and stresses in the Crusader-Jihadi axis became even more acute after the US led illegal invasion of Iraq in March, 2003, angering and pitting Muslim masses all over the world against USA , UK and other western nations in the backdrop of continued illegal occupation and encroachments on Palestinian land by Israel since 1967 and daily killings of Palestinians telecast on channels like Al Jazeera and others.

This is acutely true in US-Saudi relations with the latter being the leading Sunni Muslim state , protecting the holy Islamic shrines in Mecca and Medina and blessed with vast oil resources. With increasing public support for Al Qaeda inside the Kingdom ,Riyadh is now in a quandary. Its power and prestige have been eroded as a result of its rival Shia power Iran's strengthened position in Iraq and the region , just the opposite of what Washington had foolishly hoped for. President George Bush did not even know the difference between Shia and Sunni Islam and Ahmet Chalebi ,a wily Iraqi ,exiled after the 1958 overthrow of the Hashemite dynasty , had sold to the willing in the Pentagon the charade that US troops would be welcomed with flowers by the Iraqis .No body ever cared to read the history of Iraq or the region.

US invasion and occupation has divided Iraq into at least three parts, Shia, Sunni and Kurdish ; it now appears difficult to hold them together .Apart from exposing the hollow claims of the US success of its 'Surge ' and stability in Iraq ,the current fighting between the puppet government Iraqi troops and Mahdi army ,the Moqtada –as Sadr militia , specially in Basra and Baghdad is" a result of an attempt to impose Colombian-style democracy on the unstable country. Iraqi PM Maliki's goal, shared by the like-minded allies among the Shia, Sunni and Kurdish parties that dominate his administration, and with U.S. approval and air support , is to kill off the opposition and then hold a vote." Moqtda is fighting to retain control for provincial elections in October, as" the winners of those elections will determine the future of the Iraqi state. Control of the country's oil wealth, and how its treasure will be developed, will also be significantly influenced by the outcome of the elections."

Washington which had coerced President Gen Pervez Musharraf after 9/11, under threat to bomb Pakistan back to stone ages ( some ally?), to align Islamabad in its so called 'War on terror 'wanted Pakistan to destroy Al Qaeda , Pushtun Talebans and Muslim Jihadis in Pakistan and Afghanistan, with whom Saudi Arabia , Pak Army , ISI and the establishment have umbilical connections since their holy Jihad against atheist Soviet Union in Afghanistan during 1980s.( Israel now wants PLO to destroy Tehran aligned Hamas-originally incubated by Mossad to counter Al Fattah.)
US has lost the war on the ground in Iraq and Nato is in disarray in Afghanistan .At the end of 'Operation Iraqi freedom ' transmuted into a ' war on terror' , really the mother of all battles for oil, raw materials and strategic space in west , south and central Asia , the frontiers in the Middle East and even Pakistan are likely to be redrawn , but not by the West but by the movements , militias and peoples of the region .Say by Shias in south Iraq and Pushtuns in Pak-Afghanistan border who might obliterate the Durand Line officially , to begin with. But West has invested too much in the region and its prosperity depends on it. It is unlikely to give in or give up without a bloody fight.

The Kingdom of Afghanistan was accepted as a defacto buffer state by the British and Russian empires at the end of 'the Great Game' in Central Asia in 19th century .By the end of the 20th century , the British and Russian empires in Asia had vanished and many new states have emerged out of them. Thus the very raison d'etre of that buffer state no longer holds good. The Afghan territory is under control of different armed groups , foreign and local , with Washington installed President Hamid Karzai, with US mercenaries as his bodyguards, barely controlling the city of Kabul. Look at new states sprung from former Russian and British empires now , at Europe after the two world wars and at the end of the Cold War . State and national boundaries are always waxing and waning , some times changing drastically. So what is new if Pakistan breaks apart .Little effort has been made by its leaders since 1947 to even develop a territory based nationalism. China would not escape further problems in Tibet and may be even in Xinjiang.

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, USA went about methodically in dismantling Russia and its near abroad and succeeded, with ample help from a naive Gorbachev and an often drunk or drugged Boris Yeltsin. The 9/11 assaults on US symbols of power was exploited by the Bush administration to spread its tentacles to Afghanistan and beyond in central Asia . For USA the Cold War never really ended and all means were employed to push Western military arm NATO to encroach into and encircle Russian strategic space. In central Europe it was carried out by dismantling Yugoslavia, an Orthodox Christian Slav nation like and friendly to Russia and by aligning Georgia and Azerbaijan to Washington. US franchised street revolutions failed in Belarus but succeeded in Serbia and Georgia and partially in Ukraine. When USA tried the same in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, Uzbek ruler Islam Karimov expelled the Americans from the air base and Kyrgyzstan placed new restrictions. The eastward movement of NATO has resulted in the creation of Shanghai Corporation Organisation which is now promoting military coordination and collaboration among its members and possibly even a formal military alliance in future to counter Nato.

In its backyard Latin America, USA maintained its dominance under Monroe doctrine except for defiant Cuba under Fidel Castro .But Washington is losing its sway and total control, led against it by Hugo Chavez of Venezuela and other leaders who represent and implement aspirations of their people and not of the old elites in cahoots with corporate interests in USA and Europe. US attempt for a colonial style control of its oil has been brought to a halt by fierce Sunni Iraqi resistance ; full Shia resistance would also emerge. Defied by Iran and even forced to engage with it , there are limitations to what Washington, now caught in the Iraqi quagmire , can do in Latin America . With a defiant nuclear North Korea, and China, an emerging economic power house, the policies of Japan, the second economic industrial power in the world which can quickly transmute its formidable industrial base into a lethal military machine, the situation in East Asia remains pregnant with many unpredictable possibilities. But certainly the US writ and influence are on the wane every where.
K Gajendra Singh, Indian ambassador (retired), served as ambassador to Turkey and Azerbaijan from August 1992 to April 1996. Prior to that, he served terms as ambassador to Jordan, Romania and Senegal. He is currently chairman of the Foundation for Indo-Turkic Studies. Copy right with the author. E-mail: Gajendrak@hotmail.com .http://www.informationclearinghouse.info
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Saundra Hummer

April 1st, 2008, 01:49 PM

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Inside the Black Budget

By
William J. Broad
The New York Times
Tuesday 01 April 2008

Skulls. Black cats. A naked woman riding a killer whale. Grim reapers. Snakes. Swords. Occult symbols. A wizard with a staff that shoots lightning bolts. Moons. Stars. A dragon holding the Earth in its claws.

No, this is not the fantasy world of a 12-year-old boy.
It is, according to a new book, part of the hidden reality behind the Pentagon's classified, or "black," budget that delivers billions of dollars to stealthy armies of high-tech warriors. The book offers a glimpse of this dark world through a revealing lens - patches - the kind worn on military uniforms.

"It's a fresh approach to secret government," Steven Aftergood, a security expert at the Federation of American Scientists in Washington, said in an interview. "It shows that these secret programs have their own culture, vocabulary and even sense of humor."

One patch shows a space alien with huge eyes holding a stealth bomber near its mouth. "To Serve Man" reads the text above, a reference to a classic "Twilight Zone" episode in which man is the entree, not the customer. "Gustatus Similis Pullus" reads the caption below, dog Latin for "Tastes Like Chicken."

Military officials and experts said the patches are real if often unofficial efforts at building team spirit.

The classified budget of the Defense Department, concealed from the public in all but outline, has nearly doubled in the Bush years, to $32 billion. That is more than the combined budgets of the Food and Drug Administration, the National Science Foundation and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

Those billions have expanded a secret world of advanced science and technology in which military units and federal contractors push back the frontiers of warfare. In the past, such handiwork has produced some of the most advanced jets, weapons and spy satellites, as well as notorious boondoggles.

Budget documents tell little. This year, for instance, the Pentagon says Program Element 0603891c is receiving $196 million but will disclose nothing about what the project does. Private analysts say it apparently aims at developing space weapons.

Trevor Paglen, an artist and photographer finishing his Ph.D. in geography at the University of California, Berkeley, has managed to document some of this hidden world. The 75 patches he has assembled reveal a bizarre mix of high and low culture where Latin and Greek mottos frame images of spooky demons and sexy warriors, of dragons dropping bombs and skunks firing laser beams.

"Oderint Dum Metuant," reads a patch for an Air Force program that mines spy satellite images for battlefield intelligence, according to Mr. Paglen, who identifies the saying as from Caligula, the first-century Roman emperor famed for his depravity. It translates "Let them hate so long as they fear."

Wizards appear on several patches. The one hurling lightning bolts comes from a secret Air Force base at Groom Lake, northwest of Las Vegas in a secluded valley. Mr. Paglen identifies its five clustered stars and one separate star as a veiled reference to Area 51, where the government tests advanced aircraft and, U.F.O. buffs say, captured alien spaceships.

The book offers not only clues into the nature of the secret programs, but also a glimpse of zealous male bonding among the presumed elite of the military-industrial complex. The patches often feel like fraternity pranks gone ballistic.

The book's title? "I Could Tell You but Then You Would Have to Be Destroyed by Me," published by Melville House. Mr. Paglen says the title is the Latin translation of a patch designed for the Navy Air Test and Evaluation Squadron 4, at Point Mugu, Calif. Its mission, he says, is to test strike aircraft, conventional weapons and electronic warfare equipment and to develop tactics to use the high-tech armaments in war.

"The military has patches for almost everything it does," Mr. Paglen writes in the introduction. "Including, curiously, for programs, units and activities that are officially secret."

He said contractors in some cases made the patches to build esprit de corps. Other times, he added, military units produced them informally, in contrast to official patches.

Mr. Paglen said he found them by touring bases, noting what personnel wore, joining alumni associations, interviewing active and former team members, talking to base historians and filing requests under the Freedom of Information Act.

A spokesman for the Pentagon, Cmdr. Bob Mehal, said it would be imprudent to comment on "which patches do or do not represent classified units." In an e-mail message, Commander Mehal added, "It would be supposition to suggest 'anyone' is uncomfortable with this book."

Each year, the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, a private group in Washington, publishes an update on the Pentagon's classified budget. It says the money began to soar after the two events of Mr. Bush's coming into office and terrorists' 9/11 attacks.

What sparked his interest, Mr. Paglen recalled, were Vice President Dick Cheney's remarks as the Pentagon and World Trade Center smoldered. On "Meet the Press," he said the nation would engage its "dark side" to find the attackers and justice. "We've got to spend time in the shadows," Mr. Cheney said. "It's going to be vital for us to use any means at our disposal, basically, to achieve our objective."

In an interview, Mr. Paglen said that remark revived memories of his childhood when his military family traveled the globe to bases often involved in secret missions. "I'd go out drinking with Special Forces guys," he recalled. "I was 15, and they were 20, and they could never say where they where coming from or what they were doing. You were just around the stuff."

Intrigued by Mr. Cheney's remarks as well as his own recollections, Mr. Paglen set off to map the secret world and document its expansion. He traveled widely across the Southwest, where the military keeps many secret bases. His labors, he said, resulted in his Ph.D. thesis as well as a book, "Blank Spots on a Map," that Dutton plans to publish next year.

The research also led to another book, "Torture Taxi," that Melville House published in 2006. It described how spies kidnapped and detained suspected terrorists around the globe.

"Black World," a 2006 display of his photographs at Bellwether, a gallery in Chelsea, showed "anonymous-looking buildings in parched landscapes shot through a shimmering heat haze," Holland Cotter wrote in The New York Times, adding that the images "seem to emit a buzz of mystery as they turn military surveillance inside out: here the surveillant is surveilled."

In this research, Mr. Paglen became fascinated by the patches and started collecting them and displaying them at talks and shows. He said a breakthrough occurred around 2004, when he visited Peter Merlin, an "aerospace archaeologist" who works in the Mojave Desert not far from a sprawling military base. Mr. Merlin argued that the lightning bolts, stars and other symbols could be substantive clues about unit numbers and operating locations, as well as the purpose of hidden programs.

"These symbols," Mr. Paglen wrote, "were a language. If you could begin to learn its grammar, you could get a glimpse into the secret world itself."

His book explores this idea and seeks to decode the symbols. Many patches show the Greek letter sigma, which Mr. Paglen identifies as a technical term for how well an object reflects radar waves, a crucial parameter in developing stealthy jets.

A patch from a Groom Lake unit shows the letter sigma with the "buster" slash running through it, as in the movie "Ghost Busters." "Huge Deposit - No Return" reads its caption. Huge Deposit, Mr. Paglen writes, "indicates the bomb load deposited by the bomber on its target, while 'No Return' refers to the absence of a radar return, meaning the aircraft was undetectable to radar."

In an interview, Mr. Paglen said his favorite patch was the dragon holding the Earth in its claws, its wings made of American flags and its mouth wide open, baring its fangs. He said it came from the National Reconnaissance Office, which oversees developing spy satellites. "There's something both belligerent and weirdly self-critical about it," he remarked. "It's representing the U.S. as a dragon with the whole world in its clutches."

The field is expanding. Dwayne A. Day and Roger Guillemette, military historians, wrote an article published this year in The Space Review (www.thespacereview.com/article/1033/1) on patches from secret space programs. "It's neat stuff," Dr. Day said in an interview. "They're not really giving away secrets. But the patches do go farther than the organizations want to go officially."

Mr. Paglen plans to keep mining the patches and the field of clandestine military activity. "It's kind of remarkable," he said. "This stuff is a huge industry, I mean a huge industry. And it's remarkable that you can develop these projects on an industrial scale, and we don't know what they are. It's an astounding feat of social engineering."
Go on-site to gain access to todays features. Just click on the following Link/URL:
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/040108F.shtml + + + + + + .

Saundra Hummer

April 1st, 2008, 03:02 PM

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^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^Tomgram: Howard Zinn, The End of Empire?

posted April 01, 2008 3:53 pm
In Iraq, in Afghanistan, and at home, the position of the globe's "sole superpower" is visibly fraying. The country that was once proclaimed an "empire lite" has proven increasingly light-headed. The country once hailed as a power greater than that of imperial Rome or imperial Britain, a dominating force beyond anything ever seen on the planet, now can't seem to make a move in its own interest that isn't a disaster. The Iraq government's recent offensive in Basra is but the latest example with -- we can be sure -- more to come.

In the meantime, the fate of that empire, lite or otherwise, is the subject of Howard Zinn today at Tomdispatch, and of a new addition to his famed People's History of the United States. The new book represents a surprise breakthrough into cartoon format. It's a rollicking graphic history, illustrated by cartoonist Mike Konopacki, that takes us from the Indian Wars to the Iraqi "frontier" (with some striking autobiographical asides from Zinn's own life). It's called A People's History of American Empire. It's a gem and it's being published today.

In honor of publication day, Tomdispatch offers the equivalent of a little online extravaganza. Below, you can read Zinn's essay on how he first learned about the American Empire; and you can also click here for two special treats. You can view an animated video, using some of the book's art, with voiceover by none other than Viggo Mortensen. (Think of it as Lord of the Rings, Part IV: The American Mordor Chronicles.) Finally, if you look below the video on that same page, you'll see an autobiographical section of the new book, focusing on Zinn's early years. (Click on each illustration to view a single page of text.) Have fun. Tom

Empire or Humanity?
What the Classroom Didn't Teach Me About the American Empire
By
Howard Zinn

With an occupying army waging war in Iraq and Afghanistan, with military bases and corporate bullying in every part of the world, there is hardly a question any more of the existence of an American Empire. Indeed, the once fervent denials have turned into a boastful, unashamed embrace of the idea.

However the very idea that the United States was an empire did not occur to me until after I finished my work as a bombardier with the Eighth Air Force in the Second World War, and came home. Even as I began to have second thoughts about the purity of the "Good War," even after being horrified by Hiroshima and Nagasaki, even after rethinking my own bombing of towns in Europe, I still did not put all that together in the context of an American "Empire."

I was conscious, like everyone, of the British Empire and the other imperial powers of Europe, but the United States was not seen in the same way. When, after the war, I went to college under the G.I. Bill of Rights and took courses in U.S. history, I usually found a chapter in the history texts called "The Age of Imperialism." It invariably referred to the Spanish-American War of 1898 and the conquest of the Philippines that followed. It seemed that American imperialism lasted only a relatively few years. There was no overarching view of U.S. expansion that might lead to the idea of a more far-ranging empire -- or period -- of "imperialism."

I recall the classroom map (labeled "Western Expansion") which presented the march across the continent as a natural, almost biological phenomenon. That huge acquisition of land called "The Louisiana Purchase" hinted at nothing but vacant land acquired. There was no sense that this territory had been occupied by hundreds of Indian tribes which would have to be annihilated or forced from their homes -- what we now call "ethnic cleansing" -- so that whites could settle the land, and later railroads could crisscross it, presaging "civilization" and its brutal discontents.

Neither the discussions of "Jacksonian democracy" in history courses, nor the popular book by Arthur Schlesinger Jr., The Age of Jackson, told me about the "Trail of Tears," the deadly forced march of "the five civilized tribes" westward from Georgia and Alabama across the Mississippi, leaving 4,000 dead in their wake. No treatment of the Civil War mentioned the Sand Creek massacre of hundreds of Indian villagers in Colorado just as "emancipation" was proclaimed for black people by Lincoln's administration.

That classroom map also had a section to the south and west labeled "Mexican Cession." This was a handy euphemism for the aggressive war against Mexico in 1846 in which the United States seized half of that country's land, giving us California and the great Southwest. The term "Manifest Destiny," used at that time, soon of course became more universal. On the eve of the Spanish-American War in 1898, the Washington Post saw beyond Cuba: "We are face to face with a strange destiny. The taste of Empire is in the mouth of the people even as the taste of blood in the jungle."

The violent march across the continent, and even the invasion of Cuba, appeared to be within a natural sphere of U.S. interest. After all, hadn't the Monroe Doctrine of 1823 declared the Western Hemisphere to be under our protection? But with hardly a pause after Cuba came the invasion of the Philippines, halfway around the world. The word "imperialism" now seemed a fitting one for U.S. actions. Indeed, that long, cruel war -- treated quickly and superficially in the history books -- gave rise to an Anti-Imperialist League, in which William James and Mark Twain were leading figures. But this was not something I learned in university either.

The "Sole Superpower" Comes into View
Reading outside the classroom, however, I began to fit the pieces of history into a larger mosaic. What at first had seemed like a purely passive foreign policy in the decade leading up to the First World War now appeared as a succession of violent interventions: the seizure of the Panama Canal zone from Colombia, a naval bombardment of the Mexican coast, the dispatch of the Marines to almost every country in Central America, occupying armies sent to Haiti and the Dominican Republic. As the much-decorated General Smedley Butler, who participated in many of those interventions, wrote later: "I was an errand boy for Wall Street."

At the very time I was learning this history -- the years after World War II -- the United States was becoming not just another imperial power, but the world's leading superpower. Determined to maintain and expand its monopoly on nuclear weapons, it was taking over remote islands in the Pacific, forcing the inhabitants to leave, and turning the islands into deadly playgrounds for more atomic tests.

In his memoir, No Place to Hide, Dr. David Bradley, who monitored radiation in those tests, described what was left behind as the testing teams went home: "[R]adioactivity, contamination, the wrecked island of Bikini and its sad-eyed patient exiles." The tests in the Pacific were followed, over the years, by more tests in the deserts of Utah and Nevada, more than a thousand tests in all.

When the war in Korea began in 1950, I was still studying history as a graduate student at Columbia University. Nothing in my classes prepared me to understand American policy in Asia. But I was reading I. F. Stone's Weekly. Stone was among the very few journalists who questioned the official justification for sending an army to Korea. It seemed clear to me then that it was not the invasion of South Korea by the North that prompted U.S. intervention, but the desire of the United States to have a firm foothold on the continent of Asia, especially now that the Communists were in power in China.

Years later, as the covert intervention in Vietnam grew into a massive and brutal military operation, the imperial designs of the United States became yet clearer to me. In 1967, I wrote a little book called Vietnam: The Logic of Withdrawal. By that time I was heavily involved in the movement against the war.

When I read the hundreds of pages of the Pentagon Papers entrusted to me by Daniel Ellsberg, what jumped out at me were the secret memos from the National Security Council. Explaining the U.S. interest in Southeast Asia, they spoke bluntly of the country's motives as a quest for "tin, rubber, oil."

Neither the desertions of soldiers in the Mexican War, nor the draft riots of the Civil War, not the anti-imperialist groups at the turn of the century, nor the strong opposition to World War I -- indeed no antiwar movement in the history of the nation reached the scale of the opposition to the war in Vietnam. At least part of that opposition rested on an understanding that more than Vietnam was at stake, that the brutal war in that tiny country was part of a grander imperial design.

Various interventions following the U.S. defeat in Vietnam seemed to reflect the desperate need of the still-reigning superpower -- even after the fall of its powerful rival, the Soviet Union -- to establish its dominance everywhere. Hence the invasion of Grenada in 1982, the bombing assault on Panama in 1989, the first Gulf war of 1991. Was George Bush Sr. heartsick over Saddam Hussein's seizure of Kuwait, or was he using that event as an opportunity to move U.S. power firmly into the coveted oil region of the Middle East? Given the history of the United States, given its obsession with Middle Eastern oil dating from Franklin Roosevelt's 1945 deal with King Abdul Aziz of Saudi Arabia, and the CIA's overthrow of the democratic Mossadeq government in Iran in 1953, it is not hard to decide that question.

Justifying Empire
The ruthless attacks of September 11th (as the official 9/11 Commission acknowledged) derived from fierce hatred of U.S. expansion in the Middle East and elsewhere. Even before that event, the Defense Department acknowledged, according to Chalmers Johnson's book The Sorrows of Empire, the existence of more than 700 American military bases outside of the United States.

Since that date, with the initiation of a "war on terrorism," many more bases have been established or expanded: in Kyrgyzstan, Afghanistan, the desert of Qatar, the Gulf of Oman, the Horn of Africa, and wherever else a compliant nation could be bribed or coerced.

When I was bombing cities in Germany, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and France in the Second World War, the moral justification was so simple and clear as to be beyond discussion: We were saving the world from the evil of fascism. I was therefore startled to hear from a gunner on another crew -- what we had in common was that we both read books -- that he considered this "an imperialist war." Both sides, he said, were motivated by ambitions of control and conquest. We argued without resolving the issue. Ironically, tragically, not long after our discussion, this fellow was shot down and killed on a mission.

In wars, there is always a difference between the motives of the soldiers and the motives of the political leaders who send them into battle. My motive, like that of so many, was innocent of imperial ambition. It was to help defeat fascism and create a more decent world, free of aggression, militarism, and racism.

The motive of the U.S. establishment, understood by the aerial gunner I knew, was of a different nature. It was described early in 1941 by Henry Luce, multi-millionaire owner of Time, Life, and Fortune magazines, as the coming of "The American Century." The time had arrived, he said, for the United States "to exert upon the world the full impact of our influence, for such purposes as we see fit, and by such means as we see fit."

We can hardly ask for a more candid, blunter declaration of imperial design. It has been echoed in recent years by the intellectual handmaidens of the Bush administration, but with assurances that the motive of this "influence" is benign, that the "purposes" -- whether in Luce's formulation or more recent ones -- are noble, that this is an "imperialism lite." As George Bush said in his second inaugural address: "Spreading liberty around the world… is the calling of our time." The New York Times called that speech "striking for its idealism."

The American Empire has always been a bipartisan project -- Democrats and Republicans have taken turns extending it, extolling it, justifying it. President Woodrow Wilson told graduates of the Naval Academy in 1914 (the year he bombarded Mexico) that the U.S. used "her navy and her army... as the instruments of civilization, not as the instruments of aggression." And Bill Clinton, in 1992, told West Point graduates: "The values you learned here… will be able to spread throughout the country and throughout the world."

For the people of the United States, and indeed for people all over the world, those claims sooner or later are revealed to be false. The rhetoric, often persuasive on first hearing, soon becomes overwhelmed by horrors that can no longer be concealed: the bloody corpses of Iraq, the torn limbs of American GIs, the millions of families driven from their homes -- in the Middle East and in the Mississippi Delta.

Have not the justifications for empire, embedded in our culture, assaulting our good sense -- that war is necessary for security, that expansion is fundamental to civilization -- begun to lose their hold on our minds? Have we reached a point in history where we are ready to embrace a new way of living in the world, expanding not our military power, but our humanity?

Howard Zinn is the author of A People's History of the United States and Voices of a People's History of the United States, now being filmed for a major television documentary. His newest book is A People's History of American Empire, the story of America in the world, told in comics form, with Mike Konopacki and Paul Buhle in the American Empire Project book series. An animated video adapted from this essay with visuals from the comic book and voiceover by Viggo Mortensen, as well as a section of the book on Zinn's early life, can be viewed by clicking here. Zinn's website is HowardZinn.org.

Copyright 2008 Howard Zinn

http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/174913/howard_zinn_the_end_of_empire_
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Saundra Hummer

April 1st, 2008, 05:18 PM

BREAKING: Bush Administration Suspends Laws Along U.S./Mexican Border
Abuse of Power
Today, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff (pictured above at his nomination in 2005) announced that the Bush Administration will waive environmental and land use laws along 470 miles of the border -- a gross abuse of power that could harm border communities and jaguars and other wildlife.

Call your Senators and Representative now and urge them to do everything they can to stop this awful abuse of power and protect our wildlife and border communities.

Greg Walden - (202) 225-6730 or (541) 776-4646 [CALL YOUR OWN]

Ron Wyden - (202) 224-5244 or (503) 326-7525
Gordon H. Smith - (202) 224-3753 or (503) 326-3386

Help us spread the word! Forward this message to at least five friends…

Dear Saundra,

I wish this were an April Fools Day joke, but it’s not. Today, the Bush/Cheney Administration announced that it will waive environmental and land management laws along 470 miles of the U.S./Mexico border.

Laws ensuring clean water for us and our children? Dismissed. Laws protecting wildlife, land, rivers, streams and places of cultural significance? Disregarded. And laws giving American citizens a voice in the process? Gone.

Clearly, this is out of control.

Please call your U.S. Representative and Senators at the phone numbers provided below:

Greg Walden - (202) 225-6730 or (541) 776-4646

Ron Wyden - (202) 224-5244 or (503) 326-7525
Gordon H. Smith - (202) 224-3753 or (503) 326-3386
(Call your own)

Once you’re connected, please deliver this simple message:

“My name is (YOUR NAME) and I’m calling (from your own town) to voice my shock and outrage about the Bush Administration’s announcement today that it will waive important environmental and land use laws along 470 miles of the U.S./Mexico border.

This flagrant abuse of power threatens border communities and wildlife. I urge you to do everything in your power to challenge this awful decision.”

Important: Please let us know that you called. Report your call now.

We can't allow the Bush/Cheney Administration to unilaterally disregard laws that protect the health and safety of our families and communities and preserve America’s wildlife and wild places for future generations.

Please call your elected officials right now.

Rodger Schlickeisen
President
Defenders of Wildlife

P.S. Defenders of Wildlife and the Sierra Club have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review the constitutionality of this controversial waiver as a flagrant violation of the separation of powers principle that frames the U.S. Constitution. Read more here...

© Copyright 2008 Defenders of Wildlife.

This message was sent to JohnDoe@???com.

Please do not respond to this message.
Click here to update your information or unsubscribe.

Defenders of Wildlife is a national, nonprofit membership organization dedicated to the protection of all native wild animals and plants in their natural communities.

Defenders of Wildlife can be contacted at:
1130 17th Street, NW
Washington, DC 20036

http://www.defendersofwildlife.org

Telemundo had a long story on their TV station yesterday, addressing this very issue, showing the Jaguar's (some with night vision video), and Panthers, the metal barrier to keep our human neigbors out, the mountains rivers, and the desert streams. I don't understand enough Spanish to make much of it other than I could make out that they were talkling of the environmental disaster in the making. Pity, but it will propably come to be.

Here's the gripe, or one of them, why was't this beautifully shot and long article which had English speaking participants shown on our own television? On the main networks, ABC, CBS, NBC, and FOX? Telemundo seems to be independent of them and they are doing their own thing, maybe?

The reporting out of the US, Central America, and South America by Telemundo seems to go into depth about a lot of issues impacting them, and us as well. I only wish I had a better command of Spanish as I miss too much. SRH
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Saundra Hummer

April 1st, 2008, 05:49 PM

.~~~~~~~
"Freedom of expression is the well-spring of our civilization... The history of civilization is in considerable measure the displacement of error which once held sway as official truth by beliefs which in turn have yielded to other truths. Therefore the liberty of man to search for truth ought not to be fettered, no matter what orthodoxies he may challenge."

Felix Frankfurter
1882-1965
U.S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Concurring Opinion
Dennis et al. v. U.S. (1951)
~~~
"Freedom to differ is not limited to things that do not matter much. That would be a mere shadow of freedom. The test of its substance is the right to differ as to things that touch the heart of the existing order."

Justice Robert H. Jackson
(1892-1954)
U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source:
West Virginia
State Board of Education
versus
Barnette, 1943
~~~
"There is no telling to what extremes of cruelty and ruthlessness a man will go when he is freed from the fears, hesitations, doubts and the vague stirrings of decency that go with individual judgement. When we lose our individual independence in the corporateness of a mass movement, we find a new freedom- freedom to hate, bully, lie, torture, murder and betray without shame and remorse. Herein undoubtedly lies part of the attractiveness of a mass movement."

Eric Hoffer
~~~
"He therefore is the truest friend to the liberty of his country who tries most to promote its virtue, and who, so far as his power and influence extend, will not suffer a man to be chosen into any office of power and trust who is not a wise and virtuous man..."

Samuel Adams

~~~~~
.

Homer

April 2nd, 2008, 10:28 AM

This is the guy who runs CNN. Who can take that 'news' station seriously after reading or hearing this:

Turner: Global Warming Will Cause Mass Cannibalism, Insurgents Are Patriots
Photo of Brent Baker.
By Brent Baker | April 2, 2008 - 02:18 ET

Interviewed Tuesday for Charlie Rose's PBS show, CNN founder Ted Turner argued that inaction on global warming “will be catastrophic” and those who don't die “will be cannibals.” He also applied moral equivalence in describing Iraqi insurgents as “patriots” who simply “don't like us because we've invaded their country” and so “if the Iraqis were in Washington, D.C., we'd be doing the same thing.” On not taking drastic action to correct global warming:

Not doing it will be catastrophic. We'll be eight degrees hottest in ten, not ten but 30 or 40 years and basically none of the crops will grow. Most of the people will have died and the rest of us will be cannibals.

Turner ridiculed the need for a big U.S. military, insisting “China just wants to sell us shoes. They're not building landing craft to attack the United States,” and “even with our $500 billion military budget, we can't win in Iraq. We're being beaten by insurgents who don't even have any tanks.” After Rose pointed out the Iraqi insurgents “have a lot of roadside bombs that kill a lot of Americans” and wondered “where do you think they come from?”, Turner answered:

I think that they're patriots and that they don't like us because we've invaded their country and occupied it. I think if the Iraqis were in Washington, D.C., we'd be doing the same thing: we'd be bombing them too. Nobody wants to be invaded.

Audio Clip (http://newsbusters.org/static/2008/04/2008-04-01-PBS-ROSE-Turner.mp3)

Homer

April 2nd, 2008, 10:30 AM

What are fighting for?

http://www.foxnews.com/images/foxnews_story.gif
A couple found guilty of adultery by an Islamic "qazi" court was stoned to death by Taliban militants in Pakistan's northwest border region, according to a report in Dawn, Pakistan's English-language newspaper.

The execution, which reportedly took place Monday, is the first by stoning reported in the region, which borders Afghanistan. "Qazi" courts, which are allowed to administer Islamic law outside the Pakistani judicial system, traditionally have ordered execution by firing squad in cases of adultery.

The married woman, identified as Shano, had allegedly eloped on March 15 with Daulat Khan Malikdeenkhel.

A spokesman for the Taliban said a complaint had been received from the woman's family that she had been abducted by Daulat Khan. They later changed the report to say she had run away with him.

Taliban militants captured the couple as they were returning from Karachi, the spokesman said.

Dawn reported that the woman's body was buried by local residents not far from the execution site. The man's body was handed over to his relatives for burial.

Homer

April 2nd, 2008, 10:32 AM

Could the recent uprising in Tibet have a role in this reversal?

http://www.foxnews.com/images/foxnews_story.gif
VIENNA, Austria — China, an opponent of harsh U.N. Security Council sanctions against Iran, has nonetheless recently provided the International Atomic Energy Agency with intelligence linked to Tehran's alleged attempts to make nuclear arms, diplomats have told The Associated Press.

Beijing, along with Moscow, has acted as a brake within the council, consistently watering down a U.S.-led push to impose severe penalties on Tehran for its nuclear defiance since the first set of sanctions was passed in late 2006.

A Chinese decision to provide information for use in the agency's attempts to probe Iran's purported nuclear weapons program would appear to reflect growing international unease about how honest the Islamic republic has been in denying it ever tried to make such arms.

The new development was revealed by two senior diplomats who closely follow the IAEA probe of Iran's nuclear program. One commented late last week and the other Wednesday.

The IAEA declined comment, and nobody was picking up phones at the Iranian and Chinese missions to the IAEA.

John Bolton, the previous U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and before that the U.S. undersecretary of state in charge of the Iran nuclear dossier, said any such Chinese move would be "potentially significant" because of Beijing's former military ties to Tehran.

In a telephone call from Washington, Bolton said America believed that the Chinese had helped Iran develop its nuclear program, particularly in one area of uranium enrichment, "plus they had cooperation on ballistic missile programs as well."

The diplomats said Beijing was the most surprising entry among a fairly substantial list of nations recently forwarding information to the agency that adds to previously provided intelligence, and which could be relevant in attempts to probe Iran for past or present nuclear weapons research.

But they said several other countries not normally considered to be in the anti-Iran camp had also done so in recent weeks.

The diplomats — who demanded anonymity because their information was confidential — declined to name individual nations. But they attributed a generally increased flow of information to the U.N. nuclear watchdog to concerns sparked by a multimedia presentation to the 35 IAEA board members by the agency in February about intelligence previously forwarded by member states on Iran's alleged clandestine nuclear arms program.

One of the diplomats said the agency also was on the lookout for misleading information provided it, either inadvertently or in attempts to falsely implicate Iran.

One example, he said was a document showing experiments with implosion technology that can be used to detonate a nuclear device. While the document appeared genuine, it was unclear whether it originated from Iran, said the diplomat.

Suspected weapons-related work outlined in the February presentation and IAEA reports preceding it include:

—uranium conversion linked to high explosives testing and designs of a missile re-entry vehicle, all apparently interconnected through involvement of officials and institutions;

—procurement of so-called "dual use" equipment and experiments that also could be used in both civilian and military nuclear programs; and

—Iran's possession of a 15-page document outlining how to form uranium metal into the shape of a warhead.

A U.S. intelligence estimate late last year said Tehran worked on nuclear weapons programs until 2003, while Israel and other nations say such work continued past that date.

Tehran continues uranium enrichment, which can generate the fissile core of nuclear warheads, and has led to three sets of Security Council sanctions but insists it is developing the technology only for its other use — power generation.

It denies ever trying to make atomic arms and last month declared the issue of its purported nuclear weapons strivings — and any attempt to investigate them — closed, asserting that information suggesting it ever had a nascent nuclear arms program is fabricated.

But the agency has signaled it is not giving up on its efforts to investigate purported military aspects of Tehran's nuclear activities. Other diplomats told the AP that deputy director general Olli Heinonen planned to meet in the next few days with Ali-Ashgar Soltanieh, Iran's chief delegate to the agency, to press for answers.

Ahead of that tentative meeting, Gregory L. Schulte, the chief U.S. delegate to the IAEA, urged Tehran to end its stonewalling. He told the AP that with the next IAEA report due in about two months, time was running out for Iran to "explain these serious indications of troubling activities."

An IAEA report in February said suspicions about most past Iranian nuclear activities had eased or been laid to rest. But it also noted that Iran had rejected the information provided by IAEA member nations to the agency for its probe of suspected weapons research as false and irrelevant.

It also noted that Iran had blocked agency requests to talk to key officials suspected of possible involvement in past military nuclear programs, among them one identified by diplomats as nuclear engineer Mohsen Fakhrizadeh.

They told the AP that he and others active as academics in Iran's civilian nuclear faculties are suspected by the agency of key roles in secret nuclear activities with a possible military dimension, including the procurement of "dual use" equipment.

In a summary recently forwarded to the AP, the National Council of Resistance of Iran, an opposition group that claims to have informants inside the Iranian government, identified three others as Revolutionary Guard commander Fereydoon Abbasi, Seyed Jaber Safdari and Mohammed Mehdi Nejad-Nouri.

It said the three and others are involved in clandestine nuclear weapons-related research at three Iranian universities: Beheshti; Malek Ahstar and Imam Hossein.

Asked for verification, a senior diplomat of an IAEA member state said that a fact check run by his country's relevant agency showed the claims to be generally accurate. Another senior diplomat also said the information appeared to be fairly reliable.

Saundra Hummer

April 2nd, 2008, 11:45 PM

.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
JUSTICE INTERROGATION MEMO:

CONSTITUTION NOT IN PLAY

By
James Oliphant
Posted April 1, 2008 8:30 PM

The Justice Department late Tuesday released a declassified 2003 memorandum long sought by congressional Democrats and other administration critics that outlines the government's legal justification for harsh interrogation techniques used by the military against captured enemy combatants outside the United States.

(Here are part one and part two of the memo.)

The memo, written by John Yoo, then a key architect of legal policy in the wake of 9/11, dismisses several legal impediments to the use of extreme techniques.

Yoo was long a proponent of an aggressive approach in the war against terrorism and a believer in executive branch authority. But the memo was withdrawn as formal government policy less than a year after it was written.

In the March 14, 2003 memo, Yoo says the Constitution was not in play with regard to the interrogations because the Fifth Amendment (which provides for due process of law) and the Eighth Amendment (which prevents the government from employing cruel and usual punishment) does "not extend to alien enemy combatants held abroad.":

The memo goes on to explain that federal criminal statutes regarding assault and other crimes against the body don't apply to authorized military interrogations overseas and that statutes that do apply to the conduct of U.S. officials abroad pertaining to war crimes and torture establish a limited obligation on the part of interrogators to refrain from bodily harm.

It also defines the United States' obligations under the United Nations Convention Against Torture and other international treaties prohibiting torture to be confined to ensuring that interrogators do not apply "cruel and unusual punishment" as defined by American constitutional law, regardless of differing international standards.

And it restates the oft-repeated view held by administration officals that the Geneva Conventions, which governs the treatment of prisoners of war, does not apply to members of al Qaeda and the Taliban.

The memo also reflected Yoo's belief in that the executive branch had the inherent authority during wartime to obtain information by necessarily hazardous means:

"If a government defendant were to harm an enemy combatant during an interrogation in a manner that might arguably violate a criminal prohibition, he would be doing so in order to prevent further attacks on the United States by the al Qaeda terrorist network," Yoo wrote. "In that case, we believe that he could argue that the executive branch's constitutional authority to protect the nation from attack justified his actions."

It was during 2003, while the memo was operative, that guards and other military personnel committed the abuses of prisoners at Abu Ghraib in Baghdad, Iraq. The memo was withdrawn shortly thereafter, but before those abuses came to light.

The memo was prepared by Yoo for William Haynes, then the Pentagon's general counsel and another key player in the administration's legal strategy. It was declassified Monday by Haynes' acting successor, Daniel Dell' Orto. Yoo is now a law professor at the University of California at Berkeley.

Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which has repeatedly asked the Justice Department to release the memo and others like it, had this to say Tuesday evening:

It has been more than four months since I asked the White House – again – to declassify the secret Justice Department opinions on interrogation practices. Today’s declassification of one such memo is a small step forward, but in no way fulfills those requests. The administration continues to shield several memos even from members of Congress.

The memo they have declassified today reflects the expansive view of executive power that has been the hallmark of this administration. It is no wonder that this memo, like the now-infamous “Bybee memo”, could not withstand scrutiny and had to be withdrawn. Like the “Bybee memo”, this memo seeks to find ways to avoid legal restrictions and accountability on torture and threatens our country’s status as a beacon of human rights around the world.
http://www.buzzflash.com

http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/news/politics/blog/2008/04/justice_dept_releases_interrog.html
~ ~ ~
.

Saundra Hummer

April 2nd, 2008, 11:55 PM

.
.
Current times have taught us one thing, and it's this: having a clear and level head on ones shoulders isn't a prerequisite for being chief of state, regardless the country. Just start turning in a circle while looking all about; fools are everywhere. And to think, they're calling the shots. SRH
.
.
.

Saundra Hummer

April 3rd, 2008, 01:29 AM

.~~~~~~~
"The man who does not do his own thinking is a slave, and is a traitor to himself and his fellow men."

Robert G. Ingersoll
-
1833-1899
~~~
"Make men wise, and by that very operation you make them free. Civil liberty follows as a consequence of this; no usurped power can stand against the artillery of opinion."

William Godwin
-
1756-1836
~~~
"Perhaps the most obvious political effect of controlled news is the advantage it gives powerful people in getting their issues on the political agenda and defining those issues in ways likely to influence their resolution."

W. Lance Bennett
-
Author, professor
at
University of Washington
Source:
News: The Politics of Illusion, 1983 ~~~~~
.

Saundra Hummer

April 3rd, 2008, 02:07 AM

.
. . . . . . . .
Strangelove's Wet Dream
A Nuclear Free Fire Zone
By
Peter Chamberlin
"You've felt it your entire life, that there's something wrong with the world. You don't know what it is, but it's there, like a splinter in your mind, driving you mad.

You are a slave..., like everyone else you were born into bondage. Into a prison that you cannot taste or see or touch. A prison for your mind." – Morpheus - The Matrix
02/04/08 "ICH" --- -Never before have so few invested so much, for such long a time, to confuse so many people, about so many things. Never before have so many free people willingly betrayed their own country, their own religion, even their own family, in order to gamble for the opportunity to serve the interests of the powerful few, who are known to reward loyalty so extravagantly. This is typical behavior for a country that gambles enough to support its public school system with proceeds from lottery ticket sales.

Our government, with the help of the psychos and sycophants who worship at its feet, has created a police state, which the people allow to masquerade as a democracy. The various wars against this or that problem in America, but more specifically, the "war on drugs," have been used successfully by our overlords as an excuse to create a police state apparatus, and with it, new omnipresent agencies which made illegal searches and the invasion of privacy in America commonplace, long before the Patriot Act applied it to every facet of our lives.

The American government, in bed with the magnates of big business (the dictionary definition of "fascism"), have been at war with the American people for a very long time. Fat cat Republicans, who regularly bankroll both parties, have long plotted to replace democracy with a fascist dictatorship. SEE: THE PLOT TO SEIZE THE WHITE HOUSE:
http://mparent7777-1.blogspot.com/2008/03/plot-to-seize-white-house.html
Corporations have invested billions in foundations to study the people, in order to make more efficient war upon their minds.

America has the largest prison population in the world, not by accident, but by design. Many years ago it became apparent to the masters of our government that the American people would never submit to the involuntary slavery that awaited them. One day, when the people realized what was being done to them, circumstances would devolve into a military confrontation between Washington and the people. When that day comes, it would be better for government mercenary forces if most young men of fighting age were either overseas, or in jail.

Like the revolutionary movie "Matrix," every totalitarian state will eventually produce an underground resistance, which will find its own charismatic leaders, who can convince enough fellow slaves to rise-up into an irresistible critical mass. It will be the same way here in America, once Internet researchers finally manage to blow the lid off the 911 cover-up, or one of the other pressure cooker political cover-ups that are now being brought to a boil on the stove. When the people can finally get a clear glimpse of the totalitarian state rising around them, they will throw off all pretense of self-serving self-restraint.

The nature of the overthrow will depend upon the length of time required to alert the masses to the dangerous truth. If the people can be aroused to perform their patriotic duty to restrain their government from destroying the world, before it crosses the nuclear threshold, then peaceful change is still possible. The lunatic-in-chief and his supporters in both the political parties are prepared to use nuclear weapons against vast civilian populations, if We the People are unwilling to stop them. This new phase in the war that is allegedly being fought in America's defense will represent the final transmutation of that war into a totally new war, fought to prevent alleged nuclear weapons construction, by unleashing actual nuclear destruction. Strangelove's "wet dream," a nuclear free fire zone.

The disaster unfolding in Washington is like nothing the earth has ever seen. The highest form of government ever produced by man is putting the final stages of planning on freedom's demise, and yet the freest people in the history of the world believe that they are powerless to change anything, as they watch excitedly from the sidelines, screaming patriotic hymns to Clinton and McCain. The planners and their stooges ultimately believe in their own ability to carry forward the grand "success" stories of Iraq and Afghanistan into the rest of the Muslim world. The illusion that they can destroy select areas of the rest of the world without destroying us, helps to calm the delirious worry-free psyches of an immoral society, ready to kill the world to save their own sorry asses.

The war on terrorism uses our beliefs against us. It has been exposed as a holy war between Christianity and Islam, at least that is evidently what the Jewish neocon authors of the war want it to be. It is only a matter of time before it becomes obvious to everyone that the war of the new world order is a war against all religion. Religious belief and basic human morality must be allowed to serve as the basis for the fight against this war, because it is a war on life itself. The inherent evil of the whole operation must become the rallying point for the people to oppose the war. It is nothing less than an egotistical human attempt to overthrow the moral basis of international law, replacing it with the inhumane law of parasitic capitalist Darwinism. Kill everyone who refuses to be made into a slave!

Religious extremists are primary tools for manipulating religious populations into embracing false violent beliefs, in direct contradictions to the peaceful books they were taught from. In both politics and religion, it is the extremists who stand-out, commanding attention, if not respect. It is through the various targeted extremists that the false religious and political beliefs are introduced into the mainstream of ideas. It is within this flow of ideas that we must wade, to fight the false ideas of a war of civilizations and its counterpart a "holy war" between Christianity and Islam.

It is time that extremists in the cause of religious truth and freedom took the fight to our corporate government. We do not have to bow before a form of Zionist-sanctioned political correctness, which leaves no room for truth in an entertainment/indoctrination bureau which masquerades as a free press. Our "free press" has allowed itself to become the greatest threat to freedom our nation has ever faced. It is impossible for a free people to defend itself against an administration of deadly lies when the truth is so easily buried. The American people must become their own press, in order to get around the main obstacle to freedom.

The revolution must be a national rejection of a political system based on lies and cover-ups. Our national resistance movement must take the form of a fight for truth, and it must take place in the national arena. The truth we have learned from the rest of the world, through the alternative media, must become common knowledge. You would think that the way Americans love ironic, sarcastic humor, the majority would eagerly join us over here in the alternative media, to share our fascination with the hypocritical stage theater now being performed for our national amusement, which masquerades as politics and foreign policy.

The national debate has been strangled because of the news blackout over American/Israeli relations and American duplication of Israeli tactics in the war. Criticism of Israel or its tactics which are used by American forces will not be found anywhere in the "legitimate" American press. This news "dead zone," which is geographically centered on Israel, is certain to be where the planned conflict against Iran and everyone associated with Iran will break-out. We have to overcome this news blackout over the selected zone of conflict.

The Zionist censorship of American debate relies upon the accusation of "anti-Semitism" as their primary weapon, to silence fair-minded Americans, who would normally refuse to remain silent in the face of such massive cold-blooded murder on this scale. This instantly has the effect of elevating whatever position they are defending from debate to an (so far) unassailable position beyond debate from the "racist" rabble, otherwise known as "anti-Zionists." By openly making Israel's war America's war, the magical talisman of "anti-Semitism" insulates the Israeli roots of the war on Islam from criticism. Israel must be exposed as the progenitor of this war and the even bigger battle about to be let loose upon the innocent Muslims of the world.

The real racists are the Zionists. It is impossible to fight the racist basis of the war, without exposing this cold hard fact. Ideas of Jewish superiority based on Biblical accounts of ancient Israel are embraced by "Christian" leaders, who ignore the obvious ethnic cleansing and state policies of today's "Israel" that easily match the accepted international definition of "genocide." The ongoing "Shoah" (holocaust) being inflicted upon the Palestians is ignored by the loyal press, while the most cynical Zionists seek to derail true debate by mislabeling feeble homemade rockets as genocidal weapons. http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1206632348924&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull Once again, the Zionists turn truth on its head, with its genocidal weapons claim, while denying that the truly horrific thermobaric, phosphorus and uranium-based weapons it has used in Gaza and Lebanon were used in contravention of international law. http://uruknet.info/?p=m42553&hd=&size=1&l=e

If the indigenous people of Palestine are not made to seem inferior, as somewhat less human than the citizens of the "Jewish state," then it becomes much harder to rationalize a "Shoah" upon them, or to "broom them" from their land, like an infestation of vermin. The war against Islam is based on this false position of superiority over all the Muslim people, just as it has been in previous American wars against other non-white populations, who had land or lives available for the taking. The would-be tyrants of the world have always looked at the American genocide of Native Americans as the ultimate example to follow.

For those of you still on the sidelines, who have never been baptized by the fires of vitriol and accusations of "anti-Semitism" that always come from criticizing our government for fighting catastrophic wars to enshrine Israel's security above our own, I invite you to wade into the political waters and be baptized in organized hatred, for daring to speak-out. For I guarantee that the first comments you will hear for breaking the taboo and telling the truth will be very abusive in a special mad dog sort of way. The Jewish extremists (who call themselves Zionists) have manipulated Christians, (who also call themselves Zionists) into fighting a genocidal war against Muslims (whom the Zionists call Islamists), so that the Jewish extremists in Israel could safely, openly, remove all Muslims from "Greater Israel," the land coveted by "the chosen people."

It is wrong to allow a new holocaust of one people to fulfill the territorial ambitions of the descendents of the survivors of the last holocaust. This is a controversial article in how it looks at some of what it's relating. SRH
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article19669.htm. . . . . .

Saundra Hummer

April 3rd, 2008, 05:18 PM

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Information Clearing House
Newsletter
News You Won't Find On CNN
03/04/08
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Correcting an error:

This article ( http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article19640.htm ) was originally published on 27/ 03/ 2007 by RIA Novosti. I had intended to post it with an "In Case You Missed It " heading. My purpose on doing so was to make the reader aware of a continuous buildup of U.S. military preparations for both an air and ground operation against Iran over the last year. Due to sloppy work on my part I neglected to provided the heading and incorrectly dated the article 29/03/08, thereby misleading ICH readers into thinking this was a recent development. I apologize for misinforming readers and am very grateful to those who brought this error to my attention.

Tom Feeley - Editor - Information Clearing House. 03/04/08
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article19640.htm
~~~
.

Saundra Hummer

April 3rd, 2008, 05:28 PM

.
~~~~~~~
"A great wave of oppressive tyranny isn't going to strike, but rather a slow seepage of oppressive laws and regulations from within will sink the American dream of liberty."

George Baumler
~~~
"The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home."

James Madison
US fourth president
1751-1836
~~~
"This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when he first appears he is a protector."

Plato
Ancient Greek philosopher
~
428/427-348/347 B.C.
~~~
"The welfare of the people in particular has always been the alibi of tyrants, and it provides the further advantage of giving the servants of tyranny a good conscience."

Albert Camus
French novelist,
essayist, & playwright.
1957 Nobel Prize for Literature
1913-1960

~~~~~
.

Saundra Hummer

April 3rd, 2008, 05:48 PM

.
* * * * * * *
General William Odom Tells Senate

Rapid Withdrawal Is Only Solution
TESTIMONY BEFORE THE SENATE FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMITTEE ON IRAQ

By
William E. Odom
LT General, USA, Ret.
2 April 2008

Good morning Mr. Chairman and members of the committee. It is an honor to appear before you again. The last occasion was in January 2007, when the topic was the troop surge. Today you are asking if it has worked. Last year I rejected the claim that it was a new strategy. Rather, I said, it is a new tactic used to achieve the same old strategic aim, political stability. And I foresaw no serious prospects for success.

I see no reason to change my judgment now. The surge is prolonging instability, not creating the conditions for unity as the president claims.

Last year, General Petraeus wisely declined to promise a military solution to this political problem, saying that he could lower the level of violence, allowing a limited time for the Iraqi leaders to strike a political deal. Violence has been temporarily reduced but today there is credible evidence that the political situation is far more fragmented. And currently we see violence surge in Baghdad and Basra. In fact, it has also remained sporadic and significant inseveral other parts of Iraq over the past year, notwithstanding the notable drop in Baghdad and Anbar Province.

More disturbing, Prime Minister Maliki has initiated military action and then dragged in US forces to help his own troops destroy his Shiite competitors. This is a political setback, not a political solution. Such is the result of the surge tactic.

No less disturbing has been the steady violence in the Mosul area, and the tensions in Kirkuk between Kurds, Arabs, and Turkomen. A showdown over control of the oil fields there surely awaits us. And the idea that some kind of a federal solution can cut this Gordian knot strikes me as a wild fantasy, wholly out of touch with Kurdish realities.

Also disturbing is Turkey’s military incursion to destroy Kurdish PKK groups in the border region. That confronted the US government with a choice: either to support its NATO ally, or to make good on its commitment to Kurdish leaders to insure their security. It chose the former, and that makes it clear to the Kurds that the United States will sacrifice their security to its larger interests in Turkey.

Turning to the apparent success in Anbar province and a few other Sunni areas, this is not the positive situation it is purported to be. Certainly violence has declined as local Sunni shieks have begun to cooperate with US forces. But the surge tactic cannot be given full credit. The decline started earlier on Sunni initiative. What are their motives? First, anger at al Qaeda operatives and second, their financial plight.

Their break with al Qaeda should give us little comfort. The Sunnis welcomed anyone who would help them kill Americans, including al Qaeda. The concern we hear the president and his aides express about a residual base left for al Qaeda if we withdraw is utter nonsense. The Sunnis will soon destroy al Qaeda if we leave Iraq. The Kurds do not allow them in their region, and the Shiites, like the Iranians, detest al Qaeda. To understand why, one need only take note of the al Qaeda public diplomacy campaign over the past year or so on internet blogs. They implore the United States to bomb and invade Iran and destroy this apostate Shiite regime. As an aside, it gives me pause to learn that our vice president and some members of the Senate are aligned with al Qaeda on spreading the war to Iran.

Let me emphasize that our new Sunni friends insist on being paid for their loyalty. I have heard, for example, a rough estimate that the cost in one area of about 100 square kilometers is $250,000 per day. And periodically they threaten to defect unless their fees are increased. You might want to find out the total costs for these deals forecasted for the next several years, because they are not small and they do not promise to end. Remember, we do not own these people. We merely rent them. And they can break the lease at any moment. At the same time, this deal protects them to some degree from the government’s troops and police, hardly a sign of political reconciliation.

Now let us consider the implications of the proliferating deals with the Sunni strongmen. They are far from unified among themselves. Some remain with al Qaeda. Many who break and join our forces are beholden to no one. Thus the decline in violence reflects a dispersion of power to dozens of local strong men who distrust the government and occasionally fight among themselves. Thus the basic military situation is far worse because of the proliferation of armed groups under local military chiefs who follow a proliferating number of political bosses.

This can hardly be called greater military stability, much less progress toward political consolidation, and to call it fragility that needs more time to become success is to ignore its implications. At the same time, Prime Minister Maliki’s military actions in Basra and Baghdad, indicate even wider political and military fragmentation. We are witnessing is more accurately described as the road to the Balkanization of Iraq, that is, political fragmentation. We are being asked by the president to believe that this shift of so much power and finance to so many local chieftains is the road to political centralization. He describes the process as building the state from the bottom up.

I challenge you to press the administration’s witnesses this week to explain this absurdity. Ask them to name a single historical case where power has been aggregated successfully from local strong men to a central government except through bloody violence leading to a single winner, most often a dictator. That is the history of
feudal Europe’s transformation to the age of absolute monarchy. It is the story of the American colonization of the west and our Civil War. It took England 800 years to subdue clan rule on what is now the English-Scottish border. And it is the source of violence in Bosnia and Kosovo.

How can our leaders celebrate this diffusion of power as effective state building? More accurately described, it has placed the United States astride several civil wars. And it allows all sides to consolidate, rearm, and refill their financial coffers at the US expense.

To sum up, we face a deteriorating political situation with an over extended army. When the administration’s witnesses appear before you, you should make them clarify how long the army and marines can sustain this band-aid strategy.

The only sensible strategy is to withdraw rapidly but in good order. Only that step can break the paralysis now gripping US strategy in the region. The next step is to choose a new aim, regional stability, not a meaningless victory in Iraq. And progress toward that goal requires revising our policy toward Iran. If the president merely renounced his threat of regime change by force, that could prompt Iran to lessen its support to Taliban groups in Afghanistan. Iran detests the Taliban and supports them only because they will kill more Americans in Afghanistan as retaliation in event of a US attack on Iran. Iran’s policy toward Iraq would also have to change radically as we withdraw. It cannot want instability there. Iraqi Shiites are Arabs, and they know that Persians look down on them. Cooperation between them has its limits.

No quick reconciliation between the US and Iran is likely, but US steps to make Iran feel more secure make it far more conceivable than a policy calculated to increase its insecurity. The president’s policy has reinforced Iran’s determination to acquire nuclear weapons, the very thing he purports to be trying to prevent.

Withdrawal from Iraq does not mean withdrawal from the region. It must include a realignment and reassertion of US forces and diplomacy that give us a better chance to achieve our aim.

A number of reasons are given for not withdrawing soon and completely. I have refuted them repeatedly before but they have more lives than a cat. Let try again me explain why they don’t make
sense.

First, it is insisted that we must leave behind military training element with no combat forces to secure them. This makes no sense at all. The idea that US military trainers left alone in Iraq can be safe and effective is flatly rejected by several NCOs and junior officers I have heard describe their personal experiences. Moreover, training foreign forces before they have a consolidated political authority to command their loyalty is a windmill tilt. Finally, Iraq is not short on military skills.

Second, it is insisted that chaos will follow our withdrawal. We heard that argument as the “domino theory” in Vietnam. Even so, the path to political stability will be bloody regardless of whether we withdraw or not. The idea that the United States has a moral responsibility to prevent this ignores that reality. We are certainly to blame for it, but we do not have the physical means to prevent it. American leaders who insist that it is in our power to do so are misleading both the public and themselves if they believe it. The real moral question is whether to risk the lives of more Americans. Unlike preventing chaos, we have the physical means to stop sending more troops where many will be killed or wounded. That is the moral responsibility to our country which no American leaders seems willing to assume.

Third, nay sayers insist that our withdrawal will create regional instability. This confuses cause with effect. Our forces in Iraq and our threat to change Iran’s regime are making the region unstable. Those who link instability with a US withdrawal have it exactly backwards. Our ostrich strategy of keeping our heads buried in the sands of Iraq has done nothing but advance our enemies’ interest.

I implore you to reject these fallacious excuses for prolonging the commitment of US forces to war in Iraq.

Thanks for this opportunity to testify today.

Click on the link below to gain access to this article and the comments by viewers, and you can add your own if the need hits you. SRH

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info * * * * *

Saundra Hummer

April 3rd, 2008, 06:00 PM

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^^^^^^^
Mukasey Hints US Had Attack Warning Before 9/11
By David Edwards and Muriel Kane
02/04/08 "Raw Story" -- - When Attorney General Mukasey delivered a speech last week demanding that Congress grant the president warrantless eavesdropping powers and telecom immunity, the question and answer session afterwards included one extraordinary but little-noticed claim.

Mukasey argued that officials "shouldn't need a warrant when somebody with a phone in Iraq picks up a phone and calls somebody in the United States because that's the call that we may really want to know about. And before 9/11, that's the call that we didn't know about. We knew that there has been a call from someplace that was known to be a safe house in Afghanistan and we knew that it came to the United States. We didn't know precisely where it went."

Blogger Glenn Greenwald picked up on Mukasey's statement, suggesting, "If what Muskasey said this week is true -- and that's a big 'if' -- his revelation about this Afghan call that the administration knew about but didn't intercept really amounts to one of the most potent indictments yet about the Bush administration's failure to detect the plot in action. Contrary to his false claims, FISA -- for multiple reasons -- did not prevent eavesdropping on that call."

Keith Olbermann has now featured the story on MSNBC's Countdown. "What?" Olbermann asked incredulously after quoting Mukasey. "The government knew about some phone call from a safe house in Afghanistan into the U.S. about 9/11? Before 9/11? ... You didn't do anything about it?"

"Either the attorney general just admitted that the government for which he works is guilty of malfeasant complicity in the 9/11 attacks," Olbermann commented, "or he's lying."

"I'm betting on lying," concluded Olbermann. "If not, somebody in Congress better put that man under oath right quick."

After September 11, 2001, it was revealed that the CIA and FBI had intercepted a variety of messages including phrases such as "There is a big thing coming," "They're going to pay the price" and "We're ready to go." None of these messages gave specific details and none reached intelligence analysts until after the destruction of the World Trade Center.

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, "Mukasey did not specify the call to which he referred. He also did not explain why the government, if it knew of telephone calls from suspected foreign terrorists, hadn't sought a wiretapping warrant from a court established by Congress to authorize terrorist surveillance, or hadn't monitored all such calls without a warrant for 72 hours as allowed by law. The Justice Department did not respond to a request for more information."

This video is from MSNBC's Countdown with Keith Olbermann, broadcast March 31, 2008.

Go on-site to view video. Click on the following Link/URL:
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Saundra Hummer

April 3rd, 2008, 06:21 PM

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<<<<<o>>>>>
War Is A Racket
US Lawmakers Have As Much As $196 Million Invested In "Defense" Companies

By
The Associated Press

03/04/08 "AP" -- -- WASHINGTON: Members of the U.S.Congress have as much as $196 million (126.2 million) collectively invested in companies doing business with the Defense Department, earning millions since the start of the Iraq war, according to a new study by a nonpartisan research group.

The review of lawmakers' 2006 financial disclosure statements, by the Washington-based Center for Responsive Politics, suggests that members' holdings could pose a conflict of interest as they decide the fate of Iraq war spending. Several members who earned the most from defense contractors have plum committee or leadership assignments, including Democratic Sen. John Kerry, independent Sen. Joseph Lieberman and House Republican Whip Roy Blunt.

The study found that more Republicans than Democrats hold stock in defense companies, but that the Democrats who are invested had significantly more money at stake. In 2006, for example, Democrats held at least $3.7 million (€2.3 million) in military-related investments, compared to Republican investments of $577,500 (€372,000).

Overall, 151 members hold investments worth $78.7 million (€50.6 million) to $195.5 million (€125.9 million) in companies that receive defense contracts that are worth at least $5 million (€3.2 million). These investments earned them anywhere between $15.8 million (€10.1 million) and $62 million (€39.9 million) between 2004 and 2006, the center concludes.

It is unclear how many members still hold these investments and exactly how much money has been made. Disclosure reports for 2007 are not due until this May. Also, members are required to report only a general range of their holdings.

According to the report, presidential hopefuls Barack Obama and John McCain did not report any defense-related holdings on their filings; Hillary Rodham Clinton did note holdings in such companies as Honeywell, Boeing and Raytheon, but sold the stock in May 2007. All three are members of the Senate.

Not all the companies invested in by lawmakers are typical defense contractors. Corporations such as PepsiCo, IBM, Microsoft and Johnson & Johnson have at one point received defense-related contracts, the report notes.

"So common are these companies, both as personal investments and as defense contractors, it would appear difficult to build a diverse blue-chip stock portfolio without at least some of them," wrote the center's Lindsay Renick Mayer.

Still, earning dividends from companies tied to the military "could be problematic" for members that oversee defense policy and budgeting, Mayer adds.

Kerry, a Democrat, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, is identified as earning the most at least $2.6 million between 2004 and 2006 from investments worth up to $38.2 million (€24.6 million).

Spokesman David Wade said Kerry, who staunchly opposes the war in Iraq, is one of many beneficiaries of family trusts which he doesn't control. Wade also noted that Kerry does not sit on the Appropriations Committee, which has direct control of the defense budget.

"He has a 24-year Senate record of working and voting in the best interests of our men and women in the military, not of any defense contractors," Wade said.

Lieberman, an independent and chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee and a member of the Armed Services Committee, held a considerably smaller share at $51,000 (€32,850).

A spokesman for Blunt, a senior member of House Republican, leadership who held at least $15,000 (€9,660) in Lockheed Martin stock in 2006, said the insinuation that lawmakers' votes might be affected by their portfolios is "offensive."

"I don't pretend to speak for other offices, but I am fairly certain that no member would consider their personal finances when voting on issues as important as sending our men and women in uniform into harms way," said Nick Simpson.

Lieberman and Blunt support continued operations in Iraq.
Go on-site to see this and other articles concerning the news of the day, as well as archives and op-eds. Just click below.
Now it is making much more sense to me. This is not right. War has become even dirter in my eyes. We know of how the war machine, the arms dealers, and the corporate world which derive huge profits during wartime have always tried to, and have bought politicians, and now we have to wonder even more today as to why they vote for war as they do. We all know how the war complex, these corporations who build the tools of war, have donated and funded politicians, and that was bad enough. Now this revelation. When did our honesty fly off to? It would be nice to realize that there are those out there in power who care more about this country than their own selves, and their bank accounts. There are those who don't mind making money off of war, and hopefully just because they are hauling in the bucks, doesn't mean they won't be doing the right thing. I hope that they won't be turning to war to stuff their pockets. SRH

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info
<<<o>>> .

Saundra Hummer

April 4th, 2008, 06:26 PM

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~~~~~~~~~
And an orator said,
"Speak to us of Freedom."

And he answered:

At the city gate and by your fireside I have seen you prostrate yourself and worship your own freedom,

Even as slaves humble themselves before a tyrant and praise him though he slays them.

Ay, in the grove of the temple and in the shadow of the citadel I have seen the freest among you wear their freedom as a yoke and a handcuff.

And my heart bled within me; for you can only be free when even the desire of seeking freedom becomes a harness to you, and when you cease to speak of freedom as a goal and a fulfillment.

The Prophet
(Freedom) by Kahlil Gibran
~~~
Provided by:

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info

&
Continued here:

http://leb.net/~mira/works/prophet/prophet14.html ~~~~~~~ .

Saundra Hummer

April 4th, 2008, 06:44 PM

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:: :: :: :: ::The Terrorists Are In Fact Peacemakers
Iran is sufficiently powerful to broker a ceasefire deal

By Pepe Escobar
04/04/03 -- Real News

Transcript:

VOICE OF ZAA NKWETA, PRESENTER: After a week of heavy clashes, fighting in Basra has calmed down, Muqtada al-Sadr has pulled his Mahdi Army fighters off the streets, and Nouri al-Maliki declared the military operation to clear Basra of Shiite militia violence a success. But who won the battle of Basra? To answer this question, we go to Real News analyst Pepe Escobar.

PEPE ESCOBAR, THE REAL NEWS ANALYST: George W. Bush said that the battle of Basra was a defining moment in Iraq. Well, defining it was, but maybe not the way he intended. There was a ceasefire. Do you know the man who brokered a ceasefire? His name is Brigadier General Qassem Suleimani. He is the head of the Quds Force of the Iranian Republican Guard Corps. As everybody knows, the Iranian Government Guard Corps was declared as a terrorist organization by the US last year. So this man in Qom, religious capital of Iran, brokered a ceasefire between Muqtada al-Sadr's envoys who came from Iraq and Hadi al-Amri, which is the number two of the Supreme Islamic Council of Iraq. He is the head of the Badr Organization. He's part of the Baghdad government. So Muqtada's people come from Baghdad. Al-Hakim's people, Badr Organization, Supreme Islamic Council come from Baghdad. They go to Iran, in Qom. And the head of the Quds Force brokers a ceasefire, and the battle of Basra ends. So who are the winners and who are the losers? Okay. The winners are Iran and Muqtada al-Sadr; the losers are al-Maliki government in Baghdad and George W. "defining moment" Bush. This doesn't mean that Muqtada al-Sadr is in the pockets of Iran. What it means is Iran is sufficiently powerful to get the two most important religious parties in Iraq, the Sadrists and al-Hakim's Supreme Islamic Council, to Iran to broker a ceasefire organized by Iran. This means that the terrorists aren't exactly terrorists—the terrorists are in fact peacemakers.

Based in Sao Paulo, Brazil, Pepe Escobar writes The Roving Eye for Asia Times Online. He has reported from Iraq, Iran, Central Asia, US and China. He is the author of the recently published Red Zone Blues. Pepe is a regular analyst for The Real News Network.

McClatchy Washington Bureau | 03/31/2008 | Iranian who brokered Iraqi peace is on U.S. terrorist watch list Go on-site to view video

Babylon & Beyond : Los Angeles Times : IRAQ: Sadr's statement calling for end to violence

McClatchy Washington Bureau | Iranian general played key role in Iraq cease-fire
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info :: :: :: .

Saundra Hummer

April 4th, 2008, 06:54 PM

. . . . . . . . .
Was Killing Iraqi Children Worth It?
By
Jacob G. Hornberger

04/04/08 "fff" --- -A snapshot of the opening scene in the U.S. invasion of Iraq provides an excellent insight into the immorality and horror of the entire operation, from start to whenever it finally finishes.

According to an article in yesterday's New York Times, at the outset of the invasion the U.S. military dropped bombs on a palatial compound in which Saddam Hussein was hiding. The article states:

"But instead of killing the Iraqi dictator, they had killed Mr. Kharbit's older brother, Malik al-Kharbit - the very man who had led the family's negotiations with the C.I.A. to topple Mr. Hussein. The bombings also killed 21 other people, including children, and the fury it aroused has been widely believed to have helped kick-start the insurgency in western Iraq."

Now, that episode has at least two important lessons.

First, prior to the invasion the popular mantra among U.S. officials and many private Americans was the need to "get Saddam." But as we often pointed out here at The Future of Freedom Foundation, it was never going to be just a question of "getting Saddam." Instead, it was going to be a question of how many Iraqi people, including children, U.S. forces would have to kill before they "got Saddam."

The article doesn't state whether the U.S. military had actual knowledge that there were innocent people, including children, in the compound that it bombed. But it is a virtual certainty that they did have such knowledge. After all, if their intelligence was sufficiently good to know that Saddam was hiding in the compound, it had to be sufficiently good to know that there were other people living in the compound, including children.

Thus, when the U.S. military dropped those bombs, it had to be with the full knowledge that they would be killing innocent people in the process, including the children. And even if they didn't "know" that there were innocent people in the compound at the time they dropped the bombs, they knew that there were dropping the bombs in reckless disregard of whether there were innocent people there or not.

The fact is that U.S. officials didn't care whether there were innocents, including children, in that compound. Those children and their parents were obviously considered a small price to pay if Saddam Hussein had been killed at the outset of the war.

Of course, this attitude would match the attitude taken by U.S. officials throughout the period of the brutal sanctions that were enforced from 1991 to 2003. As tens of thousands of Iraqi children were dying year after year from the sanctions, the U.S. attitude was that those deaths were a small price to pay for ridding Iraq of Saddam Hussein. That's why UN Ambassador Madeleine Albright, upon being asked whether the deaths of half-a-million Iraqi from the sanctions were worth it, she replied that yes - they were "worth it." She was expressing the sentiment of the U.S. government, a sentiment that manifested itself again in the bombing of the compound in which those Iraqi children and their families were killed.

Second, the killing of those children and their families is just one example of how U.S. foreign policy has engendered anger and hatred for the United States, which produces the threat of terrorist retaliation, which brings about the "war on terrorism," which results in more interventions, more massive military spending, and ever-increasing loss of liberty at home.

Let me repeat what the Times article said: "The bombings also killed 21 other people, including children, and the fury it aroused has been widely believed to have helped kick-start the insurgency in western Iraq."

Now, ask yourself: Why has the U.S. government been occupying Iraq for the past 5 years? Didn't they already "get" Saddam? Hasn't he already been executed?

The answer is that U.S. officials, having "gotten" Saddam must now "get" the "bad guys" in Iraq. And who are the "bad guys?" They're the Iraqis who are angry over the killing of Iraqis, including women and children, who had to be killed in the process of "getting Saddam."

As they continue to bomb all these "bad guys," they continue to kill more innocents, including more Iraqi children and their families, which then incites more fury, which then causes more "bad guys" to join the insurgency. Those additional "bad guys" are then used as the excuse to continue the occupation of Iraq, an occupation that for obvious reasons will go on indefinitely.

To state what I consider self-evident moral truths, it was morally wrong and a grave violation of God's laws to:
(1) attack a country whose government and citizenry had never attacked the United States;

(2) kill Iraqis, including children and their families, in order to achieve regime change in Iraq; and

(3) kill Iraqis, including children and their families, in order to spread "democracy" to Iraq.

One can only wonder whether the American people, in crises of conscience, will ever confront such issues.

Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation. Send him email
© 2001-2007 The Future of Freedom Foundation http://www.informationclearinghouse.info. . . . . . . . . . . .

Saundra Hummer

April 5th, 2008, 01:45 PM

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$ $ $ $ $ $ $
Beltway Bacchanal: Congress Lives High
on the
Contributor's Dime
By
Ken Silverstein
Harper's Magazine
March 2008 Issue

Try to list the stakes at play in the congressional elections this fall, and one might settle on health care, taxes, immigration, Iraq. Seldom considered, though, is an issue of more direct importance to the members of Congress themselves: Which party will get to live more lushly in the nation's capital, where those who control the levers of legislation also command the most and best perks? Washington by and large is a restrained, workaday sort of town, its residents not known for high living; but a significant exception can always be found among the denizens of Capitol Hill, and especially among the legislators who command a majority there. For this convivial crew and its hangers-on, the most pressing matter to be decided on Election Day is, as ever, whether they can hold on to that majority and all its accompanying boons.

The most lavish benefit of winning a congressional campaign is, ironically enough, the right to keep on campaigning - and therefore to keep raising and spending donor money. Uninformed citizens may still think of "campaigns" as discrete events, waged mostly in home districts and just before election time. In fact, political fund-raising is now a nonstop activity, with candidates chasing dollars far outside the borders of their home states and districts. And although the Federal Election Commission (FEC) is supposed to monitor the use of this money, it has interpreted the relevant rules in a highly flexible fashion. Politicians have two primary vehicles with which to raise and spend money, the first being their campaign treasuries, which according to ethics rules must be kept "separate from [the member's] personal funds" and can be used only for "bona fide campaign or political purposes." But in practice the FEC has permitted virtually any expenditure, from a night on the town to a resort stay with big contributors, to be drawn from these funds. (Last October, in a rare act of censure, the FEC cited New York Demo-cratic Congressman Gregory Meeks for using $6,230 to pay for a personal trainer, whose services initially had been justified by his office as necessary to alleviate stress brought on by "the candidate's duties.") Spending from the second vehicle - the Leadership PAC - is less restrictive still, since it is not even subject to the nominal "personal use" prohibition that applies to campaign treasuries. Furthermore, individual contribution limits to Leadership PACs are $5,000 per year, versus $2,300 per election for political campaigns. Not surprisingly, most senators and more than a third of House members now run Leadership PACs, which were quite rare as recently as a decade ago. During the 2006 election cycle, fund-raising by Leadership PACs exceeded $160 million.

Most of the political spending by members of Congress is no doubt legitimate, at least under existing rules, because it is in fact connected (if often tenuously) to winning reelection. But as the "campaign" has lost all temporal and spatial boundaries, and the FEC has largely turned a blind eye, misuse of donor money has become positively shameless. Those who hold safe seats spend just as freely as those in highly competitive districts, if not more so, and these allegedly campaign-related expenditures continue year-round. According to the Center for Responsive Politics (which helpfully provided much of the data for this article), at least eight House members spent more than $10,000 in campaign funds on food, travel, and fund-raising in the eight weeks between Election Day 2006 and New Year's Eve - not exactly a peak campaigning period. These included Democrat John Murtha and Republican Don Young, whose respective margins of victory were 22 and 17 percent. Three of the other big spenders, interestingly enough, were Republicans who lost their seats in the 2006 midterm vote; in their dwindling days of public service, they apparently decided to treat themselves well on the way out.

Inside Washington itself, such casual appropriation of political contributions bankrolls much of the city's social life. Some of the spending on food and drink is related to fund-raising events, but a notable portion is for private restaurant meals - sometimes classified in disclosure forms under the category of "political meetings." These "meetings" are held at a circuit of nightspots that include the two political parties' clubs - the semiprivate National Democratic Club and, for Republicans, the strictly cloistered Capitol Hill Club - and otherwise range from such old standbys as Morton's (where, in the 1980s, the corrupt House boss Dan Rostenkowski held court so frequently that a bronze plaque near the bar read "Rosty's Rotunda") to chic eateries like Bistro Bis and the Sonoma Wine Bar. Most Americans could not afford to eat at any of these restaurants. The price of an appetizer alone - like the $15.95 lobster mac-and-cheese at the Oceanaire or the $18 crabmeat, lobster, and shrimp cocktail at the Capitol Hill Club (why settle for one when you can have all three?) - tends to be daunting. The à la carte entrées begin at the low end with items like the stuffed rabbit loin at Bistro Bis ($29.50), move up to the signature porterhouse at the Capital Grille ($41) or the double-cut prime rib at Morton's ($43), and for the truly memorable occasion climb to $20 per ounce (5-ounce minimum) for the Kobe strip steak at Charlie Palmer's. With drinks, dessert, and a tip, a meal for two can easily run into the hundreds of dollars.

In the land of the permanent campaign, though, these are the everyday haunts of our elected leaders. Between 2005 and late 2007, at just ten of Washington's priciest restaurants, House members collectively spent $5.4 million of their campaign money. (Note that this does not even include senators, who typically spend even more than their colleagues in the lower chamber; but because senators are not required to file disclosure forms electronically, categorizing their expenses with any specificity is a nearly impossible task.)

Last year, in the aftermath of scandals involving Jack Abramoff and Randy "Duke" Cunningham, among others, Congress passed an ethics bill that barred lobbyists from directly buying members food and drinks, a step that was hailed as imposing a barrier between lawmakers and special interests. But political donations continue to underwrite legislators' nightly entertainment in Washington - helping to maintain the hermetic Beltway bubble in which lawmakers fraternize with precisely those people from whom ethics laws, and the demands of good governance, aim to separate them.
------------------
To see just how well one can live while in the public employ, stand near the Capitol South metro station around 6:30 p.m. on those weeknights when Congress is in session. One can witness a steady stream of members, staffers, and their acquaintances, in groups of twos, threes, and fours, fanning out across the city. The stream soon divides, with some branches flowing toward such nearby destinations as the Capitol Hill Club or the cavernous Charlie Palmer steakhouse. Among the other popular options are the Caucus Room, whose owners include Democratic lobbyist Tommy Boggs and former Republican National Committee chairman and current Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour; and Sam & Harry's, a beef shrine downtown.

During the period of G.O.P. rule, the Capital Grille, which, at Pennsylvania Avenue and Sixth Street, sits in the reflected glow of the Capitol dome, was perhaps the most popular hangout in town for Republican insiders. The restaurant opened here in 1994, the year that Newt Gingrich led the G.O.P. takeover of Congress, and on its opening night handed out $100,000 in free food and drink to legislators. "It might as well be part of the Capitol complex," The Hill remarked in 2003, "like the Russell Senate Office Building or the Rayburn House Office Building, since you're likely to run into almost as many members of Congress and staffers at the Capital Grille as you do on Capitol Hill." Business has reportedly dropped off now that Democrats are back in charge, but it remains one of the best spots in town to hobnob with members of Congress and their entourages.

When I visited the Capital Grille one night last fall, three SUVs were idling out front for lawmakers who were finishing up inside. As I walked toward the revolving front door, Representative Charles Rangel (D., N.Y.), head of the House Ways and Means Committee, was walking out. A man just in front of me - likely a lobbyist, given his power suit, leather briefcase, and Bluetooth earpiece - immediately accosted Rangel, furiously shaking his hand, and the two struck up a short but friendly conversation. After Rangel stepped into his waiting car (license plate nyrep15), the man turned to me, eyes afire, and exclaimed, "He's da man!"

Inside, just past a window display of aged beef hanging like holy relics, the first thing one sees is a wall of wine lockers, their owners' names engraved on brass plaques. Defense contractor Brent Wilkes, who was convicted of bribing former Representative Duke Cunningham, used to have a locker here, as did businessman Mitchell Wade, who pleaded guilty to similar charges. Former lobbyists whose names grace lockers include Jeffrey Shockey, a longtime aide to Republican Congressman Jerry Lewis, as well as the late Ann Eppard, who pleaded guilty in 1999 to taking payoffs while working for former Pennsylvania Republican Bud Shuster, a longtime powerhouse on the House Transportation Committee. (Her locker is kept in memoriam.)

In the bar just beyond, an assortment of politicos can inevitably be found mingling about. On one night in October, I saw Terry Nelson, who until the summer had served as John McCain's presidential-campaign manager, strolling through toward the dining room; William Pickle, the recently retired Senate sergeant at arms, moving from stool to stool, chatting with acquaintances; and a dapper Arthur Wu, the Republican staff director of the House Veterans' Affairs oversight and investigations subcommittee, who stood at center stage with a big smile and glass in hand. Senator Norm Coleman (R., Minn.), who had dropped by after a fund-raiser held in his honor earlier in the evening at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce town house, sipped from a drink while chatting with Matthew Brooks, head of the Republican Jewish Coalition.

On another night, Senator Ben Nelson (D., Neb.) came into the bar from the dining room and struck up a conversation with two men while several suitors lined up to wait their turn. Also on hand was Edwina Rogers, a lobbyist and the wife of Republican power broker Ed Rogers, who along with a female friend was enjoying a night on the town whose itinerary still included a stop at Georgetown's Cafe Milano. Rogers, whose freewheeling style seemed hard to square with her role as a conservative strategist and former Bush White House aide at the National Economic Council, was immersed in conversation with someone whom she identified to me, moments later, as an important committee staffer. The topic wasn't hard to discern.

"You need to make Rick an offer of at least three times what he's making now," the man told Rogers.

"Let's get together Thursday at Charlie Palmer's," Rogers replied with a laugh. "And bring Rick."

I shared drinks with several lobbyists who meet regularly at the Grille. "They decided to criminalize everything," one said, referring to the new ban on lobbyists buying meals for lawmakers. "My reaction is, 'Have a good life.' It's not going to hurt me, I already know people, but it's going to make it hard for those who are new [at lobbying] and are trying to build personal relationships."

One of our tablemates was similarly untroubled. "So far, it's saved me a lot of money," he said. "But I'm not sure what's going to happen in the long run. When they lowered the speed limit to 55, everyone paid attention for six months. Then they started driving 70 again."
--------------
As originally envisioned by the founders of the American republic, serving in Congress was to be strictly a part-time job. Early officeholders, typically farmers and businessmen, came to Washington for only a few weeks to deal with national affairs and then returned home. Too much time in the capital, it was thought, would diminish the bond between representatives and their constituents. "As it is essential to liberty that the government in general should have a common interest with the people, so it is particularly essential that [Congress] should have an immediate dependence on, and an intimate sympathy with, the people," Federalist #52 opined.

It is perhaps too easy to romanticize this era of "citizen legislators," who of course generally came from, and represented the interests of, the economic elite. And yet holding office was then genuinely seen as a public service rather than a career, let alone a path to riches. Today's lawmakers complain bitterly about the rigors of the job, including the incessant fund-raising, but they overwhelmingly opt to seek term after term and in recent decades have won reelection at a rate of roughly 90 percent, in part because both parties have gerrymandered congressional districts so that few incumbents are dislodged.

Why do they so dearly want to stay? The pay is very good but not outlandish: at $169,300 per year, a member of Congress earns less than what he or she could likely command in the private sector.1 More generous, arguably, is the retirement plan, which (for members serving at least five years) is guaranteed for life, at a payout that the National Taxpayers Union estimates to be at least twice what a similarly salaried corporate executive would get upon retirement. Another factor, no doubt, is the entourage that tends to members' needs. As recently as World War II, lawmakers got by with a minimal staff, but today each congressman typically has a score of young, eager aides who do everything from managing his schedule to driving him around town. Only the nation's most elite CEOs can afford to have so many talented minions at their beck and call around the clock.

But among the greatest perks of congressional service today is the campaign dole, which provides legislators with potentially limitless funds to lavish on associates, or on themselves. One cannot flip through disclosure reports of the most powerful members of Congress without finding vast sums being dispensed for purposes that hardly seem essential to their reelection. Over a recent four-year period, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has used more than $125,000 in political funds to pay for stays at such Las Vegas hotels as the MGM Grand, the Wynn resort, Caesars Palace, and Mandalay Bay. His House counterpart, Congressman Steny Hoyer of Maryland, has displayed similarly pricey tastes: during the 2006 election cycle alone, his Leadership PAC doled out $66,146 on hotels, including the InterContinental Hotel in Chicago, the Ritz-Carlton in Phoenix, the Breakers in Palm Beach, and the W in Seattle. In the fall of 2005, Virginia Congressman Eric Cantor, now the G.O.P. chief deputy whip, charged his political funds more than $42,000 for stays at the Beverly Hills Hotel and Bungalows, as well as $1,224 for a tour of the Warner Bros. studios.

Such eye-opening use of donor money is by no means confined to party leaders. Consider the case of Representative James McCrery (R., La.), who has held no post in the Republican leadership and whose national profile is fairly limited. McCrery's campaign took in $3.3 million between 2005 and 2007, a staggering amount given that his seat is utterly secure; he crushed his most recent Democratic opponent, who spent all of $7,000, by some 40 percentage points. McCrery's Leadership PAC - which is named, without apparent irony, the Committee for the Preservation of Capitalism - raised another $2.3 million during the same period. McCrery recently announced that he would not seek reelection this fall, a choice that analysts described as a serious blow to the G.O.P.'s financial prospects for the 2008 election.

By congressional standards, McCrery is poor: his assets, as listed on disclosure forms, are estimated at between $25,000 and $200,000, ranking him in the bottom fifth of his peers. Yet life in Congress has been good for McCrery, as well as for his friends, family, and associates. In 2004 his wife, Johnette, until then an assistant professor at Louisiana State University - Shreveport, was named a vice president at the Washington office of Ketchum, one of the world's largest P.R. firms. A number of his staffers have gone on to become lobbyists or consultants, and the wife of one former aide gets paid to run the Committee for the Preservation of Capitalism.2

McCrery has cut a broad gastronomical swath through Washington, using political funds to dine out frequently at twenty-five different restaurants since 2005. Although his favorite spot seems to be the Capitol Hill Club (twenty-eight visits and events, totaling more than $59,000), the congressman has spread his wealth around town, spending thousands of dollars from his political funds at Bistro Bis and the Capital Grille, as well as at Johnny's Half Shell, a seafood spot near Union Station, and Acadiana, whose menu reflects "the bounty of Louisiana, in the finest of seafood and premium meats." When in his home district, McCrery regularly drops by the Southern Trace Country Club (twelve visits in three years, at combined costs to his political funds of some $40,000) and the Shreveport Club (seven visits, $2,200).

For travel, McCrery appears to enjoy the Napa Valley, having charged his political funds tens of thousands of dollars for fund-raising trips there in the past three years. His fall 2007 expenses at Sonoma's Benziger Family Winery, which "produces Sonoma cabernet sauvignon, merlot, and chardonnay wines with a strong sense of place," set back his Leadership PAC $13,000. The congressman also enjoys a good party. McCrery sits on the executive committee of the

Mystick Krewe of Louisianians Inc., a group of "displaced Louisianians living in our nation's capital." In 2005, his campaign paid $7,725 to the group for a Mardi Gras-themed party.

McCrery's passions include golfing - several years ago, he appeared on Golf Digest's list of the top 200 players among members of Congress, White House officials, Supreme Court justices, and lobbyists - and he frequently can be found on the links, courtesy of his political funds. McCrery spent $1,592 in December of 2005 at the Calusa Pines Golf Club and another $994 the following month at the Olde Florida Golf Club, both in balmy Naples, Florida. He frequently holds his fund-raising events at golf clubs, where donors have given him the money to pay for yet more golfing.3 He spent $7,488 at the Talking Stick in Scottsdale, Arizona (winner of the Golden Nugget Award for Best Recreational Facility), and $32,036 at the Kiawah Island Golf Resort off the South Carolina coast (named No. 1 golf resort in America by Travel + Leisure Golf magazine and No. 2 tennis resort by Tennis magazine).

He and donors traveled farther south for an affair McCrery hosted at the Rio Mar Beach Resort and Spa in Puerto Rico, which, says its website, "lies between a magnificent palm-lined beach and lush mountains" and boasts "an award-winning staff at your beck and call." The resort offers - naturally - two championship golf courses, as well as eleven tennis courts, two oceanfront swimming pools, and "oceanfront meditation areas." Still another golfing affair - a single-event expense record for McCrery, costing his Leadership PAC nearly $52,000 - was held at the Lansdowne Resort in Virginia's Hunt Country.

McCrery's non-travel-related payments of note include an $88,512 bonus to his fund-raising consultant last year, $10,000 in checks to the Tom DeLay Legal Expense Trust, more than $10,000 for gifts (much of it spent at the Tiny Jewel Box in Washington), $3,000 labeled only as petty cash, $1,427 at the Marble Slab Creamery, and $1,102 more at the Cake House. There is seemingly nothing that McCrery has not seen fit to charge to his political funds, including babysitting for his children: a bill of $300 was paid to one Katie Raffaelli, the daughter of John Raffaelli, a lobbyist and campaign donor to the congressman.

I called McCrery and asked whether he thought some of his expenditures might have been a bit extravagant - for example, the donor event in Puerto Rico. McCrery explained that early in his career, he had attended many fund-raisers, and had developed a keen sense of what made for a memorable affair. "I tried to emulate those events that attracted people so that they would want to come back," he told me. "Yes, we do go to some very nice places, and we like to make sure that people have a good time. . . . So I plead guilty."

What about expenditures for meals and other non-fund-raising events? I asked. "It's fairly loose in terms of the use of campaign money," the congressman replied. "It has to be connected to the campaign, but that can be any number of things." For example, McCrery might pick up the dinner tab for other members of Congress "if I'm talking to them about fund-raising activities, or if I'm trying to get them to come to a campaign event." At the Capitol Hill Club, some of his expenditures were for what he called "check presentations," ceremonial events (often including donors) at which the PAC hands out checks to members and candidates. As for babysitting, the congressman said that he had asked the FEC for an opinion about that matter, and he had been assured it was appropriate. "We don't use it often, but we have occasionally," he told me, adding that he usually paid $100 "if the person comes in and spends the night." The 2007 tab for $300 was for babysitting when he and his wife were away for a few days at a Republican retreat - at the Hyatt Regency Chesapeake Bay Golf Resort, Spa and Marina.

All in all, McCrery has allocated some $650,000 in political funds for food, drinks, catering, and hotels during the past three years. This is a pace of roughly $18,000 a month - and keep in mind that this figure excludes tens of thousands of dollars more in airfare, rental cars, and related travel costs. For Democrats just beginning to enjoy the enhanced perks of majority status and hoping to tighten their grip thereon, McCrery's story can only serve as election-year inspiration.
--------------
Even as the Democrats' triumph in 2006 has accomplished almost nothing in terms of policy, it has produced a stunning reversal in the parties' respective finances. As of January, the Democratic Senate and House congressional campaign committees had combined cash on hand of $56 million, almost five times more than their formerly cash-swollen Republican counterparts. At one point last fall, the G.O.P.'s House campaign committee was technically insolvent, with $2.3 million more in debt than in the bank. "Washington is a town that operates on the basis of what people can do for you," says Melanie Sloan, director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. "Now that the Democrats control Congress, it's a lot easier to get people to show up at their fund-raisers. As a donor, you can't afford to say no."

In Washington, the Democrats' political and social resurgence can be witnessed in the revived fortunes of the National Democratic Club, which serves as a semiprivate venue for party lawmakers and elected officials, as well as the lobbyists, consultants, fund-raisers, and others whose livelihood depends on access to them. Monthly fees at the club - located on Ivy Street, a few minutes' walk from the House and Senate office buildings - are only $25 per month for members of Congress; others pay $80 monthly, on top of a $300 initiation fee.

I stopped by the club on a cold, windy evening last December to meet a party political consultant. It was a jovial spot, to be sure, but surprisingly modest, with pre-Christmas décor reminiscent of a roadside hotel lounge. Thick pillars in the dining room were wrapped in faded red, white, and silver decorations, and a small Christmas tree squatted against a wall. Among the customers were a few members of Congress, including Carolyn McCarthy of New York and Barney Frank and Michael Capuano of Massachusetts, as well as an elderly foursome playing bridge at a corner table. At the bar, Hill staffers, assorted politicos, and a few locals from the neighborhood chatted over drinks and bowls of a low-grade nut mix.

The club was founded by former staffers in the Truman Administration, and for decades it was a de rigueur stop on the local social circuit. In March 1986, when Democrats held a huge majority in the House, a capacity crowd gathered for "a glittering gala" to mark the completion of a major remodeling, the website relates. Eight years later, catastrophe struck when the party lost both chambers for the first time in over forty years. More than 1,000 members promptly resigned from the club, and the smart action drifted a few blocks away to the Republican Party's more lavish Capitol Hill Club.

As the Republican grip on Washington tightened in the ensuing years, the National Democratic Club was forced to sell its three-story building and then rent back the ground floor for its dwindling operations. Up until recently, the mood here had been desultory, but a renaissance arrived on Election Night 2006, when hundreds of revelers gathered to celebrate the sweeping Democratic victory. "Once again, the place to be is your NDC," said the club's first post-election newsletter. General Manager Christine Hilty describes the club as a refuge for Democrats and their supporters. "There's certainly networking going on, but people come here because it's a safe place," she said. "There are no cameras." Membership has climbed by about 30 percent since the 2006 elections, she estimated, and business is more bustling than at any point in the six years she's worked there. During the first nine months of 2007, congressional Democrats and party committees used political contributions to pay for $426,431 worth of food and drink at the club. That was an increase of about 70 percent from the same period in 2005, when the Democrats were still in the minority.4

Not only does the majority party have more to spend; it is also more spent upon. Democrats have found themselves newly fashionable on the Washington scene, whether as party guests, as dinner partners, or simply for a coffee or office meeting, especially, of course, with lobbyists. "You're vying for time and you're not going to vie for the time of someone who has no power," one lobbyist explained to me about his post-2006 shift in social priorities. Former Democrats, and those considering retirement, have seen their prospects soar as K Street firms look to enhance their outreach to the new kings of Congress. The Republican-dominated lobby shop of Barbour Griffith & Rogers - founded by Haley Barbour, the Mississippi governor - recently announced that it would begin hiring Democrats. "I'm not going to deny the obvious," the firm's chairman, Ed Rogers (Edwina's husband), told the Washington Post. "The expectations of our clients are such that we have to have a full range of political, policy and business expertise, and in today's world that includes Democrats."

The new ethics rules ostensibly prohibit lobbyists from buying members drinks and meals, but it almost certainly will still happen, albeit with a variety of winks and nods. One of the lobbyists I met at the Capital Grille explained a common method of picking up tabs for members in the past. "Let's say there were four or five members sitting at a table with a couple or three lobbyists," he said. "The bill might come to $1,500. But when it came time to pay, they [the members] would pay nothing, or throw in a twenty and say, 'There's my share.'"
--------------
Every so often, public outrage compels lawmakers to make a show of their determination to "clean up" Washington. Congress's "ethics reform package" passed last year, widely hailed as the toughest ever approved, is at least the fourth enacted since the end of World War II. Over the years, members have tightened the rules about their use of corporate jets, the amount of money they can receive from political donors, and the legality of having private entities pay for their food and travel, among other matters. But largely exempted from the chopping block have been the extraordinary benefits and perquisites available to members, which have grown exponentially and transformed a seat in Congress from a comfortable but relatively modest office into a sort of modern-day lordship.

Last November, the Senate Finance Committee announced that it would be scrutinizing, as part of a probe of tax-exempt organizations, the compensation packages and perks enjoyed by leaders of some of the nation's top ministries. The committee expressed concern about religious officials granting themselves high salaries, huge travel allowances, private jets, and luxury cars, all paid for by donations to their ministries. "I don't want to conclude that there's a problem, but I have an obligation to donors and the taxpayers to find out more," Senator Charles Grassley (R., Iowa) said at the time the probe was announced. "People who donated should have their money spent as intended."

Whether or not the ministers are a worthy target of investigation, the fact that a high committee of the U.S. Congress would be in charge of such an inquiry is, to put it mildly, ironic. For if there is any single group in America that lives high on funds donated for other purposes, it is our 535 members of Congress. Perhaps they should overlook the motes in the reverends' eyes until they have considered the beams in their own.
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http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/040508C.shtml $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $.

Saundra Hummer

April 5th, 2008, 02:24 PM

. <<<<o>>>>
State Extends Blackwater's Deal a Year
The Associated Press
Saturday 05 April 2008

Washington - Amid investigations into fatal shootings of civilians and allegations of tax violations, Blackwater USA's multimillion-dollar contract to protect diplomats in Baghdad has been renewed, the State Department said Friday.

A final decision about whether the private security company will keep the job is pending, the department said. Moyock, N.C.-based Blackwater is one of the largest private military contractors, receiving nearly $1.25 billion in federal business since 2000, according to a House committee estimate.

Blackwater provides security for diplomats in Baghdad, where the sprawling U.S. Embassy is headquartered. Its private guards act as bodyguards and armed drivers, escorting government officials when they go outside the fortified Green Zone.

Iraqis were outraged over a Sept. 16 shooting in which 17 Iraq civilians were killed in a Baghdad square. Blackwater said its guards were protecting diplomats under attack before they opened fire, but Iraqi investigators concluded the shooting was unprovoked.

An FBI probe began in November. Prosecutors want to know whether Blackwater contractors used excessive force or violated any laws.

The State Department's top security officer, Greg Starr, told reporters Friday that because the FBI is still investigating the shootings, there is no justification now to pull the contract when it comes due in May.

Blackwater has a five-year deal to provide personal protection for diplomats, and its contract is reauthorized each year. The decision announced Friday extends Blackwater's deal for the third year.

Prosecutors investigating the shootings have questioned more than 30 witnesses in the U.S. and in Iraq, but they have announced no conclusions. One possibility is that individual contractors could be indicted, another is that the company could be indicted, or the FBI could conclude that there was no crime.

The company is also the target of an unrelated investigation into whether its contractors smuggled weapons into Iraq. Lawmakers have called for an investigation into whether Blackwater violated tax laws by classifying employees as independent contractors. The company says the claim is groundless.

Starr said that Blackwater's contract could be pulled at some future point, depending on what the FBI and an internal State Department inquiry conclude. He would not predict whether that is likely, and he said he has no information about when the FBI might act.

Starr's predecessor, Richard Griffin, resigned just one day after a State Department study found serious lapses in the department's oversight of private guards.

After the September deaths, U.S. commanders in Iraq complained that they often do not know security firms are moving through their areas of responsibility until after a hostile incident has taken place.

At the end of October, Defense Secretary Robert Gates met with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and reached a general understanding that more military control was needed over security firms operating in the war zone.

The Pentagon and the State Department agreed in December to give the military in Iraq more control over Blackwater Worldwide and other private security contractors.

The agreement spells out rules, standards and guidelines for the use of private security contractors and says contractors will be accountable for criminal acts under U.S. law. That partly clarifies what happens if a contractor breaks the law, but it leaves the details to be worked out with Congress.

The State Department also installed new safeguards after the September shooting, including a requirement for additional monitoring of Blackwater convoys.

Rep. David Price, D-N.C., author of a House-passed bill that would subject all contractors to criminal liability, called the agreement ''an important step toward improving transparency, management and accountability in security contracting.''

''There is no question that it comes in response to significant congressional pressure ... but the agencies deserve credit for reading the writing on the wall and taking substantive steps to deal with a clear and critical problem,'' Price said.
--------- Associated Press writer Matt Apuzzo contributed to this report. http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/040508B.shtml<<<<<o>>>>> .

Norman

April 6th, 2008, 02:13 PM

There's an easier fix for global warming than we thought, so..everyone can just relax:tanz:. http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0403/p14s01-sten.html

Saundra Hummer

April 6th, 2008, 03:16 PM

.
. . . . . . . . . . .
Iranian Blogosphere Tests Government's Limits By
Neil MacFarquhar
The New York Times
Sunday 06 April 2008
Cambridge, Massachusetts - Troll through the Iranian blogosphere and you can find all manner of unexpectedly harsh critiques denouncing the government of the Islamic Republic, from reformists who revile it as well as conservatives who support it.

One conservative blogger deplored the rampant inflation undermining the middle class, saying it forced girls into prostitution to support their families. Others identified themselves as fans of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, yet they condemned government corruption and what they called arbitrary arrests. A fourth declared that government statistics were a lot of nonsense.

What gets filtered out is not entirely predictable either. Even some religious topics are deemed unacceptable. The government blocked the site of a blogger advocating the Shiite Muslim custom of temporary marriage, which is legal and considered a way for the young to relieve their sexual frustration without breaking religious laws.

Over all, a new study by the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School shows that Iran's blogosphere mirrors the erratic, fickle and often startling qualities of life in the Islamic republic itself. The rules of what is permissible fluctuate with maddening imprecision, so people test the limits.

Like women who inch their head scarves back to see how much hair they can show or people who flout the ban on alcohol by drinking at home, bloggers seem to be testing just how far they can push. And, like Iran's other rule breakers, some pay a price.

In 2004, according to Human Rights Watch, 21 bloggers or people who worked at Internet news sites critical of the government were arrested, and some of them were tortured. Periodic arrests since then have ended with jail terms.

The study, conducted over the last year by the Berkman Center, was financed by the State Department and is part of a larger and longer project on the impact new communications media are having on democracy and democratization in several countries. The research being released Sunday documents what types of blogs are being posted in Iran.

Researchers used computer software to analyze more than 6,000 blogs by subject matter to get a general sense of what issues Iranians were discussing; then the team, which included Persian-speaking students, read more than 500 of the postings.

To build a fuller picture of the Iranian blogosphere, the researchers also used the results of a parallel study that documents what blogs were being blocked by the authorities in 60 countries, including Iran. That study is also being done at the Berkman Center in collaboration with universities in Canada and Britain.

The researchers' general conclusion was that, "despite periodic persecution," many Iranians are able to use blogs to express "viewpoints challenging the ruling ideology of the Islamic Republic."

The study found, for instance, that fewer than a quarter of blogs pushing for change, including those written by expatriates, were blocked. In addition, conservatives of all stripes maintain a lively debate about President Ahmadinejad.

"Arguing about stuff, arguing about public affairs, is taking root in the blogosphere on the conservative side, on the reformist side, all over," said John Kelly, the founder of Morningside Analytics, a New York company that took part in the study and created the software that helped researchers group blogs together by subject and social networks.

"We don't know if the government is not trying or not able to block as much as we thought," said Mr. Kelly, who wrote the study with Bruce Etling, the director of the project at Berkman. "They may allow a certain amount of online discourse to be there because it seems to underline the legitimacy of the system."

Political groups bash each other with gusto from both sides of the political divide. One conservative blogger mocked reformists for pretending to care about economic matters. "The nature of the reformists is actually extremism," wrote a blogger under the name Shahrahedalat or the Highway of Justice, adding that the Iranian people would not be deceived.

Reformist supporters give back as good as they get. Even if supporting reformist politicians is nearly futile, wrote a blogger under the name Inharfha or These Talks, it is "much better that sitting back and watching how our country is being taken back to the ruins of Medieval times."

Iran seems to handpick which blogs it blocks, but researchers admit that Iran's filtering policy and techniques remain opaque.

"Our sense is that the government in Iran doesn't see the blogosphere as bad as a whole," Mr. Kelly said, noting that Iranian exiles have alleged that the government organizes and pays bloggers to put out the party line. "What they are trying to do is to promote more young religious voices, to pile as many conservatives into the network as they can."

Researchers said many of the religious sites they found used the same artwork and linked to one another. During last month's parliamentary elections, for example, many religious blogs displayed a banner encouraging Iranians to vote and a picture of President Ahmadinejad.

Blocked blogs discussed topics as varied as erotic poetry and computer coding. The blog of an Iranian woman who wrote about the joys of working in a relaxed, nonsegregated environment with men was blocked, as was that of a poet who used curse words.

The map of the Iranian blogosphere that the Internet and Democracy Project produced (available Sunday at cyber.law.harvard.edu/publications/2008/Mapping_Irans_Online_Public) resembles the night sky, with each dot representing one blog and the main constellations indicating groups of blogs that share common interests and attitudes.

Sprays of yellow and green represent secular/reformist blogs. More women and expatriates appear here than anywhere else. The points colored red, turquoise and orange show all the blogs on the religious/conservative pole.

The study found that the next largest group of bloggers, hundreds of them, concentrated on romantic poetry. So many blogging bards might be uncommon in many other countries, but in Iran it is simply a reflection of a culture that so reveres poetry, where many children grow up dreaming of becoming great poets in the way many young Americans dream of a future in sports.

The mapping program assigns each dot its place through factors including lists of words that it checks for and that indicate the likely focus of the blog: reformist, conservative or other.

For example, Masoud Dehnamaki is a conservative who helped found the Basiji, a hard-core group notorious for its bloody attacks against antigovernment demonstrators. In recent years he has become a documentary filmmaker, focusing on social problems like prostitution.

The large dot representing his blog sits almost at the middle of the map, indicating that it is popular among both conservatives and reformists. The dot representing the Web site of former President Mohammad Khatami, a moderate leader, sits to his left, deeper into the reformist field.

Mehrangiz Kar, an Iranian dissident in Boston who is aware of the project but not directly involved, said that over the long run the blogosphere would bring change within certain limits.

Bloggers are not permitted to criticize the Islamic system itself, Ms. Kar said, but they are far freer than writers for newspapers or other news media.

"These Web logs are very effective," she said. "They create conversation. Not just about elections or democracy, but about cinema, theater, arts, literature. These fields are very important for changing that society." Go on-site to gaIn access to this article and several other current ones, and check out their archives, and video's while there. Just click on the following URL:
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/040608E.shtml
- - - - - - - - - .

Saundra Hummer

April 6th, 2008, 05:01 PM

.
~~~~~~~
"Most people want security in this world, not liberty."

Henry Louis Mencken"
American journalist
1880-1956
~~~
"We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security"

Dwight David Eisenhower
34th president of the United States
1890-1969
~~~
"I have named the destroyers of nations: comfort, plenty, and security - out of which grow a bored and slothful cynicism, in which rebellion against the world as it is, and myself as I am, are submerged in listless self-satisfaction"

John Steinbeck
American novelist,
Nobel Prize for Literature
for
1962, 1902-1968
~~~
"The only security for the American people today, or for any people, is to be found through the control of force rather than the use of force"

Norman Cousins
American essayist and editor,
long associated with the Saturday Review
1912-1990
~~~
"Power always has to be kept in check; power exercised in secret, especially under the cloak of national security, is doubly dangerous"

William Proxmire ~~~~~ .

Saundra Hummer

April 6th, 2008, 05:06 PM

.. . . . . . . . .Iran joined militias in battle for Basra
By
Sarah Baxter and Marie Colvin

06/04/04 "The Times" -- -- IRANIAN forces were involved in the recent battle for Basra, General David Petraeus, the US commander in Iraq, is expected to tell Congress this week.

Military and intelligence sources believe Iranians were operating at a tactical command level with the Shi’ite militias fighting Iraqi security forces; some were directing operations on the ground, they think.

Petraeus intends to use the evidence of Iranian involvement to argue against any reductions in US forces.

Dr Daniel Goure, a defence analyst at the Lexington Institute in Virginia, said: “There is no question that Petraeus will be tough on Iran. It is one thing to withdraw troops when there is purely sectarian fighting but it is another thing if it leaves the Iranians to move in.”

US defence chiefs are concerned that the troop surge has overstretched the military. Admiral Mike McMullen, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, warned that the army and marines were at risk of crossing an “invisible red line” if the burden on forces remained. He said deployments of 15 months had to be reduced to a year “as fast as possible”.

Petraeus is likely to announce that combat tours will be reduced from 15 months to 12 months.

The number of US troops in Iraq is set to fall from 160,000 to 140,000 by July, but Petraeus is expected to recommend an indefinite pause in further troop cuts.

Moqtada al-Sadr, the radical Shi’ite cleric, has called for 1m people to march on Baghdad on Wednesday – the fifth anniversary of the fall of the capital – when Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the US ambassador to Iraq, will be briefing Congress.

A senior Iraqi official who met Petraeus last week said, “It will be difficult to show that the situation is improving.” Another Iraqi source described the US general as “furious” that al-Maliki moved against the militias into Basra without consultation and had to rely on US forces to bail him out.

Abu Ahmed, a senior military commander with the Awakening, the Sunni tribal movement cooperating with US forces, said progress was largely the result of al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army ceasefire.

“When the Mahdi Army decides to resume its activities, neither the American troops nor the Iraqi government will be able to stop it,” he said.

Additional reporting: Hala Jaberhttp://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article19679.htm . . . . . . .

Saundra Hummer

April 6th, 2008, 07:52 PM

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lllllllllllllll British fear US commander is beating the drum for Iran strikes
By
Damien McElroy
Foreign Affairs Correspondent

04/04/08 "The Telegraph" -- -- British officials gave warning yesterday that America's commander in Iraq will declare that Iran is waging war against the US-backed Baghdad government.

A strong statement from General David Petraeus about Iran's intervention in Iraq could set the stage for a US attack on Iranian military facilities, according to a Whitehall assessment. In closely watched testimony in Washington next week, Gen Petraeus will state that the Iranian threat has risen as Tehran has supplied and directed attacks by militia fighters against the Iraqi state and its US allies.

The outbreak of Iraq's worst violence in 18 months last week with fighting in Basra and the daily bombardment of the Green Zone diplomatic enclave, demonstrated that although the Sunni Muslim insurgency is dramatically diminished, Shia forces remain in a strong position to destabilise the country.

"Petraeus is going to go very hard on Iran as the source of attacks on the American effort in Iraq," a British official said. "Iran is waging a war in Iraq. The idea that America can't fight a war on two fronts is wrong, there can be airstrikes and other moves," he said.

"Petraeus has put emphasis on America having to fight the battle on behalf of Iraq. In his report he can frame it in terms of our soldiers killed and diplomats dead in attacks on the Green Zone."

Tension between Washington and Tehran is already high over Iran's covert nuclear programme. The Bush administration has not ruled out military strikes.

In remarks interpreted as signalling a change in his approach to Iran, Gen Petraeus last week hit out at the Iranian leadership. "The rockets that were launched at the Green Zone were Iranian-provided, Iranian-made rockets," he said. "All of this in complete violation of promises made by President Ahmadinejad and the other most senior Iranian leaders to their Iraqi counterparts."

The humiliation of the Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki by the Iranian-backed cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in fighting in Basra last week triggered top-level warnings over Iran's strength in Iraq.

Gen Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the US ambassador to Baghdad, will answer questions from American political leaders at the US Congress on Tuesday and Wednesday before travelling to London to brief Gordon Brown.

The Wall Street Journal said last week that the US war effort in Iraq must have a double goal.

"The US must recognise that Iran is engaged in a full-up proxy war against it in Iraq," wrote the military analyst Kimberly Kagan.

There are signs that targeting Iran would unite American politicians across the bitter divide on Iraq. "Iran is the bull in the china shop," said Ike Skelton, the Democrat chairman of the Armed Services Committee. "In all of this, they seem to have links to all of the Shi'ite groups, whether they be political or military."

Click on Link/Url below to gain access to this article as well as comments related to it.

Comments (25) Comment (0)

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article19678.htm lllllllllllll .

Saundra Hummer

April 6th, 2008, 07:59 PM

.* * * * * * * * * * *
Petraeus Testimony Next Week Will Signal Iran Attack
By
Paul Craig Roberts

06/04/08 "ICH' -- - April 5, 2008. Today the London Telegraph reported that “British officials gave warning yesterday that America’s commander in Iraq will declare that Iran is waging war against the US-backed Baghdad government. A strong statement from General David Petraeus about Iran’s intervention in Iraq could set the stage for a US attack on Iranian militiary facilities, according to a Whitehall assessment.”

The neocon lacky Petraeus has had his script written for him by Cheney, and Petraeus together with neocon warmonger Ryan Crocker, the US governor of the Green Zone in Baghdad, will present Congress next Tuesday and Wednesday with the lies, for which the road has been well paved by neocon propagandists such as Kimberly Kagan, that “the US must recognize that Iran is engaged in a full-up proxy war against it in Iraq.”

Don’t expect Congress to do anything except to egg on the attack. On April 3 the International Herald Tribune reported that senators and representatives have made millions of dollars from their investments in defense companies totaling $196 million. Rep. Ike Skelton, the Democrat chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, is already on board with the attack on Iran. The London Telegraph quotes Skelton: “Iran is the bull in the china shop. In all of this, they seem to have links to all of the Shi’ite groups, whether they be political or military.”

All Skelton knows is what the war criminal Bush regime tells him. If Iran really does have all these connections, then it behooves Washington to cease threatening Iran and to make nice with Iran in order to stabilize Iraq and extract the US from the nightmare.

Reporting from Tehran on April 4, Reuters quotes Mohsen Hakim, whose father, Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, leads the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, an ally of the Maliki US puppetgovernment in Iraq: “Tehran, by using its positive influence on the Iraqi nation, paved the way for the return of peace to Iraq and the new situation is the result of Iran’s efforts.”

Instead of thanking Iran and working with Iran diplomatically to restore stability to Iraq, the Bush regime intends to expand the nightmare with a military attack on Iran. Ryan Crocker was quick to dispute Hakim’s report that Iran had used its influence to end the fighting in Basra. Crocker alleged that Iran had started the fighting. The absurdity of Crocker’s claim is obvious as even the neocon US media reported that the fighting in Basra was started by the US and Maliki in an effort to clear out the Shi’ite al-Sadr militias. Most experts saw the attack on al-Sadr for what it was: an effort to remove a potential threat to the US supply line from Kuwait in the event of a US attack on Iran.

Crocker alleges that the rockets dropping on the Green Zone during the Basra fighting were made in 2007 in Iran. As should be obvious even to disengaged Americans, if Iran were to arm the Iraqi insurgency, the insurgents would have modern weapons to counter US helicopter gunships and heavy tanks. The insurgents have no such weapons. The neocon lie that Iran is the cause of the Iraqi insurgency is just another Bush regime lie like the lie that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and connections to al Qaeda and the lie that the Taliban in Afghanistan attacked the US.

The Bush regime will tell any lie and orchestrate any event in order to “finish the job” in the Middle East.

“Finishing the job” means to destroy the ability of Iraq, Iran, and Syria to provide support for the Palestinians and for Hezbollah in southern Lebanon against Israeli aggression. With Iraq and Iran in turmoil, Syria might simply give up and become another American client state. With Iraq and Iran in turmoil, Israel can steal the rest of the West Bank along with the water resources in southern Lebanon. That is what “the war on terror” is really about.

The entire world knows this. Consequently, the US and Israel are essentially isolated. The US can only count on the support that it can bribe and pay for.

At the NATO-Russian summit in Bucharest, Romania, on April 4, Russian President Putin said: “No one can seriously think that Iran would dare attack the U.S. Instead of pushing Iran into a corner, it would be far more sensible to think together how to help Iran become more predictable and transparent.”

Of course it would, but that is not what the warmonger Bush regime wants.

Perhaps the British government has derailed the plot to attack Iran by leaking in advance to the London Telegraph the disinformation Cheney has prepared for Petraeus and Crocker to deliver to the complicit US Congress next Tuesday and Wednesday. On the other hand, the US puppet media is likely to bury the real story and to trumpet Petraeus claims that Iran has, in effect, already declared war on the US by sending weapons to kill US troops in Iraq.

By next Thursday we will know from how the Petraeus-Crocker dog and pony show plays in the US Congress and media whether the Bush Regime will commit yet another war crime by attacking Iran.

Paul Craig Roberts a former Assistant Secretary of the US Treasury and former associate editor of the Wall Street Journal, has been reporting shocking cases of prosecutorial abuse for two decades. A new edition of his book, The Tyranny of Good Intentions, co-authored with Lawrence Stratton, a documented account of how Americans lost the protection of law, is forthcoming from Random House in March, 2008.

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Saundra Hummer

April 6th, 2008, 08:34 PM

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We've been called "Un-American", and "Anti-American" for posting anti-Cheney, anti-Bush opinions here on AAJ, and you know that's fine, as we can't come near this man, this John C. Loo and his bosses. They're the ones who are going against all we've ever believed in, and so I say it's they who are "anti-American, un-American. Criminals if there ever were any. The following article will let you see why so many of us believe as we do, why we are so ashamed and horrified as to what has become of us. Who would have ever thought we could, or would come to such as this? SRH
. . . . . . . . . . .
Permissible Assaults Cited in Graphic Detail

Drugging Detainees Is Among Techniques

By Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writer

06/04/08 "Washington Post " -- - -- Thirty pages into a memorandum discussing the legal boundaries of military interrogations in 2003, senior Justice Department lawyer John C. Yoo tackled a question not often asked by American policymakers: Could the president, if he desired, have a prisoner's eyes poked out?

Or, for that matter, could he have "scalding water, corrosive acid or caustic substance" thrown on a prisoner? How about slitting an ear, nose or lip, or disabling a tongue or limb? What about biting?

These assaults are all mentioned in a U.S. law prohibiting maiming, which Yoo parsed as he clarified the legal outer limits of what could be done to terrorism suspects as detained by U.S. authorities. The specific prohibitions, he said, depended on the circumstances or which "body part the statute specifies."

But none of that matters in a time of war, Yoo also said, because federal laws prohibiting assault, maiming and other crimes by military interrogators are trumped by the president's ultimate authority as commander in chief.

The dry discussion of U.S. maiming statutes is just one in a series of graphic, extraordinary passages in Yoo's 81-page memo, which was declassified this past week. No maiming is known to have occurred in U.S. interrogations, and the Justice Department disavowed the document without public notice nine months after it was written.

In the sober language of footnotes, case citations and judicial rulings, the memo explores a wide range of unsavory topics, from the use of mind-altering drugs on captives to the legality of forcing prisoners to squat on their toes in a "frog crouch." It repeats an assertion in another controversial Yoo memo that an interrogation tactic cannot be considered torture unless it would result in "death, organ failure or serious impairment of bodily functions."

Yoo, who is now a law professor at the University of California at Berkeley, also uses footnotes to effectively dismiss the Fourth and Fifth amendments to the Constitution, arguing that protections against unreasonable search and seizure and guarantees of due process either do not apply or are irrelevant in a time of war. He frequently cites his previous legal opinions to bolster his case.

Written opinions by the Office of Legal Counsel have the force of law within the government because its staff is assigned to interpret the meaning of statutory or constitutional language. Yoo's 2003 memo has evoked strong criticism from legal academics, human rights advocates and military-law experts, who say that he was wrong on basic matters of constitutional law and went too far in authorizing harsh and coercive interrogation tactics by the Defense Department.

"Having 81 pages of legal analysis with its footnotes and respectable-sounding language makes the reader lose sight of what this is all about," said Dawn Johnsen, an OLC chief during the Clinton administration who is now a law professor at Indiana University. "He is saying that poking people's eyes out and pouring acid on them is beyond Congress's ability to limit a president. It is an unconscionable document."

Yoo defends the memo as a "near boilerplate" argument in favor of presidential prerogatives, and says its fundamental assertions differ little from those made by previous presidents of both parties. In comments to The Washington Post and other news organizations, Yoo has also criticized the Justice Department for issuing new legal opinions that do not include detailed discussions of specific interrogation tactics, which he views as crucial to defining the boundaries of what is lawful.

"You have to draw the line," Yoo said in an Esquire magazine interview posted online this past week. "What the government is doing is unpleasant. It's the use of violence. I don't disagree with that. But I also think part of the job unfortunately of being a lawyer sometimes is you have to draw those lines. I think I could have written it in a much more -- we could have written it in a much more palatable way, but it would have been vague."

The 2003 memo includes long discussions of the relative illegality of a wide variety of coercive interrogation tactics, including a British technique in which prisoners are forced to stand in a spread-eagle position against a wall and an Israeli technique, called the Shabach, in which a suspect is hooded, strapped to a chair and subjected to powerfully loud music.

Various courts had declared both tactics to be inhumane, but not torture, Yoo noted. This meant that they were illegal under a provision of the Geneva Conventions that the administration said had no relevance to unlawful combatants in its custody.

In another passage, discussing the bounds of Eighth Amendment protections involving confinement conditions, Yoo concluded that "the clothing of a detainee could also be taken away for a period of time without necessarily depriving him of a basic human need." Yoo cited the need to prove "malice or sadism" on the part of an interrogator before he or she could be prosecuted.

The interrogation memo was considered a binding opinion for nine months until December 2003, when OLC chief Jack Goldsmith told the Defense Department to ignore the document's analysis.

In his 2007 book "The Terror Presidency," Goldsmith, who now teaches law at Harvard University, said that some of the memos written by Yoo and his colleagues from 2001 to 2003 were "deeply flawed: sloppily reasoned, overbroad, and incautious in asserting extraordinary constitutional authorities on behalf of the President."

Douglas W. Kmiec, a Pepperdine University law professor who served as constitutional legal counsel for Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, said Yoo can be faulted "for not writing more narrowly." It is often better to "brush in hazy gray" rather than "spray paint in black and white," Kmiec said.

© 2008 The Washington Post Company
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Saundra Hummer

April 7th, 2008, 12:27 PM

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Center for American Progress Action Fund
April 7, 2008 by Faiz Shakir, Amanda Terkel, Satyam Khanna, Matt Corley, Ali Frick, and Benjamin Armbruster THE PROGRESS REPORT
TORTURE
The 'Blueprint That Led To Abu Ghraib'
Last Tuesday, the Defense and Justice Departments released a previously-classified 2003 memo, which claimed that "federal laws prohibiting assault, maiming and other crimes did not apply to military interrogators who questioned al-Qaeda captives because the president's ultimate authority as commander in chief overrode such statutes." Written by John Yoo, who was then the deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC), the memo is "similar [to], although much broader" than, the infamous 2002 torture memo, which was co-written by Yoo and redefined torture to be only "equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death." In the 2003 memo, Yoo also asserted that "many American and international laws would not apply to interrogations overseas" because they "would be unconstitutional as applied in this context." Like its 2002 predecessor, Yoo's 2003 memo was rescinded by Jack Goldsmith when he took over the OLC in December 2003 because of "the unusual lack of care and sobriety in their legal analysis." Even though many legal experts, such as former Army judge advocate general Thomas Romig, find Yoo's argument that "there are no rules in a time of war" to be "downright offensive," Yoo defends his memos as "near boilerplate." Far from seeing it as "boilerplate," former OLC lawyer Martin Lederman argues that Yoo's 2003 memo "is the source of the Nile for the abuse that occurred in Iraq in 2003."

CREATING THE 'CULTURE OF ABUSE': According to "some legal experts and advocates" who spoke to The New York Times, Yoo's 2003 memo "adds to evidence that the abuse of prisoners in military custody may have involved signals from higher officials and not just irresponsible actions by low-level personnel." Noting that OLC opinions are "binding on the Defense Department," Scott Silliman, the head of the Center on Law, Ethics and National Security at Duke University and a former Air Force lawyer," says Yoo's memo "effectively sidelined military lawyers who strongly opposed harsh interrogation methods." "The memo helped to build a culture that, in the absence of leadership from the highest ranks of the Pentagon, allowed the abuses at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere," Silliman told the Times. Yoo rejects the idea that his legal opinions have any relation to detainee abuses that occurred in Iraq. "The 'culture of abuse' theory has no reliable evidence to support it," Yoo told The New York Times. But Lederman believes that Yoo's 2003 memo is "the blueprint that led to Abu Ghraib and the other abuses within the armed forces in 2003 and early 2004." His thesis is supported by the timeline of events surrounding the administration's deliberations on interrogation policy and the abuses at Abu Ghraib. According to Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba's report on Abu Ghraib, the "sadistic, blatant, and wanton criminal abuses" at the prison took place between October 2003 and December 2003, which was after Yoo issued his memo but before it was rescinded by Goldsmith.

DRUGGING DETAINEES?: In October 2006, lawyers for Jose Padilla, who was found guilty in 2007 of supporting terrorism overseas, claimed in court papers that U.S. authorities gave him "drugs against his will, believed to be some form of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) or phencyclidine (PCP), to act as a sort of truth serum during his interrogations." Rather than directly denying Padilla's claim, the Defense Department simply claimed that it does not torture and "it has always been our policy to treat all detainees humanely." Now, the release of Yoo's 2003 memo lends support to allegations that the United States may have drugged detainees. In the memo, "Yoo advised top Bush administration officials that interrogators could employ mind-altering drugs if they did not produce 'an extreme effect' calculated to 'cause a profound disruption of the senses or personality.'" Jeffrey Kaye, a clinical psychologist who works with torture victims at Survivors International in San Francisco, told CQ's Jeff Stein that he believes such drugs "have been used." "I came across some evidence that they were using mind-altering drugs, to regress the prisoners, to ascertain if they were using deception techniques, to break them down," said Kaye.

FOURTH AMENDMENT FOOTNOTE: The release of Yoo's 2003 memo on interrogation also led to the revelation of another wide-ranging Bush administration legal opinion which claimed the war on terror trumped constitutional protections. A footnote in the 2003 memo states that the OLC "concluded that the Fourth Amendment had no application to domestic military operations." The footnote is referring to an October 2001 memo written by Yoo that "focused on the rules governing any deployment of U.S. forces inside the country 'in the event of further large-scale terrorist activities' by al-Qaeda." In effect, the memo meant that "for at least 16 months after the Sept. 11 terror attacks in 2001, the Bush administration believed that the Constitution's protection against unreasonable searches and seizures on U.S. soil didn't apply to its efforts to protect against terrorism." The memo was written "just days before Bush administration officials, including Vice President Dick Cheney, briefed four House and Senate leaders on the NSA's secret wiretapping program for the first time." White House Spokesman Tony Fratto, however, says the wiretapping program, known as the Terrorist Surveillance Program, "relied on a separate set of legal memoranda." The same 2001 memo, according to a footnote in the 2002 torture memo, "also concluded that Posse Comitatus -- an 1878 statute barring the military from participating in "law and order" missions domestically, under most circumstances -- does not apply to the war on terror."

UNDER THE RADAR

ENVIRONMENT -- NASA SCIENTIST WARNS MORE DRASTIC CUTS ARE NEEDED TO PROTECT CLIMATE: James Hansen, head of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, warned the European Union today that its target of 550 parts per million of CO2 emissions -- "the most stringent in the world -- should be slashed to 350ppm" if "humanity wishes to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed." In a draft paper on the subject, Hansen relies on the earth's history, using samples taken from the bottom of the ocean that "allow CO2 levels to be tracked millions of years ago. They show that when the world began to glaciate at the start of the Ice age about 35 [million] years ago, the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere stood at about 450ppm." Hansen warned that allowing the earth to rest at 450ppm "will probably melt all the ice" and create "a disaster -- a guaranteed disaster." Hansen has called for an immediate moratorium on the creation of new coal plants, without which, he states, "we don't have any chance of stopping global climate change." Last fall, Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) issued "Global Warming Principles" that call for a 450ppm target.

IRAQ -- EXPERTS SAY U.S. NO CLOSER TO LEAVING IRAQ THAN IT WAS A YEAR AGO: The United States Institute of Peace (USIP) released a new report today stating that because "political progress is so slow, halting and superficial, and social and political fragmentation so pronounced," the United States "is no closer to being able to leave Iraq than it was a year ago." The new assessment -- which was conducted by the same experts that advised the Iraq Study Group (ISG) -- "predicts that lasting political development could take five to 10 years of 'full, unconditional commitment' to Iraq, but also cautions that future progress may not be worth the 'massive' human and financial costs" to the United States. The report also says that the recent security gains in Iraq are "due to factors that are outside U.S. control and therefore subject to change." "Reductions in troop levels will likely result in some degree of chaos and violence no matter what," the report finds, but adds that a rapid withdrawal would cause "massive chaos and even genocide." The White House "blocked efforts to reassemble" the ISG for a follow-up report even though former co-chair Lee Hamilton "was interested in a sequel timed to the [Iraq] assessment this week by Gen. David Petraeus and Amb. Ryan Crocker."

ECONOMY -- ECONOMIC CRISIS HITS BIG BUSINESS, MEMBERS OF CONGRESS: Last month, the New York Times reported that the banking and housing crises had moved "from Wall Street to Main Street" and was beginning to affect "communities that seemed insulated." Now the country's economic crisis is taking a toll on the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA). Last year, the MBA was "thrilled to sign a contract to buy a fancy new headquarters building in downtown Washington." Since then, however, the group "has fallen on tough times as many of the subprime mortgages dispensed by some of its members proved dicey." The MBA is now finding it "harder than it imagined to pay its own mortgage," forced to make cuts to "expenses across the board." Roll Call reports today that members of Congress have also become "vulnerable to the financial woes" of the banking sector. "All told, tumbling share prices for more than a dozen of the most troubled banks and investment houses, which last week continued to write off record numbers of bad loans, may have cost 51 Members as much as $13.2 million in stock value during the past 15 months."-----------
THINK FAST

CNN reports that "President Bush is planning to address the nation Thursday morning about the Iraq war," following two days of congressional testimony by Amb. Ryan Crocker and Gen. David Petraeus. Bush "is expected to discuss the administration's decision to reduce combat tours of duty from 15 months to 12 months, as well as the future in Iraq."

Tomorrow on Capitol Hill, Gen. David Petraeus "is expected to call for halting troop reductions that began in December for about six months to assess the security situation." Petraeus's recommendation "would keep about 140,000 troops in Iraq -- 10,000 more than before the surge of troops last year."

USA Today reports that "[t]he percentage of recruits requiring a waiver to join the Army because of a criminal record or other past misconduct has more than doubled since 2004." Since October, "13% of recruits have entered the Army with conduct waivers" compared to 11% for all of last year.

"The national average price for gasoline jumped 5 cents the past two weeks according to the bi-weekly Lundberg Survey of 7,000 stations. The average price of self-serve regular gasoline Friday was $3.32 a gallon, mid-grade was $3.44 and premium was $3.55, according to the Lundberg Survey."

Last year, Congress adopted strict ethics rules "requiring members to disclose when they steered federal money to pet projects." Lawmakers, however, are still relying on "soft earmarks," in which they direct "billions of dollars to favored organizations by making vague requests rather than issuing explicit instructions to government agencies in committee reports and spending bills."

Government auditors are investigating the $2.6 billion Veterans Affairs employees charged to agency credit cards last year, which included "hundreds of thousands of dollars in government credit-card bills at casino and luxury hotels, movie theaters, and high-end retailers such as Sharper Image and Franklin Covey."

"Security officials have extinguished the Olympic flame amid heavy protests" in Paris, the AP reports. The torch was extinguished due to "pro-Tibetan protests" that "broke out along its path."

And finally: While traveling, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice likes to work out on the elliptical machine. White House Chief of Staff Joshua Bolten, however, prefers bowling. While in Romania for the NATO summit, Bolten "sneaked off the first night for an evening of bowling, along with communications director Kevin Sullivan and some others." In Zagreb, Croatia, he also "hit the local Harley-Davidson store, where he bought a T-shirt. Then, in Sochi, he hit another bowling alley.
-----------
GOOD NEWS
"After months of warning from senior Pentagon officials that the 15-month combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan are grinding on U.S. troops," the Bush administration will announce next week that the tours of duty will be shortened to 12 months. -----------

STATE WATCH

MISSOURI: "Missouri residents heading to the store or going to the polls on Tuesday may find themselves being asked to sign a petition aimed at changing the Missouri Constitution to prohibit state-related affirmative action programs."

ALABAMA: Former governor Don Siegelman wants Karl Rove to appear before Congress and testify about Siegelman's prosecution.

ECONOMY: Deterioration in "states' revenue is likely to continue through the end of this year, and probably longer."
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BLOG WATCH

THINK PROGRESS: NATO allies rebuff President Bush on expansion, "looking forward now to the next president."

WONK ROOM: Oil industry apologists declare, "We like oil," "be thankful," "don't blame oil."

CROOKS AND LIARS: The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan: Donald Rumsfeld, David Addington, and John Yoo should fear being indicted as war criminals if they leave the United States.

VET VOICE: Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-NC) violates operations security in Iraq by revealing "critical information" as defined in Army regulations.
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DAILY GRILL
"From June 2007 through February 2008, deaths from ethno-sectarian violence in Baghdad have fallen approximately 90%. American casualties have also fallen sharply, down by 70%."
-- Sens. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC), 4/7/08

VERSUS
"Iraqi deaths rose from a low of 568 in December and 541 in January to roughly 721 in February to more than 1,082 in March. ... US troop deaths have also crept up, from 23 in December -- the lowest number since 2004 -- to 40 in January, 29 in February, and 38 in March."
-- Boston Globe, 4/7/08
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Saundra Hummer

April 7th, 2008, 05:12 PM

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~~~~~~~
"Justice in the life and conduct of the State is possible only as first it resides in the hearts and souls of the citizens"

Plato
Ancient Greek philosopher
428/427- 348/347 B.C.
~~~
"Military justice is to justice what military music is to music"

Groucho Marx
American
comedian, actor and singer
1890-1977
~~~
"In war, there are no unwounded soldiers"

Jose Narosky
~~~
"If my soldiers were to begin to think, not one would remain in the ranks"

Frederick The Great
~~~~~
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Saundra Hummer

April 7th, 2008, 06:00 PM

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^V^V^V^V^V
THE NATION INSTITUTE

Bill Moyers, The 2008 recipient of the Ridenhour Courage Prize

Bill Moyers Accepts
Ridenhour Courage Prize
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Bill Moyers is the recipient of the 2008 Ridenhour Courage Prize, given in recognition of his fierce embrace of the public interest, his advocacy of media pluralism, and the unyielding moral voice he has contributed to our national discourse.

"The job of trying to tell the truth about people whose job it is to hide the truth is almost as complicated and difficult as trying to hide it in the first place. We journalists are of course obliged to cover the news, but our deeper mission is to uncover the news that powerful people would prefer to keep hidden."
Read the rest of Moyers' speech.
(go on-site to gain access)

About The Ridenhour Prizes
The 5th Annual Ridenhour Prizes, sponsored by The Nation Institute and the Fertel Foundation, were awarded at a luncheon ceremony on April 3, 2008 at the Press Club in Washington, D.C. The 2008 Ridenhour Prizes were given to veteran journalist Bill Moyers (Courage Prize), author James D. Scurlock (Book Prize) and former Navy JAG officer Matthew Diaz (Prize for Truth-Telling). Named for the Vietnam era whistleblower Ron Ridenhour who exposed the truth of the My Lai massacre, the Ridenhour Prizes recognize those who have spoken out on behalf of the public interest, promoted social justice or illuminated a more just vision of society. For more complete information about The Ridenhour Prizes, as well as past and current winners, please visit www.ridenhour.org.
Read the rest of Bill Moyers speech here: http://www.nationinstitute.org/p/moyers_transcript
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Saundra Hummer

April 8th, 2008, 03:24 PM

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^^ ^ ^^ THE HILL
News from The Hill:
The Hill is liveblogging from the much-anticipated Petraeus hearings on Capitol Hill

--> Keep up with events as Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker testify to lawmakers about the American presence in Iraq.

> Read More

http://briefingroom.thehill.com

FROM THE BLOGS:
Petraeus Blogging: Worth It? - Ezra Klein, The American Prospect
100 Years of Qietude? - Josh Marshall, TalkingPointsMemo
Clinton: ‘Marking Time’ in Iraq – Mark Silva, The Swamp
So Long and Thanks for All the Fishy Polls – Sam Boyd, TAPPED
A Gender Shift in Pennsylvania? - Andrew Sullivan, The Atlantic
Required Reading 4/08/08 - Michael Goldfarb, The Weekly Standard
Key Statement from Petraeus - Amanda Carpenter, Townhall.com
Obama Now Lying about ‘100 Years’ Comment - Allahpundit, Hot Air
Primary Math - Michael Crowley, The Stump
Cred and Circuses - Christy Hardin Smith, Firedoglake

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Saundra Hummer

April 8th, 2008, 04:46 PM

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. . . . . . . State Dept. to Renew Blackwater's Security Contract in Iraq. . .After Blackwater operators opened fire on civilians in Baghdad last September, killing 17 and wounding more than 20 others, there was speculation that the controversial firm would be replaced by another security contractor when its five-year contract with the State Department expired in May. After all, initial investigations by the military and the FBI indicated that—contrary to Blackwater's version of events—its contractors were at fault in the shootings. "It was obviously excessive, it was obviously wrong," a military official told the Washington Post back in October. "The civilians that were fired upon, they didn't have any weapons to fire back at them. And none of the IP [Iraqi Police] or any of the local security forces fired back at them." For a company that has maintained that the actions of its contractors were justified, the steps it took immediately after the shootings certainly seemed suspicious. Initially, Blackwater said that damage to its vehicles would prove its side of the story—that its contractors were attacked and were simply defending themselves and their clients. Yet, after the incident, the company reportedly repainted and repaired its vehicles, destroying key evidence that could potentially exonerate the company.

While a cloud still hangs over Blackwater, and it remains the subject of multiple investigations, including one by Henry Waxman's House oversight committee, the State Department shocked some Blackwater watchers yesterday by announcing that it would renew the firm's contract for another year.

The State Department says it can terminate Blackwater's contract at any time—and that the results of the FBI's ongoing investigation, when released, could also affect Blackwater's deal. That said, it's fairly remarkable that State would endure what is sure to be an onslaught of bad PR just to keep Blackwater on the job in Iraq. But there's a reason the agency may be willing to weather the flack—it is scared that the job of guarding the civilians currently protected by Blackwater could fall to its Diplomatic Security branch, which is spread pretty thin as it is. According to the Washington Post, State has a total of 1,400 diplomatic security agents, which are stationed at various posts around the world. Blackwater, by comparison, has close to 1,000 contractors working in Iraq and the ability to deploy many more at a moment's notice. The truth is, the government has become so reliant on PSCs that it is likely willing to overlook a shooting here and a shooting there so long as it doesn't have to deploy its own to resources to do the very dangerous work of guarding diplomats and dignitaries (and, yes, members of the press).

But whether or not Blackwater's contractors are guilty of massacring civilians, there's a rather big problem with the State Department's decision to keep Blackwater on. Many Iraqis already believe that Blackwater, and other security firms, operate with complete impunity, shielded from any form of accountability for their actions, and the U.S. government has done nothing to dispel that notion. Now, by renewing Blackwater's contract, it probably only reinforced the already widespread belief that security contractors are above the law.

Last winter, as Bruce Falconer and I reported our recent story on Blackwater's sister company, Greystone, I rang up retired marine colonel T.X. Hammes, who served in Iraq during the early days of the war and who has been vocal in his belief that security contractors have no place there. He has nothing against Blackwater and said its operators are among the most well-trained and professional of the security contractors working in Iraq, something I've heard from numerous sources. But, he noted, the mission of security contractors—protecting their clients—is inherently in conflict with the military's overarching strategy in Iraq, which involves appealing to the hearts and minds of the people and paving the way for some form of political accommodation. You can imagine how security contractors can and have set these efforts back, when, for instance, they run cars off the road when they get too close to their convoys or, worse, when they wound or kill civilians. "I don't think they belong in an insurgency ever, or in a combat zone ever," Hammes told me. "In a counterinsurgency, essentially it's a competition for the legitimacy of the government. The government is legitimate if it can provide security and hope for a better future. But as part of that hope for a better future, there has to be a feeling that in some way that government is accountable to you.... Iraqis have known these guys will never be punished; they just leave the country." He added, "The very fact that you're using contractors undercuts the legitimacy of the government."
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Saundra Hummer

April 8th, 2008, 04:55 PM

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$$$$$$$
- - - US Lawmakers Invested in Iraq, Afghanistan Wars By
Abid Aslam
Inter Press Service
Monday 07 April 2008
Washington - U.S. lawmakers have a financial interest in military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, a review of their accounts has revealed.
Members of Congress invested nearly 196 million dollars of their own money in companies that receive hundreds of millions of dollars a day from Pentagon contracts to provide goods and services to U.S. armed forces, say nonpartisan watchdog groups.

David Petraeus, the top U.S. general in Iraq, is to brief the Senate Foreign Relations and Armed Services committees on Tuesday and Wednesday. The latest findings are unlikely to have a significant impact on this week's proceedings but could stoke anti-incumbent sentiment in this year of presidential and legislative elections.

Lawmakers charged with overseeing Pentagon contractors hold stock in those very firms, as do vocal critics of the war in Iraq, says the Centre for Responsive Politics (CRP).

Senator John Kerry, the Democrat from Massachusetts who staked his 2004 presidential bid in part on his opposition to the war, tops the list of investors. His holdings in firms with Pentagon contracts of at least five million dollars stood at between 28.9 million dollars and 38.2 million dollars as of Dec. 31, 2006. Kerry sits on the Senate foreign relations panel.

Members of Congress are required to report their personal finances every year but only need to state their assets in broad ranges.

Other top investors include Representative Rodney Frelinghuysen, a New Jersey Republican with holdings of 12.1 million - 49.1 million dollars; Rep. Robin Hayes, a North Carolina Republican (9.2 million - 37.1 million dollars); Republican Rep. James Sensenbrenner Jr. of Wisconsin (5.2 million - 7.6 million dollars); and Rep. Jane Harman, a California Democrat (2.7 million - 6.3 million dollars).

Sen. Jay Rockefeller, the Democrat and former governor of West Virginia who chairs the Senate Select Intelligence Committee, invested some 2.0 million dollars in Pentagon contractors, CRP says.

Other panel chiefs who invested in defence firms include Sen. Joseph Lieberman, the Connecticut Independent who presides over the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, and Rep. Howard Berman, the California Democrat who heads the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

In all, 151 current members of Congress - more than one-fourth of the total - have invested between 78.7 million dollars and 195.5 million dollars in companies that received defence contracts of at least 5.0 million dollars, according to CRP.

These companies received more than 275.6 billion dollars from the government in 2006, or 755 million dollars per day, says budget watchdog group OMB Watch.

The investments yielded lawmakers 15.8 million - 62 million dollars in dividend income, capital gains, royalties, and interest from 2004 through 2006, says CRP.

Not all the firms deal in arms or military equipment. Some make soft drinks or medical supplies and military contracts represent a small fraction of their revenues. Many are leaders in their industries and, as such, feature in the investment portfolios of millions of ordinary people who invest at least a portion of their savings in mutual funds, which in turn hold stocks in up to hundreds of companies.

"Giant corporations outside of the defence sector, such as Pepsico, IBM, Microsoft and Johnson & Johnson, have received defence contracts and are all popular investments for both members of Congress and the general public," says CRP.

"So common are these companies, both as personal investments and as defence contractors, it would appear difficult to build a diverse blue-chip stock portfolio without at least some of them," the group acknowledges.

If some of the stocks appear innocent, aides say legislators also are. Some did not buy the stocks in question but inherited them. Many hold them in blind trusts, so called because the investments are handled by independent entities, at least theoretically without the politicians' knowledge of how their assets are being managed.

Even so, according to CRP, owning stock in companies under contract with the Pentagon could prove "problematic for members of Congress who sit on committees that oversee defence policy and budgeting."

Members of the Senate Foreign Relations and Armed Services committees held 3.0 million - 5.1 million dollars in companies specialising in weapons and other exclusively military goods and services, it added.

Critics have assailed President George W. Bush and Vice President Richard Cheney for their ties to companies seen as benefiting from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Bush was characterised as pushing conflict in the interest of the oil fraternity whence he hailed.

Before becoming vice president, Cheney headed Halliburton, a major player in the oil services industry and the object of controversies involving political connections, government contracts, and business ethics.

Halliburton's subsidiary, Kellogg Brown & Root, was given multi-billion-dollar contracts to provide construction, hospitality, and other services to the U.S. military following the 2003 invasion of Iraq. The contracts drew fire because of Cheney's history and then-ongoing financial relationship with the firm, and because the company did not have to compete for the Pentagon's business. The firm was renamed KBR Inc. after Halliburton spun it off last year.
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/040808S.shtml
$$$$$ .

Saundra Hummer

April 8th, 2008, 05:10 PM

.
~~~~~~~
"Elections are won by men and women chiefly because most people vote against somebody rather than for somebody"

Franklin P. Adams
US journalist
1881-1960
~~~
"Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, and you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost."

John Quincy Adams,\
Eldest son of President John Adams
& Sixth president of the US
1767-1848
~~~
"In all history there is no war which was not hatched by the governments, the governments alone, independent of the interests of the people, to whom war is always pernicious even when successful."

Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy
Russian author
1828-1910
~~~
"Governments have never learned anything from history, or acted on principles deducted from it."

Hebbel
German poet & dramatist,
1813-1863
~~~
"The biggest lesson I learned from Vietnam is not to trust [our own] government statements. I had no idea until then that you could not rely on [them]"

James W. Fulbright
US senator
who initiated the international
exchange program for scholars
1905-1995
~~~
"In order to rally people, governments need enemies. They want us to be afraid, to hate, so we will rally behind them. And if they do not have a real enemy, they will invent one in order to mobilize us."

Thich Nhat Hanh,
Contemporary Vietnamese Buddhist monk,
peace activist and writer
~~~~~
.

Saundra Hummer

April 8th, 2008, 05:20 PM

.
^^^ ^^ ^^^
Secret US Plan for Military Future in Iraq
Document outlines powers but sets no time limit on troop presence
By
Seumas Milne
08/04/08 "The Guardian' -- --A confidential draft agreement covering the future of US forces in Iraq, passed to the Guardian, shows that provision is being made for an open-ended military presence in the country.

The draft strategic framework agreement between the US and Iraqi governments, dated March 7 and marked "secret" and "sensitive", is intended to replace the existing UN mandate and authorises the US to "conduct military operations in Iraq and to detain individuals when necessary for imperative reasons of security" without time limit.

The authorisation is described as "temporary" and the agreement says the US "does not desire permanent bases or a permanent military presence in Iraq". But the absence of a time limit or restrictions on the US and other coalition forces - including the British - in the country means it is likely to be strongly opposed in Iraq and the US.

Iraqi critics point out that the agreement contains no limits on numbers of US forces, the weapons they are able to deploy, their legal status or powers over Iraqi citizens, going far beyond long-term US security agreements with other countries. The agreement is intended to govern the status of the US military and other members of the multinational force.

Following recent clashes between Iraqi troops and Moqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi army in Basra, and threats by the Iraqi government to ban his supporters from regional elections in the autumn, anti-occupation Sadrists and Sunni parties are expected to mount strong opposition in parliament to the agreement, which the US wants to see finalised by the end of July. The UN mandate expires at the end of the year.

One well-placed Iraqi Sunni political source said yesterday: "The feeling in Baghdad is that this agreement is going to be rejected in its current form, particularly after the events of the last couple of weeks. The government is more or less happy with it as it is, but parliament is a different matter."

It is also likely to prove controversial in Washington, where it has been criticised by Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, who has accused the administration of seeking to tie the hands of the next president by committing to Iraq's protection by US forces.

The defence secretary, Robert Gates, argued in February that the planned agreement would be similar to dozens of "status of forces" pacts the US has around the world and would not commit it to defend Iraq. But Democratic Congress members, including Senator Edward Kennedy, a senior member of the armed services committee, have said it goes well beyond other such agreements and amounts to a treaty, which has to be ratified by the Senate under the constitution.

Administration officials have conceded that if the agreement were to include security guarantees to Iraq, it would have to go before Congress. But the leaked draft only states that it is "in the mutual interest of the United States and Iraq that Iraq maintain its sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence and that external threats to Iraq be deterred. Accordingly, the US and Iraq are to consult immediately whenever the territorial integrity or political independence of Iraq is threatened."

Significantly - given the tension between the US and Iran, and the latter's close relations with the Iraqi administration's Shia parties - the draft agreement specifies that the "US does not seek to use Iraq territory as a platform for offensive operations against other states".

General David Petraeus, US commander in Iraq, is to face questioning from all three presidential candidates on Capitol Hill today when he reports to the Senate on his surge strategy, which increased US forces in Iraq by about 30,000 last year.

Both Clinton and Democratic rival Barack Obama are committed to beginning troop withdrawals from Iraq. Republican senator John McCain has pledged to maintain troop levels until the country is secure.
Go on-site for the newest stats on the war, the costs, monetary and human, in both military and civilian. There are comments to view and add to as well as archives, etc. Just click on the following URL:

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info
^^ ^^ ^^ .

Saundra Hummer

April 8th, 2008, 07:15 PM

.A NEWSLETTER
NEWS DISSECTOR April 8, 2008
Something is Happening And You Don't Know?

Tom Nusbaumer, a journalist and a onetime marine back in the Vietnam days, called me today just as I was writing an angry letter that will do no good protesting The IFC Channel's refusal to run my film IN DEBT WE TRUST (after agreeing to do so.)

Regular IFC viewers can see how one more cable outlet has begun going down hill (ie. and down market) with a new programming thrust.

Tom could tell how discouraged I was. He wrote afterwards:

good talking to you. i feel for you, it's a damn struggle that never stops.

when in iraq i was with some marines and we were QRT (quick response team) to an VBIEB (vehicle borne IED) and there were body parts all over the fucking place. it was chaos. screaming, horror. 15 were dead, 2 babies, 35 plus wounded - marines were picking up hands and legs ? so i can't stop. we may not win Danny, but we can't stop.

keep going, man.

in respect,
tom

(SPEAKING OF CABLE: THE HISTORY CHANNEL FEELS ITS NAME IS TOO LONG FOR ITS VIEWERS TO REMEMBER. SO IT IS SHORTENING IT TO JUST "HISTORY." (The WAY FEDERAL EXPRESS BECAME JUST FEDEX.)

BUT WILL IT THEN TRADE MARK OR COPYRIGHT THAT NAME, SO THAT EVERY HISTORY DEPARTMENT IN THE WORLD HAS TO PAY THEM A LICENSE FEE?

IF THAT PROVES TOO HARD FOR VIEWERS TO REMEMBER, THEY CAN ALWAYS SHORTEN IT TO H. (THAT MAY BE TAKEN BY THE HEROIN INDUSTRY!) MAYBE PBS SHOULD BECOME JUST P?.IMAGAINE THE COP-CATTING TO COME?TALK ABOUT DUMBING DOWN?.

On to the blog.

DYLAN WINS PULITZER, MOYERS WINS RIDENHOUR WALL STREET FIGHTING BACK AGAINST FED "REFORMS"
PETRAEUS SPINS TODAY: WILL HE HAVE A NEW WAR PRETEXT?

We begin today with some congratulations to media award winners. The Pulitzer Prizes were announced yesterday and went as they usually to do predictable big time mainstream media outlets-6 to the Washington Post, Another 2 to the NY Times.

Yawn.

But this year, something new was added-an "honorary" Pulitzer to singer Bob Dylan who the judges honored for his "profound impact on popular music and American culture, marked by lyrical compositions of extraordinary poetic power."

Needless to say, there was no official comment on the songs that Dylan wrote based on the news-on World War 2, Masters of War, Ballad of Hattie Carrol, Hurricane Carter-and so many others that delved into current events with so much more clarity and depth than most journalists ever show. It was Dylan who also sang famously in response to inane questions from a reporter from Time Magazine, "something is happening, and you don't know what it is, do you Mr. Jones?"

Dylan came to public notice at age 20 when reviewer Bob Shelton of the NY Times covered his show in Greenwich Village, so he owed a lot to to the press even though he later transcended it At a time when journalists have lost so much respect this recognition may do more for the credibility of the Pulitzer Prizes than for Dylan who has all the recognition anyone can want.

If he wants to make a statement about the decline of the media, he might want to give it back. Now that would send some ripples into the mediasphere.

In fact, several years ago, Gary Schapiro wrote a piece in the New York Sun titled "Does Bob Dylan Deserve the Pulitzer?" That was in 2004.

The article was about a classical music seminar: "I don't think Bob Dylan needs a Pulitzer Prize," said a classical music critic at the San Francisco Chronicle, Joshua Kosman. Greg Sandow of NewMusicBox.com concurred, but argued that the prize needs Dylan."

How right he was.

MOYERS WINS RIDENHOUR COURAGE AWARD
Another award winner announced today was the winner or the Ridenhour prize., named after Ron Ridenhour, the soldier-journalist who actually broke the Mylai Massacre, and funded not by a media luminary but by Randy Fertel of New Orleans, one of the supporters of my film WMD. The Nation's Ham Fish wrote to tell us about it:

"Bill Moyers is the recipient of the 2008 Ridenhour Courage Prize, given in recognition of his fierce embrace of the public interest, his advocacy of media pluralism, and the unyielding moral voice he has contributed to our national discourse.

"The job of trying to tell the truth about people whose job it is to hide the truth is almost as complicated and difficult as trying to hide it in the first place. We journalists are of course obliged to cover the news, but our deeper mission is to uncover the news that powerful people would prefer to keep hidden."

A PULITZER FOR DELUSION TO JOHN MCCAIN FOR HIS QUOTE OF THE DAY: "The United States is "no longer staring into the abyss of defeat" in Iraq

A PULITZER FOR BEST SUM UP OF THE WAR FOR EXPLAINING THAT HIS UNIT'S RAID ON SADR CITY WAS TO FLUSH OUT "KNUCKLEHEADS" ABC DESCRIBED THEN FOLKS THERE AS ANTI-AMERICAN AS IF TO JUSTIFY THE BLOODY RAID.

SADR HIMSELF, NOW NO DOUBT, THEIR "KNUCLEHEAD IN CHIEF" CALLS FOR DIALOGIUE. HE IS CALLED A "RADICAL" BY THE PULITZER PRIZE WINNING WASHINGTON POST. HOW RADICAL?..

WP BAGHDAD - Aides to Muqtada al-Sadr called Monday for dialogue to resolve a violent standoff with the Iraqi government, saying that the radical Shiite cleric would disband his militia if senior religious leaders order himto.

AP: Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top military commander in Iraq, and U.S. Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker reports to Congress today on Iraq's progress.

AP tells us what he will say:

WASHINGTON - The four-star general in charge of Iraq wants more time in a war that is now in its sixth year. Democrats say he's got until the November elections.

Gen. David Petraeus planned to testify Tuesday on the war for the first time in seven months. He was expected to tell two Senate committees that last year's influx of 30,000 troops in Iraq had helped calm some of the sectarian violence but that to prevent a backslide in security, troops would likely be needed in large numbers through the end of the year.

Under his proposal, as many as 140,000 troops could be in Iraq when voters head to the polls this fall.

Note: The United States has spent more than $22 billion to build up Iraq's security forces, but they are unable to quell the militias and the resistance?..The press accounts omits the resistance and calls them just "militias."

(Anyone been watching JOHN ADAMS on HBO? This sounds like the way that the British occupation forces in Boston described the farmers who fought them?We live in a country that forgets its own history?and don't rely on the channel called HISTORY to remind us).

Time to take a lesson from folks in the former MOTHER COUNTRY:

STOP THE WAR MOVEMENT COMMENTS IN LONDON:

"As hundreds of thousands of Iraqis came onto the streets in
towns and cities across the country to call for the
occupiers to leave, it was clear that the Iraqi government
had suffered a humiliating defeat, at which point the attack
was no longer a "defining moment" for Bush and his
administration. These protests showed that, despite the US
policy to foment communal tensions, the main division in
Iraqi society is between pro- and anti-occupation forces.
The widely popular cleric Moqtada al-Sadr has now called for
a million strong demonstration this week against the
occupation."

ALSO FROM THE UK:

Researcher Sarah Meyer carefully tracks the sequence of events in connection with the fighting in Basra and asks if it is a prelude to an attack on Iran, It is essential to follow the chronologies here. Read this.

DOUGLAS FEITH: Pentagon Insider Tells 60 Minutes U.S. Attack On Iraq Was Anticipatory Self-Defense; Not 9/11 Retaliation. Add the term ASD to our lexicon of deceptive intitials?like WMD.

ROLE OF IRAN IN IRAQ: (VIA UNDERNEWS)

M K BHADRAKUMAR, ASIA TIMES By all accounts, Iran played a decisive role in hammering out the peace deal among the Shi'ite factions in Iraq. A bloody week of human killing on the Tigris River ended on Sunday. Details are sketchy, however, since they must come from non-Iranian sources. Tehran keeps silent about its role. . .

It appears that one of the most shadowy figures of the Iranian security establishment, General Qassem Suleimani, commander of the Quds Force of Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps personally mediated in the intra-Iraqi Shi'ite negotiations. Suleimani is in charge of the IRGC's operations abroad.

US military commanders routinely blame the Quds for all their woes in Iraq. The fact that the representatives of Da'wa and SIIC secretly traveled to Qom under the very nose of American and British intelligence and sought Quds mediation to broker a deal conveys a huge political message. Iran signals that security considerations rather than politics or religion prevailed.

But the politics of the deal are all too apparent. Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, who was camping in Basra and personally supervising the operations against the Mahdi Army, was not in the loop about the goings-on. As for US President George W Bush, he had just spoken praising Maliki for waging a "historic and decisive" battle against the Mahdi Army, which he said was "a defining moment" in the history of a "free Iraq". Both Maliki and Bush look very foolish. . .

IRAN WANTS TO TALK

A new WorldPublicOpinion.org polls finds that although Iranians continue to view the United States negatively, they strongly support steps to improve US-Iran relations including direct talks, greater access for each others' journalists, increased trade and more cultural, educational and athletic exchanges.

While majorities of Iranians think the United States threatens Iran and is hostile to Islam, these numbers have diminished over the past year. A growing number?now two out of three?believe it is possible for Islam and the West to find common ground.

"It appears that as the sense of threat has subsided, there has been some thawing of Iranian hostility and a greater readiness to enter into closer relations with the United States," said Steven Kull, director of WorldPublicOpinion.org.

WAR IS NOT BEING WON

MCAIN'S SON COMPARED TO PRINCE HARRY AT THE FRONT

NY SUN: Obama Adviser Calls for Troops To Stay in Iraq Through 2010

WASHINGTON - A key adviser to Senator Obama's campaign is recommending in a confidential paper that America keep between 60,000 and 80,000 troops in Iraq as of late 2010, a plan at odds with the public pledge of the Illinois senator to withdraw combat forces from Iraq within 16 months of taking office? This is not the first time the opinion of an adviser to the Obama campaign has differed with the candidate's stated Iraq policy.

ROBERT PARRY: US HAS GONE MAD

Ritter says White House preparing for war in Iran

British fear US commander is beating the drum for Iran strikes

DEATH BY PAPARRAZI

Will the media take any responsibility for its role in creating these celebrity circuses?

LONDON - A coroner's jury has ruled that Princess Diana and boyfriend Dodi Fayed were unlawfully killed through the reckless actions of their driver and the paparazzi in 1997.
The jury had been told that a verdict of unlawful killing would mean that they believed the reckless behavior of their driver and paparazzi amounted to manslaughter. It was the most serious verdict available to them Monday.

The couple died when their speeding car slammed into a concrete pillar while it was being chased by photographers in cars and on motorbikes.

NYT: Olympic Torch Run in Paris Halted as Protests Spread

Thousands of demonstrators massed to protest the relay, and the torch went out several times, forcing the police to place it on a bus.

China Meets with The International Olympic Committee Today.

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Four In Ten Americans "Putting Their Lives On Hold"

EUROPEAN LEFT PROTESTS FINANCE CAPITAL

FROM A PETITION:
"Freedom for finance is destroying society. Every day, in both North and South, shareholders silently pressure firms and workers to extract higher and higher returns.
The situation becomes dramatically visible when major crises display the excesses of speculative greed and its backlash on growth and employment"

Investment News: Nervous Americans put lives on hold

Four in 10 American adults are holding off on major life decisions because they are
worried about the economy.

COLLAPSE OF THE MIDDLE CLASS?

Distinguished law scholar Elizabeth Warren teaches contract law,
bankruptcy, and commercial law at Harvard Law School. She is an outspoken
critic of America's credit economy, which she has linked to the continuing
rise in bankruptcy among the middle-class. WATCH!

IN: Regulatory reorganization won't fix incompetence issue

The Department of the Treasury's "blueprint" for a new regulatory structure isn't a fix for the credit crisis.

Advisers gear up to battle Treasury

The financial advice industry's leading trade groups are preparing a counterattack on the Treasury Department's proposal to have investment advisers regulated by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority Inc.

Clif Droke: MARKET ORACLE COMMENTS ON DEVELOPMENTS

You can always tell the underlying reason for any crisis by waiting to see what the results of that crisis are. In the final analysis, the results, as he pointed out, are in what the crisis fomenters expected to yield as the fruit of their labors. And it's no coincidence that in every case, a financial crisis always yields the following results:

1.) Greater consolidation within the banking and financial industry with the smaller players being merged into the bigger players, or else swept away;

2.) Greater regulator powers for the monetary authorities.

There has never been an exception to this outcome in the history of U.S. financial crises.

BUFFALO NEWS: Mortgages Can Be Modified, Payments Can Be Altered: The

Apr. 6?Government agencies, national nonprofits and mortgage lenders insist they're taking real steps to help solve the nation's unprecedented mortgage mess. At the most basic level, individual lenders still work one-on-one with their borrowers, seeking creative solutions such as doubling the length of repayment plans to give borrowers time to catch up. .

MIAMI HERALD: Bill Would Lower Fees for Mortgage Brokers

Apr. 5?TALLAHASSEE - Applying to be a mortgage broker in Florida may soon become cheaper if a bill moving through the state House gets the approval of the full Legislature. This comes in a tight financial year when the state is expected to slash $5 billion from its budget, and when mortgage brokers are receiving part of the blame for Florida's immense housing crisis. "We are not in favor of such action," said D. Ritch Workman, president of the Florida Association of Mortgage Brokers.

BANK FAILURES COMING

The Real Estate market has hit the wall, as space occupied by retailers fell for the first time in decades. This suggests some major bank failures are just around the corner

NATION'S TOP BANK REGULATOR: WE BLEW IT

The government didn't do enough to prevent the current crisis in the mortgage industry, and it will need more authority to be able to effectively end it, the head of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. told a Charlotte audience Thursday night.

"We should have been on top of our game," said Sheila Bair, the FDIC's chairwoman since 2006, speaking at a conference sponsored by the UNC School of Law's Center for Banking and Finance.

Her term at the FDIC comes during a tumultuous time for the financial industry, and Bair indicated that the pain isn't over. "What can I say?" she asked. "It's going to be a bad year." In one of the latest signs of an economic slowdown, the American Bankers Association reported Thursday that consumer credit delinquencies had reached their highest levels in 15 years.

FOOD CRISIS GROWS WORLDWIDE AS COMMODITY PRICES RISE:

There have been food riots in Haiti. Al Jazeera reports:

"We are hungry,'' some protesters shouted, while others carried posters saying: "Down with the expensive life."

PRISON BREAK IN MOROCCO

BBC:Nine people convicted of involvement with suicide bombings in Casablanca have escaped from a Moroccan prison, officials say.

Prison authorities at Kenitra, 40km (25 miles) north of the capital, Rabat, noticed the escape on Monday morning, the Justice Ministry told state media.

An interior ministry source told AFP news agency that the prisoners had tunnelled their way out.

The 2003 attacks left 45 people dead, including 12 bombers, and many injured.

Most of the nine men were serving life sentences for involvement in the bombings,

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Media News: Tracking the Industry's Fall

DEAN BAKER: COVERING THE ECONOMY (TomPaine.com)

The Post Gets the Foreclosure Bill Right

Remarkably, the Post editorial writers seem to be the only ones who have noticed that the Senate "Foreclosure Prevention" bill will give banks an incentive to carry through foreclosures. The bill would give a $7,000 tax credit to buyers of foreclosed properties.

While there could be some rationale to having a credit like this for homes that had already been foreclosed and been allowed to deteriorate, it makes no sense to allow the credit to apply to homes where the process has not yet been completed. This effectively gives banks an incentive to carry through the foreclosure instead of trying to work out new terms with the homeowner

Give the Post credit for catching this one, almost no one else did.

Boston Globe to Combine Business Sections

The Sunday edition of the New York Times Co.'s Boston Globe plans to combine its Business & Money and Careers sections. The Globe also will drop the publication of weekly stock and fund listings, joining other major newspapers that have moved those tables online and elsewhere.

Breaking Through the News Filter

By: Peter Chamberlin

American media dispenses misinformation which promotes the idea of world war against the Muslims, while systematically censoring international news content to propagate the idea of "bad Muslims."

WHY IS NY TIME REPORTER IN JAIL IN ZIMBABWE?

B&C: WHERE HAVE THE TV CRITICS GONE?
The fraternity of the nation's television critics at daily newspapers was once a thriving milieu, dominated by a great diversity of committed voices. The critics' opinions were sought, revered - in many cases, even feared - and blurbed in network on-air promos. That reality has changed drastically of late as the ranks of critics have grown noticeably leaner.

YAHOO WANT$ MORE

FT: Yahoo has positioned itself for the endgame in its battle with Microsoft by issuing its strongest rejection to date of its rival's $42bn takeover offer. However, analysts said the rhetoric from both sides suggested a negotiated settlement might happen, with Microsoft offering a deal worth more than its initial $31 a share. Yahoo's swift response to Microsoft's move to set a deadline on Saturday of three weeks to conclude an agreement came in the form of a "Dear Steve" letter to Steve Ballmer, Microsoft's chief executive, from his Yahoo counterpart, Jerry Yang, and Roy Bostock, chairman of the board.

China allows access to English Wikipedia

Chinese authorities appeared to have lifted a block on the English-language version of online encyclopedia Wikipedia, but politically sensitive topics such as Tibet and Tiananmen Square are still off limits. Internet users in Beijing and Shanghai confirmed on Saturday that they could access the English-language version of one of the world's most popular websites, but the Chinese language version was still restricted. While searches of random topics such as .Johann Sebastian Bach. and .dim sum. brought up English-language articles, sensitive words such as Tibet were met with a message that the browser was unable to connect to the Internet. The move comes after International Olympic Committee (IOC) inspectors told Beijing organizers that the Internet must be open for the duration of the 2008 Olympics and that blocking it .would reflect very poorly. on the host country. (Reuters)
WP: BUSH ADMIN INTIMIDATING PRESS

HOW NICE
"Harry's Bar of Venice, in an effort to make the American victims of subprime loans happier, has decided to give them a special 20 percent discount on all items of the menu during the short term of their recovery."

Your News Dissector Interviewed in Alternet Report on the Federal Reserve Bank

HOW NOT SO NICE

The New Yorker's Financial Columnist on the Debt Burden. The CRUSHING debt burden.

NOTE TO READER WHO ASKED ABOUT BUSH'S "SABBATICAL"?The item was from the Washington POX, a humor publication.

I am off to London this evening. Back next Monday, Will try to keep my keyboard in.

Comments to dissector@mediachannel.org

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.

Saundra Hummer

April 9th, 2008, 10:59 AM

.
.+.+.+.+.+.LEADING THE NEWS
Pelosi to prevent Colombia vote
By
Alexander Bolton
Posted: 04/09/08 11:56 AM [ET]

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) announced Wednesday that Democrats will use House rules to prevent a vote on the controversial Colombia free trade agreement.
Pelosi said Democrats decided in a closed-door caucus meeting Wednesday morning to vote on a rule this week to postpone consideration of the controversial trade deal. Pelosi predicted the trade agreement would fail otherwise.

"The rules of the House govern the proceedings in the House of Representatives," Pelosi told reporters.

President Bush sent legislation implementing the deal to Congress on Tuesday in an effort to force a vote on the deal, which is opposed by the AFL-CIO and other labor unions because of violence in Colombia against union organizers.

The deal was signed before the so-called fast-track law expired. Trade deals sent to Congress under fast-track rules cannot be amended, and must be voted on within 90 legislative days.

But for months, followers of the deal have speculated that Pelosi might use the House Rules Committee to try to avoid a vote by arguing that the fast-track law cannot take precedence over House rules.

Some Republicans have accused Pelosi, who is under pressure from labor unions and much of her caucus to oppose the deal, of "cheating" by scheduling a rule change to circumvent fast-track.

"That's not true," she said. "I honor rules."

Pelosi told reporters Wednesday that she warned President Bush not to send the trade agreement to Congress but said he ignored her advice.

While the move was not completely unexpected, its timing is somewhat surprising. Pelosi made the announcement hours before a meeting on the economy between President Bush and House and Senate leaders from both parties.

Pelosi said that Americans' buying power has fallen as the result of a weakened dollar at a time when the costs of consumer goods have gone up.

http://thehill.com/index2.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=72522&pop=1&page=0&Itemid=70 .+.+.+. .

Saundra Hummer

April 9th, 2008, 11:03 AM

.
.*.*.*.*.*.
SPIEGEL ONLINE

PMSINISTER KEEPERS OF THE FLAME
Controversy over 'Thuggish' Chinese Olympic Torch Guards
By
Alexander Schwabe
04/09/2008 12:03

Amid all the protests surrounding the Olympic torch relay, many people are asking who the sinister troop of Chinese torch guards in their blue track suits really are -- and why they were allowed on the streets of London and Paris.

They outraged and they confused when they emerged on the world stage as torch bearers carried the Olympic flame through Paris and London. So just who were the Chinese men in blue and white tracksuits, white baseball caps, black fanny packs and, in some cases, sunglasses?

They appeared to serve as bodyguards of the Olympic flame, extinguishing and relighting it as they saw fit. And if anyone got in the way or too close to the flame -- pro-Tibet protestors, for example -- they could also get rough. And when this happened, they would quickly take the Olympic flame away from the torch bearers and transfer it to a bus in order to protect it from protesters. Protecting the flame or not, though, their harsh manner provoked protests in London and Paris.

"There's no way people like that should be allowed on our streets," Damian Hockney of London's Metropolitan Police told the conservative London paper the Daily Mirror. "If the parade cannot happen without UK police handling security alone it shouldn't happen at all. Who checked these people out?" His colleague Jenny Jones added: "I am curious what their status was and how far they would have gone. They looked mean. It was disturbing."

DER SPIEGEL
Graphic: Playing with fire
When asked to describe the torch guards by the BBC, TV presenter Konnie Huq, who also served as a torch bearer in London, said: "The men in blue perplexed everyone. Nobody seemed to know who they were. They were very robotic, full-on, and I noticed them having skirmishes with our own police and the Olympic authorities."

According to Huq's account, the Chinese torch guards called the shots: "They were barking orders like 'Run! Stop!', and I was like, 'Who are these people?' They kept pushing my hand higher when I was holding the torch."

The double Olympic gold medalist Sebastian Coe, who is head of the organizing committee for the 2012 Games in London, was reportedly overheard by British media describing the men as "thugs."

But there was apparently a clear division of duties in London, and officials appeared to have been briefed on the torch guards' role. A Scotland Yard spokesman quoted by the Mirror said: "Our responsibility was the safe passage of the torch bearer. Theirs was to maintain the flame. They were not employed by the Metropolitan Police."

According to the Daily Mirror, the torch guards belong to elite special forces units of the Chinese military, with some having been recruited from the much-feared Flying Dragons and Sword of Southern China counter-terrorism units. The newspaper quoted a "European military source" on the units' training practices: "A lot of recruits die within weeks. It is bloody and brutal."

Chinese state media, meanwhile, portray the torch guards as less sinister. The agents are described as "employees of the Beijing Organizing Committee," which founded a "flame protection squad" in August 2007. The unit is responsible for guarding the flame 24 hours a day along its 85,000-mile (140,000-kilometer), 130-day journey around the globe, according to Reuters.

According to Chinese media, the agents are members of the paramilitary People's Armed Police, which in China is responsible for fighting unrest and maintaining internal stability. Tens of thousands of the "Wujing," as the People's Armed Police are called in Chinese, recently took part in crackdowns against demonstrators in Tibet and neighboring regions.

AP
China's flame guards: "There's no way people like that should be allowed on our streets."
"These men, chosen from around the country, are each tall and large and are eminently talented and powerful," the squad's leader Zhao Si was quoted as saying. "Their outstanding physical quality is not in the slightest inferior to that of specialized athletes." Some of the men run up to 50 kilometers a day, one article in state media said, and many are said to speak several languages, including English, French, Spanish, Japanese and German.

The squad is apparently divided into two parts: one 30-member team is accompanying the torch during its international journey, while the other team, which has around 40 guards, will protect the flame as it travels through China on its way to Beijing.

Even four years ago, the security forces protecting the Olympic torch were the source of controversy. When the flame was carried through the Olympic cities of Sydney and Melbourne in the run-up to the Athens Games, the Australian authorities argued with the organizers of the Olympic Games about the fact that Greek officers were providing the security for the torch. Australia prohibits foreigners from working as security officials in the country.

Australia's Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has now announced that the Chinese security officers will not be allowed to accompany the torch in his country. Rudd, who considers Australian officials more than capable of protecting the torch, said there was no reason why China needed to use its own security team when the torch was carried through Canberra on April 24.

The German Olympic Sports Federation, for its part, claims to know nothing about the background of the Chinese torch guards. A spokesman said the International Olympic Committee did not have jurisdiction on security questions during the torch relay. "The event organizers are responsible for organizing the torch relay," the spokesman told SPIEGEL ONLINE. Everything between the ignition of the flame in Olympia, and the lighting of the flame in the Olympic Stadium in Beijing, was the responsibility of the Beijing Organizing Committee, the spokesman said.

URL:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,546285,00.html
RELATED SPIEGEL ONLINE LINKS:
Photo Gallery: Olympic Protests in Paris
http://www.spiegel.de/fotostrecke/0,5538,30468,00.html
Olympics in Chains: China Loses Control of the Games (04/08/2008)
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,546156,00.html
Photo Gallery: The Human Rights Games
http://www.spiegel.de/fotostrecke/0,5538,30462,00.html
Flames of Protest: Organizers Cut Short Olympic Torch Relay in Paris (04/07/2008)
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,545807,00.html
SPIEGEL 360: Our Full Coverage of China
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,k-7214,00.html
© SPIEGEL ONLINE 2008
All Rights Reserved
Reproduction only allowed with the permission of SPIEGELnet GmbH

Saundra Hummer

April 9th, 2008, 11:57 AM

.* * * * *SPIEGEL ONLINE
THE DRAGON'S BLUNDER
Tibet Has Caught China by Surprise
By
Erich Follath
04/09/2008 04:35 PM

China has burned its fingers on the Olympic flame as the international spotlight is shone on its human rights record in Tibet. Still, German politicians should refrain from overwrought gestures such as an Olympic boycott and instead continue to engage both Beijing and the Dalai Lama in dialogue.

AFP
A Chinese paramilitary policeman stands guard near the Forbidden City in Beijing.
Go on-site to view.

This is China's year, the year of the rat, which symbolizes strength and endurance in the Chinese lunar calendar. 2008 is a very special year in China. It is a watershed year, a landmark year and a year the Chinese have been looking forward to for a long time. It is the year that China, as planned by its political leaders, has moved to the center of global interest.

But in the past few, dramatic weeks, the People's Republic has entered the international spotlight under completely different circumstances than the Communist Party strategists in Beijing had planned. China is undoubtedly at the center of world interest, but mostly because it has become the target of severe international criticism. Should the Olympic Games, or at least the opening ceremony, be boycotted? What do the bloody events in Tibet say about the People's Republic of China as a "partner" and about the chances of integrating it into the international community of democracies? And is there a suitable response for German politicians to take, a middle road between a counterproductive display of strength ("Impose an economic boycott") and moral cowardice ("Spare Beijing's feelings")?

The Chinese Communist Party had carefully organized the sequence of events down to the very last detail: a jubilant People's Congress in March, the triumphant arrival of the Olympic flame and, on Aug. 8, the gala opening ceremony of the Summer Olympics, with the key Western politicians in attendance. China's aim was to play the glamorous host, and it was intent on all of its guests marveling at the impressive Olympic facilities and admiring Beijing as a new international metropolis. Its plan was to present a manifestation of political power, reinforced, to the greatest extent possible, by athletic triumphs and a strong showing in the gold medal count. Look at us, China hoped to say, "we are back in the fold of the world's most important and modern nations, and we have moved up alongside the United States as a new world power. We are even the world's leader in some areas."

The Central Committee planners had thought of so many things in their campaigns to promote civility ("wenming"), even instructing Beijing residents to give up their habit of spitting in public and police officers to wave more pleasantly. But there was one thing the political calligraphers, in their obsession with detail, had ignored: the big picture. They had apparently believed it impossible that their own people, or rather, one of the "national minorities," would rise up against them. The regime has forcefully subjugated its minorities over the course of history and believed them, by virtue of material concessions, to have been pacified long ago. But they failed to realize that the vast majority of Tibetans are more interested in religious freedom than improving their standard of living; that they feel increasingly like strangers in their own homeland, robbed of their cultural identity; and that they are prepared to risk their livelihoods for their spiritual and political leader, who has been living in exile for the past 49 years.

The current situation also brings to light a misunderstanding to which many in the West succumbed, especially those who did business with Beijing's pragmatic and economically cosmopolitan rulers in recent years. But during the days of the crisis, China's leadership demonstrated that it is everything but an enlightened power that brings order to the region, rules with political means and cares about world opinion. Instead, the Communist Party bosses crushed the peaceful demonstrations of monks -- and later the violent demonstrations of angry youth -- with yesterday's tools of power. Their implements of choice included tanks and handcuffs, a news blackout and a slanderous campaign against the Dalai Lama reminiscent of the worst days of the Cultural Revolution. In the words of the head of the Communist Party in the so-called Tibet Autonomous Region, the Tibetan leader and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, along with his "clique," is a "wolf in monk's robes, a devil with a human face" and was responsible for everything that happened in Tibet.

China has suffered a "relapse" many had believed was no longer possible, a relapse that is perhaps more normal than not for a leadership that is obsessed with a fear of national disintegration and has now destroyed any illusions. On its face, China has changed dramatically. Its cities seem more modern even than some cities in the West. But in its interior and at the core of its being, the People's Republic -- whenever it feels existentially threatened by chaos -- is still a police state. The Communist Party does not see its citizens as politically mature equals, but only as subjects. A straight and, unfortunately, unbroken line leads from the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre to today's reality.

One of Beijing's current, and preposterous, pronouncements is that China is proud of the way it "dealt with" the problem of rebellious Tibetans. But if there is one thing that the People's Republic can be proud of it is this: In no other country on earth have so many people risen out of extreme poverty in such a relatively short time -- close to 250 million people in about 30 years. Despite China's growing problems, economic growth, which has averaged about 10 percent a year since the early 1980s, is still breathtaking, and the world benefits from the entrepreneurial spirit and investment activity of the Chinese. Those who do not "interfere" in politics enjoy relatively generous opportunities to acquire wealth.

A PR Disaster for Beijing
Nothing makes the Chinese as self-confident -- and rightly so -- as the fact that they have shaken off the yoke of foreign domination and, thanks to their own efforts, have become a major power once again. But it is an irony that apparently escapes party leaders that they themselves are now in the process of becoming an international pariah because of China's role as a colonial power in Tibet. Meanwhile, the Communist Party continues to entangle itself in further, outlandish contradictions. On the one hand, it claims that the Tibetans have forgotten the 14th Dalai Lama and that he is an irrelevant factor in the power structure. On the other hand, it paints a greatly exaggerated picture of him as an important enemy, as a "divider of the nation" and as the inciter of the unrest in Tibet. The Communist Party calls traditional Tibetan culture backward, and yet it insists that Tibet has always been an integral part of the Han Chinese empire.

Beijing's leadership either fails to recognize or chooses to ignore the dangers of its policy. The Communist Party leaders foment hatred, not just within the "minority" on the rooftop of the world, with their one-sided accusations against the Tibetans and against the Western media as their supposedly malicious collaborators. They unleash almost unbridled chauvinism among the Han Chinese, who make up about 92 percent of China's population of 1.3 billion. Party leaders have already played with fire twice: during the Kosovo war in 1999, when American NATO troops bombed the Chinese embassy in Belgrade, they unleashed angry nationalists; a similar situation developed in 2005, when Japan sought to downplay its wartime massacres of the Chinese in new schoolbooks. In both cases, the police tried to keep the protests under control, but failed. The numbers of demonstrators grew quickly, and the whipped-up crowds smashed windows and upended cars. The authorities managed to restore order, but with difficulty. Does Beijing's leadership want to risk similar riots leading up to the Olympics? And how does it expect to put the nationalistic genie back in the bottle once it has been released?

Beijing is already in the midst of a PR disaster. Perhaps the Communist Party leaders could not have anticipated the vehemence of the Tibetan protests, but they must have known that the international community would focus on the human rights situation in China ahead of the games. This is why it is so incomprehensible that the Chinese leadership, which had expressly promised the International Olympic Committee the "improvement of the human rights situation" when Beijing submitted its bid for the 2008 Summer Olympics, reacted to the protests with such brutality and obvious lack of preparation.

The party is now paying for the fact that it is hardly ever confronted with a critical public -- and one that could have warned it of risks. It apparently failed to understand that today's world -- in contrast to the world in 1936, when Nazi Germany hosted the games in Berlin, and even the world of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre -- is shaped by the media. Beijing has already lost the fight for the images that determine whether hearts and minds will be won. The PR professionals working for Tibetan aid societies and international human rights groups have literally put China's leadership on display. They have skillfully pulled out all the stops when it comes to nonviolent resistance, demonstratively unfurling their banners on the Great Wall of China and even applying for IOC approval of a Tibetan Olympic team. Thanks to their protests, the torch relay around the world will likely become more like the running of the gauntlet for China.

Should we gloat over the humiliation of the People's Republic, as it burns its fingers on the Olympic flame? Should we secretly rejoice over the fact that Beijing's leaders have only themselves to blame for returning China to the group of pariah nations, or even antagonize them with an Olympic boycott, possibly even tied to economic sanctions?

This would be entirely the wrong approach. German politicians ought to do everything in their power to strengthen the voices of reason in China and support the faction in the Politburo -- apparently still a minority -- intent on de-escalation. This cannot be achieved through chest-beating and crowing. Anyone considering an economic boycott against China is naïve. Beijing's ability to use its billions in investments in German corporations and US treasury bonds as a retaliatory tool and destroy Western economies with irrational reactions is more potent than any actions the West could take.

Anyone who wishes to boycott Chinese toys should know that in addition to making his own children unhappy (80 percent of high-tech toys, for example, are made in the People's Republic), he would be depriving millions of workers of their jobs -- with unforeseeable consequences.

Instead, what is needed is the lever that allows Beijing to abandon its repressive policies and its demonization of minorities, and to enter into negotiations with the Dalai Lama. In light of the most recent violence in his native Tibet, the spiritual and political leader of the Tibetans has also advised against an Olympic boycott. Everything should be done to strengthen his position against his detractors in the People's Republic and with the radicalizing youth within his own ranks. The Dalai Lama is not only the Tibetans' best hope, but also that of the Chinese. Instead of a divider of the nation, as the Communist Party insinuates, he is a peacemaker willing to approach the limits of compromise.

The End of Sycophancy
In an interview with SPIEGEL, the Dalai Lama has already outlined his view of a possible solution to the conflict. "Give us true autonomy! Defense, foreign policy and economic strategy can remain the responsibility of the central government," His Holiness said. If this happens, he said, there would "no further conflicts" surrounding him. He would transfer his "historic authority" to the local government in Lhasa and restrict himself to spiritual duties as a "simple monk." China's leaders will never get a better deal, especially not if the 14th Dalai Lama, who is now 72, dies and, possibly, decrees that there is to be no rebirth or that it should only occur in exile. For Beijing, the alternative is a policy of repression leading to recurring unrest, which could inflame other dissatisfied ethnic groups.

The German government and the public could help bring this vision closer to reality -- not with overwrought opposition, but with small, deliberate steps. For more than eight years now, the German government has conducted a "Constitutional State Dialogue" with the Chinese. Beijing is very interested in this program, because it includes seminars on matters of judicial administration, patent and labor law. During upcoming negotiations in Munich in late April, German Justice Minister Brigitte Zypries should make a continuation of the dialogue dependent on human rights and minority issues becoming a focus of the talks, and on German members of parliament and journalists being allowed to travel freely in Tibet to gain an unbiased impression of the situation. The Dalai Lama is coming to Germany in mid-May for a private lecture series, but an appointment in Berlin is not on the agenda. The German president should change this and invite the Dalai Lama to a meeting at his official residence -- a gesture of solidarity and sovereignty.

As far as the games in Beijing are concerned: Please, no German politicians, not anywhere. And the athletes should be assured that civil courage and political expressions of opinion are more important than the muzzle demanded by IOC officials and defined in the organization's statutes a few days ago -- even if it costs them their medals. The time of sycophancy must come to an end if the Olympic idea is to be saved.

Erich Follath is a SPIEGEL editor and the author of the current biography of the Dalai Lama, "The Legacy of the Dalai Lama."

Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan
URL:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,546392,00.html

RELATED SPIEGEL ONLINE LINKS: Olympics in Chains: China Loses Control of the Games (04/08/2008)
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,546156,00.html
Sinister Keepers of the Flame: Controversy over 'Thuggish' Chinese Olympic Torch Guards (04/09/2008)
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,546285,00.html
Photo Gallery: The Human Rights Games
http://www.spiegel.de/fotostrecke/0,5538,30462,00.html
Interview with Chinese Dissident Liu Xiaobo: 'If the Games Fail, Human Rights Will Suffer' (04/07/2008)
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,545892,00.html
The World From Berlin: Olympic Flame Now 'Symbolizes Repressive Regime' (04/08/2008)
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,546078,00.html
Truth or Propaganda?: A War of Words over Tibet (04/01/2008)
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,544626,00.html
'Unstable Factors': In Western Provinces, Chinese Authorities Eye Tibetans with Suspicion (03/31/2008)
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,544484,00.html
Avoiding the Olympics: Who's Going to the Games? (03/28/2008)
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,544067,00.html

© SPIEGEL ONLINE 2008
All Rights Reserved . . . . . .

Saundra Hummer

April 9th, 2008, 02:10 PM

.
. . . . . ... . . . . .
The great Pacific rubbish dump

Twice the size of the United States, a floating island of plastic is growing daily
April 09, 2008

Could you imagine an island the size of Maui that was nothing but rubbish? Okay, how about an island 739 times size of Maui that was all rubbish? That island actually exists out in the Pacific between Hawaii and California.

I know it sounds crazy but it is true. There have been different estimates about the size of this rubbish pile which, by the way, is always growing. The estimates for this Pacific Ocean rubbish dump are that they range from twice the size of Texas to to twice the size of the United States.

In my research I came upon the Christopher Columbus/discoverer of this Pacific Garbage Dump. He is a gentleman by the name of Charles Moore. As a side note – it is a bit unfair to compare him to Columbus. As one comedian put it, “Columbus discovering America is a bit like me discovering your car in the parking lot.”

Taking an unusual route back from a 1997 yacht race, Captain Moore discovered a Pacific Ocean that shocked him. In his words, “There were shampoo caps and soap bottles and plastic bags and fishing floats as far as I could see. Here I was in the middle of the ocean, and there was nowhere I could go to avoid the plastic.” After that experience, Moore created the Algalita Marine Research Foundation. AMRF is now an established and dedicated provider of ocean research and analysis that is used by numerous organizations, including the United Nations Environmental Program.

Dr. Marcus Eriksen, with AMRF, says that the rubbish is comprised of two linked areas of ocean. One area is off the coast of California and the other area is off the coast of Japan.

Taking the size of the ocean, approximately 361 million square kilometers, and multiplying it by the United Nations Environmental Program estimate of 13,000 pieces of trash floating in every square kilometer of ocean water means there are about 4.7 trillion pieces of trash floating in world’s oceans.

This information got me wondering. Have we finally entered the apocalypse, the end of times, the Pacific Ocean version of Mad Max? Could it be possible? Is it true... an ocean of rubbish twice the size of the United States of America? How long before the entire ocean and the entire planet is engulfed with rubbish?

Unfortunately, it is all true and the hard truth is that this ocean rubbish dump is primarily composed of plastic.

As Mr. McGuire said in The Graduate, “There is a great future in plastics.” Well, the future is here and plastics are great. Of course, the definition I am using for great is “very large in size.” The problem with plastics is that they are not biodegradable; they are photo degradable. That means the sun breaks the plastic down into smaller and smaller sizes, turning the ocean into a plastic rubbish soup. Because of its composition, plastic can remain in the sea for centuries. The most significant polluters are the plastic pellets that manufacturers use to make consumer goods such as toys, lighters, pens, etc.

Researcher Yukie Mato explains the threat of these plastic pellets not only as polluters, but also as transporters of toxins: “Plastic resin pellets are small granules generally with the shape of a cylinder or a disk with a diameter of a few millimeters. These plastic particles are industrial raw material transported to manufacturing sites where ‘user plastics’ are made by re-melting and molding into the final products. Resin pellets can be unintentionally released to the environment, both during manufacturing and transport. The released resin pellets are carried by surface runoff, stream and river waters eventually to the ocean. Resin pellets can also be directly introduced to the ocean through accidental spills during shipping. Because of their environmental persistence, they are distributed widely in the ocean and found on beaches and on water surfaces all over the world. A significant increase in concentrations of plastic particles, including resin pellets, in the seasurface has been observed in the North Pacific from the 1970s to the present.

“Plastic resin pellets are widely distributed in the ocean all over the world. They are an industrial raw material for the plastic industry and are unintentionally released to the environment both during manufacturing and transport. They are sometimes ingested by seabirds and other marine organisms, and their adverse effects on organisms are a concern.”

The reason that this massive rubbish dump is collecting at this particular spot in the ocean is because of a phenomenon called a gyre. An ocean gyre is a whirling vortex created by wind currents. These currents tend to suck in all the floating rubbish from land and sea. They exist in both the North and South Atlantic, the Pacific and the Indian Ocean as well as sub-polar gyres. Plastics and pollutants from around the world are attracted to these currents.

So, the answer to whether or not “out of sight means out of mind” applies to dat rubbish is a resounding NO! In fact, the Great Pacific Rubbish Dump is expected to double in ten years if something isn’t done. Much of the plastic rubbish can be seen being washed up on the shores of Hawaii. I have seen much of it myself on the Big Island, washed up just outside of Kapoho Bay.

All in all, it really is amazing what we humans have created on our earth. It has caused made me to wonder what I can do.

Increase awareness, volunteer, recycle and reuse, research environmental organizations on the internet – there is much that we can all do. For myself, the first step was telling the grocery bagger just to give me paper.

Who knows? maybe I will soon move up to bringing my own bag. Either way, it felt good, if only for a moment, to know that I wouldn’t be part of all that rubbish.

For more information on dat rubbish phenomenon be sure to check out the following websites.

http://www.algalita.org/index.html

http://plasticsareforever.org •••Jonas Holmes III is currently finishing a sci-fi novel and trying to think of something witty to write before he grabs a beer and works on his irreverence.
••• .

Saundra Hummer

April 9th, 2008, 03:45 PM

. ^ ^ ^ ^ ^
A NEWSLETTER
Exposing Corruption
~
Exploring Solutions
Project on Government Oversight

Dear Saundra,

What do lingerie, an Internet dating service, and a $13,000 steak-and-liquor dinner all have in common? The answer: all were recently paid for with your taxpayer dollars through the federal government's purchase card program. As reported in today's Washington Post (1), a new audit (2) by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) has revealed that the program is being systemically abused throughout the federal government.

Purchase cards are basically like corporate credit cards for federal employees. But, as the GAO audit makes abundantly clear, far too many employees are using the cards for personal expenditures. Nearly 41 percent of the purchases examined in the audit did not follow internal control procedures, and 48 percent of purchases over $2,500 were not properly authorized or recorded.

As longtime friends of POGO are aware, we have argued for years (3) that the widespread use of government-issued purchase cards without adequate oversight exposes federal agencies to wasteful and fraudulent expenditures (purchase card abuses were especially bad during the Katrina Recovery effort (4)). Stay tuned in the months ahead as we'll be releasing a more comprehensive analysis of the purchase card program, including our recommendations for preventing future abuses.

To see our past recommendations on purchase cards, be sure to check out our Press Alert (5). You can also learn more by reading POGO's blog (6).

Warm regards,

Danielle Brian
Executive Director
Project On Government Oversight

1)http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/08/AR2008040802718.html?hpid%3Dtopnews&sub=AR

2)http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d08333.pdf

3)http://pogo.org/p/contracts/PurchaseCards.html

4)http://pogo.org/p/contracts/katrina/katrinaPurchaseCards.html

5)http://pogo.org/p/contracts/ca-080409-purchasecards.html

6)http://pogoblog.typepad.com/pogo/2008/04/steak-and-cockt.html___________.
.

Saundra Hummer

April 9th, 2008, 07:04 PM

White House Watch
No Exit
By Dan Froomkin
Special to washingtonpost.com
Wednesday, April 9, 2008; 1:06 PM

Well, it's official. Getting out of Iraq is now exclusively the next president's problem.

That's the only serious conclusion that can be drawn from yesterday's Senate testimony by Army Gen. David H. Petraeus and U.S. Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker. The two standard-bearers for President Bush's war engaged in an absurd tap-dance that nevertheless made it clear that U.S. troops aren't going anywhere anytime soon.

Consider:

While asserting that "the way forward on reduction should be conditions-based," Petraeus and Crocker were unable or unwilling to say what those conditions might be.

While insisting that the U.S. commitment in Iraq is not open-ended, they described no circumstance in which it would end.

They refused to consider any hypothetical scenarios, except for their own.

They refused to acknowledge that reasonable people might disagree with them.

And, as they demonstrated yesterday and in their testimony last September, no matter what the situation on the ground, they are able to use it as an argument for staying the course.

A few key exchanges tell the story. Here's one with Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton:
Clinton: "What conditions would have to exist for you to recommend to the president that the current strategy is not working? And it seems apparent that you have a conditions-based analysis, as you set forth in your testimony, but the conditions are unclear, they certainly lack specificity, and the decision points, with respect to these conditions, are also vague.

"So how are we to judge, General Petraeus, what the conditions are or should be and the actions that you and the administration would recommend pursuing based on them?"

Petraeus: " . . . With respect to the conditions, Senator, what we have is a number of factors that we will consider by area as we look at where we can make recommendations for further reductions beyond the reduction of the surge forces that will be complete in July."

Here's one with Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama:

Obama: "[T]he problem I have is if the definition of success is so high, no traces of Al Qaida and no possibility of reconstitution, a highly-effective Iraqi government, a Democratic multiethnic, multi- sectarian functioning democracy, no Iranian influence, at least not of the kind that we don't like, then that portends the possibility of us staying for 20 or 30 years.

"If, on the other hand, our criteria is a messy, sloppy status quo but there's not, you know, huge outbreaks of violence, there's still corruption, but the country is struggling along, but it's not a threat to its neighbors and it's not an Al Qaida base, that seems to me an achievable goal within a measurable timeframe, and that, I think, is what everybody here on this committee has been trying to drive at, and we haven't been able to get as clear of an answer as we would like."

The response from Crocker: "And that's because, Senator, is a -- I mean, I don't like to sound like a broken record, but this is hard and this is complicated."

And here's one with Indiana Democrat Evan Bayh:

Bayh: "And I would just ask you the question, isn't it true that a fair amount of humility is in order in rendering judgments about the way forward in Iraq, that no one can speak with great confidence about what is likely to occur? Is that a fair observation?"

Petraeus: "It is very fair, Senator, and it's why I repeatedly noted that we haven't turned any corners, we haven't seen any lights at the end of the tunnel. The champagne bottle has been pushed to the back of the refrigerator. And the progress, while real, is fragile and is reversible."

Bayh: "In fact, reasonable people can differ about the most effective way forward. Is that not also a fair observation?"

Petraeus: "I don't know whether I would go that far, sir . . . "

Bayh: "General, you would not -- you would not mean to say that anyone who would have a different opinion is, by definition, an unreasonable person?"

Petraeus: "Senator, lots of things in life are arguable. And, certainly, there are lots of different opinions out there. But, again, if you -- I believe that the recommendations that I have made are correct."

It's all highly reminiscent of the argument Bush made in the run-up to the war, when he insisted that Saddam Hussein's unwillingness to disclose his weapons of mass destruction meant that he had them. Then, as now, Bush bent logic to justify what he wanted to do anyway.

This time around, at least, there's a bit of pushback.

The Coverage
Karen DeYoung and Thomas E. Ricks write in The Washington Post: "Asked repeatedly yesterday what 'conditions' he is looking for to begin substantial U.S. troop withdrawals from Iraq after this summer's scheduled drawdown, Army Gen. David H. Petraeus said he will know them when he sees them. For frustrated lawmakers, it was not enough.

"'A year ago, the president said we couldn't withdraw because there was too much violence,' said Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.). 'Now he says we can't afford to withdraw because violence is down.' Asked Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.): 'Where do we go from here?'

"Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) said: 'I think people want a sense of what the end is going to look like.'

"But the bottom line was that there was no bottom line. . . .

"In eight hours of testimony, the two men danced around the question of what constitutes success in Iraq. 'As I've explained, again, from a military perspective,' Petraeus said wearily as the day drew to a close, ' . . . what we want to do is to look at conditions and determine where it is without taking undue risks. This is all about risk.'

"'We'll look at the circumstances and assess,' Crocker said, as he and Petraeus spoke of 'battlefield geometry' and 'political-military calculus.'"

Petraeus announced that his plan -- which has already won Bush's approval -- calls for a reversal of last year's troop buildup, followed by a 45-day "period of consolidation and evaluation" in July, followed by an indefinite period of assessment before any further drawdown.

Peter Baker and Jonathan Weisman write in The Washington Post that such a plan means "all but guaranteeing that about 140,000 troops will remain at least through the fall presidential election. . . .

"[T]he 45-day consolidation period would last until early September. Petraeus repeatedly declined to say how long he would then need to decide whether to bring more troops out, but he would be deliberating in the weeks before Election Day.

"Because it takes a couple of months to withdraw a combat unit once a decision is made, Petraeus's plan means no further significant troop drawdown would take place until November, at the earliest, and yesterday's testimony fueled suspicions about whether any major pullouts would happen during the remainder of Bush's presidency."

Ken Fireman and Kristin Jensen write for Bloomberg: "Voters will choose a new U.S. president in November with as many as 140,000 American troops still in Iraq and no clear plan for extricating them from the unpopular conflict."

Aamer Madhani and Mike Dorning write in the Chicago Tribune: "As the war's architect, Bush has spent five years making the public case for it, cajoling allies for support and battling to stop Congress from setting a timetable for troop withdrawals. But with Bush having successfully ensured that troop levels will remain largely unchanged through the end of his presidency, the debate over how to proceed in the years to come has now, it seems, been left to others."

Peter Grier writes in the Christian Science Monitor that the Petraeus pause "could effectively push major future decisions on Iraq into the administration of the next president. In that sense it could mark the end of President Bush's role in a conflict whose outcome might well define his standing in history."

On ABC's World News, Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulous summed up yesterday's testimony this way:
Gibson: "George, did anything change today?"

Stephanopoulous: "Not much, Charlie. I think this was one, big exercise in kicking the can down the road."

Steven Lee Myers and Thom Shanker write in the New York Times: "Mr. Bush is scheduled to outline his policy for the months ahead at the White House on Thursday, and despite relentless questioning on the cost and conduct of the war, Democrats appeared to lack support to force a significant change in his approach."

Bush's Tears
Baker and Weisman write in The Post that Bush made no public comment on the testimony yesterday, "but teared up at a White House ceremony awarding the Medal of Honor to a Navy SEAL who died in Iraq. He plans to address the nation tomorrow, when aides expect him to adopt Petraeus's plan."

They write that "just as Bush gave the Medal of Honor to a war hero the day after announcing his troop-buildup strategy in January 2007, he gave another one yesterday.

"The East Room ceremony honoring Petty Officer 2nd Class Michael A. Monsoor was emotional. Bush wiped tears from his eyes and put his arm around Monsoor's family as the SEAL's death was recounted -- he threw himself onto a grenade to save two fellow SEALs. 'We see his legacy in the city of Ramadi,' Bush said, 'which has gone from one of the most dangerous places in Iraq to one of the most safest.'"

Here's the transcript and video of the event. Here's an AP photo of Bush's tears. Go on-site to view.
He actually did look quite stricken, particularly as he finished up his comments. "Mr. and Mrs. Monsoor: America owes you a debt that can never be repaid. This nation will always cherish the memory of your son. We will not let his life go in vain. And this nation will always honor the sacrifice he made. May God comfort you."

What was going on inside his head as he contemplated this amazing act of heroism in a war he launched by choice? There are so many possibilities.

Aamer Madhani and Mike Dorning write in the Chicago Tribune: "As the war's architect, Bush has spent five years making the public case for it, cajoling allies for support and battling to stop Congress from setting a timetable for troop withdrawals. But with Bush having successfully ensured that troop levels will remain largely unchanged through the end of his presidency, the debate over how to proceed in the years to come has now, it seems, been left to others."

Peter Grier writes in the Christian Science Monitor that the Petraeus pause "could effectively push major future decisions on Iraq into the administration of the next president. In that sense it could mark the end of President Bush's role in a conflict whose outcome might well define his standing in history."

Legacy Watch
Ben Feller writes for the Associated Press: "If he has doubts, he does not voice them. If he has regrets about his decision, he does not show them. More than five years into an Iraq war that has been longer, bloodier and costlier than the country expected, President Bush never wavers: The battle is just, the victory assured.

"Along the way, he has locked in another certitude. The pre-emptive war in Iraq will define how he is remembered.

"'Let history be the judge,' Bush responds as legacy questions creep into his final months in office.

"But the American people tend to live in the moment and evaluate their leaders in real time. Their disapproval is clear."

Opinion Watch
Maureen Dowd writes in her New York Times opinion column: "Maybe it was because I was sitting in the back of the Senate chamber with three war protesters -- grim-faced, chanting women dressed in black hooded cloaks, white makeup and blood-red hands -- that I felt as though I were watching a production of 'Macbeth' rather than a hearing on Iraq.

"'Fair is foul, and foul is fair,' the witches in the play said. 'Hover through the fog and filthy air.'

"Many words hovered Tuesday in the Senate -- including some pointed ones by the woman and two men vying to be commander in chief. But the words seemed trapped in a labyrinth leading nowhere."

Fred Kaplan writes for Slate: "Judging from Gen. David Petraeus' Senate testimony today, our military commitment to Iraq is open-ended and unconditional.

"The 'pause' in troop withdrawals, after the surge brigades go home this July, will not be 'brief' -- as some officials have hoped -- but indefinite."

MSNBC host Chris Matthews weighed in: "I didn't get anything out of it except that we're staying there indefinitely; there is no condition we can point to. Petraeus and Crocker never told us what to look for so we can know when we're getting close to the end of the tunnel. I was very dissatisfied by the hearings."

The Los Angeles Times editorial board writes: "Their argument was the same used to defend President Bush's 'surge' strategy in September: Whether it's going well or badly, the Iraq project is too important to risk failure by withdrawing U.S. forces 'prematurely.' But in nine hours of testimony, Petraeus and Crocker avoided offering any benchmarks that, if met, would permit most U.S. soldiers to leave at last.

"On the contrary, they cited the very problems that Bush created by his decision to invade Iraq -- an Al Qaeda presence and enhanced Iranian influence -- as requiring an indefinite U.S. military effort."

The USA Today editorial board writes that "on the question of how long it would take to succeed, the answer remains: We don't know and we won't know, in Petraeus' view, until some undefined time after a pause he seeks in the drawdown of U.S. troops.

"With the public and military both weary after five years of war, that absence of accountability is not good enough."

Robert Scheer, writing in his syndicated opinion column, recalls the controversial " General Betray Us" ads run by Moveon.org last year: "By undercutting the widespread support for getting out of Iraq, Petraeus did indeed betray the American public, siding with an enormously unpopular president who wants to stay the course in Iraq for personal and political reasons that run contrary to genuine national security interests. Once again, the president is passing the buck to the uniformed military to justify continuing a ludicrous imperial adventure, and the good general has dutifully performed."

Simon Jenkins writes in his Guardian opinion column: "As Petraeus told Congress yesterday, the surge has been a partial success in that crudest of measures: body count. But what next? [Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-] Maliki has shown that he still cannot command authority in Iraq's two biggest cities without calling on foreign firepower. Sunni warlords have been armed, ghettos created and the Mahdists possibly silenced for the time being. But these are sticking-plaster jobs. They have done nothing to bring Iraq's communities together in some sort of political concord. It has rather realigned them for future conflict. . . .

"There is no way of sustaining a client who no longer exists except by virtue of being sustained. The past fortnight has shown conclusively that the Maliki government is wholly dependent on A