Not a lot tonight. I'm starting very late. But I will note that when Fog of War came out and was showing in theaters, I called C.I. and asked, "What is this ___?" We both agreed we'd see it together, which we did. Thank goodness. Because I wouldn't want to offer a penny towards that film and C.I. bought tickets to a film playing on another screen. I thought Robert McNamara got the Disney treatment. Suddenly, he was Robbie the Ant Eater -- cuddly and coming to a Happy Meal soon. Robert McNamara is a war criminal many times over. I didn't doubt that some of his statements were genuine but, when you're staring death in the face, a lot of criminals repent. I faulted the film maker who seemed to cover topics and seemed to cover all the topics but, for those who lived through it, there was a lot left out.
I mention all of that as a lead up to the following highlight.
"Arrest Robert McNamara" (Stanley Heller, CounterPunch):
I propose that 91 year old Robert McNamara be arrested. No, I'm not suggesting he be tried for his role in planning the fire bombings of Japanese cities during World War II, or for being LBJ's Defense Secretary and architect of the war of aggression against Vietnam. Jail him for one much smaller act, the betrayal of sailors aboard the USS Liberty. While the Liberty was under a massive attack, Robert McNamara twice recalled the airplanes that a navy commander had sent out to defend them.
The crime took place on June 8, 1967 during Israel's "Six Day" war against Egypt, Syria and Jordan. On the third day of the conflict Israeli forces launched a two-hour air and naval attack on the USS Liberty which was in international waters 14 miles off the coast of Egypt. At least a dozen unmarked Israeli aircraft dropped napalm, and shot 30 mm cannon shells and rockets into the ship over a period of a half hour. Then an assault followed from torpedo boats involving torpedoes and machine gun fire. 34 Americans were killed and 172 were wounded.
The attack on the Liberty began at 1358 (military time). The Liberty was the most sophisticated intelligence ship in the world in 1967 and the first thing hit after the gun mounts were the antennae and the bridge. Nevertheless the radio operator managed to send this distress signal from Captain McGonagle: "Under attack by unidentified jet aircraft, require immediate assistance." Eleven minutes later the USS Saratoga acknowledged receiving the message and Captain Joseph M. Tully ordered 12 F-4 jets and other refueling aircraft to go to the assistance of the Liberty and informed Sixth Fleet Commander Admiral William Martin. The planes were about 40 minutes away. They wouldn't have arrived in time to stop the air attack, but could have prevented the torpedo attacks in which the majority of sailors were killed. Yet within minutes after launch an order came down from the flagship, the USS Little Rock, to recall the planes. There's an account that it was done on orders from Defense Secretary Robert McNamara.
Sixth Fleet carrier division commander Lawrence Geis transmitted the message to the Saratoga to recall the planes, but he also told Captain Tully to prepare to launch planes 90 minutes later. At 1450 the order was given to send another group of rescue planes and at 1545 they took off. At 1639 McNamara ordered the recall of these planes. Reportedly Geis demanded confirmation of that recall order from the next higher up in the command, President Lyndon Johnson. Johnson confirmed it and told him that he would not have his allies embarrassed. The reports about what McNamara and LBJ said are from an account by Liberty intelligence officer David Lewis who said he met privately with Geis after Liberty survivors had been rescued. He said Geis had wanted to assure him that the Saratoga had tried to help. Geis died in 1980 so he can't confirm Lewis' account, but surely there are records about these messages and orders about what went on that day in the Sixth Fleet buried in Navy files.
What would be the charge against McNamara? He denied aid to American troops when they were under deadly attack and as a result 20 some men died and many more were injured. I'm no lawyer, but I've been told that the applicable crime is treason.
Now that's the Robert McNamara I remember.
Cedric e-mailed about his "What's a little Jew hating among hypocrites?" and Wally's "THIS JUST IN! THEY LOVE JEW HATERS!" which resulted in a really nasty e-mail. First, they're doing a humorous post. Second, I don't see anything wrong with it if they'd done it as a none humorous post. Billy Graham's remarks are not unknown and his laughable comment that he didn't remember saying them was nonsense. I don't doubt that he doesn't remember saying them to Nixon. That's probably due to the fact that he made comments like that all the time. (May still. He bragged to Nixon that the Jewish people had no idea what he really thought of them.) The ones who owe apologies are Bush the elder, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton. Graham doesn't need to be "honored" even at his funeral but this didn't even have that excuse. Graham's got a vanity museum opening and they went to attend that. Again, Graham's remarks are now well known.
"Iraq snapshot" (The Common Ills):
Friday, June 1, 2007. Chaos and violence continue, two US soldiers remain missing (someone tell the national press), the US military announces more deaths, May becomes the third worst month of the illegal war thus far in terms of US military fatalities, Nancy Youssef looks at payouts to Iraqis, and Veterans of Foreign Wars stands with Iraq Veterans Against the War's Adam Kokesh -- which begs the question of where the psuedo 'left' and 'centrist' groups are -- you know all the useless groups who take up time endorsing candidates while maintaing "we're non-partisan." Guess they must all be off to the (election) races. Someone tell the Marx Brothers.
Starting with apparently breaking news: Alex R. Jimenez and Byron W. Fouty are missing. The two US soldiers have been missing since May 12th. The military has not announced that the two have been found, it's just the press that's lost interest in the story -- the big press. Possibly, if they worked for a corporation with lots of money to toss around (isn't that how they got the contract to begin with?), the New York Times, et al, would take a moment to remember that two US soldiers have been missing since May 12th. Jennifer Manley (Queens Chronicle) spoke with Maria del Rosario Duran and Ramon Jimenez who are the parents of Alex Jimenez, "Each night in Corona, Jimenez's parents keep the faith that their son is luckier. Despite the grim evidence to the contrary, Duran believes in her heart that he is alive. 'That's what I hope. That's what I have put in my mind,' she said." Manley notes that vigils for Alex Jimenez were originally packed but "[b]y Tuesday, the numbers had dwindled and the news coverage had as well. About a dozen people remained, mostly the family's friend and neighbors." Adam Pincus (Times Ledger) reports Maria del Rosario Duran is unable to sleep or eat while she awaits some word on her son and quotes what she would to say to her son ("Alex, I miss you. Alex, please come to my house.") and what she would say to the Bully Boy ("This is a desperate mother. Stop this thing and bring them home. Every day this is happening. George Bus, please bring them home.") Rosario Duran last saw her son in December when he got a pass to attend the funeral of his grandmother. She tells Christina Santucci (Queens Courier), "I cannot do anything but think about where is my son. What's he doing? Who has my son?" and Ramon Jimenez states, "I pray every night for the three missing people. And I say, 'God give me my son back!'"
The three soldiers refers to Joseph Anzack whose body was found. On May 12th, 4 US soldiers and 1 Iraqi translator were found dead from an attack and three US soldiers were classified missing and assumed captured. Jimenez and Byron Fouty remain missing -- not at all unlike big media's coverage. CBS and AP break from the pack to note that, while the search for the 5 British contractors (one is considered a consultant) continues, "the hunt for two U.S. soldiers missing since an ambush on May 12 has slowed down."
KXAN (NBC, Texas) reports that Byron Fouty's family released a statement yesterday: "Son, we are so proud of you and for who you are, what you stand for. We know in our hearts, you were doing what you needed to do in Iraq, and we would have never expected any less from you. You are our Hero, our son. We will miss you and love you forever. Love, Mom and Dad." Today is day 20 that Jimenez and Fouty have been missing. Day 20. Big media moved on to the story of contractors -- from England -- because that's cleary the biggest domestic story coming out of Iraq. (That was sarcasm.)
Turning to news of Adam Kokesh who faces a hearing Monday, June 4th in Kansas City, MO that will determine the status of his discharge (previously "honorable") and would determine the status of his benefits. The Manny Named Brian (Public Eye, CBS) offers that Kokesh may be the new Cindy Sheehan, that he's "photogenic" and "sure seems like the kind of thing that could gather momentum as the summer heats up." (I swear, I did not make that up, use the link.) From the world of Candy Perfume Boy, to the Institute for Public Accuracy (IPA) which has a press release from which we'll note this "Executive director of Iraq Veterans Against the War, [Kelly] Dougherty was in Iraq from March 2003 to February 2004 with the Colorado National Guard. She said today: 'This is not so much about Adam as it is an attempt by the military brass to silence opposition to the war among veterans. The military is supposed to fight to preserve free speech, not quashing it. Not only are veterans, who can attest to the realities of this war, increasingly speaking out against the war -- but its grim realities are moving them to increasingly take nonviolent direct action to stop it." AP reports that "The Veterans of Foreign Wars is urging the military to show 'a little common sense' and call off its investigation of a group of Iraq war veterans who wore their uniforms during war protests." Sam Hananel (AP) quotes the national commander of Veterans of Foreign Wars, Gary Kurpius, stating, "We all know that people give up some individual rights when they joint the military. But these Marines went to war, did their duty, and were honorably discharged from the active roles. I may disagree with their message, but I will always defend their right to say it."
Eric Ruder (Socialist Worker) observes that the goal in going after Kokesh and Liam Madden is "silencing criticism from veterans -- discharge them again, but this time less than honorably" and quotes Tod Ensign (Citizen Soldier and Different Drummer Cafe) stating, "These are important issues, and they go to the question of military-civilian balance, and when you cease being bound by military rules. Are Liam and Adam bound by those rules? I'd say hell no. This is just a trial balloon, and it's harassment. But if they get away with it, you can be sure that they will then start becoming more draconian and their sweep of other people will be expanded. This could have a very chilling effect on the IVAW, to say the least." Matthew Rothschild (The Progressive) provides a strong overview of the issues at stake and noted that Monday's hearing/administrative meeting is not expected to result in a quick 'verdict' but a recommendationg that Master Sgt. Ronald Spencer says "can take up to two weeks."
Adam Kokesh wore fatigues during DC actions in March, Liam Madden, as David Montgomery (Washington Post) noted, "is accused of wearing his camouflage shirt at an antiwar march in Washington in January." For all the drama the military's created, you'd think the two (and a third who has been unidentified) had shown up in their dress uniform. David Morgan (Reuters) identifies the third: Cloy Richards. Cloy Richards is an Iraq veteran who suffers from PTSD. Both he and his mother Tina Richards have discussed this publicly. Apparently the US military believes the way to 'help' Cloy Richards is to threaten the veteran with loss of benefits. If that doesn't digust you, what does? Last week, Tina Richards discussed her son's suicide attempt with Kris Welch on KPFA's Living Room. Getting help for his PTSD has been a battle for Cloy Richards to begin with, the US military's lack of "common sense" just became even more visible.
As the lack of "common sense" becomes more apparent to the public, war resistance continues to grow within the US military. Pepe Lozano (People's Weekly World) reports on the June 19th event by the Rosenberg Fund for Children which "will commemorate the 54th anniversary of the Rosenbergs' execution with 'Celebrate the Children of Resistance." The fund was created by Robert Meeropol, the son of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, and guests will include Angela Davis, Eve Ensler, Howard Zinn, David Strathairn as well as US war resister Camilo Mejia who notes, "When you prosecute an activist, it brings hard times to the family, especially for children like [his daughter] Samantha. People have to realize there is a family behind activists, and there should be more groups like RFC." Mejia's book Road from Ar Ramaid: The Private Rebellion of Staff Sergeant Mejia (The New Press) came out at the beginning of May and Iraq Veterans Against the War's Martin Smith (Socialist Worker) reviewed it noting: "Mejia's work -- written from the vantage of a soldier who served and saw firsthand the consequences of U.S. imperialism -- cuts through the deceptions and lies used to justify the war. . . . Beyond Mejia's exposure of the lies of occupation, the strength of his book is the humility with which Mejia explains the change within himself that led to his decision to follow the conscience and oppose war." John Catalinotto (Workers World) provided a wide ranging look at war resistance within the US military this week and noted of Iraq war resister Ehren Watada that his "court-martial is still pending after the military uniltaterally decided to declare his first trial a mistrial last February, has now had the court-martial postponed once more. At first scheduled for June 23 at Ft. Lewis, the trial is now on hold until it is determined if re-starting the trial would mean that Watada faced 'double jeopardy.' It is still possible that the Army will be forced to drop charges on Lt. Watada, the first officer to refuse duty in Iraq."
The growing movement of war resistance within the US military includes Joshua Key, Ehren Watada, Terri Johnson, Camilo Mejia, Kimberly Rivera, Dean Walcott, Linjamin Mull, Augstin Aguayo, Justin Colby, Marc Train, Robert Zabala, Darrell Anderson, Kyle Snyder , Corey Glass, Jeremy Hinzman, Kevin Lee, Joshua Key, Mark Wilkerson, Patrick Hart, Ricky Clousing, Ivan Brobeck, Aidan Delgado, Pablo Paredes, Carl Webb, Jeremy Hinzman, Stephen Funk, Clifton Hicks, David Sanders, Dan Felushko, Brandon Hughey, Clifford Cornell, Joshua Despain, Joshua Casteel, Katherine Jashinski, Chris Teske, Matt Lowell, Jimmy Massey, Tim Richard, Hart Viges, Michael Blake and Kevin Benderman. In total, forty US war resisters in Canada have applied for asylum.
Information on war resistance within the military can be found at Center on Conscience & War, The Objector, The G.I. Rights Hotline, Iraq Veterans Against the War and the War Resisters Support Campaign. Courage to Resist offers information on all public war resisters.
On Memorial Day, Michael Kamber (New York Times) reported from Iraq on the rising disillusion of some serving in Iraq noting Staff Sgt. David Safstrom's comments about how he felt when first deployed -- "In Mosul, in 2003, it felt like we were making the city a better place. There was no sectarian violence, Saddam was gone, we were tracking down the bad guys. It felt awesome" -- compared to now -- "I thought:'What are we doing here? Why are we still here?' We're helping guys that are trying to kill us. We help them in the day. They turn around at night and try to kill us." On a semi-related note, Peter Laufer -- journalist, author of many books including Mission Rejected: U.S. Soldiers Who Say No to Iraq and former NBC correspondent, debuts Sunday with his new (still unnamed) program on KPFA, taking over the slot Larry Bensky has occupied until recently (9:00 am to 11:00 am PST).
The announcement was made today during the KPFA Management Report to the Listeners.
More information can be found on Laufer here.
Meanwhile, Nancy A. Youssef (McClatchy Newspapers) reports: "The Department of Defense spent nearly $31 million in three years in condolence payments to civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan, but it didn't rack how it doled out the money, a Government Accountability Officer report found" -- which, she notes, didn't include what monies were paid for property damage, loss of life or for injuries. Youssef notes that the report states that June of 2003 was when the US military began offering compensation. In his book The Deserter's Tale, Joshua Key shares (p. 97) the story of how the process had no rhyme or reason but, at one point, $50 was given to one Iraqi male whose home had been damaged and bed burned when US illumination rounds "crashed into his home".
The violence continued today.
Bombings?
Mohammed al Dulaimy (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a Baghdad bombing this morning that claimed 1 life (2 wounded), an afternoon Baghdad bombing that wounded four police officers, a third Baghdad bombing that left 3 dead, three Baghdad mortar attacks that left
11 dead (32 wounded), a Salaheddin truck bombing that killed 12 civilians ("and two houses were destroyed"), a Basra mortar attack that left four police officers wounded, and 3 Kirkuk bombings that left 2 dead (6 wounded). Reuters notes a Kirkuk roadside bombing which injured five police officers and a Mahmudiya mortar attack that claimed 2 lives (four wounded).
Shootings?
Mohammed al Dulaimy (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a Kirkuk attack in which an Iraqi soldier was shot dead. The US military announced today that they killed three children while firing on what they hope were insurgents (one of whom they killed, two of whom escaped).
Corpses?
Mohammed al Dulaimy (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 15 corpses were discovered in Baghdad. Reuters notes six corpses discovered in Baquba.
Today, the US military announced: "Baghdad Soldier was killed when a patrol was attacked with small arms fire in the eastern section of the Iraqi capital May 31." This brought count of the total US forces killed in Iraq for the month of May to 125 (caution, there may be more announcements pending) making May the third worst month for US fatalities since the start of the illegal war in March of 2003. And the US military announced: "One MNC-I Soldier was killed by small arms fire at approximately noon June 1 in the vincinty of Zawiyah." This brings the total number of US service members killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war to 3477.
Late yesterday, Reuters reported that 26 year-old AP camera person Saif M. Fakhry was shot dead in Baghdad on Thursday. Reporters Without Borders has issued a call. Noting that four journalists had been killed in five days (their call was written before news of Saif M. Fakhry's death was broadcast), they declare: "The Iraqi authorities must fulfil their duty to protect journalists. We call for the creation of a special force within the national police to identify the perpetrators and instigators of killings of journalists and to organise awareness campaigns about the protection of journalists for all the Iraqi security forces and for the public. To help the investigators, a witness protection programme should also be set up with the help of countries in the region." Organize awareness campaigns among Iraqi forces? Drop back to the January 25th snapshot: "This 'fine' Iraqi military that al-Maliki intends to turn loose on homes and schools includes some real thugs as evidenced by incident reported this morning by Damien Cave and James Glanz (New York Times): 'One Iraqi soldier in the alley pointed his rifle at an American reporter and pulled the trigger. There was only a click, the weapon had no ammunition. The soldier laughed at his joke'."
Meanwhile, in news that is sure to soften ultimate War Pornographer Michael Gordon's war on, CBS and AP report: "U.S. military officers tell CBS News the troop surge, which has not reached full strength, stands no chance of succeeding by September." Which is why, yesterday, the military sent out flacks attempting to reset the clocks and take the pressure off the upcoming September progress report.
PBS' NOW with David Brancaccio has interviewed Cindy Sheehan about her decision to pull back currently ("We're going to pull back and regroup and figure out a better way to come at this," Sheehan tells Brancacio) and the interview can be streamed here or you can catch it via YouTube. In addition, they offer Shron Clemons sharing his poetry (written while in the Sheridan Correctional Center of Illinois) at YouTube here.
Also on Cindy Sheehan, Laura Flanders (writing at Common Dreams) notes:
Two years later, Sheehan's pushed another question into the public glare. Quitting the Democratic Party and resigning from the front ranks of the US anti-war movement, Sheehan said out loud what hundreds of Democratic voters have been muttering: Democrats in Congress -who do you think you're working for?
In a letter to Democratic leaders shortly after they permitted a vote in Congress that approved $120 billion more for war, Sheehan wrote: "There is absolutely no sane or defensible reason for you to hand Bloody King George more money to condemn more of our brave, tired, and damaged soldiers and the people of Iraq to more death and carnage."
The president's never been more unpopular, nor has his Iraq war. Yet a majority of Democrats in both houses voted "aye" to keep the funding flowing.
Speaking with me on Air America Radio soon afterwards, Sheehan called it a betrayal. "Before they came into power they told me it was because they were in the minority. Now it's because they're the majority? What stakes do they have in keeping this occupation going?" Given the choice of funding an unpopular war or being accused by the right wing vitriol machine of "abandoning the troops," 86 Democrats in the House and all but 14 in the Senate voted to sacrifice more troops. Sheehan called that playing "party politics with human lives."
Laura Flanders is the host of RadioNation with Laura Flanders which now airs at one p.m. Sundays on Air America Radio, XM satellite radio and streams online.
In other news, Saturday from 10:00 am until noon (PST), KPFA will broadcast a Pacifica Radio and Free Speech Radio News special hosted by Sonali Kolhatkar (host of KPFK's
Uprising) and Dalia Hashad (attorney, the USA program director for Amnesty International and one of the co-hosts of WBAI's Law and Disorder). The special will address the new Senate bill on immigration which is due to be voted on shortly and "present challenging interviews with lawmakers, and look at global dynamics that lead to migration and Europe's own crackdown on immigration."
In media news, as independent media continues to be under attack, News Dissector Danny Schechter's "Special Blog: Can Our Media Channel Survive?" announces the potential fate of
Mediachannel.org which may shut down: "If we can get 1500 of our readers (that means you) to give $25, we can keep going for another quarter. [PLEASE CLICK HERE TO MAKE A TAX-DEDUCTIBLE DONATION ONLINE]"
Finally, independent journalist John Pilger is on a speaking tour with his new book Freedom Next Time and his documentary Breaking the Silence: Truth and Lies in the War on Terror (which looks at DC, Afghanistan and Iraq). June 7th, he will discuss his book with Amy Goodman at The New School, Tishman Auditorium, 66 West 12th Street, beginning at 7:00 pm (doors open at 6:15). Admission is $5 per person and students (with ID) can attend for free. Pilger will sign copies of his book afterwards and Amy Goodman will sign copies of her latest book (written with her brother David Goodman) Static. "For ticket information, contact (212) 229-5488 or boxoffice@newschool.edu. For media inquiries, contact (212) 209-5407 or ruth@nationbooks.org For more information, click here or e-mail pilgerny@gmail.com." June 11th, Pilger will be in Los Angeles at the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center (244 S. San Pedro St.) and will discuss his book and show his documentary beginning at 7:00 pm (doors open at 6:00 pm). The price of admission to the even is five dollars. "Directions, maps, and parking info at: http://www.jaccc.org/directions.htmPresented by The Center for Economic Research and Social Change, and The Nation Institute, with support from the Wallace Global Fund. For ticket information, call or visit the JACCC. Box office: 213-680-3700 (Box Office Hours: Monday - Saturday: Noon - 5 pm)For media inquiries, contact (212) 209-5407 or ruth@nationbooks.org For more information, email pilger.la@gmail.com." June 13th finds him in San Francisco showing his film and discussing his book at Yerba Beuna Center for Arts (beginning at 7:00 pm, doors open at 6:00 pm) and the price of admission is $15 general and $5 for students. "Presented by The Center for Economic Research and Social Change, The Nation Institute, and KPFA, with support from the Wallace Global Fund. For ticket information, call 415-978-2787 or order online at http://www.ybca.org/. In person tickets at YBCA Box office located inside the Galleries and Forum Building, 701 Mission Street at Third. (Hours: Tue, Wed, Fri, Sat & Sun: noon - 5 pm; Thu: noon - 8 pm.) For media inquiries, contact (212) 209-5407 or ruth@nationbooks.org For more information, email pilgersf@gmail.com." From San Francisco, he moves on to Chicago for the 2007 Socialism conference. At 11:30 am Saturday June 16th, he and Anthony Arnove will participate in a conversation, audience dialogue and book signing (Arnove is the author most recently of IRAQ: The Logic of Withdrawal) and that evening (still June 16th) at 7:30 Pilger will be at Chicago Crowne Plaza O'Hare (5440 North River Road, Rosemont, IL 60018) as part of a panel of international activists. To attend the conference, the fee is $85. For Saturday and Sunday only, the price is $70. To attend only one session, the cost is ten dollars. "Presented by The Center for Economic Research and Social Change, The Nation Institute, with support from the Wallace Global Fund. Co-sponsors: Obrera Socialista, Socialist Worker, International Socialist Review, and Haymarket Books. For ticket information, call 773-583-8665 or e-mail info@socialismconference.org For media inquiries, contact (212) 209-5407 or ruth@nationbooks.org. For more information, email info@socialismconference.org." The Socialism 2007 conference will take place in Chicago from June 14-17. Along with Pilger and Arnove, others participating will include Dahr Jamail, Laura Flanders, Kelly Dougherty, Joshua Frank, Amy Goodman, Sharon Smith, Dave Zirin, Camilo Mejia, Jeremy Scahill, Jeffrey St. Clair and many others.
iraq
iraq veterans against the war
kpfakris welch
living room
camilo mejia
matthew rothschild
the washington postann scott tyson
john catalinotto
the new york timesmichael kamber
sonali kolhatkardalia hashad
law and disorderwbai
danny schechter
laura flandersradionation with laura flanders
pbs nowfree speech radio news
Saturday, June 02, 2007
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
Jean Daniels, Trish Schuh
I need to start out by noting Betty's "Thomas Friedman Stereotypes Again!" is her latest chapter and it went up Saturday as did Trina's "Pizza in the Kitchen." Isaiah's The World Today Just Nuts "Alberto's Hospital Rounds" is so funny and I want to post it here but I need to figure out why I either end up with a blurry illustration or one so large it throws off the entire site? I'll talk to C.I. about that this weekend if not before. Let me also note Wally's "THIS JUST IN! FRED'S DOING NOTHING! " and Cedric's "Divas need attention, lots of attention " because I do such a poor job of promoting the community and, to visit here, you'd never know that Wally and Cedric make me smile on a bad day and have me laughing out loud on a good one.
"World Press Freedom in the Eyes & Ears of the Beholder" (Trish Schuh, NYC Indymedia):
UNITED NATIONS- On the 14th Anniversary of World Press Freedom Day celebrated in May 3, UNESCO hosted an event for journalists called "Press Freedom, Safety of Journalists and Impunity." Under Article 1 of its Constitution, UNESCO is the only United Nations agency with a mandate to defend freedom of expression and press freedom.
United Nations Correspondent Association President Tuyet J. Nguyen spoke about the life-threatening danger faced by journalists covering such war zones as Rwanda and Iraq where the media is controlled by special interests or armed political parties.
Mr. Georges Malbrunot of France's neocon Le Figaro spoke of newsgathering under various "vicious surveillance" states- all Arab- and starting with Syria. In contrast, Malbrunot's embedding with American forces in Iraq was "not a bad solution", but opened embeddees to paranoid Arab charges of being "a spy...Its one of the major blames addressed to the foreign press today... Of course this blame is 99.9% wrong, but in the minds of these people who suffer from "conspiracy theory" this accusation is serious" and can cost a journalist his life. "There is alot of work to do to convince these groups that the journalist is not a spy." Malbrunot added that it is the work of Muslim Imams, scholars, leaders etc to persuade their Muslim flock of this fact... "Only then will the fate of the global war against terror be dramatically changed."
This writer asked the panel if journalists themselves could ever be partly responsible for such suspicions? Citing CNN's Anderson Cooper, who admitted spending his earlier summers working for the CIA: "Doesn't this kind of moonlighting put other journalists at risk?"
No response from the panel.
Representing half a million media professionals around the world on behalf of the International Federation of Journalists was Judith Matloff, a Professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, and a member of the International News Safety Institute. Professor Matloff implored the international community to uphold UN Security Council Resolution 1738 which prohibits the killing and targeting of media, and protects free speech and freedom of the press globally.
In a followup conversation by telephone on May 25, I asked Prof Matloff for her opinion on how UNSCR 1738 applies to Lebanon's Al Manar TV and the LMG communications network- Lebanese media outlets bombed by Israel during the 2006 war, and officially censored as a "terrorist organization" by the US Congress. Regarding this unprecedented, landmark free speech/censorship law, Ivy League academic Matloff said she was "unfamiliar with these situations" and refused to comment on Middle East issues. "I am an Africa specialist".
But wasn't free speech protected equally around the world under Res 1738? In the Middle East, as well as in Africa? Being a media expert, could she comment on what a law equating the media with "terrorism" could mean for freedom of the press? Concurrent with Bush's admitted deliberate bombing of Al Jazeera in Afghanistan and Iraq?
"I never heard of that," Matloff said.
With her credentials, shouldn't such Katrina-scale censorship have caught her eye?
Or perhaps she could assess how the mainstream media's advocacy of falsehoods promoted an illegal war in Iraq? "The New York Times has apologized," she said, referring to a full page 'mea culpa ad'. But isn't the NYT repeating the same misleading tactics to promote a next war in Iran?
With this and similar questions, Matloff responded like a true press "pro": avoiding ethical implications, defending her product- the status quo, and referring most answers to "other supervisors" or experts. Her refrain of "I don't know", "don't remember", "can't comment" captured the essence of a White House Press Briefing.
As a trainer of America's next generation of government "privatized propaganda contractors," (tomorrow's 'Mercenary Press') Matloff diverted the subject, passed the buck, and expertly earned her tenure...
On Press Freedom Day I spoke briefly to New York Times correspondent Warren Hoge about the media, Iraq and World Press Freedom Day.
Q: Its World Press Freedom Day and I just wanted to ask if you have any comments about The New York Times and their reporting in the runup to the Iraq War, and if you feel any kind of responsibility?
A: I can't talk about that- we've already said everything about that to be said in the paper, and I really don't want to add to it. I mean, The New York Times- more than most newspapers- has absolutely admitted what we thought was faulty and what was not. There's just nothing I can add to that at all. And I certainly don't want to talk about that on
Press Freedom Day when our thoughts are with Alan Johnston and other journalists that are being killed.
Q: Well my thoughts are also with the Iraqis. There are half a million dead- thanks in part to
your newspaper-
A: Oh come on.
Q: Your newspaper was one of the primary advocates for the war-
A: Oh come on, I can't talk to you-
Q: Your newspaper was primary- yes it was- Judith Miller got a security clearance from Donald Rumsfeld, sir-
A: The New York Times is not responsible for any dead Iraqis. I won't listen to that-
Q: None of the other American journalists but Judith Miller from your paper got a security
clearance from the US Defense Secretary himself. How is this different from working for the government?
A: You are are defiling Press Freedom Day- Shut up! This is about Press Freedom, this is not about defiling the Press. We've just come back from a demonstration for Alan Johnston for journalists being killed and that's what this day is about- Press Freedom.
Perhaps BBC World News Editor Jon Williams best summarized the outcome of shutting up the press: "We must not stand by and allow the intimidation of journalists- wherever it happens. If we do, we will pay a heavy price... There will be no eyes or ears telling us what's going on. We won't have the insight from those able to make sense of it."
But then, that may be just how the Powers That Be really want it.
(c) Trish Schuh
C.I. highlighted this on Memorial Day and I'm noting it here as well.
I want to take a moment to sing the praises of my friend C.I. who's not playing dumb on the issue of contractors. A lot are. A lot remember the 2004 fallout.
Here's reality, if contractors weren't in Iraq, the illegal war would stop. Congress won't even consider cutting off that funding. So it's past time to turn to look at the contractors who think "Big Money!" and head to Iraq. As C.I. has rightly noted, if you're there to "serve," you sign up at a recruiters. There's no prospect of getting rich off the illegal war that way. You won't stand the chance of raking in $600 a day, for instance. You also will actually have to fight. You will have to put your life on the line without a military escort made up of US forces being paid a ridiculously low sum to ensure that your own pricey ass makes it from point A to point B.
If you are an American contractor/mercenary, you have no excuses. The country is against the illegal war. You aren't going in there for 'freedom' -- there is no freedom in Iraq. You aren't going there to 'serve' your country -- serving your country in Iraq would require enlisting if you were one of the few who believed in the illegal war. You are there to make a profit. The $600 a day figure wasn't picked out of the air. There's a woman who thinks that contractors should receive the same attention and benefits as the US military. (Just not the same pay, obviously.) She thinks they are 'war heroes' and she wants them included on a memorial.
That is such a slap in the face to those who are ordered to Iraq. They are paid peanuts and they have to guard these contractors who make far more money in one month than they can in one year, two years, three years . . .
The woman's son died as a contractor in Iraq. I am sorry her son died. But, as I heard the story (from her mouth on TV), her son had child support payments and was looking at McDonalds type jobs and realized he could make more working for Blackwater. Let's not pretend this was about 'serving' your country. That's really insulting to those in the US military.
It's also insulting to the peace movement because we are trying to get US troops out of Iraq. These contractors, by contrast, are electing to go into Iraq (to make money). Bully Boy has privatized the military allowing Republican donors to clean up by handing them various contracts. Contractors are prolonging the illegal war and I may feel sad when one dies but I do not ever trick myself into believeing that any American contractor is the same thing as the US military. They make more money, they can leave when they want, they choose to go and, from the vets I've had as patients, I know full well the opinion of them that those serving in Iraq have. It's offensive to those serving to realize how much money these contractors are making, that's bad enough. But when their 'mission' turns out to be a day escorting around contractors -- who make so much more than they do -- it really drives home how little the US government cares about the enlisted. It's their job to act as rent-a-cops and provide security for these contractors.
C.I.'s hit on this before and one of my ex-patients called today to say how much he appreciates it. (He knows C.I. C.I.'s the one who steered him to me shortly after he returned from Iraq.)
If you ever doubt that so much time and energy are expanded on contractors by the US military, look at what's going on in Baghdad right now. 5 contractors are missing (one is a 'consultant'). They are British. They are British and 4 work for a Canadian corporation and 1 got a contract with the US government. If you've forgotten, although the body of one missing US soldier was found last week, two are still missing. What was the big 'mission' today (same as yesterday) for the US military? Tearing apart Baghdad to look for those 5 missing British. Let me repeat that the US military has not announced that the other 2 missing US soldiers have been found. This is the sort of thing that 'happens.' It is the sort of thing that underscores the 'value' the US government places on US troops. I would hope that the search for the 2 US soldiers goes on; however, just the fact that there is now time and soldiers to be used searching for the missing British underscores that there was more that could have been done for the three missing US soldiers. (The British are also searching -- as they should be. My comments revolve around the orders being given to the US military only.)
"Dealing Democrats" (Jean Daniels, CounterPunch):
President Bush can meet with family friend, Prince Bandar while Vice President Cheney meets with King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, but neither leader are able to meet with Cindy Sheehan and the mothers who ask to know why their children have died in Iraq and Afghanistan. Congress, the Democrats in particular dealt Cindy and the families of these soldiers another blow. Instead of voting-all the democrats voting against this 120 billion dollar spending bill lacking any deadline for troop withdrawal, the Democrats, as Cindy writes in her open letter to the Congress and the American public, May 28, 2007, handed the Bush administration more money for political expediency. "It is a moral abomination and every second the occupation of Iraq endures, you all have more blood on your hands."
The country was lied to by this administration.
The country has witnessed the unraveling of the Halliburton and Blackwater scheme for war profits.
We have had Katrina and a despicable response from the administration before and after the hurricane.
Eight million dollars sent to Iraq, handed over to the Iraqi "government" under Paul Brenner's control, is missing. It is a good possibility that this money was distributed as treats to hands held out, including the hands of El-Qaeda and other insurgent groups who, in turn, are maiming and killing U.S. soldiers.
What deal have the Democrats made with the Bush administration?
Over 3000 soldiers have died without the media in this country covering their return home. The President has not attended one funeral. Over 50, 000 wounded soldiers are returning to no homes and are ending up on the streets. Many are coming back to wives who are stressed out from trying to care for children while they face the possibility of foreclosures on their homes and or farms. More soldiers are suffering from devastating injuries, particularly brain trauma, requiring life-long care. Others are suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
Did I mention the criminal conditions suffered by returning Vets at Walter reed Hospital right there in Washington D.C.?
Teaching people to kill-to shape an "enemy" in their minds rather than incubate or foster ideas for living with others has resulted in soldiers returning home and seeing wives and other family members as the enemy. When those responsible for leading this country, betrays its military for oil profits for the few and an idea of world control for mega-corporations, should the American public speak up in outrage? Shouldn't all of America have joined Cindy in demanding accountability to the countless deaths of U.S. soldiers and Iraqi citizens alike? Shouldn't the Democrats have done more than capitulate to Bush's spending of billions for war?
All Americans should have joined Cindy Sheehan. There are reasons all did not. I can't go into that because "Ruth's Report" had a paragraph on this and she pulled it and wants to expand it on it in her next report. But it's really easy to say: Why didn't people stand with Cindy!
There are probably many reasons for that but one that comes to mind is that most didn't know. As to why they didn't know, you have to wait for the report.
"Iraq snapshot" (The Common Ills):
Wednesday, May 30, 2007. Chaos and violence continue, the US military announces 2 more deaths, Free Speech Radio News provides a first rate special, and more.
Steve Negus and Demetri Sevastopulo (Financial Times of London) report, "A series of fatalities announced on Tuesday in Iraq saw the US military's death toll rise to its highest monthly level in more than two years." Curiously (or maybe not so), the New York Times isn't interested. The story noting the 10 deaths (covered in yesterday's snapshot) isn't even worthy of a solo story. Instead it gets teamed up with the kidnapping of five people who chose to go to Iraq to make money. Five contractors (one prefers consultant) who are British and not even working for a British corporation so let's not pretend the "They wanted to serve their country!" crap is going to fly. Four were armed security guards. Currently the US army -- composed of service members who make peanuts unlike the high paid contractors -- are searching throughout Baghdad to save the five who came to Iraq hoping to line their pockets with some blood money. So it's all the more insulting that the New York Times thinks the 'perfect' thing to do is to pair the disappearance of 5 with the death of 10 who were ordered into Iraq and saw no chance of getting rich off the illegal war. After a 'shout out' paragraph two, Damien Cave forgets the US soldiers until paragraph nineteen. By contrast, the Washington Post front pages John Ward Anderson's report on how May is "the deadliest month for U.S. troops in 2 1/2 years".
Currently, the ICCC count for the total number of US service members killed in the illegal war is 3470 and the number killed in May (thus far) is 119. On Monday, Free Speech Radio News used their half-hour broadcast for a special Memorial Day look at the some of the costs of the war in US with reporter Aaron Glantz in the role of reporter and anchor. Glantz spoke with Muriel Dean whose husband was killed last Christmas. James E. Dean wasn't shot dead in Iraq, he was shot dead in Maryland. Having served 18 months in Afghanistan, suffering from PTSD and with an Iraq redployment coming up (January 14, 2007), James E. Dean went to his father's farm and holed up there, alone, with the possible intent to kill himself. Muriel Dean strongly believes that, at some point, her husband would have gotten tired, gone to sleep and, when he woke up, and left the farm. Instead, the police decided the thing to do in a situation where the farm was empty, where no neighbors were close by and where the only person James E. Dean could have hurt was himself, the thing to do was to use tear gas to force him out and then shoot him dead. The report from the review conducted by Maryland's State Attorney office deemed the police behavior "assualtive and militaristic."
Aaron Glantz: Pentagon doctors estimate that 12 percent of the 1.5 million veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Other studies put that number higher at closer to 30 percent. As the war drags on the military is increasingly sending soldiers back to Iraq for second and third tours even if they suffer from the same type of mental illness as Patrick Resta.
Glantz also spoke with Melissa and Patrick Resta who served in Al Anbar Province in Iraq and spoke of Iraqis approaching US service members with ill children but, Resta explains, that they were threatened with court-martial if they used medical supplies on anyone other than US service members. [This point is echoed in Camilo Mejia's Road from Ar Ramaid: The Private Rebellion of Staff Sergeant Mejia.] When he returned from Iraq at the end of 2004, he was angry, unable to sleep, drinking, avoiding everyone. At Christmas, Melissa Resta asked her husband "if he wanted to split up and he told me he didn't care" which was her clue that there was something seriously wrong.
Patrick Resta has now been diagnosed with PTSD and is receiving treatment and attending college. He states: "I'm definitely not the person I was before. I was always laid back, you know relaxed, always cracking jokes and now I'm anxious and tense and have bouts of anger, have some pretty severe insomnia, have some bad nightmares and I think it's pretty standard for the men and women that have been over there. All of the people that I've talked to, it's pretty much the same -- the same set of symptons and the same problems."
Melissa Resta: There are so many of these things that I never would have thought would be a problem and now I have to think them through. The grocery store's too crowded. We also live in a city with a very high Muslim population and there are a lot of women in traditional Muslim dress and sometimes I notice that that can be unsettling for him to see that just because I think it brings back these feelings. I mean there are a lot of things that you have to take into consideration and at 27 it's not really where I had pictured myself.
Glantz also interviewed Kristy Kruger whose brother, Eric Kruger, was killed in Baghdad by a roadside bomb November 2, 2006. [Kristy Kruger, a singer-songwriter, often performs concerts to benefit her brother's four children. Donations can be sent to: The Memorial Fund for Children of LTC Eric Kruger, 6460 Crystal Mountain Rd., Colorado Springs, CO 80923.]
And Glantz interviewed doctors who treat PTSD including Dr. Col. Vito Imbascini who was stationed in Germany for four months last year where he treated US service members wounded in the war and discussed how body armor meant service members who might have lost a limb in Vietnam and suffered wounds to their chest and abdmonen that led to their deaths are now likely to survive "but be severely disabled for life" allowing "an extremely high number of wounded American soldiers are coming home with their arms or legs amputated" and, during his four months in Germany, he "amputated the genitals of one or two men every day."
Again, that is the Memorial Day special of Free Speech Radio News. Today the Daily Mail reported on Martin Packer, a British soldier who had self-checked out, and killed himself (Monday) in front of Joanne Hepple (his girlfriend) and her two songs as a result of being "tormented by what he had witnessed in" Iraq. War resisters Darrell Anderson and Joshua Key are among those who have disclosed their own PTSD. From Key's book, The Deserter's Tale (pp. 209-210):
A Canadian psychiatrist told me that you never truly emerge from post-traumatic stress disorder, that you simply learn to live with it.
There are certain things that I avoid these days, such as alcohol and crowds, because I fear they will trigger more of my own blackouts. I know that thousands of American soldiers have abused drugs or committed suicide after returning home from war. It would be easy to follow in the steps of many in my own family and drown my shame and my sorrows in alcohol. Alcohol, however, could lead to the very problem of suicidal depression that have plagued vets for generations.
Joshua Key is part of a growing movement of war resistance within the US military that includes Ehren Watada, Terri Johnson, Camilo Mejia, Kimberly Rivera, Dean Walcott, Linjamin Mull, Augstin Aguayo, Justin Colby, Marc Train, Robert Zabala, Darrell Anderson, Kyle Snyder , Corey Glass, Jeremy Hinzman, Kevin Lee, Joshua Key, Mark Wilkerson, Patrick Hart, Ricky Clousing, Ivan Brobeck, Aidan Delgado, Pablo Paredes, Carl Webb, Jeremy Hinzman, Stephen Funk, Clifton Hicks, David Sanders, Dan Felushko, Brandon Hughey, Clifford Cornell, Joshua Despain, Joshua Casteel, Katherine Jashinski, Chris Teske, Matt Lowell, Jimmy Massey, Tim Richard, Hart Viges, Michael Blake and Kevin Benderman. In total, forty US war resisters in Canada have applied for asylum.
Information on war resistance within the military can be found at Center on Conscience & War, The Objector, The G.I. Rights Hotline, Iraq Veterans Against the War and the War Resisters Support Campaign. Courage to Resist offers information on all public war resisters.
Today, in Iraq, the violence continues as does the breeding of hostilities. Alexandra Zavis (Los Angeles Times) reports that the raids to find the 5 British contractors is even more violent than the search to find the 3 missing US soldiers (and remember, only the corpse of one of the 3 US soldiers is confirmed found) by crashing into one Iraqi police officer's "home about 2 a.m. using an armored vehicle, cuffed and blindfolded those inside, and pointed lasers at their chests. 'They were hitting us, asking, "Where are the kidnapped British?" said the man who asked that his name not be published for fear of retribution by Western forces. 'I told them that we are five brothers in the police force. How could we do that? They said OK, then tell us where are they?" Also today, the US military has confirmed what CNN reported yesterday -- remember the days when reporting was reporting and official government statements were official government states? Rest easy outlets, you can now report what CNN did yesterday: A US helicopter was shot down Monday in Iraq (which led to the death of 2 US soldiers and 6 died while attempting to rush to the scene of the crash). Repeating, the US military has confirmed what CNN reported. Read AP here and wonder why news outlets not only wouldn't report the helicopter was shot down but they also wouldn't even report it by couching it with "CNN is reporting that . . ." In other air news, Turkey, which shares a border with Iraq, has issued a request. Turkish Daily News reports the government of Turkey "formally asked the United States not to repeat any airspace violation, following an incident last week where two US F-16 fighters infringed the Turkish air corridor." And that comes as tensions continue to mount between Turkey and the Kurdish northern Iraq. CBS and AP report, "Turkey has sent large contigents of soldiers, tanks and armored personnel carriers to reinforce its border with Iraq amid a heated debate over whether to stage a cross-border offensive to hit Kurdish rebel bases. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday urged the United States and Iraq to destroy bases of the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, in northern Iraq as the Turkish military depoloyed more tanks and soldiers on the border."
Bombings?
Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a parked car Baghdad bombing that claimed 1 life (5 wounded), 2 Baghdad mortar attacks that killed 1 person and left 6 wounded, a Baghdad bombing that killed an Iraqi soldier and three police officers were wounded from a bombing near the Basheer village. Reuters reports a Mhmudiya mortar attack that killed 3 people and left 21 wounded and a Falluja mortar attack that left 5 dead (15 wounded).
Shootings?
Alexandra Zavis (Los Angeles Times) notes the Amarah shooting death of "a journalist working with the Aswat Al-Iraq news agency". AFP notes that "three journalists had been killed in the previous three days." Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports Ala'a Abdul Razzaq Qasim (interior ministry intelligence) was shot dead in Baghdad along with two of his bodyguards, Mohammed Shakir (ministry of interior affairs) was shot dead in Baghdad, a bodyguard was shot dead in Hawija in an attack on "the head of the judicial committee of Hawija," and 3 police officers wer shot dead in Diyala province. Reuters notes a woman killed in an Mosul attack.
Corpses?
Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 23 corpses discovered in Baghdad.
Today the US military announced: "Two Multi-National Division-Center Soldiers were killed while on dismounted patrol when a roadside bomb exploded today."
On this week's Law and Disorder (WBAI on Monday and others throughout the ) featured Anthony Arnove's remarks from the Left Forum panel Iraq: What's At Stake (which also featured A.K. Gupta, Christian Parenti, Gilbert Achcar and Nir Rosen) that was held March 11th.
Anthony Arnove: The fundamental political reality is that the US occupation -- not al Qaeda, not Iran, not Syria -- is the reason for the insurgency in Iraq which is why no amount of 'surges' of additional troops, programs for police training, rhetoric about cutting off supply routes to Iran and Syria, or plans for victory is going to end the resistance to US occupation.Iraq today is an unqualified disaster even from the standpoint of the US ruling class. One can now regularly read on the pages of the Finanical Times and the Wall St. Journal establishment observers who proclaim Iraq the greatest foreign policy mistake in the history of the United States -- greater even than Vietnam.
[. . . ]
The Democrats came into a majority in the House, the Senate and the state governorships last Novemember as a result of a vote against the war in Iraq yet what have they done since taking office?
For all the laughable rhetoric about exporting democracy in Iraq and the Middle East -- which is the opposite of US intentions -- we now see again how little democracy we have at home as well. So far, the boldest measure the Democrats have been able to muster was to pass a non-binding House resolution criticizing the additional 21,500 troops Bush has sent to Iraq -- not the underlying occupation, not the military bases, not the economic occupation, not the presence of a 100,000 private mercenaries operating without any accountablility. The deaths, though, of Iraqis are binding. The deaths of US soldiers are binding. And let's remember that the Democrats, certainly the party's key leadership voted overwhelmingly to support Bush's invasion, that they have repeatedly voted to appropriate more funding for the occupation, and now many leading Democrats are pushing to add more than seventeen billion dollars to Bush's one hundred billion supplemental funding request for the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. Only now that the occupation is widely recognized as a complete disaster do you have Democrats voicing muted criticism of the war but much if it is utterly superficial.
[. . .]
There will be growing pressure on all of us as the 2008 presidentional election cycle continues to pick up to restrict the debate in this country to ever more narrow circles but we cannot afford to fall into that trap. If we become a lobbying wing of the Democratic Party we will become not more relevant as some insist but we will become irrelevant. The anti-war movement must maintain its independence and must continue to mobolize to fight for its own independent demands which I think first and foremost should be for the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of troops from Iraq.
Arnove is the author of, most recently, IRAQ: The Logic of Withdrawal. Last week on Law and Disorder (as Mike noted Friday) co-hosts Dalia Hashad and Michael Ratner discussed Brigadier General Douglas Lute who was the one who finally consented to be Bully Boy's war czar. Hashad noted that "czar" was a title the administration had moved away from and had settled on "war coordinator. Makes it sound like an after school job." Hashad also noted that Lute had told the Financial Times of London, some time ago, that he didn't support the concept of escalation. In August 2005, Peter Spiegel and Demetri Sevastopulo (Financial Times) reported that Lute felt the numbers of US troops on the ground in Iraq needed to be reduced for several reasons including, Lute speaking, "You have to undercut the perception of occupation in Iraq. It's very difficult to do that when you have 150,000-plus, largely western, foreign troops occupying the country." That was Lute in 2005, when US troops on the ground were far less than they are now and before he became the war czar or war coordinator.
Last week, Andishen Nouaree (Columbia's Free Times), observing that Laura Bush's laughable claim that no one suffers this illegal war more than the Bully Boy who started it, asked, "How much is the president suffering? Last week he quit his job. Not the whole job. He's still gonna give speeches, sign legislation, live in the White House, fly around on Air Force One and park his pickup truck in front of the 'Parking for Presidents Only' sign that Jenna bought him for the driveway in Crawford. Bush quit the 'lead the nation's war effort' part of his job. He announced . . . that he's handing that responbility over to U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute."
Finally, today on Democracy Now!, Amy Goodman spoke at length with Cindy Sheehan. From the end of the interview:
AMY GOODMAN: Cindy Sheehan, we have fifteen seconds. I have the sense, as you talk, that you're not actually leaving, even as a public face of the movement, but stepping back perhaps for a few months, a few weeks, to regroup. Is that accurate?
CINDY SHEEHAN: Well, what I like to think about is like, we're closing down the factory, we're going to retool, and we're going to open up, and it will be a new and improved version of it. But we are definitely going to come at it from a totally different direction.
And remember independent journalist John Pilger is on a speaking tour with his new book Freedom Next Time and his documentary Breaking the Silence: Truth and Lies in the War on Terror (which looks at DC, Afghanistan and Iraq). June 7th, he will discuss his book with Amy Goodman at The New School, Tishman Auditorium, 66 West 12th Street, beginning at 7:00 pm (doors open at 6:15). Admission is $5 per person and students (with ID) can attend for free. Pilger will sign copies of his book afterwards and Amy Goodman will sign copies of her latest book (written with her brother David Goodman) Static. "For ticket information, contact (212) 229-5488 or boxoffice@newschool.edu. For media inquiries, contact (212) 209-5407 or ruth@nationbooks.org For more information, click here or e-mail pilgerny@gmail.com."
June 11th, Pilger will be in Los Angeles at the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center (244 S. San Pedro St.) and will discuss his book and show his documentary beginning at 7:00 pm (doors open at 6:00 pm). The price of admission to the even is five dollars. "Directions, maps, and parking info at: http://www.jaccc.org/directions.htm
Presented by The Center for Economic Research and Social Change, and The Nation Institute, with support from the Wallace Global Fund. For ticket information, call or visit the JACCC. Box office: 213-680-3700 (Box Office Hours: Monday - Saturday: Noon - 5 pm)For media inquiries, contact (212) 209-5407 or ruth@nationbooks.org For more information, email pilger.la@gmail.com."
June 13th finds him in San Francisco showing his film and discussing his book at Yerba Beuna Center for Arts (beginning at 7:00 pm, doors open at 6:00 pm) and the price of admission is $15 general and $5 for students. "Presented by The Center for Economic Research and Social Change, The Nation Institute, and KPFA, with support from the Wallace Global Fund. For ticket information, call 415-978-2787 or order online at http://www.ybca.org/. In person tickets at YBCA Box office located inside the Galleries and Forum Building, 701 Mission Street at Third. (Hours: Tue, Wed, Fri, Sat & Sun: noon - 5 pm; Thu: noon - 8 pm.) For media inquiries, contact (212) 209-5407 or ruth@nationbooks.org For more information, email pilgersf@gmail.com."
From San Francisco, he moves on to Chicago for the 2007 Socialism conference. At 11:30 am Saturday June 16th, he and Anthony Arnove will participate in a conversation, audience dialogue and book signing (Arnove is the author most recently of IRAQ: The Logic of Withdrawal) and that evening (still June 16th) at 7:30 Pilger will be at Chicago Crowne Plaza O'Hare (5440 North River Road, Rosemont, IL 60018) as part of a panel of international activists. To attend the conference, the fee is $85. For Saturday and Sunday only, the price is $70. To attend only one session, the cost is ten dollars. "Presented by The Center for Economic Research and Social Change, The Nation Institute, with support from the Wallace Global Fund. Co-sponsors: Obrera Socialista, Socialist Worker, International Socialist Review, and Haymarket Books. For ticket information, call 773-583-8665 or e-mail info@socialismconference.org For media inquiries, contact (212) 209-5407 or ruth@nationbooks.org. For more information, email info@socialismconference.org."
The Socialism 2007 conference will take place in Chicago from June 14-17. Along with Pilger and Arnove, others participating will include Dahr Jamail, Laura Flanders, Kelly Dougherty, Joshua Frank, Amy Goodman, Sharon Smith, Dave Zirin, Camilo Mejia, Jeremy Scahill, Jeffrey St. Clair and many others.
iraq
anthony arnove
law and disorderwbaidalia hashadmichael ratner
the new york timesdamien cave
camilo mejiamartin smithiraq veterans against the warjohn ward anderson
the washington postmcclatchy newspapers
amy goodmandemocracy now
cindy sheehan
"World Press Freedom in the Eyes & Ears of the Beholder" (Trish Schuh, NYC Indymedia):
UNITED NATIONS- On the 14th Anniversary of World Press Freedom Day celebrated in May 3, UNESCO hosted an event for journalists called "Press Freedom, Safety of Journalists and Impunity." Under Article 1 of its Constitution, UNESCO is the only United Nations agency with a mandate to defend freedom of expression and press freedom.
United Nations Correspondent Association President Tuyet J. Nguyen spoke about the life-threatening danger faced by journalists covering such war zones as Rwanda and Iraq where the media is controlled by special interests or armed political parties.
Mr. Georges Malbrunot of France's neocon Le Figaro spoke of newsgathering under various "vicious surveillance" states- all Arab- and starting with Syria. In contrast, Malbrunot's embedding with American forces in Iraq was "not a bad solution", but opened embeddees to paranoid Arab charges of being "a spy...Its one of the major blames addressed to the foreign press today... Of course this blame is 99.9% wrong, but in the minds of these people who suffer from "conspiracy theory" this accusation is serious" and can cost a journalist his life. "There is alot of work to do to convince these groups that the journalist is not a spy." Malbrunot added that it is the work of Muslim Imams, scholars, leaders etc to persuade their Muslim flock of this fact... "Only then will the fate of the global war against terror be dramatically changed."
This writer asked the panel if journalists themselves could ever be partly responsible for such suspicions? Citing CNN's Anderson Cooper, who admitted spending his earlier summers working for the CIA: "Doesn't this kind of moonlighting put other journalists at risk?"
No response from the panel.
Representing half a million media professionals around the world on behalf of the International Federation of Journalists was Judith Matloff, a Professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, and a member of the International News Safety Institute. Professor Matloff implored the international community to uphold UN Security Council Resolution 1738 which prohibits the killing and targeting of media, and protects free speech and freedom of the press globally.
In a followup conversation by telephone on May 25, I asked Prof Matloff for her opinion on how UNSCR 1738 applies to Lebanon's Al Manar TV and the LMG communications network- Lebanese media outlets bombed by Israel during the 2006 war, and officially censored as a "terrorist organization" by the US Congress. Regarding this unprecedented, landmark free speech/censorship law, Ivy League academic Matloff said she was "unfamiliar with these situations" and refused to comment on Middle East issues. "I am an Africa specialist".
But wasn't free speech protected equally around the world under Res 1738? In the Middle East, as well as in Africa? Being a media expert, could she comment on what a law equating the media with "terrorism" could mean for freedom of the press? Concurrent with Bush's admitted deliberate bombing of Al Jazeera in Afghanistan and Iraq?
"I never heard of that," Matloff said.
With her credentials, shouldn't such Katrina-scale censorship have caught her eye?
Or perhaps she could assess how the mainstream media's advocacy of falsehoods promoted an illegal war in Iraq? "The New York Times has apologized," she said, referring to a full page 'mea culpa ad'. But isn't the NYT repeating the same misleading tactics to promote a next war in Iran?
With this and similar questions, Matloff responded like a true press "pro": avoiding ethical implications, defending her product- the status quo, and referring most answers to "other supervisors" or experts. Her refrain of "I don't know", "don't remember", "can't comment" captured the essence of a White House Press Briefing.
As a trainer of America's next generation of government "privatized propaganda contractors," (tomorrow's 'Mercenary Press') Matloff diverted the subject, passed the buck, and expertly earned her tenure...
On Press Freedom Day I spoke briefly to New York Times correspondent Warren Hoge about the media, Iraq and World Press Freedom Day.
Q: Its World Press Freedom Day and I just wanted to ask if you have any comments about The New York Times and their reporting in the runup to the Iraq War, and if you feel any kind of responsibility?
A: I can't talk about that- we've already said everything about that to be said in the paper, and I really don't want to add to it. I mean, The New York Times- more than most newspapers- has absolutely admitted what we thought was faulty and what was not. There's just nothing I can add to that at all. And I certainly don't want to talk about that on
Press Freedom Day when our thoughts are with Alan Johnston and other journalists that are being killed.
Q: Well my thoughts are also with the Iraqis. There are half a million dead- thanks in part to
your newspaper-
A: Oh come on.
Q: Your newspaper was one of the primary advocates for the war-
A: Oh come on, I can't talk to you-
Q: Your newspaper was primary- yes it was- Judith Miller got a security clearance from Donald Rumsfeld, sir-
A: The New York Times is not responsible for any dead Iraqis. I won't listen to that-
Q: None of the other American journalists but Judith Miller from your paper got a security
clearance from the US Defense Secretary himself. How is this different from working for the government?
A: You are are defiling Press Freedom Day- Shut up! This is about Press Freedom, this is not about defiling the Press. We've just come back from a demonstration for Alan Johnston for journalists being killed and that's what this day is about- Press Freedom.
Perhaps BBC World News Editor Jon Williams best summarized the outcome of shutting up the press: "We must not stand by and allow the intimidation of journalists- wherever it happens. If we do, we will pay a heavy price... There will be no eyes or ears telling us what's going on. We won't have the insight from those able to make sense of it."
But then, that may be just how the Powers That Be really want it.
(c) Trish Schuh
C.I. highlighted this on Memorial Day and I'm noting it here as well.
I want to take a moment to sing the praises of my friend C.I. who's not playing dumb on the issue of contractors. A lot are. A lot remember the 2004 fallout.
Here's reality, if contractors weren't in Iraq, the illegal war would stop. Congress won't even consider cutting off that funding. So it's past time to turn to look at the contractors who think "Big Money!" and head to Iraq. As C.I. has rightly noted, if you're there to "serve," you sign up at a recruiters. There's no prospect of getting rich off the illegal war that way. You won't stand the chance of raking in $600 a day, for instance. You also will actually have to fight. You will have to put your life on the line without a military escort made up of US forces being paid a ridiculously low sum to ensure that your own pricey ass makes it from point A to point B.
If you are an American contractor/mercenary, you have no excuses. The country is against the illegal war. You aren't going in there for 'freedom' -- there is no freedom in Iraq. You aren't going there to 'serve' your country -- serving your country in Iraq would require enlisting if you were one of the few who believed in the illegal war. You are there to make a profit. The $600 a day figure wasn't picked out of the air. There's a woman who thinks that contractors should receive the same attention and benefits as the US military. (Just not the same pay, obviously.) She thinks they are 'war heroes' and she wants them included on a memorial.
That is such a slap in the face to those who are ordered to Iraq. They are paid peanuts and they have to guard these contractors who make far more money in one month than they can in one year, two years, three years . . .
The woman's son died as a contractor in Iraq. I am sorry her son died. But, as I heard the story (from her mouth on TV), her son had child support payments and was looking at McDonalds type jobs and realized he could make more working for Blackwater. Let's not pretend this was about 'serving' your country. That's really insulting to those in the US military.
It's also insulting to the peace movement because we are trying to get US troops out of Iraq. These contractors, by contrast, are electing to go into Iraq (to make money). Bully Boy has privatized the military allowing Republican donors to clean up by handing them various contracts. Contractors are prolonging the illegal war and I may feel sad when one dies but I do not ever trick myself into believeing that any American contractor is the same thing as the US military. They make more money, they can leave when they want, they choose to go and, from the vets I've had as patients, I know full well the opinion of them that those serving in Iraq have. It's offensive to those serving to realize how much money these contractors are making, that's bad enough. But when their 'mission' turns out to be a day escorting around contractors -- who make so much more than they do -- it really drives home how little the US government cares about the enlisted. It's their job to act as rent-a-cops and provide security for these contractors.
C.I.'s hit on this before and one of my ex-patients called today to say how much he appreciates it. (He knows C.I. C.I.'s the one who steered him to me shortly after he returned from Iraq.)
If you ever doubt that so much time and energy are expanded on contractors by the US military, look at what's going on in Baghdad right now. 5 contractors are missing (one is a 'consultant'). They are British. They are British and 4 work for a Canadian corporation and 1 got a contract with the US government. If you've forgotten, although the body of one missing US soldier was found last week, two are still missing. What was the big 'mission' today (same as yesterday) for the US military? Tearing apart Baghdad to look for those 5 missing British. Let me repeat that the US military has not announced that the other 2 missing US soldiers have been found. This is the sort of thing that 'happens.' It is the sort of thing that underscores the 'value' the US government places on US troops. I would hope that the search for the 2 US soldiers goes on; however, just the fact that there is now time and soldiers to be used searching for the missing British underscores that there was more that could have been done for the three missing US soldiers. (The British are also searching -- as they should be. My comments revolve around the orders being given to the US military only.)
"Dealing Democrats" (Jean Daniels, CounterPunch):
President Bush can meet with family friend, Prince Bandar while Vice President Cheney meets with King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, but neither leader are able to meet with Cindy Sheehan and the mothers who ask to know why their children have died in Iraq and Afghanistan. Congress, the Democrats in particular dealt Cindy and the families of these soldiers another blow. Instead of voting-all the democrats voting against this 120 billion dollar spending bill lacking any deadline for troop withdrawal, the Democrats, as Cindy writes in her open letter to the Congress and the American public, May 28, 2007, handed the Bush administration more money for political expediency. "It is a moral abomination and every second the occupation of Iraq endures, you all have more blood on your hands."
The country was lied to by this administration.
The country has witnessed the unraveling of the Halliburton and Blackwater scheme for war profits.
We have had Katrina and a despicable response from the administration before and after the hurricane.
Eight million dollars sent to Iraq, handed over to the Iraqi "government" under Paul Brenner's control, is missing. It is a good possibility that this money was distributed as treats to hands held out, including the hands of El-Qaeda and other insurgent groups who, in turn, are maiming and killing U.S. soldiers.
What deal have the Democrats made with the Bush administration?
Over 3000 soldiers have died without the media in this country covering their return home. The President has not attended one funeral. Over 50, 000 wounded soldiers are returning to no homes and are ending up on the streets. Many are coming back to wives who are stressed out from trying to care for children while they face the possibility of foreclosures on their homes and or farms. More soldiers are suffering from devastating injuries, particularly brain trauma, requiring life-long care. Others are suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
Did I mention the criminal conditions suffered by returning Vets at Walter reed Hospital right there in Washington D.C.?
Teaching people to kill-to shape an "enemy" in their minds rather than incubate or foster ideas for living with others has resulted in soldiers returning home and seeing wives and other family members as the enemy. When those responsible for leading this country, betrays its military for oil profits for the few and an idea of world control for mega-corporations, should the American public speak up in outrage? Shouldn't all of America have joined Cindy in demanding accountability to the countless deaths of U.S. soldiers and Iraqi citizens alike? Shouldn't the Democrats have done more than capitulate to Bush's spending of billions for war?
All Americans should have joined Cindy Sheehan. There are reasons all did not. I can't go into that because "Ruth's Report" had a paragraph on this and she pulled it and wants to expand it on it in her next report. But it's really easy to say: Why didn't people stand with Cindy!
There are probably many reasons for that but one that comes to mind is that most didn't know. As to why they didn't know, you have to wait for the report.
"Iraq snapshot" (The Common Ills):
Wednesday, May 30, 2007. Chaos and violence continue, the US military announces 2 more deaths, Free Speech Radio News provides a first rate special, and more.
Steve Negus and Demetri Sevastopulo (Financial Times of London) report, "A series of fatalities announced on Tuesday in Iraq saw the US military's death toll rise to its highest monthly level in more than two years." Curiously (or maybe not so), the New York Times isn't interested. The story noting the 10 deaths (covered in yesterday's snapshot) isn't even worthy of a solo story. Instead it gets teamed up with the kidnapping of five people who chose to go to Iraq to make money. Five contractors (one prefers consultant) who are British and not even working for a British corporation so let's not pretend the "They wanted to serve their country!" crap is going to fly. Four were armed security guards. Currently the US army -- composed of service members who make peanuts unlike the high paid contractors -- are searching throughout Baghdad to save the five who came to Iraq hoping to line their pockets with some blood money. So it's all the more insulting that the New York Times thinks the 'perfect' thing to do is to pair the disappearance of 5 with the death of 10 who were ordered into Iraq and saw no chance of getting rich off the illegal war. After a 'shout out' paragraph two, Damien Cave forgets the US soldiers until paragraph nineteen. By contrast, the Washington Post front pages John Ward Anderson's report on how May is "the deadliest month for U.S. troops in 2 1/2 years".
Currently, the ICCC count for the total number of US service members killed in the illegal war is 3470 and the number killed in May (thus far) is 119. On Monday, Free Speech Radio News used their half-hour broadcast for a special Memorial Day look at the some of the costs of the war in US with reporter Aaron Glantz in the role of reporter and anchor. Glantz spoke with Muriel Dean whose husband was killed last Christmas. James E. Dean wasn't shot dead in Iraq, he was shot dead in Maryland. Having served 18 months in Afghanistan, suffering from PTSD and with an Iraq redployment coming up (January 14, 2007), James E. Dean went to his father's farm and holed up there, alone, with the possible intent to kill himself. Muriel Dean strongly believes that, at some point, her husband would have gotten tired, gone to sleep and, when he woke up, and left the farm. Instead, the police decided the thing to do in a situation where the farm was empty, where no neighbors were close by and where the only person James E. Dean could have hurt was himself, the thing to do was to use tear gas to force him out and then shoot him dead. The report from the review conducted by Maryland's State Attorney office deemed the police behavior "assualtive and militaristic."
Aaron Glantz: Pentagon doctors estimate that 12 percent of the 1.5 million veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Other studies put that number higher at closer to 30 percent. As the war drags on the military is increasingly sending soldiers back to Iraq for second and third tours even if they suffer from the same type of mental illness as Patrick Resta.
Glantz also spoke with Melissa and Patrick Resta who served in Al Anbar Province in Iraq and spoke of Iraqis approaching US service members with ill children but, Resta explains, that they were threatened with court-martial if they used medical supplies on anyone other than US service members. [This point is echoed in Camilo Mejia's Road from Ar Ramaid: The Private Rebellion of Staff Sergeant Mejia.] When he returned from Iraq at the end of 2004, he was angry, unable to sleep, drinking, avoiding everyone. At Christmas, Melissa Resta asked her husband "if he wanted to split up and he told me he didn't care" which was her clue that there was something seriously wrong.
Patrick Resta has now been diagnosed with PTSD and is receiving treatment and attending college. He states: "I'm definitely not the person I was before. I was always laid back, you know relaxed, always cracking jokes and now I'm anxious and tense and have bouts of anger, have some pretty severe insomnia, have some bad nightmares and I think it's pretty standard for the men and women that have been over there. All of the people that I've talked to, it's pretty much the same -- the same set of symptons and the same problems."
Melissa Resta: There are so many of these things that I never would have thought would be a problem and now I have to think them through. The grocery store's too crowded. We also live in a city with a very high Muslim population and there are a lot of women in traditional Muslim dress and sometimes I notice that that can be unsettling for him to see that just because I think it brings back these feelings. I mean there are a lot of things that you have to take into consideration and at 27 it's not really where I had pictured myself.
Glantz also interviewed Kristy Kruger whose brother, Eric Kruger, was killed in Baghdad by a roadside bomb November 2, 2006. [Kristy Kruger, a singer-songwriter, often performs concerts to benefit her brother's four children. Donations can be sent to: The Memorial Fund for Children of LTC Eric Kruger, 6460 Crystal Mountain Rd., Colorado Springs, CO 80923.]
And Glantz interviewed doctors who treat PTSD including Dr. Col. Vito Imbascini who was stationed in Germany for four months last year where he treated US service members wounded in the war and discussed how body armor meant service members who might have lost a limb in Vietnam and suffered wounds to their chest and abdmonen that led to their deaths are now likely to survive "but be severely disabled for life" allowing "an extremely high number of wounded American soldiers are coming home with their arms or legs amputated" and, during his four months in Germany, he "amputated the genitals of one or two men every day."
Again, that is the Memorial Day special of Free Speech Radio News. Today the Daily Mail reported on Martin Packer, a British soldier who had self-checked out, and killed himself (Monday) in front of Joanne Hepple (his girlfriend) and her two songs as a result of being "tormented by what he had witnessed in" Iraq. War resisters Darrell Anderson and Joshua Key are among those who have disclosed their own PTSD. From Key's book, The Deserter's Tale (pp. 209-210):
A Canadian psychiatrist told me that you never truly emerge from post-traumatic stress disorder, that you simply learn to live with it.
There are certain things that I avoid these days, such as alcohol and crowds, because I fear they will trigger more of my own blackouts. I know that thousands of American soldiers have abused drugs or committed suicide after returning home from war. It would be easy to follow in the steps of many in my own family and drown my shame and my sorrows in alcohol. Alcohol, however, could lead to the very problem of suicidal depression that have plagued vets for generations.
Joshua Key is part of a growing movement of war resistance within the US military that includes Ehren Watada, Terri Johnson, Camilo Mejia, Kimberly Rivera, Dean Walcott, Linjamin Mull, Augstin Aguayo, Justin Colby, Marc Train, Robert Zabala, Darrell Anderson, Kyle Snyder , Corey Glass, Jeremy Hinzman, Kevin Lee, Joshua Key, Mark Wilkerson, Patrick Hart, Ricky Clousing, Ivan Brobeck, Aidan Delgado, Pablo Paredes, Carl Webb, Jeremy Hinzman, Stephen Funk, Clifton Hicks, David Sanders, Dan Felushko, Brandon Hughey, Clifford Cornell, Joshua Despain, Joshua Casteel, Katherine Jashinski, Chris Teske, Matt Lowell, Jimmy Massey, Tim Richard, Hart Viges, Michael Blake and Kevin Benderman. In total, forty US war resisters in Canada have applied for asylum.
Information on war resistance within the military can be found at Center on Conscience & War, The Objector, The G.I. Rights Hotline, Iraq Veterans Against the War and the War Resisters Support Campaign. Courage to Resist offers information on all public war resisters.
Today, in Iraq, the violence continues as does the breeding of hostilities. Alexandra Zavis (Los Angeles Times) reports that the raids to find the 5 British contractors is even more violent than the search to find the 3 missing US soldiers (and remember, only the corpse of one of the 3 US soldiers is confirmed found) by crashing into one Iraqi police officer's "home about 2 a.m. using an armored vehicle, cuffed and blindfolded those inside, and pointed lasers at their chests. 'They were hitting us, asking, "Where are the kidnapped British?" said the man who asked that his name not be published for fear of retribution by Western forces. 'I told them that we are five brothers in the police force. How could we do that? They said OK, then tell us where are they?" Also today, the US military has confirmed what CNN reported yesterday -- remember the days when reporting was reporting and official government statements were official government states? Rest easy outlets, you can now report what CNN did yesterday: A US helicopter was shot down Monday in Iraq (which led to the death of 2 US soldiers and 6 died while attempting to rush to the scene of the crash). Repeating, the US military has confirmed what CNN reported. Read AP here and wonder why news outlets not only wouldn't report the helicopter was shot down but they also wouldn't even report it by couching it with "CNN is reporting that . . ." In other air news, Turkey, which shares a border with Iraq, has issued a request. Turkish Daily News reports the government of Turkey "formally asked the United States not to repeat any airspace violation, following an incident last week where two US F-16 fighters infringed the Turkish air corridor." And that comes as tensions continue to mount between Turkey and the Kurdish northern Iraq. CBS and AP report, "Turkey has sent large contigents of soldiers, tanks and armored personnel carriers to reinforce its border with Iraq amid a heated debate over whether to stage a cross-border offensive to hit Kurdish rebel bases. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday urged the United States and Iraq to destroy bases of the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, in northern Iraq as the Turkish military depoloyed more tanks and soldiers on the border."
Bombings?
Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a parked car Baghdad bombing that claimed 1 life (5 wounded), 2 Baghdad mortar attacks that killed 1 person and left 6 wounded, a Baghdad bombing that killed an Iraqi soldier and three police officers were wounded from a bombing near the Basheer village. Reuters reports a Mhmudiya mortar attack that killed 3 people and left 21 wounded and a Falluja mortar attack that left 5 dead (15 wounded).
Shootings?
Alexandra Zavis (Los Angeles Times) notes the Amarah shooting death of "a journalist working with the Aswat Al-Iraq news agency". AFP notes that "three journalists had been killed in the previous three days." Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports Ala'a Abdul Razzaq Qasim (interior ministry intelligence) was shot dead in Baghdad along with two of his bodyguards, Mohammed Shakir (ministry of interior affairs) was shot dead in Baghdad, a bodyguard was shot dead in Hawija in an attack on "the head of the judicial committee of Hawija," and 3 police officers wer shot dead in Diyala province. Reuters notes a woman killed in an Mosul attack.
Corpses?
Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 23 corpses discovered in Baghdad.
Today the US military announced: "Two Multi-National Division-Center Soldiers were killed while on dismounted patrol when a roadside bomb exploded today."
On this week's Law and Disorder (WBAI on Monday and others throughout the ) featured Anthony Arnove's remarks from the Left Forum panel Iraq: What's At Stake (which also featured A.K. Gupta, Christian Parenti, Gilbert Achcar and Nir Rosen) that was held March 11th.
Anthony Arnove: The fundamental political reality is that the US occupation -- not al Qaeda, not Iran, not Syria -- is the reason for the insurgency in Iraq which is why no amount of 'surges' of additional troops, programs for police training, rhetoric about cutting off supply routes to Iran and Syria, or plans for victory is going to end the resistance to US occupation.Iraq today is an unqualified disaster even from the standpoint of the US ruling class. One can now regularly read on the pages of the Finanical Times and the Wall St. Journal establishment observers who proclaim Iraq the greatest foreign policy mistake in the history of the United States -- greater even than Vietnam.
[. . . ]
The Democrats came into a majority in the House, the Senate and the state governorships last Novemember as a result of a vote against the war in Iraq yet what have they done since taking office?
For all the laughable rhetoric about exporting democracy in Iraq and the Middle East -- which is the opposite of US intentions -- we now see again how little democracy we have at home as well. So far, the boldest measure the Democrats have been able to muster was to pass a non-binding House resolution criticizing the additional 21,500 troops Bush has sent to Iraq -- not the underlying occupation, not the military bases, not the economic occupation, not the presence of a 100,000 private mercenaries operating without any accountablility. The deaths, though, of Iraqis are binding. The deaths of US soldiers are binding. And let's remember that the Democrats, certainly the party's key leadership voted overwhelmingly to support Bush's invasion, that they have repeatedly voted to appropriate more funding for the occupation, and now many leading Democrats are pushing to add more than seventeen billion dollars to Bush's one hundred billion supplemental funding request for the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. Only now that the occupation is widely recognized as a complete disaster do you have Democrats voicing muted criticism of the war but much if it is utterly superficial.
[. . .]
There will be growing pressure on all of us as the 2008 presidentional election cycle continues to pick up to restrict the debate in this country to ever more narrow circles but we cannot afford to fall into that trap. If we become a lobbying wing of the Democratic Party we will become not more relevant as some insist but we will become irrelevant. The anti-war movement must maintain its independence and must continue to mobolize to fight for its own independent demands which I think first and foremost should be for the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of troops from Iraq.
Arnove is the author of, most recently, IRAQ: The Logic of Withdrawal. Last week on Law and Disorder (as Mike noted Friday) co-hosts Dalia Hashad and Michael Ratner discussed Brigadier General Douglas Lute who was the one who finally consented to be Bully Boy's war czar. Hashad noted that "czar" was a title the administration had moved away from and had settled on "war coordinator. Makes it sound like an after school job." Hashad also noted that Lute had told the Financial Times of London, some time ago, that he didn't support the concept of escalation. In August 2005, Peter Spiegel and Demetri Sevastopulo (Financial Times) reported that Lute felt the numbers of US troops on the ground in Iraq needed to be reduced for several reasons including, Lute speaking, "You have to undercut the perception of occupation in Iraq. It's very difficult to do that when you have 150,000-plus, largely western, foreign troops occupying the country." That was Lute in 2005, when US troops on the ground were far less than they are now and before he became the war czar or war coordinator.
Last week, Andishen Nouaree (Columbia's Free Times), observing that Laura Bush's laughable claim that no one suffers this illegal war more than the Bully Boy who started it, asked, "How much is the president suffering? Last week he quit his job. Not the whole job. He's still gonna give speeches, sign legislation, live in the White House, fly around on Air Force One and park his pickup truck in front of the 'Parking for Presidents Only' sign that Jenna bought him for the driveway in Crawford. Bush quit the 'lead the nation's war effort' part of his job. He announced . . . that he's handing that responbility over to U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute."
Finally, today on Democracy Now!, Amy Goodman spoke at length with Cindy Sheehan. From the end of the interview:
AMY GOODMAN: Cindy Sheehan, we have fifteen seconds. I have the sense, as you talk, that you're not actually leaving, even as a public face of the movement, but stepping back perhaps for a few months, a few weeks, to regroup. Is that accurate?
CINDY SHEEHAN: Well, what I like to think about is like, we're closing down the factory, we're going to retool, and we're going to open up, and it will be a new and improved version of it. But we are definitely going to come at it from a totally different direction.
And remember independent journalist John Pilger is on a speaking tour with his new book Freedom Next Time and his documentary Breaking the Silence: Truth and Lies in the War on Terror (which looks at DC, Afghanistan and Iraq). June 7th, he will discuss his book with Amy Goodman at The New School, Tishman Auditorium, 66 West 12th Street, beginning at 7:00 pm (doors open at 6:15). Admission is $5 per person and students (with ID) can attend for free. Pilger will sign copies of his book afterwards and Amy Goodman will sign copies of her latest book (written with her brother David Goodman) Static. "For ticket information, contact (212) 229-5488 or boxoffice@newschool.edu. For media inquiries, contact (212) 209-5407 or ruth@nationbooks.org For more information, click here or e-mail pilgerny@gmail.com."
June 11th, Pilger will be in Los Angeles at the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center (244 S. San Pedro St.) and will discuss his book and show his documentary beginning at 7:00 pm (doors open at 6:00 pm). The price of admission to the even is five dollars. "Directions, maps, and parking info at: http://www.jaccc.org/directions.htm
Presented by The Center for Economic Research and Social Change, and The Nation Institute, with support from the Wallace Global Fund. For ticket information, call or visit the JACCC. Box office: 213-680-3700 (Box Office Hours: Monday - Saturday: Noon - 5 pm)For media inquiries, contact (212) 209-5407 or ruth@nationbooks.org For more information, email pilger.la@gmail.com."
June 13th finds him in San Francisco showing his film and discussing his book at Yerba Beuna Center for Arts (beginning at 7:00 pm, doors open at 6:00 pm) and the price of admission is $15 general and $5 for students. "Presented by The Center for Economic Research and Social Change, The Nation Institute, and KPFA, with support from the Wallace Global Fund. For ticket information, call 415-978-2787 or order online at http://www.ybca.org/. In person tickets at YBCA Box office located inside the Galleries and Forum Building, 701 Mission Street at Third. (Hours: Tue, Wed, Fri, Sat & Sun: noon - 5 pm; Thu: noon - 8 pm.) For media inquiries, contact (212) 209-5407 or ruth@nationbooks.org For more information, email pilgersf@gmail.com."
From San Francisco, he moves on to Chicago for the 2007 Socialism conference. At 11:30 am Saturday June 16th, he and Anthony Arnove will participate in a conversation, audience dialogue and book signing (Arnove is the author most recently of IRAQ: The Logic of Withdrawal) and that evening (still June 16th) at 7:30 Pilger will be at Chicago Crowne Plaza O'Hare (5440 North River Road, Rosemont, IL 60018) as part of a panel of international activists. To attend the conference, the fee is $85. For Saturday and Sunday only, the price is $70. To attend only one session, the cost is ten dollars. "Presented by The Center for Economic Research and Social Change, The Nation Institute, with support from the Wallace Global Fund. Co-sponsors: Obrera Socialista, Socialist Worker, International Socialist Review, and Haymarket Books. For ticket information, call 773-583-8665 or e-mail info@socialismconference.org For media inquiries, contact (212) 209-5407 or ruth@nationbooks.org. For more information, email info@socialismconference.org."
The Socialism 2007 conference will take place in Chicago from June 14-17. Along with Pilger and Arnove, others participating will include Dahr Jamail, Laura Flanders, Kelly Dougherty, Joshua Frank, Amy Goodman, Sharon Smith, Dave Zirin, Camilo Mejia, Jeremy Scahill, Jeffrey St. Clair and many others.
iraq
anthony arnove
law and disorderwbaidalia hashadmichael ratner
the new york timesdamien cave
camilo mejiamartin smithiraq veterans against the warjohn ward anderson
the washington postmcclatchy newspapers
amy goodmandemocracy now
cindy sheehan
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Monday
And I confess I was one of millions who got caught up in the Sanjaya phenomenon--fascinated by how he snubbed Idol conventions and flaunted his notorious Mohowk updo, amused by Howard Stern's silly campaign to use Sanjaya to discredit Idol, and the sweet taunting of Simon Cowell. He became an emblem of something--a desire for something less formulaic, more in-your-face, in a winner-take-all culture. And maybe Sanjaya's success exposed how mediocrity, with a dose of flash, rises to the top--in our culture as well as politics. As conventional wisdom has it, the finale came down to the singer vs. the entertainer, 17-year old Jordin Sparks vs beatboxing 20-something Blake Lewis. A record 74 million voted. (By the way, who's making the big bucks off of the text-voting?) But to dissent from conventional wisdom, I think Jordin Sparks won not only because she's a talented singer, the youngest-ever finalist and winner, but she is a woman who represents the demographic and geographic future of this country.
No, I am not confessing that. I'm an adult, a grown woman. Unlike Katrina vanden Heuvel (who penned the above crap), I have no desire to return to the 'tweener' days. I also am not a couch potato and really don't watch television very often. The saying used to be: "Crap in, crap out." As a result, I'm really not surprised to learn of vanden Heuvel's TV addiction. (Actually, she's addicted to reality TV and I knew that some time ago -- it's been the source of many jokes behind her back, as Rebecca's mother-in-law can tell you -- for at least three years now.) A grown woman writing about what is nothing but the return of The Gong Show, writing about Howard Stern and generally embarrassing herself?
For those who missed it (and many may have), Katrina vanden Heuvel wrote the Thursday that our Congress got behind buying half-ownership of the illegal war from Bully Boy. Instead of writing about that, this is what the woman who runs the biggest political weekly in the country thought was important? Thought it was so important, so political, so necessary to our lives, this is what she wrote about.
Now, to be clear, you can cover TV in a responsible way. For instance, every week at Third Estate Sunday Review , Ava and C.I. offer their feminist critique of TV. "TV: Friendly faces aren't who we meet" is their latest and it's epic. While Katrina vanden Heuvel elected to gush over a nonsense, non-reality based, Queen for a Day type TV show, Ava and C.I. were hitting hard on PBS -- on a laughable 'documentary' on Tony Blair, on Charlie Rose, on Washington Week, on NOW. Read "TV: Friendly faces aren't who we meet" and look at the issues being addressed: war, health care, Big Business, the safety net and a great deal more. Read it and enjoy the critical observations, enjoy the humor. You will not find either trying to pass themselves off as 12-year-old glued to her TV set cooing over cute boys.
Let's be really clear, in terms of the TV critics, no one touches Ava and C.I. They have their off weeks (they think every week is an off week and, as usual, they hated this week's commentary) as will be expected when you cover it every week, week after week, for over two years -- when you groan at the thought of making the time to turn on the TV. (vanden Heuvel apparently lives in front of her TV.) But my goodness, what they have accomplished. Most weekends, I just hear the frustration and the weariness in their voices when they announce they've got to go attempt to "pull something together." But I have also seen them, in California, in DC, in NYC, in Mexico and in Texas break away to write those commentaries. They never think it will be any good. They never think it will be worth reading.
They know readers of the site love their commentaries and they know it's the drawing card. When they're done, they always trash what they have written. They insult it, they downgrade it. But if you ask them why they even bothered, they'll bring up one thing. It may not be the thing you notice when you first read it. But it's always an important issue. Due to the popularity of their commentaries and the ability to make that one political comment (they make many more than one but they're always trying to work in one), they'll keep "plugging away." They aren't satisifed with it. They're writing that at four or five in the morning, Sunday morning. After having been up since Saturday morning. After a busy week for both of them. (C.I. speaks all over the country about Iraq. Ava speaks about Iraq and she also is very involved in the immigration rights movement in California.) They are exhausted and they could kick back like Katrina vanden Heuvel. They didn't go to court to get their money but they have more than vanden Heuvel and, unlike her, having worked their butts off the last few years, no one who knows them would object if they took six weeks and did nothing but lay out by the pool sipping margaritas all day.
The work habits of Katrina vanden Heuvel amaze me. If she didn't want to be in charge of The Nation, why did she buy her seat at the table? I grew up with money. I didn't lodge any lawsuits to get my inherentence, but I've got a sizeable amount. So I'm not slamming her for having money. I am slamming her for using it to get a position that once she had, she decided to do nothing with.
I am also slamming her, a grown woman (who I didn't like she was a tot, true), for conducting herself in a self-centered, self-serving manner. C.I. didn't say it but I know it almost made the snapshot. (I know C.I. well enough to read between the lines.) So I will say it, the wrong bloodlines are coming through. She flits around like her father, with none of the precision of the maternal side of her family. (I knew her maternal grandfather, he was a wonderful man.)
She is an embarrassment. As the editor and publisher of The Nation, she is an embarrassment. As someone who bought her way in, she is an embarrassment. The only one who can change that is her. I can point it out, and have no trouble doing so, but she's the only one who can turn it around.
If she has any brains, if anything from the maternal side of her family (and her mother Jean is a wonderful person) seeped through those bloodlines, she can save herself and save her reputation. If that wasn't the case, if she's all Daddy's Girl, we're going to see a lot worse in the coming months.
Please read "Ruth's Report." It is wonderful. Poor Ruth thought it was being held (she wrote it Saturday) because C.I. was offended by it. C.I. hadn't read it. Kat came up with the idea (a wise one) that her review, Ruth's report and Isaiah's comic should be held for Monday and then C.I. could actually have an easy day (or, as some might consider it, Katrina vanden Heuvel's life). It didn't work out that way due to e-mails and issues that were coming up. Kat [Kat's Korner (of The Common Ills)] persuaded C.I. to hold things for this week and if C.I. was in a rush or short on time (or just tired), they could be posted those mornings and C.I. would just have to do one morning entry (as opposed to two). We have all been urging C.I. to take some down time. If you read "Cindy Sheehan," you'll see the need for down time and for walls. I have tremendous respect for Cindy Sheehan. I have no ill will towards her or her decision to take time for herself. I wish her all the best and all the rest. She has earned it because she has worked herself beyond the point of exhaustion. Had others tried to do even some of what she was doing, she might have been able to take time along the way. But Cindy Sheehan knew if she dropped the ball, there were not a lot of people there to pick it up.
In this community, we always talk about how you can do more and most of us can do more. I also always try to note the need to take care of yourself. If you're feeling tired and that you just can't do it anymore, that's your mind and body telling you that you need to take a break.
There is nothing wrong with taking a break. Living your life on a break, that's sad. But we all need to take the time we know we need. As I noted on Friday, I've insisted C.I. put up some walls. If you have a friend who is working themselves beyond the point, please consider urging them to do so. I hope Cindy Sheehan had people around her urging her to take time for herself. (I'm sure her sister urged it.) But I know she was a focal point and I know how easy it is for those people to get used. "Oh sure, you need a rest. Just show up for this one thing and then you'll be done and can take a rest." That one thing is followed by another one thing, by another one thing, by another one thing . . . . It's a treadmill. Cindy Sheehan ran one publicly from, I believe, April 2005 through last weekend. I hope she finds the joy in waking up as opposed to what I fear was mornings of hearing the alarm and wondering how she was going to make it through that day.
"Iraq snapshot" (The Common Ills):
Tuesday, May 29, 2007. Chaos and violence continue, the US military announces 10 deaths, the peace movement gets mainstream media coverage (so you know something bad has happened) and we love our Canadian Dahr Jamail . . . Wait. Dahr Jamail's not Canadian! He is to Jane Perlez. All this and more.
But starting out with the violence.
Bombings?
CNN reports "at least 38" Iraqis dead in two Baghdad car bombings. CBS and AP note that the death toll from the two bombings reached forty. Reuters notes the count has risen to 41 with 109 more wounded. AP notes that the first bombing "occurred about 1 p.m. in an area filled with bus stops and shops".
Shootings?
Reuters reports two police officers were shot dead in Shirqat (three wounded).
Corpses?
Reuters reports that 21 corpses were discovered in Baquba and 4 in Suwayra.
Today the US military announced: "While conducting a combat security patrol in the southern section of the Iraqi capital, two Multi-National Division-Baghdad Soldiers were killed when an improvised explosive device detonated May 28." And they announced: "Six Task Force Lightning Soldiers were killed when explosions occurred near their vehicles while conducting operations in Diyala Province, Monday." And they announced: "Two Task Force Lightning Soldiers were killed when a helicopter went down in Diyala Province, May 28." The last two announcements are connected.
CNN reports that after "a U.S. helicopter was shot down" -- killing the two -- the six died as they rushed "to the helicopter crash site [and] were hit by exploding roadside bombs, killing six soldiers and injuring three". The ten announced deaths bring the current ICCC count to 3467 US service members killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war and brings the month of May death toll to 116 -- and May's not over yet. With 116 announced deaths, May is the deadliest month thus far of 2006. 116 is also more than were announced dead in any single month of 2006. 116 is also more than were announced dead in any single month of 2006. You have to drop back to November and April of 2004 (137 and 135) to find months with higher totals. May 2007, not yet over, is already the third deadliest month for US service members.
Also today, the UK Defence Ministry announced: "It is with deep regret that the Ministry of Defence must confirm that a soldier serving in the 1st Battalion the Royal Anglican Regiment was killed on the morning of Monday 28 May 2007, in Helmand Province, southern Afghanistan." This should bring to 150 the number of UK soldiers killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war. In addition the BBC reports that "four bodyguards from security company GardaWorld and a finance expert" -- all Britons -- were kidnapped in Baghdad today. The contractors have an unexpected cheerleader. In a snapshot earlier this month, we noted British War Cheerleader Andrew White. Deborah Haynes and Stephen Farrell (Times of London) report that White has e-mailed the paper an "urgent prayer request" stating "Four of our security guards have been kidnapped along with one other British client. They were taken from the Ministry of Finance, which is Shia controlled." "Our," Canon White? White sometimes plays the "our" card and sometimes plays the "I am here in the Green Zone to lead St George's Church . . . except when I'm at my home in England or jet setting for meetings or on a book tour or . . " Today, White writes of "our" contractors. On Sunday, Michael Smith (Times of London), who broke the news on the Downing Street Memos, reported that prime minister heir-to-be Gordon Brown has has alarmed "senior army officers" who fret that "Brown is preparing to speed up the pull-out to draw a symbolic line under the Blair era." On Sunday, Steve Fainaru and Saad al-Izzi (Washington Post) reported on the mercenaries Blackwater who "shot and killed an Iraqi driver Thursday" and will face no legal fall out because that's the way it's set up. Pray for them to Canon White?
In other kidnappings, CBS and AP report that 40 Iraqis were kidnapped in Samarra. Strangely, no word on whether Canon White has sent out e-mails expressing shock over this kidnapping or referring to them as "our" people.
Meanwhile, the refugee crisis in Iraq (approximately 4 million when you put together internal refugees with external refugees) receives attention from Katherine Zdepf (New York Times)reports on the realities for many female refugees -- prostitution. Zdepf zooms in on the 16-year-old daughter of Umm Hiba who now works "at a nightclub along a highway known for prostituion."
Staying with the New York Times, Jane Perlez who did some fine work on the tsunami (end of 2004, start of 2005) apparently decided today to illustrate Laura Nyro's "Money" ("I found the system and I lost the pearl"). That's the best logical explanation for "An Assault in Iraq, a Stage Hit in London" which mangles every known fact in the supposed search of a play review. Fallujah is playing London and that may be one of the few things Perlez gets 100% correct. She describes Dahr Jamail as "a freelance Canadian journalist." Is that for comic effect? Jamail grew up in Houston, Texas is a Lebenese-American who was born in the US. Jamail's reporting from Iraq is used for one of the character's lines. We don't have time to go over all of Perlez' errors. We will ask did Perlez measure US v. British sentiment with a dipstick when determining "deeper" and when was she last in the US? And we will note that she's surprised "The Guardian, a liberal daily" did not care for the play while even the Telegraph of London (conservative) did. The Guardian is the bible of Tony Blair and New Labour, buy a clue Perlez. Blair is a war monger and the Guardian of London works overtime to avoid pointing that out (just like it ignored the Downing Street Memos). She notes allegations of napalm use in Falluja "never substantiated." Napalm was used in Iraq. The US State Department and the Pentagon both admitted to it being used early on in the illegal war. The charge of napalm, remember Perlez is assigned to London, came, in England, from the Sunday Mirror, not "left-wing critics" as Perlez wants US readers to believe. Sunday Mirror political editor Paul Gilfeather wrote, on November 28, 2004, "US troops are secretly using outlawed napalm gas to wipe out remaining insurgents in and around Fallujah. News that President George W. Bush has sanctioned the use of napalm, a deadly cocktail of polystyrene and jet fuel banned by the United Nations in 1980, will stun governments around the world. And last night Tony Blair was dragged into the row as furious Labour MPs demanded he face the Commons over it. Reports claim that innocent civilians have died in napalm attacks, which turn victims into human fireballs as the gel bonds flames to flesh." Now maybe Perlez would prefer to argue that was all from the white phosphorus which, for the record, her paper didn't report in real time, denied when Democracy Now! reported it and then Scott Shane out with the big mop to yet again clean up. If Perlez was starting out at the paper, this article and all of its errors (big and small) would probably mean she'd be cleaning her desk right about now.
Turning to peace news, Iraq Veterans Against the War continued bringing the war home last weekend:
NYC Operation First Casualty a Success!
"By reenacting what we've been through in Iraq we hope to inspire more of our fellow Americans to act to end the war now," said IVAW member Adam Kokesh. Actual veterans of the conflict in Iraq played their part of American service members, dramatically interacting with non-veteran supporters playing civilians. In full uniform IVAW members performed searches, detentions, squad patrol, and crowd control operations in locations that included Central Park, Times Square, Union Square and Grand Army Plaza...
Click here to see photos of this action.
Read more of this item -->-->
Click here for more IVAW Updates
Amy Goodman (Democracy Now!) noted, "In New York City, members of Iraq Veterans Against the War re-enacted scenes from occupied Iraq in a series of street theater actions. The veterans wore camouflage fatigues and pointed imaginary guns at a crowd of protesters playing Iraqi civilians" and that the University of Massachusetts-Amherst Friday found students and faculty booing, holding signs and protesting Andrew Card, former White House chief of staff, who got a honory degree in . . . There is audio of this but it's hard to make out due to the loud booing so let's all just assume Card was awarded an honorary doctorate in War Crimes. He certainly earned it.
Meanwhile Joshua Key's The Deserter's Tale has won another strong review for Key's story of serving Iraq and what led him to realize the war was illegal, self-check out and move his family to Candad. Ying Lee (Berkeley Daily Planet) who notes the difference between earlier wars and this one (as well as his own experience growing up in Shanghai during the Japanese occupationg): "Now we have the details, a book, a deserter's story as told to a Canadian journalist and writer. It is a simple story told simply: of how our soldiers in Iraq (and Afghanistan I would suppose) are trained, what they do as an occupying army, and how war affects them."
There is a growing movement of war resistance within the US military that includes Joshua Key, Ehren Watada, Terri Johnson, Camilo Mejia, Kimberly Rivera, Dean Walcott, Linjamin Mull, Augstin Aguayo, Justin Colby, Marc Train, Robert Zabala, Darrell Anderson, Kyle Snyder , Corey Glass, Jeremy Hinzman, Kevin Lee, Joshua Key, Mark Wilkerson, Patrick Hart, Ricky Clousing, Ivan Brobeck, Aidan Delgado, Pablo Paredes, Carl Webb, Jeremy Hinzman, Stephen Funk, Clifton Hicks, David Sanders, Dan Felushko, Brandon Hughey, Clifford Cornell, Joshua Despain, Joshua Casteel, Katherine Jashinski, Chris Teske, Matt Lowell, Jimmy Massey, Tim Richard, Hart Viges, Michael Blake and Kevin Benderman. In total, forty US war resisters in Canada have applied for asylum.
Information on war resistance within the military can be found at Center on Conscience & War, The Objector, The G.I. Rights Hotline, and the War Resisters Support Campaign. Courage to Resist offers information on all public war resisters.
Now for the topic that everyone's talking about in the press, Cindy Sheehan has stepped away. (This is also the thing that is the biggest topic in e-mails from members. I am pressed for time but I will try to note all subjects Martha and Shirley told me were in the e-mails. Also note, some of this was covered yesterday.) In an article that's gotten more attention from the mainstream media than any she's written before, Sheehan observes that "when I started to hold the Democratic Party to the same standards that I held the Republican Party, support for my cause started to erode and the 'left' started labeling me with the same slurs that the right used. I guess no one paid attention to me when I said that the issue of peace and people dying for no reason is not a matter of 'right or left,' but 'right and wrong.' . . . The most devastating conclusion that I reached this morning, however, was that Casey did indeed die for nothing. His precious lifeblood drained out in a country far away from his family who loves him, killed by his own country which is beholden to and run by a war machine that even controls what we think. I have tired every since he died to make his sacrifice meaningful. Casey died for a country which cares more about who will be the next American Idol than how many people will be killed in the next few months while Democrats and Republicans play politics with human lives."
More about American Idol than about the dying? Couldn't be, right? Except of course Katrina vanden Heuvel -- who does not edit & publish Teen Beat nor TV Guide but who does edit & publish The Nation -- spent last week -- in her position as the woman who runs the largest circulated political weekly -- gushing over American Idol. If you check in at her blog Editor's Cut, you won't find it. Did Ruth get it wrong? Did Mike dream it up? No.
Apparently even the Peace Resister is capable of some shame or at least wanting to rewrite history. The post, which originally appeared at her Editors Cut no longer shows up. However, it ran May 24, 2007 -- the day, as Mike pointed out, when most of the left were up in arms over Congress caving on Iraq. On that day, the most important thing to Katrina vanden Heuvel, alleged editor and publisher of a political weekly, was to gush: "I have a not-so-secret addiction. American Idol. My colleagues know I've watched every week, all of 19, checking out all of the theme nights . .." Trina addressed how strange it was for the non-60s teen Katrina to cite Smokey Robinson (well, he was a womanizer) and ignore Diana Ross but we all know that, under vanden Heuvel, The Nation loves to ignore women. Regarding that embarassing post, Trina wrote: "Knock-knock, is there a grown up home? Judging by her post, no there's not. Just a little girl trying to look cool and failed because as the Washington Post noted yesterday, American Idol had six million less viewers than the year before. Woops! It's as though she bought a pair of blue jeans to fit in only to find out that she bought the wrong brand! Maybe next time she can just try acting her age."
While Laura Flanders used space and time that Thursday to urge people in the US to call their Reps and Senators and demand that they not cave, Katrina vanden Heuvel winded down her (now vanished but click here for Google) ode to American Idol with: "I'm pushing this, I know. But, hell, the Idol season is over -- so why not?" Why not? Why not? Because you're not a TV critic. Because you're not 15. Because you're a grown woman who supposedly edits and publishes a politically weekly. Because it is painful to watch you embarrass yourself. Because "Idol Chatter" is beneath the publisher of The Nation, whomever occupies that position. Because Matthew Rothschild, the editor of The Progressive, spent the same day writing about the cave, not some crappy TV reality show. And because -- though no one would know it to read most issues of The Nation -- and illegal war is dragging on.
Cindy Sheehan notes: "This is my resignation letter as the 'face' of the American anti-war movement." Sheehan notes the very real attacks on her and notes that has included some at Democratic Underground. Nikki Stone 1 (Democratic Underground) has written "I support Cindy Sheehan" and the bulk commenting on this thread are in strong agreement. Attacks came from all sorts of supposed friends (Skinner, lead administrator at DU, has a statement up). But let's get real about the attacks. "You have Cindy Sheehan running around, a symbol of the peace movement. A symbol of what? Who is she? Who nominated her to be the spokesperson? She did one brave thing. I'm all for what Cindy Sheehan did last August. But people say, 'She sacrificed so much.' She didn't sacrifice anything." That lovely statement was made (or snorted) by the pig Scott Ritter when speaking to Colorado Springs Indy (an alternative weekly) in 2006. From his stye, he snorted that and he snorted a lot more. For some reason, Ritter is built up as a hero by some 'left' types.
Apparently heroic is having the mainstream media report that you, over 40 years old, were twice arrested for trying to arrange meet ups with underage girls? That is the reality of the Scott Ritter (and when CNN offered him the opportunity to explain the first arrest, he refused to do so). Here's another reality of Scott Ritter: Katrina vanden Heuvel keeps publishing him. In the magazine and via Nation Books, she publishes Ritter who does not move books. Now you may, as some wrongly do, assume Ritter is a lefty. Until 2004, Ritter admits he voted Republican every time -- which he will no doubt return to doing in 2008 but how 'nice' of The Nation to give a twice busted Republican an outlet.
Now here's how polite society worked once upon a time, when someone was reported to have been twice busted for pedophilia, that was really it for them. They didn't get write ups, they didn't pen op-eds. They weren't invited on programs to chat. But for some reason, Pig Ritter is seen as a voice the 'left' needs to adopt. Scott Ritter was allowed to repeatedly attack Cindy Sheehan on his joint-tour in 2006 (The Sky is Falling Tour -- DVD set retails for $19.99 unless you're going for the NC-17 version) and everyone looked the other way and most of the press (big and small) just chuckled. That's why he felt brave enough to issue the nonsense in an interview proper (and one that didn't require him to be handcuffed -- how novel that must have been for him).
The peace movement needs to be inclusive, no question, but that doesn't translate as: "Because we have the Peace Mom, we need to have the Pedophile Man." That's not inclusion, that's stupidity on ever level (including legal liabilities should anything happen to an underage female). We washed our hands of him a long time ago in this community. He is "pig" when noted here for any reason. His name is being mentioned here (for the first time since he went public in attacking Sheehan) only because there are some who seem unable to believe it could be true. Well it is. And it's equally true that you need to ask your outlets why they have repeatedly featured a man who will not explain his criminal busts and allows to stand the mainstream media's reporting that they were for attempting to hook up with young (underage) girls online. It is amazing that the same independent media that wants to scream 'crackpot' and 'crazy' to make sure they are not associated with certain groups is perfectly happy to break bread with a pedophile. Repeatedly.
The Nation managed to cover Sheehan (in print) once -- a (bad) cover story including Cindy Sheehan in the summer of 2005 yet, somehow, The Progressive was able to feature Cindy Sheehan's writing this year (April 2007 issue). And while Katrina vanden Heuvel wants to jaw bone today about "imagining" possibilities -- quick, get thee to the new age retreat! -- it's Matthew Rothschild who yet again has to play grown up and note Sheehan's announcement: "We all owe Cindy Sheehan a huge debt of gratitude for all that she has contributed. I wish her happiness and comfort and relaxation and love and laughter in her days ahead. And I look forward to joining hands with her again somewhere down the road."
Today on Democracy Now!, Amy Goodman noted, "And we have Cindy Sheehan, in this Memorial Day letter, saying she's going home and that, well, she expected the attack from the Republicans. It was the Democrats that hurt her the most as she criticized them." Norman Solomon noted, "Well, she's undergone and shouldered, of course, a huge burden on so many levels of human existance". Solomon was on to discuss War Made Easy, not the book, the documentary which Sean Penn narrates and is available on DVD. Like the book (this isn't a PowerPoint presentation passing as a documentary -- this is an actual documentary) it is based upon, War Made Easy traces the ways war is sold, the way propaganda is used and the willingness of big media to 'enlist'.
iraq
joshua key
matthew rothschild
iraq veterans against the war
amy goodman
democracy now
norman solomon
the washington post
cindy sheehan
the new york times
ruths report
trinas kitchen
mikey likes it
katrina vanden heuvel
the world today just nuts
No, I am not confessing that. I'm an adult, a grown woman. Unlike Katrina vanden Heuvel (who penned the above crap), I have no desire to return to the 'tweener' days. I also am not a couch potato and really don't watch television very often. The saying used to be: "Crap in, crap out." As a result, I'm really not surprised to learn of vanden Heuvel's TV addiction. (Actually, she's addicted to reality TV and I knew that some time ago -- it's been the source of many jokes behind her back, as Rebecca's mother-in-law can tell you -- for at least three years now.) A grown woman writing about what is nothing but the return of The Gong Show, writing about Howard Stern and generally embarrassing herself?
For those who missed it (and many may have), Katrina vanden Heuvel wrote the Thursday that our Congress got behind buying half-ownership of the illegal war from Bully Boy. Instead of writing about that, this is what the woman who runs the biggest political weekly in the country thought was important? Thought it was so important, so political, so necessary to our lives, this is what she wrote about.
Now, to be clear, you can cover TV in a responsible way. For instance, every week at Third Estate Sunday Review , Ava and C.I. offer their feminist critique of TV. "TV: Friendly faces aren't who we meet" is their latest and it's epic. While Katrina vanden Heuvel elected to gush over a nonsense, non-reality based, Queen for a Day type TV show, Ava and C.I. were hitting hard on PBS -- on a laughable 'documentary' on Tony Blair, on Charlie Rose, on Washington Week, on NOW. Read "TV: Friendly faces aren't who we meet" and look at the issues being addressed: war, health care, Big Business, the safety net and a great deal more. Read it and enjoy the critical observations, enjoy the humor. You will not find either trying to pass themselves off as 12-year-old glued to her TV set cooing over cute boys.
Let's be really clear, in terms of the TV critics, no one touches Ava and C.I. They have their off weeks (they think every week is an off week and, as usual, they hated this week's commentary) as will be expected when you cover it every week, week after week, for over two years -- when you groan at the thought of making the time to turn on the TV. (vanden Heuvel apparently lives in front of her TV.) But my goodness, what they have accomplished. Most weekends, I just hear the frustration and the weariness in their voices when they announce they've got to go attempt to "pull something together." But I have also seen them, in California, in DC, in NYC, in Mexico and in Texas break away to write those commentaries. They never think it will be any good. They never think it will be worth reading.
They know readers of the site love their commentaries and they know it's the drawing card. When they're done, they always trash what they have written. They insult it, they downgrade it. But if you ask them why they even bothered, they'll bring up one thing. It may not be the thing you notice when you first read it. But it's always an important issue. Due to the popularity of their commentaries and the ability to make that one political comment (they make many more than one but they're always trying to work in one), they'll keep "plugging away." They aren't satisifed with it. They're writing that at four or five in the morning, Sunday morning. After having been up since Saturday morning. After a busy week for both of them. (C.I. speaks all over the country about Iraq. Ava speaks about Iraq and she also is very involved in the immigration rights movement in California.) They are exhausted and they could kick back like Katrina vanden Heuvel. They didn't go to court to get their money but they have more than vanden Heuvel and, unlike her, having worked their butts off the last few years, no one who knows them would object if they took six weeks and did nothing but lay out by the pool sipping margaritas all day.
The work habits of Katrina vanden Heuvel amaze me. If she didn't want to be in charge of The Nation, why did she buy her seat at the table? I grew up with money. I didn't lodge any lawsuits to get my inherentence, but I've got a sizeable amount. So I'm not slamming her for having money. I am slamming her for using it to get a position that once she had, she decided to do nothing with.
I am also slamming her, a grown woman (who I didn't like she was a tot, true), for conducting herself in a self-centered, self-serving manner. C.I. didn't say it but I know it almost made the snapshot. (I know C.I. well enough to read between the lines.) So I will say it, the wrong bloodlines are coming through. She flits around like her father, with none of the precision of the maternal side of her family. (I knew her maternal grandfather, he was a wonderful man.)
She is an embarrassment. As the editor and publisher of The Nation, she is an embarrassment. As someone who bought her way in, she is an embarrassment. The only one who can change that is her. I can point it out, and have no trouble doing so, but she's the only one who can turn it around.
If she has any brains, if anything from the maternal side of her family (and her mother Jean is a wonderful person) seeped through those bloodlines, she can save herself and save her reputation. If that wasn't the case, if she's all Daddy's Girl, we're going to see a lot worse in the coming months.
Please read "Ruth's Report." It is wonderful. Poor Ruth thought it was being held (she wrote it Saturday) because C.I. was offended by it. C.I. hadn't read it. Kat came up with the idea (a wise one) that her review, Ruth's report and Isaiah's comic should be held for Monday and then C.I. could actually have an easy day (or, as some might consider it, Katrina vanden Heuvel's life). It didn't work out that way due to e-mails and issues that were coming up. Kat [Kat's Korner (of The Common Ills)] persuaded C.I. to hold things for this week and if C.I. was in a rush or short on time (or just tired), they could be posted those mornings and C.I. would just have to do one morning entry (as opposed to two). We have all been urging C.I. to take some down time. If you read "Cindy Sheehan," you'll see the need for down time and for walls. I have tremendous respect for Cindy Sheehan. I have no ill will towards her or her decision to take time for herself. I wish her all the best and all the rest. She has earned it because she has worked herself beyond the point of exhaustion. Had others tried to do even some of what she was doing, she might have been able to take time along the way. But Cindy Sheehan knew if she dropped the ball, there were not a lot of people there to pick it up.
In this community, we always talk about how you can do more and most of us can do more. I also always try to note the need to take care of yourself. If you're feeling tired and that you just can't do it anymore, that's your mind and body telling you that you need to take a break.
There is nothing wrong with taking a break. Living your life on a break, that's sad. But we all need to take the time we know we need. As I noted on Friday, I've insisted C.I. put up some walls. If you have a friend who is working themselves beyond the point, please consider urging them to do so. I hope Cindy Sheehan had people around her urging her to take time for herself. (I'm sure her sister urged it.) But I know she was a focal point and I know how easy it is for those people to get used. "Oh sure, you need a rest. Just show up for this one thing and then you'll be done and can take a rest." That one thing is followed by another one thing, by another one thing, by another one thing . . . . It's a treadmill. Cindy Sheehan ran one publicly from, I believe, April 2005 through last weekend. I hope she finds the joy in waking up as opposed to what I fear was mornings of hearing the alarm and wondering how she was going to make it through that day.
"Iraq snapshot" (The Common Ills):
Tuesday, May 29, 2007. Chaos and violence continue, the US military announces 10 deaths, the peace movement gets mainstream media coverage (so you know something bad has happened) and we love our Canadian Dahr Jamail . . . Wait. Dahr Jamail's not Canadian! He is to Jane Perlez. All this and more.
But starting out with the violence.
Bombings?
CNN reports "at least 38" Iraqis dead in two Baghdad car bombings. CBS and AP note that the death toll from the two bombings reached forty. Reuters notes the count has risen to 41 with 109 more wounded. AP notes that the first bombing "occurred about 1 p.m. in an area filled with bus stops and shops".
Shootings?
Reuters reports two police officers were shot dead in Shirqat (three wounded).
Corpses?
Reuters reports that 21 corpses were discovered in Baquba and 4 in Suwayra.
Today the US military announced: "While conducting a combat security patrol in the southern section of the Iraqi capital, two Multi-National Division-Baghdad Soldiers were killed when an improvised explosive device detonated May 28." And they announced: "Six Task Force Lightning Soldiers were killed when explosions occurred near their vehicles while conducting operations in Diyala Province, Monday." And they announced: "Two Task Force Lightning Soldiers were killed when a helicopter went down in Diyala Province, May 28." The last two announcements are connected.
CNN reports that after "a U.S. helicopter was shot down" -- killing the two -- the six died as they rushed "to the helicopter crash site [and] were hit by exploding roadside bombs, killing six soldiers and injuring three". The ten announced deaths bring the current ICCC count to 3467 US service members killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war and brings the month of May death toll to 116 -- and May's not over yet. With 116 announced deaths, May is the deadliest month thus far of 2006. 116 is also more than were announced dead in any single month of 2006. 116 is also more than were announced dead in any single month of 2006. You have to drop back to November and April of 2004 (137 and 135) to find months with higher totals. May 2007, not yet over, is already the third deadliest month for US service members.
Also today, the UK Defence Ministry announced: "It is with deep regret that the Ministry of Defence must confirm that a soldier serving in the 1st Battalion the Royal Anglican Regiment was killed on the morning of Monday 28 May 2007, in Helmand Province, southern Afghanistan." This should bring to 150 the number of UK soldiers killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war. In addition the BBC reports that "four bodyguards from security company GardaWorld and a finance expert" -- all Britons -- were kidnapped in Baghdad today. The contractors have an unexpected cheerleader. In a snapshot earlier this month, we noted British War Cheerleader Andrew White. Deborah Haynes and Stephen Farrell (Times of London) report that White has e-mailed the paper an "urgent prayer request" stating "Four of our security guards have been kidnapped along with one other British client. They were taken from the Ministry of Finance, which is Shia controlled." "Our," Canon White? White sometimes plays the "our" card and sometimes plays the "I am here in the Green Zone to lead St George's Church . . . except when I'm at my home in England or jet setting for meetings or on a book tour or . . " Today, White writes of "our" contractors. On Sunday, Michael Smith (Times of London), who broke the news on the Downing Street Memos, reported that prime minister heir-to-be Gordon Brown has has alarmed "senior army officers" who fret that "Brown is preparing to speed up the pull-out to draw a symbolic line under the Blair era." On Sunday, Steve Fainaru and Saad al-Izzi (Washington Post) reported on the mercenaries Blackwater who "shot and killed an Iraqi driver Thursday" and will face no legal fall out because that's the way it's set up. Pray for them to Canon White?
In other kidnappings, CBS and AP report that 40 Iraqis were kidnapped in Samarra. Strangely, no word on whether Canon White has sent out e-mails expressing shock over this kidnapping or referring to them as "our" people.
Meanwhile, the refugee crisis in Iraq (approximately 4 million when you put together internal refugees with external refugees) receives attention from Katherine Zdepf (New York Times)reports on the realities for many female refugees -- prostitution. Zdepf zooms in on the 16-year-old daughter of Umm Hiba who now works "at a nightclub along a highway known for prostituion."
Staying with the New York Times, Jane Perlez who did some fine work on the tsunami (end of 2004, start of 2005) apparently decided today to illustrate Laura Nyro's "Money" ("I found the system and I lost the pearl"). That's the best logical explanation for "An Assault in Iraq, a Stage Hit in London" which mangles every known fact in the supposed search of a play review. Fallujah is playing London and that may be one of the few things Perlez gets 100% correct. She describes Dahr Jamail as "a freelance Canadian journalist." Is that for comic effect? Jamail grew up in Houston, Texas is a Lebenese-American who was born in the US. Jamail's reporting from Iraq is used for one of the character's lines. We don't have time to go over all of Perlez' errors. We will ask did Perlez measure US v. British sentiment with a dipstick when determining "deeper" and when was she last in the US? And we will note that she's surprised "The Guardian, a liberal daily" did not care for the play while even the Telegraph of London (conservative) did. The Guardian is the bible of Tony Blair and New Labour, buy a clue Perlez. Blair is a war monger and the Guardian of London works overtime to avoid pointing that out (just like it ignored the Downing Street Memos). She notes allegations of napalm use in Falluja "never substantiated." Napalm was used in Iraq. The US State Department and the Pentagon both admitted to it being used early on in the illegal war. The charge of napalm, remember Perlez is assigned to London, came, in England, from the Sunday Mirror, not "left-wing critics" as Perlez wants US readers to believe. Sunday Mirror political editor Paul Gilfeather wrote, on November 28, 2004, "US troops are secretly using outlawed napalm gas to wipe out remaining insurgents in and around Fallujah. News that President George W. Bush has sanctioned the use of napalm, a deadly cocktail of polystyrene and jet fuel banned by the United Nations in 1980, will stun governments around the world. And last night Tony Blair was dragged into the row as furious Labour MPs demanded he face the Commons over it. Reports claim that innocent civilians have died in napalm attacks, which turn victims into human fireballs as the gel bonds flames to flesh." Now maybe Perlez would prefer to argue that was all from the white phosphorus which, for the record, her paper didn't report in real time, denied when Democracy Now! reported it and then Scott Shane out with the big mop to yet again clean up. If Perlez was starting out at the paper, this article and all of its errors (big and small) would probably mean she'd be cleaning her desk right about now.
Turning to peace news, Iraq Veterans Against the War continued bringing the war home last weekend:
NYC Operation First Casualty a Success!
"By reenacting what we've been through in Iraq we hope to inspire more of our fellow Americans to act to end the war now," said IVAW member Adam Kokesh. Actual veterans of the conflict in Iraq played their part of American service members, dramatically interacting with non-veteran supporters playing civilians. In full uniform IVAW members performed searches, detentions, squad patrol, and crowd control operations in locations that included Central Park, Times Square, Union Square and Grand Army Plaza...
Click here to see photos of this action.
Read more of this item -->-->
Click here for more IVAW Updates
Amy Goodman (Democracy Now!) noted, "In New York City, members of Iraq Veterans Against the War re-enacted scenes from occupied Iraq in a series of street theater actions. The veterans wore camouflage fatigues and pointed imaginary guns at a crowd of protesters playing Iraqi civilians" and that the University of Massachusetts-Amherst Friday found students and faculty booing, holding signs and protesting Andrew Card, former White House chief of staff, who got a honory degree in . . . There is audio of this but it's hard to make out due to the loud booing so let's all just assume Card was awarded an honorary doctorate in War Crimes. He certainly earned it.
Meanwhile Joshua Key's The Deserter's Tale has won another strong review for Key's story of serving Iraq and what led him to realize the war was illegal, self-check out and move his family to Candad. Ying Lee (Berkeley Daily Planet) who notes the difference between earlier wars and this one (as well as his own experience growing up in Shanghai during the Japanese occupationg): "Now we have the details, a book, a deserter's story as told to a Canadian journalist and writer. It is a simple story told simply: of how our soldiers in Iraq (and Afghanistan I would suppose) are trained, what they do as an occupying army, and how war affects them."
There is a growing movement of war resistance within the US military that includes Joshua Key, Ehren Watada, Terri Johnson, Camilo Mejia, Kimberly Rivera, Dean Walcott, Linjamin Mull, Augstin Aguayo, Justin Colby, Marc Train, Robert Zabala, Darrell Anderson, Kyle Snyder , Corey Glass, Jeremy Hinzman, Kevin Lee, Joshua Key, Mark Wilkerson, Patrick Hart, Ricky Clousing, Ivan Brobeck, Aidan Delgado, Pablo Paredes, Carl Webb, Jeremy Hinzman, Stephen Funk, Clifton Hicks, David Sanders, Dan Felushko, Brandon Hughey, Clifford Cornell, Joshua Despain, Joshua Casteel, Katherine Jashinski, Chris Teske, Matt Lowell, Jimmy Massey, Tim Richard, Hart Viges, Michael Blake and Kevin Benderman. In total, forty US war resisters in Canada have applied for asylum.
Information on war resistance within the military can be found at Center on Conscience & War, The Objector, The G.I. Rights Hotline, and the War Resisters Support Campaign. Courage to Resist offers information on all public war resisters.
Now for the topic that everyone's talking about in the press, Cindy Sheehan has stepped away. (This is also the thing that is the biggest topic in e-mails from members. I am pressed for time but I will try to note all subjects Martha and Shirley told me were in the e-mails. Also note, some of this was covered yesterday.) In an article that's gotten more attention from the mainstream media than any she's written before, Sheehan observes that "when I started to hold the Democratic Party to the same standards that I held the Republican Party, support for my cause started to erode and the 'left' started labeling me with the same slurs that the right used. I guess no one paid attention to me when I said that the issue of peace and people dying for no reason is not a matter of 'right or left,' but 'right and wrong.' . . . The most devastating conclusion that I reached this morning, however, was that Casey did indeed die for nothing. His precious lifeblood drained out in a country far away from his family who loves him, killed by his own country which is beholden to and run by a war machine that even controls what we think. I have tired every since he died to make his sacrifice meaningful. Casey died for a country which cares more about who will be the next American Idol than how many people will be killed in the next few months while Democrats and Republicans play politics with human lives."
More about American Idol than about the dying? Couldn't be, right? Except of course Katrina vanden Heuvel -- who does not edit & publish Teen Beat nor TV Guide but who does edit & publish The Nation -- spent last week -- in her position as the woman who runs the largest circulated political weekly -- gushing over American Idol. If you check in at her blog Editor's Cut, you won't find it. Did Ruth get it wrong? Did Mike dream it up? No.
Apparently even the Peace Resister is capable of some shame or at least wanting to rewrite history. The post, which originally appeared at her Editors Cut no longer shows up. However, it ran May 24, 2007 -- the day, as Mike pointed out, when most of the left were up in arms over Congress caving on Iraq. On that day, the most important thing to Katrina vanden Heuvel, alleged editor and publisher of a political weekly, was to gush: "I have a not-so-secret addiction. American Idol. My colleagues know I've watched every week, all of 19, checking out all of the theme nights . .." Trina addressed how strange it was for the non-60s teen Katrina to cite Smokey Robinson (well, he was a womanizer) and ignore Diana Ross but we all know that, under vanden Heuvel, The Nation loves to ignore women. Regarding that embarassing post, Trina wrote: "Knock-knock, is there a grown up home? Judging by her post, no there's not. Just a little girl trying to look cool and failed because as the Washington Post noted yesterday, American Idol had six million less viewers than the year before. Woops! It's as though she bought a pair of blue jeans to fit in only to find out that she bought the wrong brand! Maybe next time she can just try acting her age."
While Laura Flanders used space and time that Thursday to urge people in the US to call their Reps and Senators and demand that they not cave, Katrina vanden Heuvel winded down her (now vanished but click here for Google) ode to American Idol with: "I'm pushing this, I know. But, hell, the Idol season is over -- so why not?" Why not? Why not? Because you're not a TV critic. Because you're not 15. Because you're a grown woman who supposedly edits and publishes a politically weekly. Because it is painful to watch you embarrass yourself. Because "Idol Chatter" is beneath the publisher of The Nation, whomever occupies that position. Because Matthew Rothschild, the editor of The Progressive, spent the same day writing about the cave, not some crappy TV reality show. And because -- though no one would know it to read most issues of The Nation -- and illegal war is dragging on.
Cindy Sheehan notes: "This is my resignation letter as the 'face' of the American anti-war movement." Sheehan notes the very real attacks on her and notes that has included some at Democratic Underground. Nikki Stone 1 (Democratic Underground) has written "I support Cindy Sheehan" and the bulk commenting on this thread are in strong agreement. Attacks came from all sorts of supposed friends (Skinner, lead administrator at DU, has a statement up). But let's get real about the attacks. "You have Cindy Sheehan running around, a symbol of the peace movement. A symbol of what? Who is she? Who nominated her to be the spokesperson? She did one brave thing. I'm all for what Cindy Sheehan did last August. But people say, 'She sacrificed so much.' She didn't sacrifice anything." That lovely statement was made (or snorted) by the pig Scott Ritter when speaking to Colorado Springs Indy (an alternative weekly) in 2006. From his stye, he snorted that and he snorted a lot more. For some reason, Ritter is built up as a hero by some 'left' types.
Apparently heroic is having the mainstream media report that you, over 40 years old, were twice arrested for trying to arrange meet ups with underage girls? That is the reality of the Scott Ritter (and when CNN offered him the opportunity to explain the first arrest, he refused to do so). Here's another reality of Scott Ritter: Katrina vanden Heuvel keeps publishing him. In the magazine and via Nation Books, she publishes Ritter who does not move books. Now you may, as some wrongly do, assume Ritter is a lefty. Until 2004, Ritter admits he voted Republican every time -- which he will no doubt return to doing in 2008 but how 'nice' of The Nation to give a twice busted Republican an outlet.
Now here's how polite society worked once upon a time, when someone was reported to have been twice busted for pedophilia, that was really it for them. They didn't get write ups, they didn't pen op-eds. They weren't invited on programs to chat. But for some reason, Pig Ritter is seen as a voice the 'left' needs to adopt. Scott Ritter was allowed to repeatedly attack Cindy Sheehan on his joint-tour in 2006 (The Sky is Falling Tour -- DVD set retails for $19.99 unless you're going for the NC-17 version) and everyone looked the other way and most of the press (big and small) just chuckled. That's why he felt brave enough to issue the nonsense in an interview proper (and one that didn't require him to be handcuffed -- how novel that must have been for him).
The peace movement needs to be inclusive, no question, but that doesn't translate as: "Because we have the Peace Mom, we need to have the Pedophile Man." That's not inclusion, that's stupidity on ever level (including legal liabilities should anything happen to an underage female). We washed our hands of him a long time ago in this community. He is "pig" when noted here for any reason. His name is being mentioned here (for the first time since he went public in attacking Sheehan) only because there are some who seem unable to believe it could be true. Well it is. And it's equally true that you need to ask your outlets why they have repeatedly featured a man who will not explain his criminal busts and allows to stand the mainstream media's reporting that they were for attempting to hook up with young (underage) girls online. It is amazing that the same independent media that wants to scream 'crackpot' and 'crazy' to make sure they are not associated with certain groups is perfectly happy to break bread with a pedophile. Repeatedly.
The Nation managed to cover Sheehan (in print) once -- a (bad) cover story including Cindy Sheehan in the summer of 2005 yet, somehow, The Progressive was able to feature Cindy Sheehan's writing this year (April 2007 issue). And while Katrina vanden Heuvel wants to jaw bone today about "imagining" possibilities -- quick, get thee to the new age retreat! -- it's Matthew Rothschild who yet again has to play grown up and note Sheehan's announcement: "We all owe Cindy Sheehan a huge debt of gratitude for all that she has contributed. I wish her happiness and comfort and relaxation and love and laughter in her days ahead. And I look forward to joining hands with her again somewhere down the road."
Today on Democracy Now!, Amy Goodman noted, "And we have Cindy Sheehan, in this Memorial Day letter, saying she's going home and that, well, she expected the attack from the Republicans. It was the Democrats that hurt her the most as she criticized them." Norman Solomon noted, "Well, she's undergone and shouldered, of course, a huge burden on so many levels of human existance". Solomon was on to discuss War Made Easy, not the book, the documentary which Sean Penn narrates and is available on DVD. Like the book (this isn't a PowerPoint presentation passing as a documentary -- this is an actual documentary) it is based upon, War Made Easy traces the ways war is sold, the way propaganda is used and the willingness of big media to 'enlist'.
iraq
joshua key
matthew rothschild
iraq veterans against the war
amy goodman
democracy now
norman solomon
the washington post
cindy sheehan
the new york times
ruths report
trinas kitchen
mikey likes it
katrina vanden heuvel
the world today just nuts
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