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The Jewish Divide on Israel

06.30.04 (7:30 am) [edit]

For a glimpse of how Israel plays out in an American election year, recall the day in September when then-Democratic presidential frontrunner Howard Dean told reporters he would like to see the United States take an "even-handed" approach to Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. Thirty-four Congressional Democrats responded by sending Dean a harsh letter questioning whether he shared their "unequivocal support for Israel's right to exist," and anonymous e-mails inundated Jewish listservs, accusing him of abandoning Israel. Dean promptly appeared on CNN to defend Israel's assassinations of Palestinian militants.

Or consider the day in February when John Kerry sat down in New York to discuss issues with a group of Jewish leaders hand-selected by the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. Hannah Rosenthal, executive director of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs and one of the few liberals invited, said she had her hand in the air, ready to ask questions about civil rights, poverty and the erosion of the church/state divide, but she was avoided by the facilitators, and the meeting shaped up as a single-agenda affair. "The central issue, no matter how they came at it, was, 'Are you going to be there for Israel in these difficult times?'" Rosenthal recalls. "It was, 'We're putting you on notice that this is our number-one concern.'" Kerry took his cue. During the meeting, he backed off from earlier statements that he'd send Jimmy Carter (seen by the right as pro-Palestinian) to the region to jump-start negotiations, and six weeks later, when George W. Bush, in an agreement with Ariel Sharon, accepted Jewish settlements as permanent and renounced Palestinian refugees' right of return, Kerry immediately endorsed it.

Or consider May 18, when the hawkish American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) held its annual conference in Washington. House majority leader Tom DeLay showed up to speak, along with two assistant secretaries of state, an assistant secretary of defense and the President himself. Bush's speech was regularly interrupted by cheering and chants of "Four more years!" The meeting of the Jewish community's most prominent voice on Capitol Hill may as well have been a Republican political rally.

These events reveal a stubborn political fact: that AIPAC and the Conference of Presidents, along with their powerful fellow travelers, Christian Zionists, have forged a bipartisan consensus in Washington that Middle East policy must privilege the "special relationship" between the United States and Israel. In practice, this solid consensus means putting Israeli security before peace; supporting even such extreme Israeli measures as the separation wall and assassinations; and delegitimizing the Palestinian leadership. In AIPAC's view, even Bush's unambitious Middle East "road map" conceded too much to the Palestinians. Until the late 1980s, when the PLO publicly affirmed Israel's right to exist, such positions may truly have represented the vast majority of American Jews. But ever since the 1993 Oslo Accord proved that negotiations were possible, surveys have consistently found that 50 to 60 percent of American Jews favor ending the occupation and dismantling settlements in return for peace.

The trouble is, AIPAC and the Conference of Presidents never fully embraced the Oslo thaw, and once peace talks failed in 2000, they snapped back to their hard-line stance. The combination of Palestinian suicide bombings, the election of Sharon, the ultimate hawk, as prime minister and Bush's with-us-or-against-us "war on terror" allowed the AIPAC consensus to harden throughout the Jewish establishment. After 9/11, United Jewish Communities, the joint Jewish charity, decided to direct funds to Jewish settlers for the first time. And 2002 was a banner year: At a pro-Israel rally in Washington that April, busloads of demonstrators from Jewish social-service agencies and Hillels (the network of Jewish campus organizations) booed Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz for speaking about Palestinian suffering, and the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and other groups published manuals on how to discredit "anti-Israel propaganda" on campuses. "Arafat had a chance to move toward peace and he rejected it," says Rabbi Eric Yoffie, the leader of the 1.5 million-strong Reform Jewish movement, and one of mainstream Jewry's most outspoken voices against settlement expansion. "We rallied to Israel's side out of the sense that it was the right thing to do, and out of real anger toward the Palestinians." The joke used to be two rabbis, three congregations; over the past two or three years it's become 6 million American Jews, one official opinion.

[i]The Full Article [/i] http://www.thenation.com/doc....

Bush Reappoints Poster Boy for Extremism to Influential Womens Health Position

06.30.04 (7:28 am) [edit]

WASHINGTON - June 29 - According to a report in today’s Washington Post President Bush has reappointed W. David Hager, notorious for his fringe anti-choice beliefs and persistent anti-choice activism, to the influential Reproductive Health Drugs Advisory Committee of the FDA. Hager has used his position on the committee to advocate his ideological agenda, becoming one of only four dissenters from the overwhelming vote to recommend over-the-counter sale of the morning-after contraceptive Plan B® -- a recommendation that was overruled by the Administration in response to far-right political pressure.

In recent weeks, NARAL Pro-Choice America has led a grassroots campaign to persuade the president not to reappoint Hager, spurring more than 25,000 pro-choice activists to send messages of opposition. In addition, a coalition of Members of Congress, including pro-choice Republican Representatives James Greenwood of Pennsylvania and Nancy Johnson of Connecticut sent Bush a letter pleading that he not take this step.

Elizabeth Cavendish, Interim President of NARAL Pro-Choice America said: “President Bush has done it again – bent over backwards to keep his anti-choice base happy in a way that simply slaps the pro-choice majority in the face, ignores women’s health, and shows absolute disdain for medical science. Pro-choice Republicans asked him not to re-appoint David Hager. More than 25,000 grassroots Americans sent him petitions asking that he not put this extremist back into this influential position. And common sense would argue that Hager is nowhere near qualified to serve on a body that’s supposed to provide non-ideological scientific guidance.”

Among the highlights of Hager’s record:

... As a practicing ob-gyn, Hager not only refuses to perform surgical abortions or prescribe mifepristone (medical abortion), he will not even provide intra-uterine devices (IUDs), a widely accepted form of contraception.

... Hager helped the Christian Medical Association write a "citizen's petition" in August that called for the FDA to reverse its approval of mifepristone and pull it off the market, ignoring over a decade of international research that has established the safety and efficacy of this early abortion option.

... Time magazine cited two sources familiar with his private practice as saying that Hager has refused to prescribe contraceptives to unmarried women.

... Hager wrote "Stress and the Woman's Body" with his wife Linda, recommending Scripture readings as treatment for premenstrual syndrome and other medical conditions.

[b]CONTACT:[/b] NARAL Pro-Choice America
David Seldin (202) 973-3032. - http://www.commondreams.org/n...

Republican Senator Rips Bush on Iraq Strategy

06.30.04 (7:25 am) [edit]

[b]Hagel says war hurt U.S. in terror battle [/b]

LOS ANGELES -- Sen. Chuck Hagel, an influential moderate Republican from Nebraska, sharply criticized the Bush administration in an interview here Tuesday, saying that the war in Iraq appears to have hurt America in its battle against terrorism.

Hagel, a politician sometimes mentioned as a future presidential contender, also said the United States is going to have to consider restarting the draft to maintain its many military commitments abroad.

In a sharp critique of the leader of his own party, Hagel said he believes the occupation of Iraq by the American military was poorly planned and has spread terrorist cells more widely around the world.

"This put in motion a new geographic dispersion" of the terrorists, said Hagel, 58, in an interview before delivering a speech to the World Affairs Council in Los Angeles. "It's harder to deal with them because they're not as contained. Iraq has become a training ground."

He added that although it is too soon to judge how the war in Iraq will ultimately influence the war on terror, in the short term it has created more terrorists and given them more targets -- American soldiers.

Hagel, a decorated veteran of the Vietnam War, said he agrees with President Bush that the duration of the war on terror might be measured in generations and that to sustain the badly overstretched military for the struggle, a new draft may be needed.

"We are seeing huge cracks developing in our force structure," he said. "The fact is, if we're going to continue with this, we're going to have to be honest with the American people."

Hagel is clearly trying to carve out a role for himself as a leading moderate voice within the Republican Party, particularly in foreign policy. He has given a string of speeches over the past year advocating a cooperative approach in foreign policy, and he wrote an essay in the current issue of "Foreign Affairs," a policy journal, in which he spells out his principles for a more internationalist and pragmatic Republican foreign policy.

A two-term senator, Hagel is regarded as a pragmatist who is ideologically out of line with the conservatives in the Bush administration. There were even reports recently that he had been courted by Sen. John Kerry, the likely Democratic nominee for president, as a vice presidential candidate.

Asked if he had been approached or if he would consider the offer, Hagel said he is a diehard Republican "and I'll stay in the Republican Party."

But after finding his moderate views largely ignored by the president, Hagel said he feels that Bush, who has taken a strong unilateral approach to foreign policy, is now being forced to embrace positions much closer to those Hagel and other moderates have advocated.

Hagel has pushed for the United States to work much more closely with the United Nations, NATO and America's principal allies in Europe. The president has been in Europe this week offering a more conciliatory face to the allies, and Hagel said the harsh reality of the war in Iraq has forced his hand.

"It's a whole different administration approach,'' Hagel said. "There is a newfound humility, a newfound realism" in the Bush administration.

In another area in which Hagel's views differ sharply from the president's, he suggested that the best way to ultimately win the war on terror is to earn the trust and respect of foreigners, especially younger people in the Arab world and other parts of the globe. The best way to do that, he said, is to make the United States more accessible to them and more open to immigration.

"We are pushing away our friends, our allies, the next generation around the world," Hagel said. - http://www.commondreams.org/h...

Iraq is Worse Off Than Before the War Began, GAO Reports

06.30.04 (7:23 am) [edit]

WASHINGTON - In a few key areas - electricity, the judicial system and overall security - the Iraq that America handed back to its residents Monday is worse off than before the war began last year, according to calculations in a new General Accounting Office report http://www.gao.gov/new.items/... released Tuesday.

The 105-page report by Congress' investigative arm offers a bleak assessment of Iraq after 14 months of U.S. military occupation. Among its findings:

-In 13 of Iraq's 18 provinces, electricity was available fewer hours per day on average last month than before the war. Nearly 20 million of Iraq's 26 million people live in those provinces.

-Only $13.7 billion of the $58 billion pledged and allocated worldwide to rebuild Iraq has been spent, with another $10 billion about to be spent. The biggest chunk of that money has been used to run Iraq's ministry operations.

-The country's court system is more clogged than before the war, and judges are frequent targets of assassination attempts.

-The new Iraqi civil defense, police and overall security units are suffering from mass desertions, are poorly trained and ill-equipped.

-The number of what the now-disbanded Coalition Provisional Authority called significant insurgent attacks skyrocketed from 411 in February to 1,169 in May.

The report was released on the same day that the CPA's inspector general issued three reports that highlighted serious management difficulties at the CPA. The reports found that the CPA wasted millions of dollars at a Hilton resort hotel in Kuwait because it didn't have guidelines for who could stay there, lost track of how many employees it had in Iraq and didn't track reconstruction projects funded by international donors to ensure they didn't duplicate U.S. projects.

Both the GAO report and the CPA report said that the CPA was seriously understaffed for the gargantuan task of rebuilding Iraq. The GAO report suggested the agency needed three times more employees than what it had. The CPA report said the agency believed it had 1,196 employees, when it was authorized to have 2,117. But the inspector general said CPA's records were so disorganized that it couldn't verify its actual number of employees.

GAO Comptroller General David Walker blamed insurgent attacks for many of the problems in Iraq. "The unstable security environment has served to slow down our rebuilding and reconstruction efforts and it's going to be of critical importance to provide more stable security," Walker told Knight Ridder Newspapers in a telephone interview Tuesday.

"There are a number of significant questions that need to be asked and answered dealing with the transition (to self-sovereignty)," Walker said. "A lot has been accomplished and a lot remains to be done."

The GAO report is the first government assessment of conditions in Iraq at the end of the U.S. occupation. It outlined what it called "key challenges that will affect the political transition" in 10 specific areas.

The GAO gave a draft of the report to several different government agencies, but only the CPA offered a major comment: It said the report "was not sufficiently critical of the judicial reconstruction effort."

"The picture it paints of the facts on the ground is one that neither the CPA nor the Bush administration should be all that proud of," said Peter W. Singer, a national security scholar at the centrist Brookings Institution. "It finds a lot of problems and raises a lot of questions."

One of the biggest problems, Singer said, is that while money has been pledged and allocated, not much has been spent. The GAO report shows that very little of the promised international funds - most of which are in loans - has been spent or can't be tracked. The CPA's inspector general found the same thing.

"When we ask why are things not going the way we hoped for," Singer said, "the answer in part of this is that we haven't actually spent what we have in pocket."

He said the figures on electricity "make me want to cry."

Steven Susens, a spokesman for the Program Management Office, which oversees contractors rebuilding Iraq, conceded that many areas of Iraq have fewer hours of electricity now than they did before the war. But he said the report, based on data that's now more than a month old, understates current electrical production. He said some areas may have reduced electricity availability because antiquated distribution systems had been taken out of service so they could be rebuilt.

"It's a slow pace, but it's certainly growing as far as we're concerned," Susens said.

Danielle Pletka, the vice president of foreign and defense policy studies at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, said other issues are more important than the provision of services such as electricity. She noted that Iraqis no longer live in fear of Saddam Hussein.

"It's far better to live in the dark than it is to run the risk that your mother, father, brother, sister, husband or wife would be taken away never to be seen again," Pletka said.

Pletka pointed to a Pentagon slide presentation that detailed increases and improvement in telephone subscribers, water service, food, health care and schools in Iraq.

But Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that asked for the GAO report, said the report showed major problems.

"So while we've handed over political sovereignty, we haven't handed over practical capacity - that is, the ability for the Iraqis themselves to provide security, defend their borders, defeat the insurgency, deliver basic services, run a government and set the foundation for economic progress," Biden said in a written statement. "Until Iraqis can do all of that, it will be impossible for us to responsibly disengage from Iraq."

The GAO report can be found at:

http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d04902r.pdf" title="http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d04902r.pdf" target="_blank"http://www.gao.gov/new.items/...

Iraq is Worse Off Than Before the War Began, GAO Reports

06.30.04 (7:22 am) [edit]

"Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!" "F**k this, Dick!"

06.29.04 (9:33 am) [edit]

[b]'F**k this, Dick!'[/b]

"Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"

I'm not talking about the "end of occupation" or the farcical "transfer of power" in Iraq. Nor do I mock the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, which Dr. King himself borrowed from an old Negro spiritual for his "I Have a Dream" speech in 1963.

No, I'm celebrating freedom as only the freed can -- the precious gift granted to all Americans last week, when Vice President Dick Cheney, "during a photo session in the usually decorous Senate chamber," exploded in "colorful profanity," according to the WashingtonPost, and told Vermont's Senator Patrick Leahy to "f**k" himself.

I understand there's still some question about the exact phrasing of Cheney's outburst - whether he said, "F**k you!" or "F**k off!" or "Go f**k yourself!" The Post, protecting some non-existent aggregate reader, was careful to point out on Friday that "the obscenity was published in yesterday's editions" - apparently it was too hot to print a second time, even with asterisks. [I wonder what Jesus would have made of Cheney's remarks!]

What's not in dispute is the word Cheney used in his assault on Leahy. The word was "f**k." Here, you can believe the papers, even if they can't print it.

"I think he was just having a bad day," Leahy said after they mopped him up. "I was kind of shocked to hear that kind of language on the floor." So was Kevin Kellems, "a spokesman for Cheney," who twittered to the press, "That doesn't sound like language the vice president would use."

Sorry, Kevin - that's exactly the language the vice president would and does use, as he confessed the next day on Fox News, adding that he has "no regrets."

"I expressed myself rather forcefully, felt better after I had done it," the VP grunted in an interview with Neil Cavuto. Later, "the White House" - by implication, President Bush - agreed that "these things happen." Very astute.

"I think that a lot of my colleagues felt that what I had said badly needed to be said, that it was long overdue," said Cheney. After all, Leahy had "challenged [Cheney's] integrity" by suggesting there might be something fishy, or at least oily, about the "no-bid" contracts that Cheney's former firm, Halliburton Co., has managed to bag for itself in the "reconstruction" of Iraq.

Indeed, last week, Senator Leahy presided over the Democratic National Committee's "Halliburton Week," a well-intended but completely toothless publicity stunt, "focusing on Cheney, the company, `and the millions of dollars they've cost taxpayers,'" according to the Post. Leahy also complained "that the White House [had] sanctioned a smear of Catholic Democratic senators over their objections to Bush's judicial nominees."

High time, don't you think, that Leahy noticed the relations between the White House and the Vatican? But when he tried to discuss these issues with Cheney on "the Republican side of the aisle," the Veep smelled a rat.

"I didn't like the fact that ... he wanted to act like, you know, everything's peaches and cream," Cheney said.

Like, yeah: "And I informed him of my view of his conduct in no uncertain terms. And as I say, I felt better afterwards." A spokesman for Leahy added, perceptively, "It appears the vice president's previous calls for civility are now inoperative."

So, here are the new rules: You can say whatever you want, wherever you want, whenever you want and about anything you want, as long as

a) you have "no regrets";
b) it's "long overdue"; and
c) you "feel better" afterwards.

What could be simpler? And who'd have thought it would be Dick Cheney, that fat Nazi pig, who became the poster boy for free expression in America? There I was feeling unpatriotic for calling Attorney General John Ashcroft "a Christian cultist and pious windbag" in this column, when all the time I was just ahead of the curve! I should have called Ashcroft a religious lunatic, a liar, a hypocrite, a sadist, a fascist and a menace to democracy, with a bug up his ass about sex.

Isn't free speech a lark, Dickhead? Oh, this is madness without the moon!

Try this: The President of the United States, George W. Bush, is an incompetent, sub-intelligent, inhuman and probably wet-brained mass murderer with a Messiah complex. If his "patrician" family hadn't connived to get rich with every dictatorship in the world over the past 100 years, he'd be managing - no, assistant managing - a Burger King franchise in Montgomery, Alabama, where he went AWOL in 1973 to avoid being killed in the Vietnam War.

Indeed, if the world were right-ended, Bush would be taking his orders now from Condoleezza Rice, the phoniest black woman ever to have her name inscribed on an oil tanker's booty. Dr. Rice may have to go back to Alabama, where she was born and raised, in order to know what "booty" means - she seems to have to forgotten a lot about her heritage, and, besides, she hasn't got any (booty, that is).

Donald Rumsfeld, of course, would pop into the burger joint from time to time to tell Dubya and Condi how well they're doing their jobs, before cutting their staff and their benefits by two-thirds and insisting that burgers can be flipped by "precision" machines. And those Likudniks in the White House - Wolfowitz, Perle, etc., the men who brought you "Operation Iraqi Freedom" - would be back in the ghetto where they belong. Because - let's face it, Dick - this is what "patricians" do to Jews.

Laura! Hey, Mrs. Bush! What's it like living in the Stepford Wing of the White House? Or haven't you seen The Stepford Wives? Frankly, I'd recommend the earlier, Katharine Ross version, or even the book, since you're such a fan of literacy. Just go to the reference desk at your local library and ask them to help you look it up: The Stepford Wives, by Ira Levin. Then settle down for a real treat, Laura, because, believe me, someone's been giving you pills for a long, long time.

It pains me to report that, with absolute frankness suddenly on the loose in Washington, the usual cowards and namby-pambys are trying to put a stop to it - that is, the Democrats, whose timidity and, I suspect, chronic dandruff are more than anything responsible for the Bushmen's hold on power. Again, the Post:

"As news spread on Thursday of the Cheney-Leahy exchange, Senate Minority Leader Thomas A. Daschle (D-S.D.) appealed to colleagues of both parties to rise above `partisan retaliation' and find a `common ground' for lawmaking." So did Nancy Pelosi, Daschle's counterpart in the House of Representatives, who's apparently squirming in her seat over what the Post calls "the perceived significance of voters' impatience with the partisan squabbling in Washington."

It doesn't occur to either of these flacks to tell Cheney to "f**" himself too, while he's at it. Neither can Senator Leahy be brought to speak an honest word about a punch-up that should have gone much, much farther than it did. St. Patrick is the ultimate backstairs politician, regarded as "a pill" by the Republican radicals now in charge of Congress and always ready to snap his camera and take the first pen whenever Ding-Dong signs a bill further limiting the rights of American citizens in the so-called War on Terror. He is, in fact, an Uncle Tom, and if Cheney weren't a Republican and a congenital monster, I'd be clapping him on the back right now for calling Leahy's bluff.

Alas, this leads me to the topic of John Kerry, the Amazing Non-Existent Candidate, who, so far in this campaign, has proved conclusively that he can run up the stairs of the Capitol Building and smile at the same time. It was Kerry's "electability," I recall, that sent Howard Dean back to his tent - how did they do that? - but, to this day, I haven't heard anyone, anywhere, not even in Massachusetts, speak about Kerry with more than a shrug and a prayer that he's smart enough not to lose in November.

By this time, we ought to be able to recognize Kerry's voice when we hear it on television, but we can't. He ought to be able to recite the alphabet or read from the phonebook and still defeat that goon in the Oval Office, but something tells me he won't. I hope I'm wrong. I fear I'm not.

I'm glad to see that Kerry has decided not to address the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Boston, because doing so would entail crossing a policemen's picket line. This shows he knows something, at least, about American democracy. And still I want to shout at him, "Wake up, asshole!" Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 is the number one film at the box office - you have nothing to lose by raising your voice and saying, "F**k you!" to Cheney, Bush, Condi, Ashcroft, Rumsfeld and all the new dictators in Iraq.

Go on, John, make my day! I dare you.

God Bless Us Everyone! - http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

"Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"

06.29.04 (9:30 am) [edit]

Public Citizen Urges Congress to Adopt ‘Water for the World’ Resolution

06.29.04 (9:24 am) [edit]

WASHINGTON - June 25 - Statement of Wenonah Hauter, Director of Public Citizen’s Water for All Campaign

In light of the growing shortage of clean water in the developing world and the international trend toward the privatization of water systems, Public Citizen applauds U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) and 29 co-sponsors of the Water for the World Resolution, which was introduced late Thursday and calls for water to be regarded as a public good and fundamental human right.

It is essential that Congress support this measure. More than a billion of the world’s inhabitants lack adequate access to safe drinking water, and 2.5 billion have no proper sanitation. Thousands, mostly children, die each day from preventable waterborne diseases. Because of increasing pollution and a rate of global water consumption that doubles every 20 years, by 2025, 48 nations will face severe water shortages, according to the World Health Organization.

The Water for the World Resolution affirms that water is a global public good and should not be treated as a private commodity. It recognizes that government policies should ensure that all individuals have equitable access to water to meet basic human needs and that no one is cut off from water due to economic constraints.

Unfortunately, these principles have not always been upheld. In Detroit, Mich., more than 50,000 people had their water shut off during the past two years because they couldn’t pay. In South Africa, pre-paid meters force poor residents in townships to provide payment before they can drink. Unable to pay, families use contaminated water sources, such as polluted rivers, and as a result, waterborne illnesses are common. In fact, pre-paid meters were linked to a massive cholera outbreak in KwaZulu-Natal in 2000.

In the United States, there exists a funding gap for water and wastewater systems, which is leading governments to turn systems over to private companies. By some estimates, it will cost $20 billion annually for the next 20 years to build, repair and maintain water systems in this country. Around the world, millions of dollars in World Bank and International Monetary Fund loans prop up water privatization schemes that are corrupt and do little to help those who need access to clean water. But giving control to private companies is not wise; private companies care foremost about profits, not about repairing the infrastructure or keeping water rates affordable.

There is an international consensus – enshrined in the United Nation’s General Comment on the right to water and in the UN Millennium Development Goals – that water is a fundamental human right, and that access to water can mean the difference between sickness and health, cyclical poverty and economic development. Congress should support the Water for the World Resolution.

To view the resolution, click here.

Note: Schakowsky is hosting a congressional briefing on the resolution from 2 p.m.-3:30 p.m. on June 29 in the Cannon Office Building, Room 121.

[b]CONTACT:[/b] Public Citizen
Newsroom: 202-588-7742 - http://www.commondreams.org/n...

Public Citizen Urges Congress to Adopt ‘Water for the World’ Resolution

06.29.04 (9:22 am) [edit]

Public Citizen Urges Congress to Adopt ‘Water for the World’ Resolution

06.29.04 (9:21 am) [edit]

Administration's Stonewalling On Secretly Negotiated Anti-Wilderness Challenged

06.29.04 (9:19 am) [edit]

WASHINGTON - June 28 - Closed-door deal puts development of 150 million acres of public land ahead of wilderness protection, reversing Reagan-era policy Washington, DC- Bush administration efforts to hide public documents relating to a deal it struck in secret that lifts wilderness protection from wild federal lands have drawn a lawsuit from a conservation group. The lawsuit seeks to force the federal government to come clean on the backroom dealings with the State of Utah that led to a sweetheart settlement of a lawsuit by Utah challenging federal lands protections. The lawsuit was filed in the DC federal district court by Earthjustice representing the Colorado-based Center for Native Ecosystems. The "no more wilderness" deal was hatched behind closed doors by Interior Secretary Gale Norton and then-Utah Governor, now EPA Administrator, Mike Leavitt. The lawsuit was filed after the Interior Department refused to provide requested documents on the deal. This is the third lawsuit conservation groups have been forced to file to obtain public records concerning secret negotiations between Leavitt and Norton.

The lands at stake are overseen by the Bureau of Land Management. Under the "no more wilderness" deal, Norton agreed to prohibit BLM from inventorying its lands across the West to determine if they deserve interim wilderness protection until Congress can act on permanent protection. The Norton/Leavitt deal also potentially opens wild lands to development that had been enjoying interim wilderness protection. Of BLM's 262 million acres, less than one-tenth are now protected as wilderness or wilderness study areas. "The Bush administration and Governor Leavitt worked in secret to put logging, oil and gas drilling, and every other destructive use of public lands ahead of wilderness protection," said Jacob Smith, Executive Director of Center for Native Ecosystems. "They reversed 25 years of wilderness protection policy, overturning a consistent policy from Reagan to Clinton. And they continue to stonewall the public's efforts to know the truth behind how this deal was secretly cut." Center for Native Ecosystems is a non-profit advocacy organization dedicated to conserving and recovering native and naturally functioning ecosystems in the Greater Southern Rockies. "Secretary Norton's radical position never again to consider, or protect, wilderness lands reversed the policy of the Reagan administration and every other Interior Secretary from 1976 to the present," said Ted Zukoski, one of the Earthjustice attorneys involved in the case. "The goal of the deal was clear: Governor Leavitt and the Bush administration wanted to open up some of Utah's most spectacular lands to destructive activities such as oil drilling and road building."

The lands at stake include millions of acres previously found by BLM to have wilderness character, including lands adjacent to Zion and Canyonlands National Parks. Since the deal was secretly negotiated, BLM has sold drilling rights on tens of thousands of acres of wilderness-quality lands to the oil industry in Utah and Colorado, making future protection of the lands unlikely. Thousands of acres of wilderness quality lands in Utah were leased last Friday. Just one business day after the "no more wilderness" deal was announced on April 11, 2003, The Wilderness Society requested Interior Department documents concerning the deal under the Freedom of Information Act. Under that law, documents shared between Utah and the Interior Department on the deal must be made available to the public. The Interior Department has refused to release the documents, relying on technicalities previously rejected by the courts.

Center for Native Ecosystems filed a separate Freedom of Information Act request seeking the documents in February 2004, doing so in a way that avoided the Interior Department's discredited evasion tactics. But three months past the legal deadline, the Interior Department continues to withhold the records.

"The administration clearly doesn't want the public to know how it cooked up this multi-million acre give-away to its friends in the oil industry," said Smith. "To this administration, secrecy is better than truth, spin better than fact, and public ignorance better than public knowledge."

For more information about Center for Native Ecosystems, visit www.nativeecosystems.org.

For more information about Earthjustice, visit www.earthjustice.org.

[b]CONTACT:[/b] Earthjustice
Ted Zukoski 303-996-9622
Jacob Smith 303-546-0214 - http://www.commondreams.org/n...

Administration's Stonewalling On Secretly Negotiated Anti-Wilderness Challenged

06.29.04 (9:18 am) [edit]

Administration's Stonewalling On Secretly Negotiated Anti-Wilderness Challenged

06.29.04 (9:17 am) [edit]

A Pitiful Occasion for the People

06.29.04 (9:15 am) [edit]

So, in the end, America's enemies set the date.

The handover of "full sovereignty" was secretly brought forward so that the ex-CIA intelligence officer who is now premier of Iraq could avoid another bloody offensive by America's enemies.

What was supposed to be the most important date in Iraq's modern history was changed - like a birthday party, because it might rain on Wednesday.

Pitiful is the word that comes to mind.

Here we were, handing "full sovereignty" to the people of Iraq - "full", of course, providing we forget the 160,000 foreign soldiers whom Prime Minister Iyad Allawi has apparently asked to stay on in Iraq, "full" providing we forget the 3,000 US diplomats in Baghdad who will constitute the largest US embassy in the world.

And we never even told the Iraqi people we had changed the date.

Few, save of course for the Iraqis, understood the cruelest paradox of the event.

For it was the new Iraqi Foreign Minister - should we not put his title, too, into quotation marks? - who chose to leak "bringing forward" of "sovereignty in Iraq" at the NATO summit in Turkey.

Thus was this date in modern Iraqi history announced not in Baghdad but in the capital of the former Ottoman empire which once ruled Iraq.

Alice in Wonderland could not have improved on this. The looking glass reflects all the way from Baghdad to Washington. In its savage irony Ibsen might have done justice to the occasion.

After all, what could have been more familiar than Allawi's appeal to Iraqis to fight "the enemies of the people".

Power was ritually handed over in legal documents. The new government was sworn in on the Qur'an. US pro-consul Paul Bremer formally shook hands with the ex-CIA man who is now prime minister and boarded his C130 home, guarded by Special Forces men in shades.

It was difficult to remember that Bremer was touted for his job more than a year ago because he was a "counter-terrorism" expert - this, definitely should be in inverted commas - and that his "dead-enders" managed to turn almost an entire Iraqi population against the US and Britain in just a few months.

According to Allawi yesterday, the "dead-enders'" and the "remnants" belonged to Saddam Hussein.

It had already been made clear that Allawi was pondering martial law, the sine qua non of every Arab dictatorship - this time to be imposed on an Arab state, heaven spare us, by a Western army led by an avowedly Christian government.

Who was the last man to impose martial law on Iraqis? Wasn't it Saddam? - http://www.commondreams.org/v...

A Pitiful Occasion for the People

06.29.04 (9:14 am) [edit]

A Pitiful Occasion for the People

06.29.04 (9:12 am) [edit]

The political 'Fahrenheit 9/11' sets record at box office

06.28.04 (7:55 am) [edit]

Michael Moore's anti-Bush "Fahrenheit 9/11" became the highest-grossing documentary of all time on its first weekend in release, taking in $21.8 million as it packed theaters across the country this weekend.

The movie, mocking President Bush and criticizing his decision to go to war in Iraq, was No. 1 at the box office, beating out the popular comedies "White Chicks" and "DodgeBall," which were playing on almost triple the number of screens.

Theater owners in large cities and smaller towns reported sellout crowds over the weekend, with numerous theaters declaring house records.

The phenomenal opening represented a decisive victory for Mr. Moore and for the Miramax movie executives Harvey and Bob Weinstein, who released the film independently after it was rejected by Miramax's corporate parent, the Walt Disney Company, as too political.

"We sold out in Fayetteville, home of Fort Bragg," in North Carolina, Mr. Moore said on Sunday. "We sold out in Army-base towns. We set house records in some of these places. We set single-day records in a number of theaters. We got standing ovations in Greensboro, N.C.

"The biggest news to me this morning is this is a red-state movie," he said, referring to the state whose residents voted for George W. Bush in the 2000 election. "Republican states are embracing the movie, and it's sold out in Republican strongholds all over the country."

Harvey Weinstein said: "It's beyond anybody's expectations. I'd have to say the sky's the limit on this movie. Who knows what territory we're in."

Mr. Moore's 2002 film, "Bowling for Columbine," had held the record for the highest-earning documentary until this weekend, taking in $21.6 million in its domestic run.

Market research leading up to the weekend had shown that the documentary would rank second or third at the box office after the two mainstream comedies. But "White Chicks" took in $19.6 million for the weekend on 2,726 screens, while "DodgeBall" took in $18.5 million on 3,020. "Fahrenheit 9/11," rated R, was released on 868 screens.

Even rival studio executives recognized that documentary's opening as exceptional. "This picture came from nowhere," said Tom Sherak, a principal at Revolution Studios, which made "White Chicks." "It's what movie viewing has become. If you make it feel like it has urgency, people will have to go."

Attendance for "Fahrenheit 9/11" resembled nothing so much as the other surprise movie event of this year, the fervor ignited by Mel Gibson's movie about the Crucifixion, "The Passion of the Christ." That film has taken in $370 million domestically and sailed to blockbuster status on a wave of media controversy and debate.

Mr. Moore and Mr. Weinstein are masters at creating media hype, and "Fahrenheit 9/11" benefited from the controversy over its release when Disney declined to distribute it in late spring. The film went on to become a sensation at the Cannes International Film Festival, where it won the Palme d'Or in May, and was picked up for distribution by the independent distributors Lions Gate and IFC Films, who promised to release the film by the Fourth of July.

The movie depicts the Bush family's business ties to Saudi Arabia and portrays the president as over his head and out of touch; Mr. Moore goes to Flint, Mich., his hometown, to interview a devastated mother who has lost her son in Iraq and questions what he died for.

Mr. Weinstein predicted that "Fahrenheit 9/11" would certainly take in $50 million, and possibly $100 million. He said he expected the film to expand to twice as many theaters next week, and ultimately to be on as many as 2,000 screens, a scale that would redefine the traditional reach of documentary films.

Beyond making box-office history, the movie may be seen by some as a bellwether of political support for the president and the war. The film's weekend success was fodder for the Sunday morning political talk shows, as pundits wondered what the political influence of the film might be, if any, on President Bush's re-election campaign.

Mr. Moore said that the film was a wake-up call to the pundits too. "I can't tell you how many times in the last week I've watched commentators say, `But people who like Bush are going to stay home.' They broke it down that way," he said. "It was far too simplistic."

Mr. Moore said that he first got an inkling that his movie would be more than just an average release when he learned that it had broken the house records on Wednesday at the two Manhattan theaters where it opened.

Then on Friday night he said he went to watch the movie at Lincoln Plaza Cinemas, and in the middle of the screening was recognized by audience members. "Suddenly everyone was turning around, and starting to applaud during the movie," Mr. Moore said. "I was going, `Sit down, watch the movie.' I had to get out of there."

He added: "Clearly something has happened here that no one expected. And there aren't words to describe how any of us feel this morning on hearing this news." - http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

The political 'Fahrenheit 9/11' sets record at box office

06.28.04 (7:54 am) [edit]

The political 'Fahrenheit 9/11' sets record at box office

06.28.04 (7:53 am) [edit]

Record 600,000 Protest Bush Plan to Weaken Mercury Emission Controls

06.28.04 (7:50 am) [edit]

Tomorrow marks the last day for the public to comment on the highest-profile battle in years between the Bush administration and advocates of public health. The administration is under court order to finalize the first-ever federal regulations to reduce poisonous emissions of mercury from power plants--the largest uncontrolled source of mercury pollution in the U.S.

The battle is marked by an unprecedented public protest against a Bush administration Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposal that would allow power plants to emit six to seven times more mercury into America's air--and for at least a decade longer--than would be the case if the current Clean Air Act were simply implemented in good faith.

An EPA analysis earlier this year stated that 630,000 American newborns are at risk each year of having unsafe levels of mercury in their blood. Mercury can cause serious developmental and neurological problems in children. It is a highly toxic chemical whose effects on the central nervous system are comparable to those of lead. Many people are exposed to mercury by eating tainted fish. Currently, more than 40 states have issued advisories against eating mercury-contaminated fish from their rivers, lakes and streams.

Properly implemented, the Clean Air Act would bring about a 90 percent reduction of mercury emissions over three years. But the Bush administration has stubbornly defended its plan to reduce mercury emissions by only 70 percent--and over a period of 13 years. As a result, over 600,000 citizens have submitted comments opposing the Bush plan. This is more than twice the highest number of comments EPA has ever received on a rulemaking--greater even than the outcry when the administration tried (unsuccessfully) to fend off stronger controls over arsenic in drinking water.

Two months ago 45 Senators and 10 attorneys general called on EPA Administrator Michael Leavitt to abandon the EPA proposal and instead finalize a rule that complies with the Clean Air Act. And this week 184 members of the House did the same.

"It seems the only people applauding the administration's mercury rule are the people who wrote it: power companies and the Bush administration," Angela Ledford, director of Clear the Air, an environmental health advocacy group, told BushGreenwatch. "Today's Washington Post reports that mercury releases are up 10 percent. This underlines the need to require power plants to reduce emissions as much and as fast as technology allows."

Critics of the Bush plan note that a combination of 25 mercury-emitting utilities have donated nearly $6 million to President Bush's campaign, and that they would share a savings of $2.7 billion under the administration proposal.

###

[b]TAKE ACTION:[/b] - http://www.bushgreenwatch.org...

Submit a comment to EPA through MercuryHurts.org. http://cta.policy.net/mercury...

Record 600,000 Protest Bush Plan to Weaken Mercury Emission Controls

06.28.04 (7:49 am) [edit]

Record 600,000 Protest Bush Plan to Weaken Mercury Emission Controls

06.28.04 (7:48 am) [edit]

Tragedy for Democracy: Bush Can Hold U.S. Citizens Without Trial

06.28.04 (7:42 am) [edit]

[b]Bush Can Hold U.S. Citizens Without Trial [/b]

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court ruled narrowly Monday that Congress gave President Bush the power to hold an American citizen without charges or trial, but said the detainee can challenge his treatment in court.

The 6-3 ruling sided with the administration on an important legal point raised in the war on terrorism. At the same time, it left unanswered other hard questions raised by the case of Yaser Esam Hamdi, who has been detained more than two years and who was only recently allowed to see a lawyer.

The administration had fought any suggestion that Hamdi or another U.S.-born terrorism suspect could go to court, saying that such a legal fight posed a threat to the president's power to wage war as he sees fit.

"We have no reason to doubt that courts, faced with these sensitive matters, will pay proper heed both to the matters of national security that might arise in an individual case and to the constitutional limitations safeguarding essential liberties that remain vibrant even in times of security concerns," Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wrote for the court.

O'Connor said that Hamdi "unquestionably has the right to access to counsel."

The court threw out a lower court ruling that supported the government's position fully, and Hamdi's case now returns to a lower court.

The careful opinion seemed deferential to the White House, but did not give the president everything he wanted.

The ruling is the largest test so far of executive power in the post-Sept. 11 assault on terrorism.

The court has yet to rule in the similar case of American-born detainee Jose Padilla and in another case testing the legal rights of detainees held as enemy combatants at a U.S. military prison facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

O'Connor said the court has "made clear that a state of war is not a blank check for the president when it comes to the rights of the nation's citizens."

She was joined by Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and justices Stephen Breyer and Anthony Kennedy in her view that Congress had authorized detentions such as Hamdi's in what she called very limited circumstances,

Congress voted shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks to give the president significant authority to pursue terrorists, but Hamdi's lawyers said that authority did not extend to the indefinite detention of an American citizen without charges or trial.

Two other justices, David H. Souter and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, would have gone further and declared Hamdi's detention improper. Still, they joined O'Connor and the others to say that Hamdi, and by extension others who may be in his position, are entitled to their day in court.

Hamdi and Padilla are in military custody at a Navy brig in South Carolina. They have been interrogated repeatedly without lawyers present.

The Bush administration contends that as "enemy combatants," the men are not entitled to the usual rights of prisoners of war set out in the Geneva Conventions. Enemy combatants are also outside the constitutional protections for ordinary criminal suspects, the government has claimed.

The administration argued that the president alone has authority to order their detention, and that courts have no business second-guessing that decision.

The case has additional resonance because of recent revelations that U.S. soldiers abused Iraqi prisoners and used harsh interrogation methods at a prison outside Baghdad. For some critics of the administration's security measures, the pictures of abuse at Abu Ghraib prison illustrated what might go wrong if the military and White House have unchecked authority over prisoners.

At oral arguments in the Padilla case in April, an administration lawyer assured the court that Americans abide by international treaties against torture, and that the president or the military would not allow even mild torture as a means to get information. - http://www.commondreams.org/h...

Supreme Court Upholds U.S. Dictatorship: Bush Can Hold U.S. Citizens Without Trial

06.28.04 (7:41 am) [edit]

Bush's Fiasco in Iraq: In Anger, Ordinary Iraqis Are Joining the Insurgency

06.28.04 (7:39 am) [edit]

[b]In Anger, Ordinary Iraqis Are Joining the Insurgency [/b]

BAQUBA, Iraq, — At a teahouse in this palm-lined city, jobless men sit on wooden benches talking about killing American soldiers.

"Tell us one benefit they've given us since they've come here," Falah, a 23-year-old man in a shabby checkered shirt, said to an Iraqi reporter.

He boasted about driving a friend to stage attacks on American patrols. The two wait in a farm field by the main road. When the Humvees roll by, his friend fires a rocket-propelled grenade, Falah said. The two hit the ground. The soldiers open fire, but the Iraqis lie still until the patrol leaves.

"I really didn't ask my friend whether they have a boss or not and whether they organize their work or not," he said. "I really don't care as long as I can take part and drive the Americans out of our country. We are all resistance."

As Falah spoke, about a dozen men gathered around him. They nodded vigorously. This was Sunni-dominated Baquba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad, where the resistance burns as fiercely as anywhere in Iraq.

With just days to go before the transfer of sovereignty to the Iraqis, American commanders concede that they are far from quelling a stubborn and increasingly sophisticated insurgency. It has extended well beyond Saddam Hussein supporters and foreign fighters, spreading to ordinary Iraqis seething at the occupation and its failures. They act at the grass-roots level, often with little training or direction, but with a zealousness born of anti-colonial ambitions.

American commanders acknowledge that military might alone cannot defeat the insurgency; in fact, the frequent use of force often spurs resistance by deepening ill will.

"This war cannot be won militarily," said Maj. Gen. John R. S. Batiste, commander of the First Infantry Division, which oversees a swath of the northern Sunni triangle slightly larger than the state of West Virginia. "It really does need a political and economic solution."

But the new government will find it tough to hammer out solutions to problems like high unemployment and lack of electricity any time soon. It will continue to come under attack, American troops will remain exposed, and the elections scheduled for January 2005 could be at risk. The Americans hope that the resistance will view the new government as legitimate, but insurgents are already assassinating Iraqi officials, and violence continues to inflame virtually every corner of the country.

On Saturday, black-clad insurgents here attacked the offices of the Iraqi National Accord, the party of the new prime minister, Iyad Allawi. The interim government has to persuade the people that it can protect everyone. The insurgents have a much easier task, one they have performed with considerable success so far: sow enough fear into people to undermine confidence in authority.

General Batiste said he did not expect the violence to subside after the transfer of sovereignty on Wednesday. A jobless man can still make $100 by agreeing to plant a roadside bomb or shoot at the Americans. "It'll be a busy summer," the general said.

American officials say Hussein supporters and foreigners like the Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi are directing some cells and are suspects in the major car bomb attacks and recent beheadings.

But much of the insurgency reflects street-level anger at the lack of progress in Iraq. The unemployment rate is still as high as 60 percent in many parts of the Sunni triangle, the region at the heart of the resistance. Iraqis complain about the chronic lack of power and clean water. Hard-line clerics are attacking the occupation in their sermons and are more popular than ever.

At the teahouse here, a muscular 40-year-old who gave his name as Abu Meshaal said: "We have experts in explosives and bomb making, ex-officers who have experience with such missions. We are everywhere, and we will not stop our work until the last soldier leaves Iraq.

"Each day, I get more enthusiastic when I hear that explosions are taking place here and there, in Baghdad and other provinces," he added.

The Sunni triangle — bounded by Ramadi and Falluja to the west, Tikrit to the north and Baquba to the east — remains the most troubled area in the country. In the south, the thousands-strong Shiite militia led by the firebrand cleric Moktada al-Sadr has quieted down in recent weeks, as the popular Mr. Sadr takes baby steps to jump into politics.

The total number of insurgents remains unclear, largely because American officials sorely lack reliable human intelligence. The insurgency does not appear to have a central command structure, said a military intelligence analyst in the Sunni triangle. Cells work independently but occasionally give each other logistical support or intelligence.

There are philosophical divisions within the resistance. Some Iraqis who support an armed struggle against the Americans bristle at bombs that kill their fellow citizens, insisting that only foreigner fighters are capable of such carnage. Some of those attacks could be a result of sectarian tensions flaring up among Sunni Arabs, Shiite Arabs and Kurds.

But during the broad uprising across Iraq in April, a rare confluence of Sunni Muslim and Shiite Muslim insurgents took place in Baquba, as the Shiite followers of Mr. Sadr tried overrunning government buildings while Sunni fighters battled American forces.

Other groups appear to have moved in since, and the city now harbors a caldron of cells working together, officers say.

The April uprisings woke commanders up to the fact that the nature of the resistance had morphed into a more widespread movement than they had previously thought.

That transformation began in November. As the insurgency appeared to grow in strength that month, the military cracked down hard on supporters of Mr. Hussein. Their role in the insurgency waned, and the nature of the resistance became "a fusion between nationalist and Islamist sentiments among the Sunnis" that allowed leaders to recruit a broader pool of fighters, wrote Ahmed Hashim, a professor at the U.S. Naval War College, in a recent paper on the insurgency.

Professor Hashim, who has interviewed American commanders and insurgents in Iraq, said the anti-occupation movement has "benefited tremendously" from its new populist orientation.

"There is really no way to be charitable about this," he wrote. "From the vantage point of spring 2004, the U.S. has failed at all levels except the tactical military level; which, ironically, is the least important of all the levels in a counterinsurgency campaign."

Here in Baquba, commanders with the First Infantry Division say they face a more formidable foe than the one that confronted their predecessors from the Fourth Infantry Division, which left in March.

"The complexity has changed," said Lt. Col. Steve Bullimore, commander of Task Force 1-6 Field Artillery, responsible for controlling Baquba proper. "The Fourth I.D. was finishing a war, cleaning up the bad guys. While that was happening, the infant insurgency was starting. Now it's more robust."

Commanders in Baquba said they have seen fighters operating recently in squads of about 20 each.

If Americans retaliate with overwhelming firepower, the insurgents simply melt away into the alleyways and farm fields.

In a pitched battle here on Thursday, insurgents set off roadside bombs to paralyze American patrols, then fired on them with AK-47's and rocket-propelled grenades, officers said. The incidence of roadside bombings — an efficient killer of soldiers — increased from 80 or so in April to more than 100 in May, said Col. Dana Pittard, commander of the Third Brigade Combat Team.

Insurgents have also turned their attacks to prime infrastructure sites like power stations and oil pipelines.

Interpreters for the military regularly receive threatening letters at their homes, and insurgents hand out fliers in the crowded bazaars threatening collaborators.

"They're very good at information operations," said Capt. Travis Van Hecke, an artillery commander here. "People are reluctant to help us."

In short, the insurgents understand that the center of gravity in this war is the support of the people. In Baquba, fighters usually distribute fliers in town hours before an attack, telling people to stay off the streets and close their shops.

But no one stirs up popular support better than the hard-line clerics. Their mosques have become rallying points for the insurgency.

"Is there a country that is subjected to occupation, abuse, looting and the stealing of his fortunes and killing of his people, but that when he raises his voice and says, `No!' it's called terrorism?" Sheik Shehab Ahmed al-Badri, the imam of the main Sunni mosque in Baquba, said in an interview on Friday.

"The reality is that the new government represents the occupation and its desire to stay here," he said. "We want full sovereignty." - http://www.commondreams.org/h...

Bush's Fiasco in Iraq:-- In Anger, Ordinary Iraqis Are Joining the Insurgency ...

06.28.04 (7:38 am) [edit]

WASHINGTON CLERIC SLAMS BUSH CHRISTIANITY

06.27.04 (6:04 am) [edit]

[i]Washington Cleric Slams Bush “Christianity” as “Triumphalism” singling out for attack the code hymn/references, phrases, and End/time constructs used by the President, for example in his State of the Union speech[/i].

Fritz Ritsch, pastor of
Bethesda Presbyterian Church, in a Washington suburb, notes that
the President will not meet with representatives of mainstream
Christian denominations, while he uses the "bully pulpit," acting
like "theologian in chief."
Ritsch's column, titled, "Of God, and Man, in the Oval
Office," gives a detailed and theological critique of Bush's
rhetoric, and that of the so-called religious drive for war and empire.
While Ritsch does not take up explicitly, the matter of
the role of Bush's lead speech-writer, Michael J. Gerson, the
Elmer Gantry-type who wrote the President's Oct. 7, 2002,
Cincinnati speech on Iraq, Ritsch does specify and denounce
specific words and phrases, which are the typical
"secret-meaning" fundamentalist clap-trap Gerson specializes in.
Ritsch writes, ``Contrary to popular opinion, the religion
that this group [Bush's religious supporters] espouses is
Triumphalism, not Christianity. Theirs is a zealous form of
nationalism, baptized with Christian language. The German
theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who was martyred by the Nazis,
foresaw the rise of a similar view in his country, which he
labeled, `joyous secularism.' .... f, as I believe, this
worldview is really American triumphalism, Christianity has taken
a backseat to joyous secularism [i.e. Nazism]''
Bush, Ritsch says, ``asserts a worldview that most Christian
denominations reject outright as heresy: the myth of redemptive
violence, which posits a war between good and evil ... God
[versus] ... Satan.... Christians have held this view to be
heretical since at least the third century.... In contrast [to
the ``fundamentalists''], the Judeo-Christian worldview is that
of redemption...."
Ritsch points to ways that the ignorant Bush misuses
received religion. For example, ``The President used the words of
a hymn `There's Power in the Blood,' to strengthen the religious
rhetoric of his State of the Union speech.

He spoke of the
`power, wonder-working power'
of `the goodness and idealism and
faith of the American people.'
The original words of the hymn
refer to the `wonder-working power' of `the precious blood of the
lamb' -- Jesus Christ. The unspoken but apparently deliberate
parallel between Americans and Jesus is disturbing, to say the least.''

[source: New York Times, by Thomas Friedman, March 2]
"DON'T BELIEVE THE POLLS," says New York Times columnist
Thomas Friedman column. "I've been to nearly 20 states recently,
and I've found that 95% of the country wants to see Iraq dealt
with without a war. But President Bush is a man on a mission...."
Friedman's report is notable, because he himself supports [as of March 2003] going
to war, but he thinks Bush has screwed up the preparations
diplomatically and otherwise. - http://idaho.indymedia.org/ne...

GOP Bush/Cheney Campaign to Smear (Destroy) Environmental Movement

06.27.04 (6:00 am) [edit]

[b]Terrorist Tree Huggers[/b]

One of environmentalism's biggest foes—Ron Arnold— is back, peddling the idea that environmentalism breeds terrorism. Arnold is the same man who once bragged to [i]The New York Times [/i]that, “No one was aware that environmentalism was a problem until we came along.” He's been so successful, says one environmentalist, that he's now "within striking distance" of checking off every item on his "wise-use" agenda.

[i]Bill Berkowitz is a longtime political observer and columnist[/i].

[b]Ron Arnold—the father of America's "wise use" movement—is back. And this time he's adding accusations of terrorism to his arsenal[/b]. Consider the following:

On June 8, the FBI distributed its weekly intelligence bulletin to some 18,000 law enforcement agencies across the country, warning that eco-terrorists were planning a “day of action and solidarity” that could involve violent actions in a number of U.S. cities.

At the recent BIO 2004 annual conference in San Francisco, Phil Celestini, supervisory special agent assigned to the FBI domestic terrorism operations unit, told attendees that they could be targets of attacks by eco-extremists despite the fact that "they don't conduct animal testing at their own facilities," the [i]San Francisco Business Times [/i]reported.

And in early June, Rep. George Nethercutt, R-Wash., introduced the "Ecoterrorism Act of 2004" which intends to 'protect and promote public safety and interstate commerce.”

All of these stories have Ron Arnold's fingerprints on them. With friends in the Bush administration, a recent [i]Playboy[/i] magazine interview under his belt, a series of radio appearances and PowerPoint presentations at industry-association gatherings and a new anti-terrorism consulting contract, Arnold is back riding high in the anti-environmentalism saddle.

"Fifteen years after creating his 25 Point Wise-Use Agenda, an agenda prescribing unrestrained, unregulated and unconscionable abuse of the American commons, Ron Arnold is within striking distance of checking off every agenda items on his list," Scott Silver, executive director of Wild Wilderness, told me in a recent interview.

Arnold is no novice when it comes to leveling charges that environmentalists are eco-terrorists. Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber point out in their new book Banana Republicans (Tarcher/Penguin, 2004) that Arnold “has been tossing around the term eco-terrorism for years, defining it as ‘any crime committed in the name of saving nature,’ which ‘includes but it not limited to crimes officially designated as ‘terrorism’ by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.’ This definition…is so broad,” Rampton and Stauber write, “that is even includes activities such as sit-ins and other forms of peaceful civil disobedience.”

Since 9/11, Arnold, the executive vice president of the Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise, has been energetically and enthusiastically revving up his anti-environmental gospel with a new twist to his message: Environmental activists not only are working to stifle America’s economic growth, but they are a breeding ground for terrorism in the homeland.

The Bush administration’s cutbacks in the enforcement of environmental regulations, coupled with its focus on the war against terrorism, have planted the seeds for Ron Arnold’s makeover as an expert on ecoterrorism. “It comes as no surprise that in today's Orwellian world where perception has become reality, Arnold has been recast as the fearless protector of corporate interests while mainstream environmentalists are being portrayed as terrorists," Silver says.

Silver pointed out that Arnold’s anti-environmental agenda is salted by his public relations expertise and the understanding that, as Arnold told Outside magazine in 1991, "Facts don't matter; in politics, perception is reality." The same year Arnold also told [i]The New York Times [/i]: “We [CDFE] created a sector of public opinion that didn't used to exist. No one was aware that environmentalism was a problem until we came along.”

These days, Arnold maintains that a phalanx of liberal foundations is not only funding anti-growth and anti-labor environmental campaigns, but that the environmental movement has become fertile ground for budding ecoterrorists. While none of this is particularly new—he’s been plowing similar ground for more than two decades—it resonates with the industry groups that support his work, as law enforcement officials struggling to keep on top of President Bush’s permanent war against terrorism, and has helped him snare a consulting contract supported by government funds.

In the May 2004 issue of[i] Playboy[/i], Arnold told Dean Kuipers that: “There is a criminal section of the environmental movement, and it's probably getting money from the above-ground sector. Some of the environmental movement is simply anti corporate; some of it is more ideological.” And in the May issue of [i]Foundation Watch[/i], a publication of the Washington, D.C.-based right-wing think tank Capital Research Center, Arnold's profile of the Philadelphia-based Pew Charitable Trusts—a leading donor to environmental groups—concludes that Pew, which recently changed its legal status from “private foundation to public charity,” is now be in a position to play “an even more active role in advocating sweeping policies to combat the alleged global warming threat.”

A month earlier, in the same publication, Arnold took a close look at Teresa Heinz Kerry, the head of the Heinz Foundation and the wife of presumptive Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry. Among other issues, Arnold looked at the “relationship between the foundation’s charitable gifts to environmental groups and environmentalist supporters of the senator’s presidential campaign” and what [that] might mean for a Kerry presidency.”

Twelve years ago,[i] Audubon [/i]magazine’s Kate Callaghan pointed out that during the 20th century’s first decade, Gifford Pinchot, the first chief of the U.S. Forest Service, likely used the term, “wise use” when he “called conservation ‘the wise use of resources.’” Eighty years later, Ron Arnold expropriated the phrase and turned it into a political movement. Using the term during a multiple use strategy conference in Reno, Nev., Arnold suggested that “wholesale mining, logging and grazing are possible while simultaneously preserving the land.”

Arnold’s 1989 book, [i]The Wise Use Agenda [/i], brought the “wise use” movement to the center of an anti-environmental, pro-industry nexus. A savvy corporate fundraiser and public relations spinmeister, he once proudly proclaimed himself as the “Darth Vader for the capitalist revolution.”

Arnold's resume also includes his job as the executive vice president of the Bellevue, Wash.-based Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise, a pro-corporate group founded in 1976 by his longtime comrade, Alan Gottlieb. (Gottlieb is also credited with founding the anti-gun control Second Amendment Foundation and the Citizen's Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms.) According to the Center for Media and Democracy’s Disinfopedia, CDFE claims to be “a non-partisan education and research organization which works on free enterprise studies, public policy research, book publishing, conferences, white papers and media outreach.” CDFE’s website asserts that it tracks “threats to free markets, property rights and limited government.”

Over the years, CDFE, a tax-exempt educational organization under Section 501(c)(3) of the U.S. Tax Code, has received support from a network of corporations, including Georgia Pacific, Louisiana-Pacific, MacMillan Bloedel, Pacific Lumber, Exxon, DuPont and Boise Cascade.

In 2002, Arnold launched a campaign to convince the FBI's Domestic Terrorism Program to take a close look at the Green Anarchy Tour 2002. He told the Conservative News Service (CNS) that the tour "presents probable cause for investigation. You do have people here recommending violence, murder, property damage, everything you can think of."

In November 2003, according to the organization’s website, Arnold, the author of[i] EcoTerror: The Violent Agenda to Save Nature, the World of the Unabomber [/i]—which traces the history of the radical environmental movement and attempts to link Unabomber Ted Kaczynski to mainstream environmentalists—was “retained as expert consultant on ecoterrorism” for a University of Arkansas Terrorism Research Center study funded by a $343,885 grant from the National Institute of Justice (NIJ).

Arnold will work with Brent Smith, a professor of sociology and director of the Terrorism Research Center at the University of Arkansas, who is working on a project called "Pre-incident indicators of Terrorist Incidents: The Identification of Behavioral, Geographic and Temporal Patterns of Preparatory Conduct," an effort aimed at predicting future terrorist attacks.

His warnings may be paying off. In early June, [i]Pork Alert[/i], an online publication of Pork magazine, reported that Rep. George Nethercutt, R-Wash., had introduced the Ecoterrorism Act of 2004. Nethercutt’s legislation would “establish federal criminal penalties and civil remedies for violent, threatening, obstructive and destructive conduct that is intended to injure, intimidate or interfere with plant or animal enterprises. This bill would serve to protect livestock from tampering by ecoterrorists.” The bill has been referred to the House Judiciary Committee for consideration.

“From drilling in the Alaskan Wildlife Refuge to clear-cutting the Tongass National Forest, from opening all public lands to mining and energy production, to gutting the Wilderness Act, from amending and weakening the Endangered Species Act to turning America's national parks over to the Walt Disney Company, Ron Arnold's agenda is on a roll,” Scott Silver pointed out. “All that stands in the way of Arnold and his ideologically extreme brethren are decades-worth of environmental laws and those who are dedicated to defending our public lands.” - http://www.tompaine.com/artic...

'Fahrenheit 9/11' Has Huge Opening Day

06.27.04 (5:55 am) [edit]

"Fahrenheit 9/11," Michael Moore's assault on President Bush, took in $8.2 million to $8.4 million in its first day, positioning it as the weekend's No. 1 film, its distributors said Saturday.

Based on Friday's numbers, "Fahrenheit 9/11" was on track for an opening weekend that would surpass the $21.6 million total gross of Moore's "Bowling for Columbine," his 2002 film that earned him an Academy Award for best documentary.

"Bowling for Columbine" holds the record for highest domestic gross among documentaries, excluding concert films and movies made for huge-screen IMAX theaters.

Friday grosses for "Fahrenheit 9/11" ran about $1.5 million ahead of its closest competitor, the Wayans brothers comedy "White Chicks." The performance of "Fahrenheit 9/11" was even more remarkable considering it played in just 868 theaters, fewer than a third the number for "White Chicks."

"Fahrenheit 9/11" benefited from a flurry of praise and condemnation. Supporters mobilized liberal-minded audiences to see it over opening weekend to counter efforts by some right-wing groups to discredit the film.

"It always helps when there's a group out there that says, 'Don't go see this movie. It's bad for you,'" said Jonathan Sehring, president of IFC Films, one of the film's distributors.

"Fahrenheit 9/11" paints Bush as a neglectful president who ignored terrorism warnings before Sept. 11, then stirred up fear of more attacks to win public support for the Iraq war. The movie won the top honor at the Cannes Film Festival in May.

The film has ridden a wave of publicity since just before Cannes, when Moore began assailing Disney for refusing to let subsidiary Miramax release "Fahrenheit 9/11" because of its political content.

Miramax bosses Harvey and Bob Weinstein bought back the film and hooked up with Lions Gate Films and IFC to distribute it.

The fury over "Fahrenheit 9/11" resembled the firestorm created by Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ," which rose to blockbuster status amid debate over whether it was anti-Semitic.

"It's like how 'The Passion of the Christ' redefined what a certain genre of movie could do at the box office, 'Fahrenheit 9/11' is doing the same thing," said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box-office tracker Exhibitor Relations. "This blows away any conceivable record for box office of a documentary." - http://www.commondreams.org/h...

'Fahrenheit 9/11' Has Huge Opening Day

06.27.04 (5:54 am) [edit]

'Fahrenheit 9/11' Has Huge Opening Day

06.27.04 (5:52 am) [edit]

Flip-flopper in chief

06.27.04 (5:51 am) [edit]

Maybe the Bush administration is in full retreat. Perhaps the President is the real "flip-flopper" in this campaign. An idealist might think President Bush has seen the errors of his ways. A believer in the supernatural could conclude that Bill Clinton invaded Mr. Bush's body during that chummy White House get-together last week.

Whatever the explanation, policy wonks will have noticed the following this week:

The administration dropped its previously adamant insistence that American military personnel be granted immunity from prosecution by the International Criminal Court. It acknowledged that it has softened its hard-line position on North Korea by offering guarantees of security and aid in return for a phasing out of the Pyongyang regime's nuclear program. And the President, for the first time, endorsed use of condoms to reduce the spread of AIDS.

It's easy, of course, to assume political motives. The majority of the American electorate, after all, views itself squarely in the center of the political spectrum. So it wouldn't be surprising if Mr. Bush viewed this as an opportune moment to attempt to re-emerge as the non-divisive "compassionate conservative" that he misleadingly promised to be in the 2000 race.

Indeed, the reaction has been mild from right-wing ideologues who despise all world courts as infringements on American sovereignty, who view overtures to North Korea as submission to blackmail and who think government should advocate only abstinence to prevent sexually transmitted diseases. Their response suggests that they may understand that their favored candidate must make expedient concessions.

It will, obviously, be instructive to see how the President follows through on these policy shifts.

Nonetheless, each switch is welcome.

The change on the international court has no practical effect, since its jurisdiction doesn't extend to countries that prosecute crimes by their military. It does, however, make the United States appear less contemptuous of opinion at the United Nations, whose help it desperately seeks in Iraq.

Despite the softer approach toward North Korea, a breakthrough during six-nation talks under way now in Beijing remains very unlikely. But the latest American proposal recognizes that successfully engaging the North Koreans will require the help of China, Japan and South Korea, all of whom have urged the U.S. to offer concrete inducements for a settlement.

And while the President properly included abstinence and marital fidelity as effective ways to prevent AIDS, it is a breakthrough that he cited the successes of Uganda in adding appropriate use of condoms as a "practical, balanced and moral" approach to avoiding the disease.

Sometimes politics can lead to more than just an election. - http://www.courierjournal.com...

Flip-flopper in chief

06.27.04 (5:49 am) [edit]

Why Isn't Bush On Trial???

06.26.04 (11:25 am) [edit]

When Neris Gonzalez sees the photos of Abu Ghraib prison, she sees not abuse, but torture. Similar to other torture survivors, she sees not a few bad apples, but clear evidence of state-sponsored terrorism.

That's a harsh assessment. But for torture survivors, nothing causes a greater repulsion than government-sanctioned torture and violence. As has now become clear, the Bush administration has seemingly been involved in an attempt not simply to legalize or "redefine" torture -- but to carry it out on an unprecedented scale and, minimally, to create a public climate of tolerance.

Despite the government release of formerly classified memos (which do not exonerate the administration), this effort has arguably included the willful intent to evade laws against torture, countless deaths and "disappearances" of prisoners, and the creation of a network of secret and illegal detention facilities worldwide, purportedly accountable to no one but President Bush.

For Gonzalez, these are unsettling times, and it is personal. She was brutally tortured in 1979 by Salvadoran National Guardsmen, and in 2002 she won a historic lawsuit against two generals (Jose Guillermo Garcia and the notorious Carlos Vides Casanova). Ironically, they lost their trial not because they committed torture, but because of "command responsibility" -- they should have known that those under their command were committing torture and other atrocities.

Under this precept, the legal ramifications for today are inescapable.

Gonzalez was also troubled by all the recent hoopla surrounding former President Reagan's death. To her, it's inconceivable how a president who essentially trained, armed and financed El Salvador's military death squads could be so honored as a peacemaker. More than 75,000 of her compatriots were killed, many thousands were "disappeared," and several million were displaced. "It wasn't just the killings of the Jesuits, the nuns or Archbishop Romero. It was the total destruction of my country," she said. It also involved countless massacres and the destruction of the environment. And it wasn't just her country. "He financed an entire war in Central America," she said.

Even more unsettling to her are the recently revealed memos that show government lawyers essentially engaging in a Clintonesque explanation over the meaning of "torture." However, unlike the previous administration, it goes far beyond stained reputations. While the president was claiming last year to be "leading by example" in the movement against torture, the administration was plotting ways to inflict pain upon prisoners without "violating the law." One way was to argue that the laws against torture don't apply to the president, and that following his orders provided legal immunity. Another was to argue that the laws did not apply inside (or outside) the United States. The result was "forceful interrogations," which have resulted in the torture and humiliation of hundreds, if not thousands, of prisoners worldwide. Many have been held incommunicado without charges or legal representation for more than two years.

Even though Amnesty International recently reminded the president that torture is a war crime, the administration obviously already knows this; all the legal wrangling took place in the context of avoiding war crimes prosecutions. This is also the context of the president's insistence in not simply exempting the United States from the U.N.'s International War Crimes Tribunal (which has since been withdrawn), but in blackmailing nations and actively sabotaging the court.

In releasing the memos (the Aug. 1, 2002, memo has now been shelved), the president did not disavow his Feb. 7, 2002, claim to have the legal right to "exempt" the United States from torture laws and treaties. Neither did he repudiate the belief that he can pick and choose which prisoners are entitled to full protection. Neither addressed nor repudiated are the secret and indefinite detentions of prisoners without charges (or legal representation), nor the maintenance of clandestine prisons -- all of which are clear violations of the Geneva Conventions.

Reflecting on her own case, Neris Gonzalez said: "Who would have thought that we (Gonzalez, Carlos Mauricio and Dr. Juan Romagoza) would have prevailed over two generals?" (All are U.S. residents.) The law that made their victory possible -- a historic $54 million judgment -- was passed by Congress and signed into law by President George H.W. Bush in 1992. Under this law, it allows U.S. citizens and non-citizens alike to bring claims in U.S. courts for torture and extrajudicial killings committed in foreign countries.

Without such laws, governments would torture with impunity, she said. "Many Americans today are embarrassed of what their president is doing. It's the height of arrogance. What example is he setting for the world?

"He has destroyed relations between religions and peoples, culture and the environment," said Gonzalez. "The only things he hasn't been able to destroy are faith and hope. Why isn't he on trial?" - http://www.commondreams.org/v...

Why Isn't Bush On Trial???

06.26.04 (11:24 am) [edit]

Why Isn't Bush On Trial???

06.26.04 (11:23 am) [edit]

Why Isn't Bush On Trial???

06.26.04 (11:22 am) [edit]

Tom DeLay's Amoral Code: Charges of Ethics Violations

06.26.04 (9:05 am) [edit]

Is it any surprise that the publication of Clinton's memoir My Life has revived the vitriolic bleating from those on the right who just can't seem to stop salivating over blue dresses and beret-wearing interns ?

But if these self-appointed morality police were truly committed to upholding ethics and promoting values in government, they would begin challenging the House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, who is hands down one of the most corrupt politicians in the United States.

"The Hammer"--DeLay got that nickname because he runs the US House of Representatives with an iron fist--has allegedly bribed his GOP colleagues to win their votes for legislation that he desperately wanted to pass in the House. He's engaged in [i]quid pro quos [/i]with corporations seeking legislative favors, and violated campaign finance laws in Texas during the 2002 state house election contests. Now, after a seven-year truce in the US House that discouraged members from filing ethics charges against one another, Rep. Chris Bell has gone to the ethics committee and filed a 187-page bombshell charging that DeLay engaged in extortion, money-laundering and other abuses of power.

Just this week, the ethics committee said that Bell had met the criteria for filing a complaint, and it will now spend at least the next forty-five days reviewing the charges that DeLay violated the house's ethics rules. Bell called the committee's decision "an important first step in the long journey to restore integrity and ethics to the people's House and to hold the House majority leader accountable for his actions." He received a riproaring (standing) ovation from the Democratic Caucus this week, winning a tacit endorsement from colleagues in his ongoing battle to hold DeLay accountable.

Bell, who lost his seat in Texas after DeLay rammed through his undemocratic statewide redistricting plan designed to help Republicans hold on to power there, has taken a bold stand. But kudos must also be given to the courageous folks at the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics (CREW) http://www.citizensforethics.... in Washington who have been filing complaints against DeLay and shining a spotlight on his transgressions for many months now. CREW bills itself as a non-partisan watchdog group established to use litigation to help ordinary people against unscrupulous government officials. "Of course, we should have high standards for government leaders," CREW's mission statement notes, "but the greatest danger to democracy is posed not by the personal peccadilloes of government leaders, but rather, public policy unduly influenced by special interests." Although it has adopted the model of legal advocacy developed by right-wing organizations like Judicial Watch and the Rutherford Institute, CREW has no political ideology, and in recent years it has stood alongside a bevy of brave souls, from columnist Paul Krugman to Democratic officials in the Texas legislature, who have opposed DeLay's brass-knuckles tactics and criticized the Majority Leader's illegal and undemocratic activities.

Thanks to Bell's complaint and CREW's persistence, Americans now have in their hands a vivid picture of corruption and ethical rule-breaking that belies the notion that this Administration and its Republican Congressional allies do anything more than simply pay lip service to upholding ethics and morality in the seats of federal power. For starters, the Democratic District Attorney in Travis County, Texas has convened a grand jury to investigate charges that "the Hammer" used his political action committee, Texans for a Republican Majority, to raise millions in corporate campaign contributions and then spent some of this money on polling, fundraising and get-out-the-vote activities in violation of Texas law, which says that corporate contributions can be used only for general administrative purposes.

DeLay is also charged in Bell's complaint with extracting campaign contributions from an electric utility in Kansas called Westar Energy. DeLay, it's alleged, agreed to insert provisions into an energy bill that would save Westar billions of dollars. One e-mail that has subsequently come to light reveals that Westar's executives thought that they were buying a "seat at the table" when they donated money to groups with links to the Majority Leader.

Then there's DeLay's role in corralling votes on behalf of the GOP's sham Medicare prescription drug legislation, a legislative low point that occurred in the long night of Republican arm-twisting last November. According to the Associated Press, Rep. Nick Smith, a Republican from Michigan, said that unnamed House Republican leaders threatened to work against Smith's son (who was running for Nick's seat) unless Smith voted for the legislation. Robert Novak reported in his column that Smith was also told that "business interests would give his son $100,000 in return for his father's vote." While Smith later recanted these allegations, his charges have the ring of truth, and they are in keeping with DeLay's thuggish tactics of forcing even his own Republican colleagues to submit to the Republican leadership's will on closely fought legislative matters.

DeLay's brazen attacks on democratic governance--a tangled web of truly scandalous behavior--are so outrageous that even conservative Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel has assailed the Republican leadership for fomenting an "anything goes" atmosphere: "I think we're on the edge of something dangerous if we don't turn it around.... It's like the Middle East. You just keep ratcheting up the intensity of the conflict." Real conservatives like Hagel believe that they should take responsibility for their actions. These conservatives actually value the rule of law, and they understand that the ends don't always justify the means in the pursuit of a radical right-wing ideology that serves corporate special interests above all.

Tom DeLay has never understood these things. He is committed to his take-no-prisoners agenda, and he sees ethics, morality and rules as nuisances that must be flouted, disdained and ignored. DeLay has racked up a record that demands investigation and action in the ethics committee and the courts of law. His scurrilous misdeeds demonstrate the yawning gap between a former President's private indiscretions and DeLay's dangerous violations of the public trust.

[b]Katrina vanden Heuvel, Editor's Cut, The Nation, http://www.thenation.com [/b]

Tom DeLay's Amoral Code

06.26.04 (9:02 am) [edit]

George W. Bush: A Dangerously Stupid Man, A Bloody Legacy of Death, Carnage & Misery ...

06.25.04 (8:48 am) [edit]

When we Americans first begun, our biggest danger was clearly in view. We knew from the bitter experience with King George III that the most serious threat to democracy is usually the accumulation of too much power in the hands of an executive, whether he be a king or a president.

Our ingrained American distrust of concentrated power has very little to do with the character or persona of the individual who wields that power; it is the power itself that must be constrained, checked, dispersed and carefully balanced in order to ensure the survival of freedom.

In addition, our founders taught us that public fear is the most dangerous enemy of democracy, because under the right circumstances, it can trigger the temptation of those who govern themselves to surrender that power to someone who promises strength and offers safety, security and freedom from fear.

It truly is an extraordinary blessing to live in a nation so carefully designed to protect individual liberty and safeguard self- governance and free communication. But if George Washington could see the current state of his generation's handiwork and assess the quality of our generation's stewardship now, at the beginning of this 21st century, what do you suppose he would think about the proposition that our current president claims the unilateral right to arrest and imprison American citizens indefinitely, without giving them the right to see a lawyer or inform their families of their whereabouts, and without the necessity of even charging them with any crime? All that is necessary, according to our president, is that he, the president, label any citizen an unlawful enemy combatant and that will be sufficient to justify taking away that citizen's liberty without due process, even for the rest of his life if the president so chooses. There's no appeal.

What would Thomas Jefferson think of the curious and discredited argument from our current Justice Department that the president may authorize what plainly amounts to the torture or prisoners, and that any law or treaty which attempts to constrain his treatment of prisoners in time of war would itself be a violation of the Constitution our founders put together? What would Benjamin Franklin think of President Bush's assertion that he has the inherent power, even without a declaration of war by the Congress, to launch an invasion of any nation on Earth at any time he chooses for any reason he wishes, even if that nation poses no imminent threat to the United States? How long would it take James Madison to dispose of our current president's recent claim in Department of Justice legal opinions that he is no longer subject to the rule of law, so long as he is acting in his role as commander in chief? I think that it is safe to say that our founders would be genuinely concerned about these recent developments in American democracy, and that they would feel that we, here, now, are facing a clear and present danger with the potential to threaten the future of the American experiment.

Shouldn't we be equally concerned, and shouldn't we ask ourselves how it is that we have come to this point? Even though we are now attuned to orange alerts and the potential for terrorist attacks, a potential that is all too real, our founders would almost certainly caution us that the biggest threat to the future of the America we love is still the endemic challenge that democracies have always faced whenever they have appeared in history, a challenge rooted in the inherent difficulty of selfgovernance and the vulnerability to fear that is part of human nature. Again, specifically, the biggest threat to America is that we Americans will acquiesce in the slow and steady accumulation of too much power in the hands of one person.

Having painstakingly created the intricate design of America, our founders knew intimately both its strengths and its weaknesses. And during their debate, they not only identified the accumulation of power in the hands of the executive as the long-term threat which they considered to be the most serious one, but they also worried aloud about one specific scenario in which this threat might become particularly potent: that is, when war transformed America's president into our commander in chief. They worried that his suddenly increased power might somehow spill over its normal constitutional boundary and upset the delicate checks and balances which they deemed so crucial to the maintenance of liberty. That is precisely why they took extra care to parse the war powers in the Constitution, assigning the conduct of war and command of the troops to the president but retaining for the Congress the crucial power of deciding whether or not and when our nation might decide to go to war.

Indeed, that limitation on the power of the executive to make war was seen as crucially important. James Madison wrote in a letter to Thomas Jefferson these words: "The Constitution supposes what the history of all governments demonstrates, that the executive is the branch of power most interested in war and most prone to it. It has accordingly with studied care vested the question of war in the legislature," end quote.

Now of course, in more recent decades the emergence of new, modern weapons that virtually eliminate the period of time between the decision to go to war or the declaration to war and the actual waging of war have naturally led to a reconsideration of the exact nature of the executive's war-making power. But the practicalities of modern warfare, which do necessarily increase the war powers of the president at the expense of Congress, do not thereby render moot the concerns our founders had so long ago that the making of war by the president, when added to his other powers, carries with it the potential for unbalancing the careful design of our constitution and, in the process, actually threatening our liberties.

They, our founders, were greatly influenced far more than we can imagine by a careful reading of the history and human drama surrounding the democracies of ancient Greece and the Roman Republic.

They knew, for example, that democracy disappeared in Rome when Caesar crossed the Rubicon in violation of the Roman Senate's long prohibition against a returning general entering the city while still in command of military forces. Though the senate lingered in form and was humored for decades, when Caesar impolitically combined his military commander role with his chief of state role, the Roman Senate, and with it the Roman Republic and the dream of democracy, withered away; and for all intents and purposes democracy disappeared from the face of the Earth for 17 centuries, until its rebirth in our land.

Symbolically, President Bush has been attempting to conflate his commander in chief role and his head of government role as a means of maximizing the power that people are naturally eager to give those who promise to defend them against active threats. But as he does so, we are now witnessing some serious erosion of the checks and balances that have always maintained a healthy democracy in America.

In Justice Jackson's famous concurring opinion in the Youngstown Steel case back in the 1950s, the single most important Supreme Court case ever on the subject of what powers are inherent to the commander in chief in a time of war, Justice Jackson wrote: The example of such unlimited executive power that must have most impressed the forefathers was the prerogative exercise by George III, and the description of its evils in the Declaration of Independence leads me to doubt that they created their new executive in their image.

And if we seek instruction from our own times -- he, again, writing in the 1950s, continued, we can match it only from the executive governments we disparagingly describe as totalitarian.

I am convinced that our founders would counsel us today that the greatest challenge facing our republic is not terrorism, as serious a threat as that is, but how we react to terrorism; and not war, but how we manage our fears and achieve security without losing our freedom. I am also convinced that they would warn us that democracy itself is in grave danger if we allow any president to use his role as commander in chief to rupture the careful balance between the executive, legislative and judicial branches of government.

Our current president has gone to war and has crossed back into the city and declared that our nation is now in a permanent state of war, which he says justifies his reinterpretation of the Constitution in ways that increase his personal power as president at the expense of Congress, the courts and every individual citizen. We must surrender some of our traditional American freedoms, he tells us, so that he may have sufficient power to protect us against those who would do us harm.

Public fear remains at an unusually high level almost three years after we were viciously attacked on September 11th, 2001.

In response to those devastating attacks, the president properly and skillfully assumed his role as commander in chief and directed a military invasion of the land in which our attackers built their training camps, were harbored, and planned their assault, but then just as the tide of battle was shifting decisively in our favor, the commander in chief made a controversial decision to divert a major portion of our army to invade another country, a country that, according to the best evidence now compiled in a new, exhaustive, bipartisan study, posed no imminent threat to us and had nothing to do with the attack against us.

As the main body of our troops were deployed for the new invasion, those who had organized the attack against us escaped, and many of them are still at large. Indeed, their overall numbers seem to have grown considerably because our invasion of the country that did not pose any imminent threat to us was perceived in their part of the world as a gross injustice. And then the way in which we have conducted that war further fueled a sense of rage against the United States in those lands, and, according to several studies, has stimulated a wave of new recruits for the terrorist group that attacked us and still wishes us harm.

A little over a year ago, when we launched this war against the second country, Iraq, President Bush repeatedly gave our people the clear impression that Iraq was an ally and partner to the terrorist group that attacked us, al Qaeda, and that Iraq not only provided a geographic base for them but was also close to providing them with weapons of mass destruction, including even nuclear bombs.

But now the extensive independent investigation by this bipartisan commission formed to study the 9/11 attack has just reported that there was no meaningful relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda of any kind; and of course, over the past year we had previously found out that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

So now the president and the vice president are arguing with this commission and they are insisting that the commission is wrong and they are right and that there actually was a working, cooperative relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda. Now, the problem for President Bush is that he does not have any credible evidence to support this claim, and yet in spite of that, he persists in making that claim repeatedly and vigorously.

And so I would like to pause here for a moment today to address the curious question of why President Bush continues to make this claim that most people who have investigated it know is wrong. And I think it's a particularly important question because it is closely connected to the questions of constitutional power with which I began this speech; and the way we answer it will profoundly affect how that power is distributed among our three branches of government.

To begin with, our founders would not be the least bit surprised at what the modern public opinion polls all tell us about why it's so important politically for President Bush to keep the American people from discovering that what he told them about the linkage between Iraq and al Qaeda just isn't true. Among those Americans who still believe that there is a linkage, there remains very strong support for the president's decision to invade Iraq, but among those who accept the commission's new detailed finding that there is no connection, support for the war in Iraq and the decision to launch it dries up pretty quickly.

And that's understandable, because if Iraq had nothing to do with the attack or the organization that launched the attack against us, then that means the president took us to war when he didn't have to, a war in which almost 900 of our soldiers have been killed and almost 5,000 have been wounded and many thousands of Iraqis have been killed and wounded.

Thus, for all of these reasons, President Bush and Vice President Cheney have evidently decided to fight to the rhetorical death over whether or not there is and was a meaningful connection between Iraq and al Qaeda. They think that if they lose that argument and people see the truth, then they will not only lose support for that controversial decision to go to war against Iraq, but also lose some of the new power they have picked up from the Congress and the courts, and face harsh political consequences at the hands of the American people. As a result, President Bush is now intentionally misleading the American people by continuing to aggressively and brazenly assert a linkage between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein.

If he actually believed in the linkage that he asserts, that would by itself, in light of the available evidence, make him genuinely unfit to lead our nation's struggle against al Qaeda.

(Laughter, applause, cheers.) If they believe these flimsy scraps, then who would want them in charge of anything? (Laughter.) Are they too dishonest or too gullible? Take your pick.

(Laughter.) But the truth is gradually emerging in spite of the president's determined dissembling. Listen, for example, to the words of this editorial this week from the Financial Times, and I quote: "There was nothing intrinsically absurd about the WMD fear" -- the weapons of mass destruction fear -- "nothing ignoble about the opposition to Saddam's tyranny, however late Washington developed this. But the purported link between Baghdad and al Qaeda, by contrast, was never believed by anyone who knows Iraq and the region. It was and is nonsense." End quote.

Now of course the first rationale presented for the war was to destroy Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, which turned out not to exist.

Then the rationale was to liberate Iraqis and the Middle East from tyranny. And it has been a positive good to remove Saddam Hussein from power, but our troops were not greeted with the promised garlands of flowers and are now viewed as an occupying force by 92 percent of Iraqis, while only 2 percent see them as liberators, according to a careful poll by the Coalition Provisional Authority.

But alongside those two rationales, right from the start, beginning very soon after the attacks of 9/11, President Bush made a decision to start mentioning Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein in the same breath, in a cynical mantra designed to fuse them together as one in the public's mind.

He repeatedly used this device in a highly disciplined manner to create a false impression in the minds of the American people that Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11.

Usually he was pretty tricky in his exact wording. Indeed, President Bush's consistent and careful artifice is itself evidence that he knew full well that he was telling an artful and important lie, visibly circumnavigating the truth, over and over again, as if he had practiced how to avoid encountering the truth.

But as I will document in a few moments, he and Vice President Cheney also sometimes slipped away from their usual tricky wording and in careless moments resorted to statements that were clearly outright falsehoods on their face.

In any case, by the time he was done, public opinion polls showed that fully 70 people of the people had gotten the message that he wanted them to get and had been convinced that Saddam Hussein was responsible for the 9/11 attacks.

The myth that Iraq and al Qaeda were working together was no accident. The president and vice president deliberately ignored warnings before the war from international intelligence services, from the CIA and from their own Pentagon that the claim was false.

Europe's top terrorism investigators said in 2002, and I quote, "We have found no evidence of any links between Iraq and al Qaeda. If there were such links, we would have found them, but we have found no serious connections whatsoever." End quote. A classified October 2002 CIA report given to the White House directly undercut the Iraq-al Qaeda claim. Top officials in the Pentagon told newspaper reporters in 2002 that the rhetoric being used by President Bush and Vice President Cheney was an exaggeration, in their words.

And at least some honest voices within the president's own party admitted the same thing.

Senator Chuck Hagel, a decorated war hero who sits on the Foreign Relations Committee, said point blank, and I quote, "Saddam is not in league with al Qaeda. I have not seen any intelligence that would lead me to connect Saddam Hussein with al Qaeda." Period, end quote.

But these voices and others did not stop the deliberate campaign to mislead America. Over the course of a year, the president and vice president used their carefully crafted language to scare Americans into believing there was an imminent threat from al Qaeda that was going to be armed by Iraq.

In the fall of 2002, President Bush actually told the country, and I quote, "You cannot distinguish between al Qaeda and Saddam," end quote. He also said, and I quote, "The true threat facing our country is an al Qaeda-type network trained and armed by Saddam," end quote. At the same time, Vice President Cheney was repeating his claim that -- and I quote -- "there is overwhelming evidence there was a connection between al Qaeda and the Iraqi government," end quote. By the spring, Secretary of State Powell was in front of the United Nations, in an appearance he now says he regrets, claiming a -- and I quote -- "sinister nexus between Iraq and the al Qaeda terrorist network," end quote.

But after the invasion, no ties were found, no evidence emerged. In June of 2003, the United Nations Security Council's al Qaeda- monitoring agency told reporters his extensive investigation had found no evidence linking the Iraqi regime to al Qaeda.

By August 3, former Bush administration national security and intelligence officials admitted that the evidence that had been used to make this Iraq-al Qaeda claim was, in their words, "tenuous, exaggerated, and often at odds with the conclusion of key intelligence agencies," end quote.

And earlier this year, Knight Ridder newspapers reported, and again I quote, "Senior U.S.

officials now say there never was any evidence of a connection." So when the bipartisan 9/11 commission issued its report last week finding no credible evidence of an Iraqi-al Qaeda connection, it should not have caught the White House off guard.

(Laughter.) Yet, instead of the candor that Americans need and deserve from their leaders, there have been more denials and more insistence without evidence.

Vice President Cheney, for example, said even this week, and I quote, "There clearly was a relationship" and there was "overwhelming evidence." Even more shockingly, Cheney put forward this question. Quote, "Was Iraq involved with al Qaeda in the attack on 9/11? We don't know." (Laughter.) And then he claimed that he probably had more information than the commission had, but has so far refused to provide anything to the commission other than more insults.

The president was even more brazen. He dismissed all questions about his statements by saying, and I quote, "The reason I keep insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and al Qaeda was because there was a relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda." (Laughter.) And he provided no evidence whatsoever.

Friends of the administration have tried mightily to rehabilitate their cherished by now shattered linkage. John Lehman, one of the Republicans on the 9/11 commission, offered up what sounded at first like new evidence that a Saddam henchman had attended an al Qaeda meeting. But within hours, the commission's files yielded definitive evidence that no, that was another man with a similar name -- (laughter) -- ironically capturing the near-miss quality of Bush's entire symbolic argument. (Applause.) They have such an overwhelming political interest in sustaining the belief in the minds of the American people that Hussein was in partnership with bin Laden that they dare not admit the truth, lest they look like complete fools for launching our country into a reckless totally discretionary war against a nation that posed no immediate threat to us whatsoever.

But the damage they have done to our country is not limited to the misallocation of military and economic and political resources, not limited even to the loss of blood and treasure, because whenever a chief executive -- whenever a president spends prodigious amounts of energy in an effort to convince the American people of a falsehood, he damages the fabric of democracy and the belief in the fundamental integrity of our self-government.

And that creates a need for -- that they feel for control over the flood of bad news and bad policies and bad decisions, and that also explains their striking attempts to influence and control news coverage.

To take the most recent example, Vice President Cheney was clearly eager and ready to do battle with the news media when he went out on CNBC earlier this week to attack news coverage of the 9/11 commission's conclusion that Iraq did not have a relationship with al Qaeda. He lashed out at The New York Times for having the nerve to print a headline saying the 9/11 commission finds no Qaeda-Iraq tie, a clear statement of the obvious. (Laughter.) And he then said that there is no, quote, "fundamental split here and now between what the president said and what the commission said." End quote. He tried to deny that he had ever personally been responsible for helping to create the false impression that there was linkage between al Qaeda and Iraq.

Ironically, his interview ended up being fodder for "The Daily Show" with Jon Stewart.

(Laughter, applause.) And Stewart played Cheney's outright denial that he had ever said that representatives of al Qaeda and Iraqi intelligence met in Prague, and then Stewart froze Cheney's image and played the exact video clip when Cheney had indeed said exactly that in exactly the words he had denied, catching him on videotape in a lie. And at that point, Stewart said, addressing himself to Cheney's frozen image on the television screen, "It's my duty to inform you that your pants are on fire." (Laughter, applause.) It's not unusual in the news-gathering environment of the kind that exists in our country today for comedians to be able to say things that others feel like they can't. Dan Rather, for example, said that the post-9/11 patriotism stifled journalism -- has stifled journalists from asking government officials, quote, "the toughest of the tough questions." Rather went -- (chuckles) -- so far as to reach for a metaphor and compare administration efforts to intimidate the press to necklacing in apartheid South Africa. While acknowledging it as a, in his phrase, "an obscene comparison," here's the point he made, and I use his words. "The fear is that you will be necklaced; you will have a flaming tire of lack of patriotism put around your neck," Rather explained.

It was his network, CBS, remember that withheld the Abu Ghraib photographs from the American people for two weeks at the request of the Bush administration.

I have a close friend whose young son was staying with a family in Barcelona, Spain, for the spring quarter. And he called his father in anguish during that two-week period and said the Spanish family with whom he was living was telling him, in the Spanish he had not yet perfected, that America had been found to be torturing Iraqi prisoners, stripping their clothes off and making them do all the things we saw in the pictures. "And Dad, it's not true, is it?" And his father said, "No, son, it's not true. Of course it's not true. You tell them that I don't know what they have on their television there, but this is not true. This is not America." His son relayed the response from his Spanish host family, who said, "Tell your father that they don't show you these pictures in the United States now, but we see them." Three days later, this father called his son back, embarrassed and chagrined, and said it was us. "I can't believe it." And that's kind of the reaction most all of us had.

But the fact that others around the world saw these pictures before we did is itself an issue that runs to the core of important concerns about the course of our democracy.

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has said that current criticisms of the administration's policy in Iraq, and I quote, "makes it complicated and more difficult to fight the war." CNN's Christiane Amanpour said on another network last September, and I quote, "I think the press was muzzled, and I think the press self-muzzled. I'm sorry to say, but certainly television -- and perhaps, to a certain extent, my station -- was intimidated by the administration." End quote.

The administration works closely with a network of rapid responders, a group of digital brownshirts who work to pressure reporters and their editors and publishers and advertisers, and are quick to accuse them of undermining support for our troops.

Paul Krugman, the New York Times columnist, was one of the first journalists to regularly expose the president's consistent distortion of the facts. Krugman writes, and I quote, "Let's not overlook the role of intimidation. After 9/11, if you were thinking of saying anything negative about the president, you had to expect right wing pundits and publications to do all they could to ruin your reputation." Bush and Cheney are spreading purposeful confusion, while attempting to punish in any way they can any reporters who stand in the way of the confusion.

It is understandably difficult for reporters and journalistic institutions to resist that kind of pressure, which in the case of individual journalists can threaten their livelihoods, and in the case of the broadcasters can lead to other forms of economic retribution. But resist they must, because without a press able to report without fear or favor, our democracy will disappear.

Recently the media has engaged in some healthy self-criticism of the way it allowed the White House to mislead the public into war under false pretenses. We are dependent on the media, especially the broadcast media, which is so dominant in America, to never let this happen again.

We must help them resist this pressure for everyone's sake or else we risk other wrongheaded decisions being based upon false and misleading impressions.

So now we are left with an ongoing, unprecedented, high-intensity conflict every single day between the ideological illusions upon which this administration's policies have been based and the reality of the world in which the American people live their lives.

When you boil it all down to precisely what went wrong with the Bush Iraq policy, it's actually fairly simple: He adopted an ideologically driven view of Iraq that was tragically at odds with reality. Everything that has gone wrong is in one way or another the result of this spectacular and violent clash between the bundle of misconceptions that he gullibly consumed and the all too painful reality that our troops and contractors and diplomats and taxpayers have encountered.

Of course, there have been several other collisions between President Bush's ideology and America's reality. To take the most prominent example, the transformation of a $5 trillion surplus into a $4 trillion deficit is in its own way just as spectacular a miscalculation as the Iraq war.

But there has been no more bizarre or troubling manifestation of how seriously off track this president's policies have taken America than the two profound shocks to our nation's conscience over the last month. First came those extremely disturbing pictures that document the strange forms of physical and sexual abuse and even torture and even murder by some of our soldiers against people they captured as prisoners in Iraq, an estimated 90 percent of them innocent of any charge.

And then the second shock to our conscience came just this past week with the strange and perverted legal memoranda from inside the administration which actually sought to justify torture and to somehow provide a legal rationale for the sadistic activities conducted in the name of the American people; activities which, according to any reasonable person, would be recognized as war crimes.

In making their analysis, the administration lawyers concluded that the president, whenever he is acting in his role as commander in chief, is above and immune from the rule of law. At least we don't have to guess what our founders would have to say about that bizarre and un-American theory.

And by the middle of this week, the uproar caused by the disclosure of this legal analysis had forced the administration to claim they were throwing the memo out and it was, in their words, irrelevant and over-broad. But no one in the administration has said that the reasoning was wrong, and in fact, a Department of Justice spokesman today confirmed that they stand by the tortured definition of torture.

In addition, the broad analysis regarding the commander in chief powers that they had asserted has explicitly not been disavowed. And the view of the memo -- that it was within the commander in chief's power to order any interrogation techniques necessary to extract information -- most certainly contributed to the atmosphere that led to the atrocities committed against the Iraqis at Abu Ghraib.

We also know that President Bush rewarded the principal author of this legal monstrosity with a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals. And the president himself meanwhile continues to place the blame for the horrific consequences of his morally obtuse policies on the young privates and corporals and sergeants, who may well be culpable as individuals for their actions, but who were certainly not responsible for the policies which set up the Bush gulag and led to America's strategic catastrophe in Iraq.

I call today on this administration to disclose all of its interrogation policies, including those used by the military in Iraq and Afghanistan, and those employed by the CIA at any detention centers operated outside the U.S., as well as all of the analyses related to the adoption of those policies.

We deserve to know what and why it's being done in our name. (Applause.) Policies matter. The Bush administration's objective of establishing U.S. domination over any potential adversary was what led to the hubristic, tragic miscalculation of the Iraq war, a painful adventure marked by one disaster after another, based on one mistaken assumption after another.

But the people who paid the price have been the U.S. soldiers trapped over there and the Iraqis in prison and out.

The top-heavy focus on dominance as a goal for the U.S. role in the world is exactly paralleled in their aspiration for the role of the president to be completely dominant within our constitutional system. Our founders understood even better than Lord Acton the inner meaning of his famous aphorism that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. The goal of dominance necessitates a focus on power, even absolute power.

Ironically, all of the administration's didactic messages about how democracies don't invade other nations fell on their own deaf ears. The pursuit of dominance in foreign and strategic policy led the Bush administration to ignore the United Nations, to do serious damage to our most important alliances in the world, to violate international law, and risk the hatred and contempt of many in the rest of the world. The seductive exercise of unilateral power has led this president to interpret his powers under the Constitution in a way what would have been the worst nightmare of our framers.

And the kind of unilateral power he imagines is fool's gold in any case. Just as its pursuit in Iraq has led to tragic consequences for our soldiers and the Iraqi people and everything we think is important, in the same way the pursuit of a new interpretation of the presidency that ends up weakening the Congress, the courts and civil society is not good for either the presidency or the rest of the nation. If the Congress becomes an enfeebled enabler to the executive and the courts become known for political calculations in their decisions, then the country suffers.

The kinds of unnatural, undemocratic activities in which this administration has engaged in order to aggrandize power have included censorship of scientific reports, manipulation of budgetary statistics, the silencing of dissent, the ignoring of intelligence. And although there have been other efforts by other presidents to encroach upon the legitimate prerogatives of Congress and the courts, there has never been this kind of persistent, systematic abuse of the truth and the institutionalization of dishonesty as a routine part of the policy process.

Two hundred and twenty years ago John Adams wrote, in describing one of America's most basic founding principles -- and I quote: "The executive shall never exercise the legislative and judicial powers, or either of them, to the end it may be a government of laws and not of men." The last time we had a president who had the idea that he was above the law was when Richard Nixon told an interviewer, David Frost -- he said, and I quote, "When the president does it, that means it's not illegal." (Laughter.) He went on to elaborate: "If the president, for example, approves something, approves an action because of national security or, in this cases, because of a threat to internal peace and order of significant order, then the president's decision in this instance is one that enables those who carry it out to carry it out without violating the law," end quote.

Fortunately for our country, President Nixon was forced to resign before he could implement his outlandish interpretation of the Constitution, but not before his defiance of the Congress and the courts created a serious constitutional crisis. The two top Justice Department officials under President Nixon, Elliot Richardson and William Ruckelshaus, turned out to be men of great integrity. And even though they were loyal Republican partisans, they were more loyal to the Constitution, and they resigned on principle rather than implement what they saw as abuses of power by Nixon. And then Congress, also on a bipartisan basis, bravely resisted Nixon's abuses of power and launched impeachment proceedings. Some of our Congress's proudest hours in recent decades came in that trial, in that struggle.

But you know, in some ways our current president is actually claiming more extraconstitutional power vis-a-vis Congress and the courts than Richard Nixon did.

For example, Nixon never claimed that he could imprison American citizens indefinitely with no charge of a crime, with no access to a lawyer and notification to their family.

And in this administration, this time the attorney general, John Ashcroft, is hardly the kind of man who would resign on principle to impede -- (laughter) -- an abuse of power. (Applause.) In fact, it seems like whenever there's an opportunity to abuse power in this administration -- (laughter) -- Ashcroft seems to be out there leading the charge. And he's the one, after all, who's responsible for picking those staff lawyers at the Justice Department, responsible for those embarrassing memos justifying and enabling torture.

Moreover, in contrast, in sharp contrast to the courageous 93rd Congress that helped to save our country from Richard Nixon's sinister abuses, the current Congress, controlled by the president's party, has virtually abdicated its constitutional role to serve as an independent and coequal branch of government. Instead, this Republican-led Congress is content, for the most part, to take orders from the president on what to vote for and what to vote against. The Republican leaders of the House and Senate have even started blocking Democrats from attending conference committee meetings, where legislation takes its final form; and instead, they let the president's staff come to the meetings and write key parts of the laws for them.

Come to think of it, the decline and lack of independence shown by this Congress would shock our founders more than anything else, because they believe that the power of the Congress was the single most important check and balance against the unhealthy exercise of too much power by the executive branch. I wish the Republican leaders of this Congress would show some backbone and discharge their constitutional responsibilities to the American people. (Applause.) This administration has not been content simply to reduce the Congress to subservience. It has also engaged in unprecedented secrecy in order to deny the American people access to crucial information with which they might hold government officials accountable for their actions, and they have launched a systematic effort to manipulate and intimidate the media into presenting a more favorable image of the administration to the American people.

Listen to what U.S. News and World Report recently had to say about their secrecy, and I quote: "The Bush administration has quietly but efficiently dropped a shroud of secrecy across many critical operations of the federal government, cloaking its own affairs from scrutiny and removing from the public domain important information on health, safety and environmental matters." Here are just a few examples, and for each one you have to ask, what are they hiding and why are they hiding it? First of all, more than 6,000 documents have been removed by the Bush administrations from governmental websites; to cite only one example, a document on the EPA website giving citizens crucial information on how to identify chemical hazards near to where their families live. Some have speculated that the principal threat to the Bush administration is a threat by the chemical hazards if the information remains available to American citizens.

To head off complaints from our nation's governors over how much they would receive under federal programs, the Bush administration simply stopped printing the primary state budget report.

To muddy the clear consensus of the scientific community on global warming, the White House directed major changes and deletions to an EPA report -- changes that were so egregious that the agency said it was too embarrassed to use the language insisted upon by the political employees at the White House.

And of course, they've kept hidden from view Vice President Cheney's ultra-secret energy task force. They've pitched a -- they fought a pitched battle in the courts for more than three years to continue denying the American people the ability to know which special interests and which lobbyists advised Vice President Cheney on the design of the new law.

We know that Ken Lay was in charge of vetting the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, and we've recently seen some of the evidence of what Enron did to circumvent the regulators.

And another example. When mass layoffs became too embarrassing, this administration simply stopped publishing the regular layoff report that economists and others have been receiving for decades.

For this administration, the truth hurts; that is, when the truth is available to the American people. Instead, they often find bliss in the induced ignorance that comes when they deprive the American people of access to information that they have a right to. What are they hiding, and why are they hiding it? In the end, for this administration it is all about power. This lie about the invented connection between al Qaeda and Iraq was and is the key to justifying the current ongoing constitutional power grab by the president. So long as their big, flamboyant lie remains an established fact in the public's mind, President Bush will be seen as justified in taking for himself the power to make war on his whim.

He will be seen as justified in acting to selectively suspend civil liberties, again on his personal discretion. He will continue to intimidate the press, and thereby distort the political reality experienced by the American people during his bid for reelection.

War is lawful violence, but even in its midst we acknowledge the need for rules. We know that in our wars there have been dissents from these standards, often the result of spontaneous anger arising out of the passion of battle. But we have never before, to my knowledge, had a situation in which the framework for this kind of violence has been created by the president. Nor have we had a situation where these things were mandated by directives signed by the secretary of Defense, as it is alleged, and supported by the national security adviser.

Always before, we could look to the chief executive as the point from which redress would come and law would be upheld. That was one of the great prides of our country, humane leadership faithful to the law. What we have now, however, is the result of decisions taken by a president and an administration for whom the best law is no law, so long as law threatens to constrain their political will. And where the constraints of law cannot be prevented or eliminated, then they maneuver it to be weakened by evasion, by delay, by hair-splitting, by obstruction and by failure to enforce on the part of those sworn to uphold the law.

In these circumstances, we need investigation of the facts under oath, and in the face of penalties for evasion and perjury. We need investigation by an aroused Congress, whose bipartisan members know that they will stand before the judgment of history. We cannot depend upon a debased Department of Justice, given over to the hands of zealots. Congressional oversight and special prosecutor are words that should hang in the air. If our honor as a nation is to be restored, it is not by allowing the mighty to shield themselves by bringing the law to bear against their pawns; it is by bringing the law to bear against the mighty themselves.

Our dignity and honor as a nation never came from our perfection as a society or as a people; it came from the belief that, in the end, this was and is a country which should -- which would pursue justice as the compass pursues the pole. And that although we might deviate, we would return and find our path in the name of our founders for the sake of posterity. This is what we as Americans must now do. Thank you. - http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

Bush's "compassion" is all phony talk ...

06.25.04 (8:43 am) [edit]

[b]Bush's compassion is all talk[/b]

WITH A Washington Post/ABC News poll showing his job approval rating for Iraq and the economy below 50 percent for the fifth straight month, President Bush returned to campaign ploys that softened up voters in the 2000 elections.

In a speech this week at a Cincinnati social service center that specializes in prisoner re-entry and alcohol and drug addiction, Bush talked anew about armies of compassion. He was back to pushing faith-based initiatives. He exhumed his education mantra of "challenging the soft bigotry of low expectations. If you've got low expectations, you're going to get lousy results."

Bush said, "I wanted you to hear that in your own community here in Cincinnati, you've got heroic figures, heroic people, saving lives on a daily basis," Bush proclaimed. "And these folks need to be supported. They need to be supported at the local level, they need to be supported at the state level, and they need to be supported at the federal level."

Bush then left for another affair and received a hero's welcome at a private fund-raiser in the suburbs that garnered $2.5 million for the Republican Party. None of that money was going to support the folks at the social service center. It was going to support the party's agenda of slashing as many social services as it can get away with.

If Bush thinks he can turn back the clock to the days of "compassionate conservatism" in order to turn back the tide of the negative poll numbers, he is mistaken. He has had three and a half years to challenge low expectations. He has delivered lousy results.

Earlier this month, Bush delivered a speech at a White House conference on faith-based initiatives. The speech was intended to revive interest in a program which stalled in Congress over concern that loosening up the rules for federal dollars to go to religious based organizations for social and educational work dangerously blurs the lines between church and state. Bush bypassed Congress and signed an executive order that allowed him to give away $1.1 billion last year under the initiative.

"There's a lot more money available," Bush said. "That's what I hope the conference explains to you: that there is money throughout our government available for faith-based programs. And the idea is to teach you how to access that money, how to make sure the grant-making process is understandable and how to make sure that people in your communities do not fear the bureaucracy interfering with your mission."

What Bush did not explain then or in Cincinnati is that while the church may giveth, the state will taketh away much more. His $1.1 billion into the collection plate of religious organizations is an illusion, considering the cuts in social services and education he has already proposed and further cuts he plans to make if he is reelected. The National Priorities Project, the think tank that studies the impact of federal budget policies to the states, has calculated that Bush's budget for 2005, with its massive increases in military spending and its attempt to make tax cuts permanent, would slash $28 billion in grants to states and cities.

Bush made a big show in Cincinnati about appearing with an ex-prisoner and unemployed workers who turned their lives around. But he plans to cut many of the things that will help others do the same. According to The Washington Post, Bush's 2005 budget would kill programs for alcohol-abuse reduction, computer training in low-income neighborhoods, family literacy and literacy for prisoners, and severely slash vocational education programs.

Adjusted for inflation and population growth, the National Priorities Project says Bush's 2005 budget would cut $2.3 billion in housing assistance, $900 million from justice programs, $1 billion in temporary assistance to needy families and $570 million from vocational education.

If Bush is reelected, he plans $2.3 billion of more cuts in 2006, according to a White House memo recently obtained by the Post. The cuts include $1.5 billion in discretionary education funding, $177 million for Head Start, $53 million from a home ownership program, $910 million for veterans affairs, and $122 million for Women, Infants, and Children. The cuts would either significantly reverse or negate election-year increases in several of those programs.

In his speech in Cincinnati, Bush used the word "compassion" or "compassionate" eight times. He referred to the human "heart" or "hearts" nine times. He referred to the human "soul" or "souls" seven times. It is getting as tiresome as hearing Bush say that there is a link between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda. He figures if he talks about compassion enough, people will believe he has a heart.

He told his audience at the social service center, "You can go from prison to be a boss. You can go from prison to the White House, just so long as you have somebody who's there, willing to take you by the hand, and say, I want to help you help yourself."

That somebody will not be Bush. His budget cuts are not the helping hand. They are the prison. - http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

Bush's So-Called "Christian" Hypocrisy: "Compassion" is All Phony Talk!!!

06.25.04 (8:41 am) [edit]

Bush's Game: Say one thing, do another - Partial & selective disclosure of torture documents

06.25.04 (8:38 am) [edit]

[b]A Partial Disclosure [/b]

THE BUSH administration has taken two important steps toward correcting its policies on the handling of foreign detainees. On Tuesday administration officials renounced earlier legal opinions that justified the use of torture, and President Bush stated that the United States will not condone its use. At the same time, the Defense Department released its current procedures for prisoner interrogation at Guantanamo Bay, where the administration considers itself unbound by the Geneva Conventions. Both the revised procedures and the administration's statements about them give some cause for concern, and many important questions remain unanswered. But President Bush deserves credit for accepting that some administration policymaking was, as his counsel put it, "controversial" and "subject to misinterpretation," and for breaking with a self-defeating policy of secrecy about the rules for interrogation.

Now that the current Guantanamo procedures are public, Americans and foreign observers alike can see that most are the same as those used by the U.S. military for decades, without controversy and without leading to abuse. Of the seven additional techniques now allowed by the Pentagon under certain circumstances, several -- including "environmental manipulation" and "isolation" -- are considered inhumane or illegal by human rights groups and other governments, as the official policy statement acknowledges. In our view, the administration ought to reconsider whether the intelligence fruits of such questionable techniques, reportedly meager, are worth the political costs and the damage they do to America's reputation, or whether they too should be publicly renounced.

A deeper concern is the administration's continuing failure to disclose the interrogation policies applicable outside Guantanamo, including those used by the military in Iraq and Afghanistan and those employed by the CIA at its secret detention centers outside the United States. A statement Tuesday by White House counsel Alberto R. Gonzales appeared to diminish Mr. Bush's broad assurance on torture: Mr. Gonzales said that the administration considers torture to be "a specific intent to inflict severe physical or mental harm or suffering." That narrow definition, according to the administration's previous reasoning, would allow the infliction of pain short of death or organ failure, and even this would be acceptable if the pain were not the interrogator's primary purpose. If Mr. Bush's pledge is to have credibility around the world, more detailed and restrictive guidelines on torture should be adopted and made public -- or legislated by Congress.

Questions also remain about how the abuse of detainees at Abu Ghraib prison and elsewhere came about. The documents confirm that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld approved a number of harsh interrogation techniques for use in Guantanamo in December 2002, including hooding, requiring nudity, placing prisoners in stress positions and using dogs. After military lawyers objected that these violated international law, Mr. Rumsfeld suspended their use a month later. But all these techniques, as well as the restricted practices now approved for Guantanamo, appeared in an interrogation policy issued for Iraq by command of Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez in September 2003. Nearly word for word, the harsh methods detailed in memos signed by Mr. Rumsfeld -- which even administration lawyers considered violations of the Geneva Conventions -- were then distributed to interrogators at Abu Ghraib. The procedures in turn could be read to cover much of what is seen in the photographs that have scandalized the world. How did this spread of improper and illegal practices occur? The Bush administration has yet to offer a convincing answer -- or hold anyone accountable for it. - http://www.washingtonpost.com...

Bush's Game: Say one thing, do another - Partial & selective disclosure of torture documents

06.25.04 (8:35 am) [edit]

Bush Hides Documents About Environmental Policy

06.25.04 (8:32 am) [edit]

President Bush regularly talks about the need for other countries to display "transparency"1 and create an open system that allows citizens to see what their government is doing. But, according to a new report, the Bush administration is hiding thousands of previously public documents to "undercut the public's right to know about contamination of the environment, transport of hazardous materials, pipeline routes, and more."

The Working Group on Community Right-to-Know this week reports that, under the guise of "national security," more than "six thousand public documents have been removed from the web sites of over a dozen government agencies since the fall of 2001."2 The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), for example, has removed from its website parts of once-public Risk Management Plans -- documents that helped communities identify nearby chemical hazards. The Department of Energy has taken down environmental impact statements related to nuclear power plants and hazardous materials transport information. The Department of Transportation removed from its web site much of the national pipeline mapping data that allowed communities to find hazardous pipeline routes.3

According to the report, President Bush has also issued executive orders that broaden the authority of agencies to withhold information from the public. May 2002's Executive Order 12958 gave the EPA Administrator authority to designate documents "Secret" or "Confidential," two of the three highest possible security classifications. The White House has even reduced the public's access to unclassified information, passing bills allowing agencies to withhold "sensitive but unclassified" information from the public.

For more, see the report at Bushgreenwatch.org.

[b]Sources:[/b]

1. Presidental Remarks , WhiteHouse.gov, 6/22/2004.
2. "Bush Administration Secrecy Imperils Environment and Public Health", Bushgreenwatch.org, 6/23/2004.
3. "Secrecy in the Bush Administration Obstructs Communities' Right-to-Know", Working Group on Community Right to Know (crtk.org), 6/23/2004.

Bush Hides Documents About Environmental Policy

06.25.04 (8:31 am) [edit]

Bush Hides Documents About Environmental Policy

06.25.04 (8:29 am) [edit]

Report Charges EPA Deliberately Underestimating Toxic Releases

06.25.04 (8:27 am) [edit]

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) this week distributed
its Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) for 2002. TRI reports the
release of chemicals from refineries and chemical plants.
According to the data, the amount of chemicals released into the
air was up 5% in 2002.

But a new report by two organizations that monitor enforcement
of pollution law charges that EPA and state governments are
knowingly underreporting toxic air emissions from refineries and
chemical plants, to the tune of 330 million pounds per year.
They assert that certain carcinogens -- benzene and butadiene --
are in the air at levels 4 to 5 times higher than what the EPA
leads the public to believe.

The Environmental Integrity Project (EIP), http://www.environmentalinteg... a nonpartisan
organization that monitors enforcement of environmental laws,
and the Galveston-Houston Association for Smog Prevention
(GHASP), http://www.ghasp.org/ show in their report, "Who's Counting? The Systematic
Underreporting of Toxic Air Emissions" that because most air
pollution is estimated instead of actually monitored, the result
is systematic underreporting.

"The 'guesswork' is being done by the polluters, who have the
incentives to keep the numbers as low as possible," said Kelly
Haragan, EIP counsel and equal justice fellow.

New rules adopted this year by EPA require polluters to monitor
emissions little more than once every five years. Previous
standards mandated that major air pollution sources monitor at a
level sufficient to show compliance with federal pollution
limits. [1]

"Refineries and chemical plants report their toxic emissions
under an honor system that is based on calculations that are
outdated and inaccurate," Haragan said. "Instead of cleaning up
this problem, the EPA has further weakened monitoring rules and
continues to knowingly feed the public inaccurate data regarding
toxic air emissions."

The EIP-GHASP report is based on findings by the Texas
Commission on Environmental Quality. It shows extreme jumps in
carcinogens released into the air. In one case -- a reported
release of 6 million pounds of benzene, a known carcinogen --
the 2001 TRI in fact totaled more than 20 million pounds. [2]

In 2001 the U.S. General Accounting Office asked that EPA
improve oversight reporting for large facilities, noting that 96
percent of all emissions estimates were based on "emissions
factors". [3] Emissions factors were originally developed as a
way to estimate long-term average emissions, but are recognized
by EPA as not being accurate for calculating a particular
facility's emissions. Nevertheless EPA has actively limited the
amount of direct monitoring that large sources of air pollution
are required to perform.

"We are tired of industry accounting tricks that always seem to
show pollution releases dropping rapidly, while air quality
improvements seem so slow. It is time for EPA and the states to
require real measurements from industry, and take forthright
action to protect the public from chemicals that cause cancer,
respiratory, cardiovascular and reproductive diseases," said
John Wilson, director of GHASP. [4]

###

[b]SOURCES:[/b] - http://www.bushgreenwatch.org...

[1] EIP press release, Jun. 22, 2004.
[2] "Who's Counting? The Systematic Underreporting of Toxic Air
Emissions," EIP report, Jun. 22, 2004.
[3] EIP report, op. cit.
[4] EIP release, op. cit.

Report Charges EPA Deliberately Underestimating Toxic Releases

06.25.04 (8:23 am) [edit]

Bush will have nothing to celebrate if he comes to Baghdad

06.25.04 (8:19 am) [edit]

[i]A presidential visit would be a furtive and humbling affair [/i]

What kind of Iraq will George Bush see when he comes here next week to celebrate the handover of sovereignty to the country's new interim government? It will certainly not be the scene that Karl Rove, the White House political adviser, must have hoped for when he hatched the idea last autumn of bringing his boss into the heart of downtown Baghdad for the ceremony.

Huge crowds of adoring Iraqis would line the streets as the presidential motorcade passed. George Bush would mount a platform at the very spot where Saddam Hussein's statue was toppled in April 2003, the Great Liberator addressing the Iraqi nation and wishing them well as they embarked on the road to freedom and democracy. God Bless Iraq. God Bless America.

Now it will be a much more humble and humbling affair. There will be a speech, of course, but only after a helicopter dash to the heavily-fortified "green zone" where the occupation authorities have held sway for the past 14 months, handshakes with a small group of carefully selected Iraqis in the government which the Americans had a decisive role in appointing, and some hasty photo-ops with US troops.

Even this hole-in-corner performance will be enough to embarrass John Kerry, which is, after all, its main purpose. Like the Thanksgiving turkey platter which Bush carried out from behind a curtain in a hangar at Baghdad airport last November, next week's publicity coup will be hard for the Democratic party's candidate to denounce. You can't sneer at patriotism or deride a president for visiting the trenches.

By any wider scale of measurement Bush's Baghdad visit will only serve to highlight the failures of his overall Iraq strategy. Instead of enjoying peace and prosperity, Iraq is in a state of war.

The Bush visit has not been announced, and may yet be cancelled for security reasons, leaving Colin Powell, the secretary of state, or perhaps not even him, to come in the president's place. But like clues in a treasure hunt, telltale hints of the Bush/Rove plan are there for the finding.

First, the extraordinary coincidence that Bush will be attending a Nato summit in Istanbul on June 28 and 29, the eve of the sovereignty transfer in Iraq. From there it is barely 90 minutes' flight to Baghdad. When was this convenient date selected? Certainly some time after June last year, when Nato foreign ministers met in Madrid to plan the alliance's next summit. At that stage, according to the Nato website, the summit was to be held in May 2004.

The next time the ministers met - in Brussels last December - they changed the date to June. This scheduling adjustment occurred less than three weeks after the US occupation authorities had made an agreement with Iraq's governing council to transfer sovereignty at the end of June this year. Well done, Karl Rove.

The second piece of evidence is decoy stuff. The Americans and their British allies have been downplaying next week's transfer of power to an extraordinary degree. "It won't be Hong Kong," as a senior official in the Coalition Provisional Authority put it. No flags coming down masts. No 21-gun salutes. No fireworks (except perhaps from the resistance).

Other officials have been suggesting the ceremony will consist of little more than Paul Bremer, the outgoing US overlord, handing a formal document to the chief justice of Iraq's supreme court before the latter swears in the new president and prime minister. "Bremer might not even stay for that. It is the Iraqis' show," said another CPA man.

If in the end Bush decides not to take the security risk of coming to Iraq, it will be a major disappointment for him. But his sense of letdown will be as nothing compared to the disappointment that the vast majority of Iraqis feel about the American performance since April last year. The superpower that toppled the dictatorship in three weeks of war was expected to restore the economy, provide security, and create a climate of renewal.

Instead, as Iraqis see it, the Americans stood idly by and failed to get basic services working while looters ran amok. When Iraqis started to hold protests, they were treated with high-handed disdain at best, and cruelty at worst. When resisters took up the gun and planted home-made bombs, US forces overreacted with clumsy house-searches and mass detentions, provoking further resistance.

As the clumsiness of the military side of the occupation mounted, people were reluctant to denounce the resistance, let alone inform on those involved in it. Deprived of useful intelligence, the Americans went from blunder to blunder, laying siege to the Sunni city of Falluja and underestimating the popularity of the radical Shia cleric, Moqtada al-Sadr.

On the political front, they were too slow to hand power to Iraqis. CPA officials argue that an occupation of only 14 months is short compared to the seven years it lasted in post-war Germany and Japan. But the comparison is unjustified. A majority of Germans and Japanese supported their previous systems. Finding people willing to set up alternative institutions necessarily took time.

Iraq was different. Most Iraqis hated Saddam and his crony dictatorship. When he fell, all they wanted was for the Americans to clean up the short-term mess and leave them alone. The presence of foreign troops was humiliating. "All done, go home", said a line of graffiti which appeared less than a month after the regime's fall on the plinth where Saddam's statue had stood.

In July last year, the Americans appointed an Iraqi governing council and asked it to pick a cabinet that would work alongside US advisers. The government that takes office next week is almost a clone of its predecessors, chosen largely from the same group of people. Was it at least elected? Not at all. It was appointed on exactly the same basis of private consultation.

This parallelism poses the question: why didn't the occupation end a year ago? If Iraq had had a government last July which was as free to take its own decisions as this one is claimed to be, would nationalist resentment and frustration have reached today's peak? Would all of us in Baghdad, whether Iraqis or foreigners, be living in as much anxiety as we are?

No, the American occupation authorities were not only bent on toppling Saddam Hussein. They also wanted to put their stamp on another people's life and behaviour as well. Alas, the old imperial delusion that foreigners know best has taken its toll again. So if Bush appears in Iraq next week, he will have to come furtively rather than in style. - http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

Bush will have nothing to celebrate if he comes to Baghdad

06.25.04 (8:17 am) [edit]

Bush's Exploitation of Christianity is Sinful

06.24.04 (7:33 am) [edit]

Throughout the course of time, religion has often assumed the form of a double-edged sword, cleaving through attempts at unity while further polarizing the world. For just as its blade can parry attacks on faith, it has the ability to sweep through the beliefs of others, leaving wounds that never heal.

While the weapon's damage is most evident in the Middle East, it continues to tear at the fabric of our Western culture. From scripture-based hate crimes against gays and Jews to the hierarchal coddling of abusive priests, the sword's pommel is grasped by a variety of hands, each stemming from an entity draped in a cloak of self-righteousness.

Is it wrong to wield the principles of faith? No. If anything, it's admirable in a world of eroding values. There is a lot to be learned from Christianity and other forms of spirituality, as they serve to establish strong foundations on which to base our lives.

What's wrong is when something as private as one's religious beliefs becomes a weapon poised at the throat of another -- a perfect example being the race for the White House.

Throughout his presidency, President Bush has worn his faith on his sleeve, portraying himself as a holy crusader anointed by God. In doing so, he has blurred the formerly clear line between church and state, while simultaneously dividing an already diverse nation. As a result, he has not only alienated himself from nonbelievers, but Jews, Muslims and a host of others who, like it or not, rightfully claim status as Americans.

A recent poll conducted by TIME magazine found that only 22 percent of non-religious voters support the commander in chief, while an overwhelming 63 percent support his chief opponent Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.). While 59 percent of those who consider themselves "very religious" support Bush, it is presumed that the majority of those polled are Protestants and Catholics.

What's interesting about this poll is that the Christian vote is somewhat split while the majority of non-Christians are flocking to Kerry. Why is that an intriguing statistic? Because Kerry is a practicing Catholic, and one who has attempted to separate his spiritual beliefs from his civic responsibilities.

I say "attempted," because Kerry has been forced into a defensive position, as fellow Catholics attempt to destroy him. Because he has been labeled pro-choice, a number of bishops have deemed the candidate unfit to take Communion. And now, those same men of the cloth are saying Catholics who vote for Kerry should be denied Communion as well.

In the meantime, the Bush campaign is attempting to skew the Christian vote in its favor by manipulating Americans of faith. From paying a Catholic-recruiting visit to the Pope to encouraging Pennsylvania churchgoers to serve as political coordinators in their houses of worship, Bush has done everything in his power to merge church and state. Yet, despite his actions, he has the gall to claim the contrary. It's to the point now, that some people -- even in our own community -- are suggesting that you shouldn't consider yourself a Christian unless you're voting for him.

As you read this, Bush is calling to use government money to subsidize religious organizations and ordering various government agencies to establish "faith-based centers" within their operations. His conservative allies even attempted to pass a proposal this month that would have allowed churches to endorse political candidates without losing their tax-exempt status.

Why the sudden rally? Is it because Bush truly cares about Christians, or is it because he's willing to exploit them in exchange for a second term?

Even Ron Reagan, the son of the late Ronald Reagan -- who in life was not only a great president, but a devout Christian -- has lashed out at Bush's antics, castigating the president for using religion "to gain political advantage." A close friend of Ron, who spoke to the press on condition of anonymity, said the late president's son is "deeply uncomfortable" with the way the Bush administration has intertwined religion and politics -- so much so that he was willing to use his father's burial as a platform to express that sentiment.

Simply put, Ron, like so many other Americans, has come to understand that Bush is an opportunist, as opposed to a saint. In his own words, the Bush administration is "overly reaching, overly aggressive, overly secretive and just plain corrupt."

And all I can say to that is amen. - http://www.paragoulddailypres...

Bush's mistaken view of US democracy (And of the bible) ...

06.24.04 (7:31 am) [edit]

President George W. Bush's efforts to build democracy in Iraq are underpinned by a misguided view of America's own democracy. He believes that American democracy works because Americans are innately good people, believing in values of tolerance and respect for others and guided by religious faith.

In his view, Americans don't need checks and balances so much as reminders of basic American values and America's overriding moral mission to bring freedom to the world. Similarly, abuses of power, as at Abu Ghraib prison and beyond, do not represent the failure of the system, but rather the deviant behavior of a few bad people.

In a speech last month, former Vice President Al Gore articulated a very different vision of American democracy, one that derives not from the Bible but from the U.S. Constitution. The founding fathers of the United States assumed that unrestrained power is dangerous. It not only enables bad people to commit abuses; it tends to corrupt ordinary, generally decent people. As James Madison said in the Federalist Papers: "If men were angels, no government would be necessary ... A dependence on the people is no doubt the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions."

The "auxiliary precautions" decided upon were America's system of checks and balances, by which Congress, the president and the courts each check each other, as do the states and the federal government, to ensure that the power of the government is both limited and controlled.

These are not simply theoretical differences about the core of American democracy. They have profound implications for how we think about and control the role of the United States in the world.

If, in the president's view, the goodness of Americans and the nobility of our mission are self-evident, then the failure of peoples around the world to see the struggle in Iraq the same way we do means that they are "enemies of freedom." Fighters opposing American power, even if they are residents of occupied countries, do not merit the protections of international law. Institutional restraints on the exercise of power by Americans in detention centers and prisons can, in this view, safely be relaxed. Moreover, constitutional protections can be denied even to American citizens, arrested in the United States, when they are suspected of being "enemy combatants."

From James Madison's point of view, on the other hand, the abuses of Abu Ghraib would have been entirely explicable. The founding fathers, and great American leaders ever since, understood that without institutional restraints, voluntarily followed and supported by the top leadership, such abuses are virtually inevitable. This doesn't mean that Americans are "bad" people, just that they are human - like Iraqis, Afghans, Germans, Japanese, and every other nationality and race.

If the struggle against terrorism were to be carried out consistently with the institutional theory embedded in the U.S. Constitution, America's leaders would be well aware of the potential for abuse - even by decent patriots. They would have ensured not only that the Constitution was upheld at home, but that the more limited protections embodied in international law would have been conscientiously applied to people living under American occupation, or otherwise within U.S. control.

Behind the debate about the conduct of the war in Iraq, and the occupation, is a larger divide - between those Americans who believe that their unique virtues should permit them to act above the law, and those who believe that people in authority, necessarily imperfect, must be constrained by institutions and by law. Those who understand and believe in the theory of the American Constitution should reject the Bush administration's political theory of personal good and evil. We must continue to insist that the United States is a "government of laws and not of men."

[b]Robert O. Keohane is a professor of political science at Duke University. Anne-Marie Slaughter is dean of Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, and author of "A New World Order."[/b] - http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

Bush's mistaken view of US democracy

06.24.04 (7:29 am) [edit]

Conservation Groups File Brief Challenging Bush Administration's Global Warming Policy

06.24.04 (7:21 am) [edit]

[b]States, Conservation Groups File Brief Challenging Bush Administration's Global Warming Policy Coalition challenges EPA policy reversal on pollution[/b]

WASHINGTON - June 22 - A coalition including 11 states and 14 environmental groups today filed a brief in a case challenging the Bush administration's continued failure to confront global warming. The plaintiffs are targeting the Environmental Protection Agency's unprecedented ruling that summarily disavowed the agency's long-standing Clean Air Act authority to regulate global warming emissions. The states, cities, and groups challenged EPA's decision in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit.

"EPA's policy reversal is a crude attempt by the Bush administration to tie its own hands, and then claim that it is powerless to address the critical issue of global warming," said David Bookbinder, Washington Legal Director for the Sierra Club.

On August 28, 2003, EPA officials reversed long-standing policy with an administrative ruling that denied authority to control heat-trapping emissions like carbon dioxide, claiming they do not meet the Clean Air Act definition of a "pollutant." The ruling came in response to a 1999 petition by the International Center for Technology Assessment, Greenpeace, and other environmental organizations asking the EPA to comply with the law, which requires the agency to protect Americans against all harmful pollutants, including emissions that damage the climate.

"The Bush administration tried to say yet again that it's not their job to fight global warming. In fact they have both the legal and moral responsibility to tackle global warming pollution," said Bookbinder.

After many delays, the EPA eventually opened a public comment period on the petition, receiving approximately 50,000 comments-the vast majority supporting the call for action against global warming. More than three years later, however, the Bush administration had still refused to act. In 2002, the groups sued the EPA for its failure to respond, which led to the decision being challenged.

"When emissions contribute to air pollution that may endanger public health and welfare, the Clean Air Act requires EPA to step in," said Earthjustice attorney Howard Fox, co-counsel for Sierra Club in this suit. "By taking a pass on global warming emissions, EPA is evading a clear duty to act against a serious air pollution menace."

Today's filing come on the heels of the California Air Resources Board's draft rule that would implement a state law requiring automobile makers to reduce global warming emissions from new cars and light trucks beginning in 2009. Inaction by the Bush administration has forced states to take the lead in reducing global warming pollution. California is leading the way to curbing global warming emissions, with seven Northeastern states planning to implement the California rules when they become final.

States, territories, and other governments challenging the EPA's decision are American Samoa, the City of Baltimore, California, California Air Resources Board, Connecticut, the District of Columbia, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, the City of New York, the Northern Mariana Islands, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington.

Environmental groups joining the challenge are Bluewater Network, Center for Biological Diversity, Center for Food Safety, Conservation Law Foundation, Environmental Advocates, Environmental Defense, Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace USA, International Center for Technology Assessment, National Environmental Trust, Natural Resources Defense Council, Sierra Club, Union of Concerned Scientists, and U.S. Public Interest Research Group.

Read the brief online here: http://www.earthjustice.org/n...

[b]CONTACT: [/b] Earthjustice
Brian O'Malley, 202-675-6279
Tim Greeff, 202-667-4500 x 238 - http://www.commondreams.org/n...

Conservation Groups File Brief Challenging Bush Administration's Global Warming Policy

06.24.04 (7:20 am) [edit]

Reality is unravelling for Bush

06.24.04 (7:18 am) [edit]

[i]Even negative attacks on Kerry no longer seem to be working [/i]

At the Pentagon, on June 10, while business in Washington had officially halted as the body of Ronald Reagan lay in state, defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld convened an emergency meeting on the Abu Ghraib scandal, according to a reliable source privy to its proceedings. Rumsfeld began the extraordinary session by saying that certain documents needed to "get out" that would show that there was no policy approving of torture and that what had happened in Iraq and Afghanistan was aberrant.

The Senate armed services committee had been conducting hearings whose corrosive impact needed to be countered. Rumsfeld complained about "serial requests" for information from Congress. Yet he was even more upset by subpoenas of defence officials issued by the special prosecutor in the case of Valerie Plame. The Pentagon, Rumsfeld said, was nearly "at a stop" because of them. Rumsfeld admitted he was startled by the uproar over Abu Ghraib: "There are so many international organisations."

On June 22, the White House released documents on policy on torture, including a directive signed on February 7 2002 by Bush stating that he has "the authority under the constitution" to abrogate the Geneva conventions, that the Taliban and al-Qaida as non-signatories were not covered by them, and that consequently Bush "declines to exercise that authority at this time". Rumsfeld's damage control was simply one front in the expanding Bush administration war for credibility.

Vice-president Dick Cheney staged a preemptive strike last week by reiterating that Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida had a relationship and insinuating that they were in league. His intended target was the 9/11 commission, which is dangerously independent. Its Republican co-chairman, Thomas Kean, replied that there was "no credible evidence" that Saddam and al-Qaida had collaborated. Bush entered the battle, repeating that there was indeed a "relationship". Then the Democratic co-chairman of the commission, Lee Hamilton, explained that al-Qaida had in fact approached Saddam seeking his help, but that it had been rebuffed. The rejection was the relationship. But Bush and Cheney's affirmative assertions made it seem that the "relationship" was affirmative.

The urgency of Bush's credibility crisis surfaced in the latest Washington Post-ABC News poll showing the collapse of Bush's standing on terrorism, losing 13 points since April, putting Kerry even on the issue and one point ahead in the contest. But even more worrying was Bush's rating on trust. By a margin of 52% to 39%, Kerry is seen as more honest and trustworthy.

Since March 3, the Bush-Cheney campaign has spent an estimated $80m on mostly negative advertising, to eliminate Kerry at the starting gate. The strategy was the acceleration of the lesson of Bush's father's victorious effort in the 1988 campaign when, 17 points behind in mid-summer, he shattered Michael Dukakis with a withering negative attack.

Now, Bush's opponent is not only moving ahead, but the failed assault may insulate Kerry against future offensives. Bush had every reason to believe that his attack on Kerry's image would succeed. After September 11, he was able to impose his explanations on the public almost without resistance and to taint anyone who contradicted them as somehow unpatriotic.

With Congress in Republican hands, checks and balances were effectively removed. Most of the media was on the bandwagon or intimidated. Cheney himself called the president of the corporation that owned one of the networks to complain about an errant commentator. Political aides directed by Karl Rove ceaselessly called editors and producers with veiled threats about access that was not granted in any case. The press would not bite the hand that would not feed it.

But Bush's projection of images can only faintly be seen on the screen, which is overwhelmed with Bush's past images of triumph unreeling in reverse. The majority of the people had supported the war in Iraq because they believed that Saddam was involved in the terrorist attacks of September 11. Bush envisioned the Iraqi war unfolding into a new world order: the liberation of Iraq resembling the liberation of France, democracy flowering throughout the Middle East, and the Palestinians submitting quietly to Sharon's fait accompli .

But the neoconservative prophesies had been advanced by suppressing the scepticism of the US intelligence agencies, the military and the state department. Without deranging and dismissing the professionalism of the basic institutions of national security, Bush would not have been able to sustain his reasons. Bush's battle is not with image, but with the unravelling of his reality. - http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

Reality is unravelling for Bush

06.24.04 (7:16 am) [edit]

Bush Fascism: High Court Sides with Cheney on Energy Papers - Govt No Longer Accountable!!!

06.24.04 (7:12 am) [edit]

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...
"[i]Justice Antonin Scalia had defiantly refused to step down from hearing the case involving Cheney, despite criticism that his impartiality has been brought into question because of a hunting vacation that he took with Cheney will the court was considering the vice president's appeal[/i]."

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court refused Thursday to order the Bush administration to make public secret details of Vice President Dick Cheney's energy task force, but kept the case alive by sending it back to a lower court.

Justices said 7-2 that a lower court should consider whether a federal open government law could be used to get documents of the task force.

The decision extends the legal fight over the information. Justices could have allowed a judge to immediately move ahead with ordering the release of the papers.

The issues in the case have been overshadowed by conflict-of-interest questions about one justice.

Justice Antonin Scalia had defiantly refused to step down from hearing the case involving Cheney, despite criticism that his impartiality has been brought into question because of a hunting vacation that he took with Cheney will the court was considering the vice president's appeal.

"Special considerations applicable to the president and the vice president suggest that the courts should be sensitive to requests by the government" in such special appeals, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy wrote for the majority.

Shortly after taking office, President Bush put Cheney, a former energy industry executive, in charge of the task force which, after a series of private meetings in 2001, produced recommendations generally friendly to industry.

The Sierra Club, a liberal environmental club, and Judicial Watch, a conservative legal group, sued. They argued that the public has a right to information about committees like Cheney's. The organizations contended that environmentalists were shut out of the meetings, while executives like former Enron Corp. Chairman Kenneth Lay were key task force players.

The Bush administration argued that privacy is important for candid White House discussions on difficult issues. The high court did not specifically address that question, however.

The case had become a potentially embarrassing election-year problem for the administration.

Thursday's decision buys the administration more time. If it loses in the appeals court, the administration can return to the Supreme Court in another extended appeal before having to release information as to whether Cheney's task force was cozy with energy executives, including those with his former company, Halliburton.

The suing groups allege the industry representatives in effect functioned as members of the government panel, which included Cabinet secretaries and lower-level administration employees. The open government law requires advisory committees with non-government members to conduct their business in public, and allow the public to inspect their records.

Until the government produces some records it won't be clear who drafted the government's policies, lawyers for the Sierra Club and Judicial Watch argued.

The Sierra Club had asked Scalia to stay out of the case, because the justice flew with Cheney to hunt in Louisiana in January, weeks after the high court agreed to hear the vice president's appeal. Dozens of newspapers also called for his recusal.

Scalia, a Reagan administration appointee and close friend of the vice president, had said the duck hunting trip was acceptable socializing that wouldn't cloud his judgment. "If it is reasonable to think that a Supreme Court justice can be bought so cheap, the nation is in deeper trouble than I had imagined," he wrote in an unusual 21-page memo. - http://www.commondreams.org/h...

Bush Fascism: High Court Sides with Cheney on Energy Papers - Govt No Longer Accountable!!!

06.24.04 (7:09 am) [edit]

Is the Murder, Torture, Rape & Abuse of Afghanistani and Iraqi Peoples the "Judeo-Christian" Way???

06.23.04 (7:57 am) [edit]

Much condemnation is heralded upon the Islamic terrorists who have beheaded Americans and a South Korean. Rightly so. It was a heinous and barbaric act.

The United States of America, Great Britain and Israel are systematically murdering, torturing, raping and abusing Afghanistanis http://www.commondreams.org/h... , Iraqis http://www.commondreams.org/h... (of whom over 16,000 have been slaughtered in Bush's war), and Palestinians http://www.icl-fi.org/ENGLISH... ...

Is this supposed to represent some sort of "holy [[i]sic[/i]]" and superior "Judeo-Christian" way???

Didn't Jesus call for the hypocrites to remove the [i]huge plank [/i]from their [i]own eyes [/i]before condemning the mote in their neighbor's???

Is the Murder, Torture, Rape & Abuse of Afghanistani and Iraqi Peoples the "Judeo-Christian" Way???

06.23.04 (7:51 am) [edit]

Much condemnation is heralded upon the Islamic terrorists who have beheaded Americans and a South Korean. Rightly so. It was a heinous and barbaric act.

The United States of America, Great Britain and Israel are systematically murdering, torturing, raping and abusing Afghanistanis http://www.commondreams.org/h... , Iraqis http://www.commondreams.org/h... (of whom over 16,000 have been slaughtered in Bush's war), and Palestinians http://www.icl-fi.org/ENGLISH... ...

Is this supposed to represent some sort of "holy [[i]sic[/i]]" and superior "Judeo-Christian" way???

Didn't Jesus call for the hypocrites to remove the[i] huge plank from their own eyes [/i]before condemning the mote in their neighbor's???

Bush Administration Secrecy Imperils Environment and Public Health

06.23.04 (7:38 am) [edit]

The Bush administration is applying new levels of secrecy to public information, using the excuse of "national security risks" to undercut the public's right to know about contamination of the environment, transport of hazardous materials, pipeline routes, and more—putting public health at risk and chilling community activism.

"We've had national security exemptions for a long time under the Freedom of Information Act, and the ability to classify information if needed under other laws, and for good reason," Paul Orum, director of the non-partisan Working Group on Community Right-to-Know, tells BushGreenwatch. "Now, secrecy is creeping forward into other areas, and in subtle ways."

According to the Working Group, over six thousand public documents have been removed from the web sites of over a dozen government agencies since the fall of 2001.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), for example, has removed parts of formerly-public Risk Management Plans from the web, documents that helped communities identify nearby chemical hazards. The Department of Energy has taken down environmental impact statements related to nuclear power plants, and hazardous materials transport information. The Department of Transportation removed from its web site much of the national pipeline mapping data that allowed communities to find hazardous pipeline routes. [1]

President Bush has also issued executive orders that broaden the authority of agencies to withhold information from the public. May 2002's Executive Order 12958 gave the EPA Administrator authority to designate documents "Secret" or "Confidential," two of the three highest possible security classifications. It also allows the Administrator to delegate classification authority to senior EPA officials. Once classified, a person can gain access to information only when an agency head or their designee reviews the request, the person signs a non-disclosure agreement, and the person can establish a "need-to-know" to the satisfaction of agency officials. [2]

The Bush administration has also reduced the public's access to unclassified information. 2002's Homeland Security Act allows agencies to withhold "sensitive but unclassified" information from the public. Information can be restricted with no review, even if public under other laws. [3]

"The Bush administration is hostile to the idea that citizens need to watchdog the government, " says Orum.

In Maryland, the Aberdeen Proving Ground Citizens Superfund Coalition took the Department of Defense (DOD) to court in 2003, to regain access to fully detailed maps of perchlorate-contaminated groundwater sites on and near the Aberdeen Proving Ground (APG). Perchlorate, a highly toxic ingredient of rocket fuel, has been used at APG for decades.

DOD removed details including streets, road names, and the extent and location of contamination, making the maps nearly useless to the community group, which has monitored environmental contamination and remediation at APG since 1991. "DOD's new secrecy at Aberdeen [coincided] with pressure on DOD to clean-up perchlorate contamination in the drinking water of some 20 million people nationwide," according to the Working Group. [4]

"Laws that specifically encourage citizen participation in environmental and public health planning are being undercut," says George Sorvalis, the Working Group's outreach coordinator. "The Bush administration's secrecy makes it much harder for citizens to engage. They don't have an effective seat at the table if they can't get this information."

The Bush Justice Department has encouraged federal agencies to block requests made under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). [5] In one of the most prominent cases, the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) had to sue to obtain documents related to Vice President Dick Cheney's 2001 energy task force, in which high-ranking administration officials met with representatives from utilities and the oil, gas, coal and nuclear power industries to formulate national energy policy. The Bush administration ultimately turned over about 13,500 pages--less than half of NRDC's FOIA request. [6]

"The new climate of secrecy is having a chilling effect as it trickles down to the state level," says the Working Group's Sorvalis. "Agencies are confused as to what environmental information they can make available to citizens, even with a Freedom of Information Act request."

###

[b]SOURCES:[/b]

[1] Working Group fact sheet, Jun. 2, 2004.
[2] "Secrecy at the EPA," OMB Watch, May 13, 2002.
[3] Working Group fact sheet, op cit.
[4] "Post 9-11 Secrecy Hits Home in Aberdeen, Maryland," Working Group.
[5] Working Group fact sheet, op cit.
[6] "How NRDC Brought the Records to Light," NRDC.

Propaganda Creep

06.23.04 (7:34 am) [edit]

In the Reagan Era, it was known as public diplomacy. The Bush administration calls it strategic influence. What both terms describe is the U.S. government's ability to influence mass perceptions around the world and, when necessary, at home.

If you don't think it's been going on for years and continues to this very moment, well, then, it's working.

As the Iraq war began, we did get a peak behind the curtain. Word leaked out that a new Pentagon office of strategic influence was gearing up to sway leaders and public sentiment by disseminating sometimes false stories. Facing censure, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld publicly denounced and disbanded it. A few months later, however, he quietly funded a private consultant to develop another version. The apparent goal was to go beyond traditional information warfare with a new "perception management" campaign designed to "win the war of ideas" - in this case, against those classified as a terrorists.

It's actually nothing new. Beginning in the 1950s, more than 800 news and public information organizations and individuals carried out assignments for the CIA, according to The New York Times. By the mid-'80s, CIA Director Bill Casey had taken the practice to the next level: an organized, covert public diplomacy apparatus designed to sell a new product -- Central America -- while stoking fear of communism, the Sandinistas, Gadhafi and others.

Sometimes this involved so-called white propaganda, stories and editorials secretly financed by the government. But they also went black, pushing false story lines.

The U.S. Department of Defense describes perception management as a type of psychological operation. Traditionally, it's supposed to be directed at foreign audiences and basically involves conveying (or denying) information to influence their emotions, motives, and objective reasoning.

The goal is to influence enemies and friends alike, and provoke the behavior you want.

During George Herbert Walker Bush's administration, the scope officially expanded to include domestic disinformation, using the CIA's public affairs office. This operation was charged with turning intelligence failures into successes by persuading reporters to postpone, change, hold, or even scrap stories that could have adversely affected national security interests.

The Clinton era, outlined in Directive 68, was known as the International Public Information System. Again, no distinction was made between what could be done abroad and at home. To defeat enemies and influence minds, information for U.S. audiences would be deconflicted through IPI's work. How appropriately Clinton-esque.

One strategy turned out to be inserting psyop -- the term of art meaning psychological operations -- specialists into newsrooms. In February 2000, a Dutch journalist revealed that CNN and the Army had agreed to do precisely that in Atlanta.

Once you realize that managing perceptions is standard procedure, some news stories take on a different meaning. Last year, for example, a popular storyline about post-war resistance in Iraq was that only a few Saddam loyalists and dead-enders were involved. Meanwhile, the opposition was sending videotaped messages, saying things like, "We are not followers of Saddam Hussein. We are sons of Iraq." More recently, a central assumption has been that, whatever problems we now face, leaving without "winning" would be worse.

Another approach is warping the facts to promote spin. Thus, in January, USA Today could headline a story, "Attacks Down 22 Percent Since Saddam's Capture." Actually, the number of troops killed went up 40 percent during that period, but the U.S. military sources making the news preferred to focus on the number of incidents.

Or just fabricate the news -- from the Al Qaida-Saddam link to WMDs. And when something goes wrong? It's simple: just misplace the blame. Thus, when photos of soldiers humiliating Iraqi prisoners came to light in May, the first line of defense was to call it an aberration -- people somehow operating outside the chain of command -- and ignore reality.

During the first Gulf War, military intelligence officers didn't even need to ask: GIs routinely forced surrendering Iraqis to strip and pose for photos in groups. The new element is sexual humiliation, persuasive evidence that it was a psyop.

According to journalist Seymour Hersh, the abuse was part of a Pentagon operation called Copper Green, which used physical coercion and the sexual humiliation of Iraqis to generate intelligence about growing insurgency. The theory was that some prisoners would do anything -- including spying on their associates -- to avoid dissemination of shameful photos to family and friends. Not exactly the work of a few out-of-control grunts.

To most of the world, the photos from Abu Ghraib prison are evidence of potential war crimes, or at least puncture U.S. pretensions about moral superiority. For those who orchestrated them, however, it was merely a psyop warfare tactic, a more violent form of perception management.

In terms of generating information that could reduce violence, Copper Green didn't work: the insurgency continued to grow. And the un-intended consequences have been enormous. But in the psyop world, this happens so often that there's even a term for it -- "blowback" -- meaning an operation that has turned on its creators. Put another way, you reap what you sow. - http://www.commondreams.org/v...

Propaganda Creep

06.23.04 (7:32 am) [edit]

Heard on the Horizon: Calls to Get All U.S. Troops Out of Iraq

06.23.04 (7:29 am) [edit]

[b]Heard on the Horizon: Calls to Get All U.S. Troops Out of Iraq

[i]Anti-war voices joined by some in the establishment[/i][/b]

The idea is still a relative whisper in the broader American political discussion, but more and more people are raising the idea of withdrawing the 138,000 U.S. forces from Iraq.

It's an idea that President Bush and his Democratic opponent, Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, scorn. Kerry has even indicated he might send in more troops to stabilize Iraq. On Tuesday, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz -- one of the architects of the 2003 invasion that ousted Saddam Hussein -- told the House Armed Services Committee that U.S. forces may have to stay in Iraq for years.

But as American casualties mount, with military deaths approaching 1,000 and with more than 5,100 wounded, analysts have begun talking about withdrawal as a viable option. The idea could become an issue in the presidential campaign, especially since independent candidate Ralph Nader embraces the notion.

"A U.S. withdrawal would be preferable to what we have now,'' University of San Francisco politics Professor Stephen Zunes said Tuesday in Washington, D.C. "The idea that more U.S. troops will improve the situation is wrong. The truth is the opposite.''

"The war was based on a lie,'' added Phyllis Bennis of the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington. "We should get U.S. troops home as soon as possible.''

Zunes and Bennis are affiliated with the anti-war Foreign Policy in Focus think tank, which has long been critical of Bush's policy toward Iraq. But calls for a withdrawal have come in recent weeks from such mainstream voices of the Washington establishment as the Brookings Institution's James Steinberg and Michael O'Hanlon. They said Americans should be pulled out by late next year, after Iraqis vote on a new government and adopt a constitution. Longtime State Department official Morton Abramowitz has also proposed a phased withdrawal.

An anti-Iraq war umbrella organization, Win Without War, also backs a phased withdrawal, and has planned protests and vigils across the country this weekend to make its views heard.

A task force from the libertarian Cato Institute has called for withdrawal by next January, saying the occupation of Iraq has distracted from the fight against the al Qaeda terrorist network.

But so far, the withdrawal movement has gained little support in Congress, although some liberal Democrats have been pressing the White House to set a timetable for achieving goals in Iraq and bringing troops home. The prevailing view in Congress is that prematurely leaving Iraq would leave that country in chaos.

"This approach could result in Iraq descending into ethnic or religious squabbling, or both, and national and regional instability and the prospect that Iraq will become a terrorist haven,'' Rep. Ike Skelton of Missouri, the Armed Services Committee's ranking Democrat, said at Tuesday's hearing with Wolfowitz.

Rep. Ellen Tauscher, D-Walnut Creek, said, "I'm deeply concerned about a precipitous withdrawal of troops, for whatever reason, in the short term, if we don't achieve a political end state that is satisfactory to the American people.

"If we cut and run in the next few months, none of this will work for the long-term stability of the region and certainly not for the people in the United States,'' she said.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who recently visited Iraq, said Bush and Kerry need to talk about the issue with the American people during the campaign.

"Regardless of who wins, the American public needs to be ready for the idea that there will be troops in Iraq at least to December of '05 in large numbers because internationally we cannot fail; domestically we cannot fail in Iraq,'' he said. "This is larger than the election.''

Many who are pushing for the United States to withdraw its troops say that while Iraqis may be grateful for Hussein's departure, they won't accept a foreign occupation and will never accept the legitimacy of Iraqi leaders associated with the occupation, such as those in the interim government that takes formal power next week.

In fact, withdrawal advocates contend, many of the attacks on U.S. soldiers and civilian contractors arise from nationalist feelings, rather than terrorism tied to Hussein's deposed Baath Party or al Qaeda or other groups.

"Declaring a timetable for withdrawal would eliminate most resistance,'' said Anas Shallal, an Iraqi American who was a founder of the Mesopotamia Cultural Society.

So far, Kerry -- who voted for the October 2002 resolution that authorized Bush to go to war in Iraq -- has called for creating a NATO mission to Iraq to further internationalize the forces there; appointing a United Nations high commissioner to oversee reconstruction; and the increased training of Iraqi security forces.

But the Democratic candidate has rejected calls for a withdrawal.

"It would be unthinkable now for us to retreat in disarray and leave behind an Iraq deep in strife and dominated by radicals,'' he said in a recent radio address.

But public opposition to the war continues to increase. A Washington Post/ABC News poll reported on Tuesday that 52 percent of those surveyed said the war is "not worth fighting." Seventy percent said the level of casualties is "unacceptable."

Support for the president's handling of Iraq policy dropped to 44 percent of those surveyed in the new poll, compared with 55 percent who disapproved.

If Nader proves a potent factor in the fall and public opinion continues to build for a withdrawal, Kerry could face pressure to change his position in order to keep his most liberal supporters.

Wolfowitz, who just returned from Iraq, told a House committee Tuesday that he was impressed with the incoming Iraqi caretaker government headed by Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, who has plans to set up an Iraqi army and security forces that can handle more of the country's security burden.

Despite that, he conceded that U.S. forces may be in Iraq for a long time.

"Is it your testimony you think we might be there, then, a good number of years?'' Skelton asked.

"I think it's entirely possible,'' Wolfowitz said. "But what I think is also nearly certain is the more Iraqis step up -- and they will be doing so more and more each month -- the less and less we will have to do.'' [Then maybe it is time to send Wolfowitz, Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, Rove and the neo-con arm-chair chicken-hawks into Iraq to risk [i]their[/i] lives and for[i] them [/i]to make a sacrifice for a change, instead of always loading the burden onto the backs of the poor, working and Middle Class.] - http://www.commondreams.org/h...

Growing Calls to Get All U.S. Troops Out of Iraq

06.23.04 (7:21 am) [edit]

By Way of Deception ...

06.22.04 (12:07 pm) [edit]

Not the judgment of film critics but the passage of time will decide whether Michael Moore's[i] Fahrenheit 9/11 [/i]can change the world. Change, of course, is the whole purpose. Whatever satisfaction Moore derives from his ever-mounting income and awards, he clearly will consider this picture a success only if it helps drive George W. Bush from office. Voters will write the real review. I can merely fill time until November, with the thought that[i] Fahrenheit 9/11 [/i]might be interesting as a movie after it has done its work as politics.

As with any good polemic--and this is an excellent one--you sit in the theater thinking of how someone else would respond, some imaginary "undecided" in a swing state, or perhaps your Uncle Max the Republican. You don't much monitor your own reactions. But then, as you leave the movie house, you might notice that the sidewalk chatter sounds oddly muffled, the traffic looks a little blurred, as you begin to realize that your attention has not come outside with you; it's still in the dark, struggling with the feelings that [i]Fahrenheit 9/11 [/i]called up and didn't resolve. Are you outraged, heartbroken, vengeful, morose, gloating, thoughtful, electrified? Moore has elicited all of these emotions and then had the nerve--the filmmaker's nerve--to leave you to sort them out.

I think there are two bundles of messages in [i]Fahrenheit 9/11[/i], one political and one emotional--and while the first is about as ambiguous as a call to take up pitchforks and torches and storm the castle, the second is too complex to unsettle those in power. It works to unsettle you. It's what makes [i]Fahrenheit 9/11 [/i]a real movie.

For clarity's sake, then, let's start with the politics: the film's bill of particulars against Bush, and also against the Democratic leadership, which in Moore's view has colluded most shamefully in the misrule the world now suffers. The prologue to [i]Fahrenheit 9/11 [/i]revisits Bush's rise to power in late 2000, paying particular attention to the hunched posture of the Democrats who let him step on their backs. Here are Dick Gephardt and Tom Daschle, counseling "acceptance" of the non-election; and here is Al Gore, mildly officiating over the Senate session that legitimized the theft of his presidency. For the first time in [i]Fahrenheit 9/11[/i], but certainly not the last, Moore tells his story through borrowed but decidedly nonstock footage, which you most likely have not seen before--in this case, a scene of members of the House, all of them African-American, coming forward to contest the election, while Gore calmly rules their objections inadmissible because no senator, not one, would satisfy Congressional rules by signing on to them.

Moore's antagonists, being Republican, won't go so easy on him. Their attacks will no doubt include the charge that his film is Democratic Party propaganda. You should understand from the preceding the flimsiness of this accusation--although it's true that Moore spares us the sight of one notable Democrat, John Kerry, voting to authorize Bush to start a war on his own say-so, at any time that suited him.

But enough of Democratic malfeasance. Who is this Sage of Crawford, that he may choose for us between life and death? Moore answers, in part, with more footage you probably haven't seen until now: a substantial portion of videotape from the morning of September 11, 2001, when Bush and his handlers staged a photo opportunity at an elementary school in Florida. After an aide whispered to him that a second airplane had struck the World Trade Center, Bush sat in place for seven minutes, pretending to read a book titled [i]My Pet Goat[/i]. Have you ever before had a chance to study his face on that morning? Has anything other than this movie made you feel the unendurable length of his inaction? What do you suppose he was thinking for all that time, as he stared into space? Moore himself asks that last question on the soundtrack, as a way of opening a biographical digression about Bush, his family and their business interests. This section of the film will particularly incense Moore's attackers, who will pronounce on him the dependable slur of "conspiracy theorist." So, to digress on my own:

Moore alleges no conspiracies. He merely says that Bush has motives beyond those he's willing to state. To make this case, Moore begins by showing that the Bush family in general, and George W. in particular, have received lavish support over the years from the Saudi elite, including the bin Ladens, and have offered valuable help in turn. Unlike the actualities footage that Moore uses in the film, these facts are by now widely known--although it was news to me that Prince Bandar, the Saudi ambassador, had dined with Bush at the White House on September 13, 2001. In speculating about this dinner, and about the subsequent airlifting out of the United States of more than a hundred Saudis when everyone else was grounded, Moore goes only so far as to say that the overwhelmingly Saudi makeup of the September 11 attack teams could have proved embarrassing to Bush. He would not have wanted journalists just then to begin looking into his personal ties to Saudi interests, or to ask whether any useful information had emerged from the two dozen bin Ladens who had been in the country, and whom he soon spirited away without the indignity of questioning.

Nothing conspiratorial about that. The worst you can reasonably say of this section of the film is that it gives Moore the opportunity for one of his man-on-the-street pranks. He films himself and Craig Unger (author of the book [i]House of Bush, House of Saud[/i]) in front of the Watergate complex in Washington, directly across the street from the Saudi Embassy: a choice of location that insures interruption. Sure enough, onto the scene drive carloads of Secret Service agents, who just want to ask, politely, why a film crew is working on this spot. The agents move off readily enough when given the answer, although one of them seems abashed when Moore blandly delivers his punch line: "I didn't realize the Secret Service guards foreign embassies."

In fact, reasonable people may find this to be the best part of the section.

You may have heard, by the way, that Moore is less of a presence in [i]Fahrenheit 9/11 [/i]than he was in his previous pictures. Actually, he's always with you, in voiceover; but he does perform for the camera less than usual. At times, his stunts serve to drive home a point, as when he accosts members of Congress on the street and offers them recruiting brochures, in case they want to enlist their children in the military. At other times, his antics are pure comic relief. (After complaining that the House passed the USA Patriot Act sight unseen, Moore corrects the situation by reading the bill aloud to Congress, circling the Capitol in an ice-cream truck and reciting the provisions over a loudspeaker.) Either way, though, Moore makes sparing use of this sort of material in advancing his main charges against Bush.

The first principal accusation is that Bush had gotten along just fine with the Taliban before September 11 (which is demonstrable) and didn't much care about fighting them afterward (which is unproved but plausible). Bush invaded Afghanistan, Moore claims, because he had to be seen to do something, because the war helpfully diverted attention from the Saudis and because those closest to him would gain lucrative contracts for a natural gas pipeline. Moore's second accusation is that Bush undertook the war in Iraq for even shadier purposes. As[i] Nation [/i]readers knew, and as others have since caught on, Bush attacked without even the excuse he'd had in Afghanistan of pursuing bin Laden. There were no terrorists in Iraq to destroy, no military threats to counter--and unless you define "democracy" as the creation of profit-making opportunities for Halliburton, no process of democratization to pursue.

There is also a third principal point, most devastating of all. But before I go into that, let me digress once more, to sum up the impressively varied materials that Moore assembles to make these arguments.

The film contains, as I've said, a few of Moore's little skits, along with a lot of borrowed actualities footage, which is usually surprising and sometimes shocking. (How many shots have you seen of daily life in Baghdad immediately before the war? How many dead and wounded Iraqi civilians have you looked at close up?) In addition, you find pop-culture images, which Moore takes over for purposes of sarcasm or parody (as when he remakes the TV western[i] Bonanza [/i]as the Bush adventure Afghanistan); talking-head interviews with expert commentators (such as former counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke, former FBI agent Jack Cloogan and Senator Byron Dorgan); a range of texts and graphics; patches of direct cinema (for example, an excursion to a shopping mall in Flint, Michigan, with a couple of Marine recruiters); and, most critical of all, filmed encounters with ordinary citizens, who pretty much have the frame to themselves while Moore stays quietly out of the way.

The most important of these citizens, the one who takes over the final portion of the movie, is Lila Lipscombe of Flint, mother of Sgt. Michael Pedersen, who served in a helicopter unit in Iraq and was killed in action sometime after "the completion of major combat operations." Lipscombe is a pleasantly robust woman of modest means, patriotic and Christian in convictions, guileless in manner, whose role in the polemic is simple: She is meant to embody disillusionment. Having once despised all protesters against war, feeling that they were slapping our soldiers in the face, she now grieves over a dead son, whose final letter home said of Bush, "He got us out here for nothing." In a succession of artfully spaced scenes, which constitute the film's third damning charge against Bush, Lipscombe speaks of the meager possibilities open to most young people in Flint; she recalls having encouraged her own children to enter the military, believing it to be a good thing to do and a good opportunity; and at the end, bereft, with Moore trailing behind, she visits the White House (or as close to it as you can get these days) and says she is glad to be there, since it gives her a place to put her anger.

Lipscombe makes a very efficient witness--but she is an intractably complex movie character. She just doesn't fit Moore's scheme. He generally relies on economics to explain the behavior of the elite and psychology to account for the rest of us. (As you may recall from [i]Bowling for Columbine[/i], he is very interested in the way politicians and the communications media use fear to grab attention and elicit compliance.) But when it comes to Lipscombe, Moore (to his great credit) forgets about his standard categories. For perhaps the first time in his career, he shows someone as a fully rounded personality, animated by beliefs and loyalties that he does not necessarily share but must respect; and so he allows her emotions to overwhelm his cleverness.

This is the point at which [i]Fahrenheit 9/11 [/i]may overwhelm you, too. Perhaps it will seem trivial to a pollster, counting and recounting those swing votes, that this campaign tool should also qualify as a work of art; but I can't believe the effect will be lost on moviegoers.

[i]Fahrenheit 9/11 [/i]is Michael Moore's most urgent diatribe and also his best, most moving film.

[u]Extremely Short Take[/u]: Had Moore's film not shouldered everything aside, I would have devoted several paragraphs of this column to praising [i]The Corporation[/i], a new documentary by Mark Achbar, Jennifer Abbott and Joel Bakan. A study of the business corporation as the dominant institution of the past century and a half--and an analysis of the built-in qualities that make this "fictitious person" a psychopath--[i]The Corporation [/i]recently opened in San Francisco and is now about to begin a New York City run at Film Forum (June 30). I think you'll find the film smart, playful, rapid and almost too richly informative. A nationwide release begins soon--a very successful one, I hope.

[b]Stuart Klawans, Film Critic

[i]The Nation's [/i]film critic Stuart Klawans is a[i] New York Daily News [/i]columnist and regular contributor to the [i]Village Voice[/i], NPR, WBAI,[i] Grand Street [/i]and the [i]Times Literary Supplement[/i]. Klawans's book Film Follies was nominated for a 1999 National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism[/b]. - http://www.thenation.com/doc....

A Time to Weep

06.22.04 (7:51 am) [edit]

[i][b]Ted Sorenson, a former aide to President John F. Kennedy, gave this moving commencement speech at the New School University in New York on May 21, 2004. (The "President Kerrey" he refers to is, alas, former Senator Bob Kerrey who is president of the New School, not future US President John Kerry.) [/b][/i]

This is not a speech. Two weeks ago I set aside the speech I prepared. This is a cry from the heart, a lamentation for the loss of this country's goodness and therefore its greatness.

Future historians studying the decline and fall of America will mark this as the time the tide began to turn - toward a mean-spirited mediocrity in place of a noble beacon.

For me the final blow was American guards laughing over the naked, helpless bodies of abused prisoners in Iraq. "There is a time to laugh," the Bible tells us, "and a time to weep." Today I weep for the country I love, the country I proudly served, the country to which my four grandparents sailed over a century ago with hopes for a new land of peace and freedom. I cannot remain silent when that country is in the deepest trouble of my lifetime.

I am not talking only about the prison abuse scandal, that stench will someday subside. Nor am I referring only to the Iraq war - that too will pass - nor to any one political leader or party. This is no time for politics as usual, in which no one responsible admits responsibility, no one genuinely apologizes, no one resigns and everyone else is blamed.

The damage done to this country by its own misconduct in the last few months and years, to its very heart and soul, is far greater and longer lasting than any damage that any terrorist could possibly inflict upon us.

The stain on our credibility, our reputation for decency and integrity, will not quickly wash away.

Last week, a family friend of an accused American guard in Iraq recited the atrocities inflicted by our enemies on Americans, and asked: "Must we be held to a different standard?" My answer is YES. Not only because others expect it. WE must hold ourselves to a different standard. Not only because God demands it, but because it serves our security.

Our greatest strength has long been not merely our military might but our moral authority. Our surest protection against assault from abroad has been not all our guards, gates and guns or even our two oceans, but our essential goodness as a people. Our richest asset has been not our material wealth but our values.

We were world leaders once - helping found the United Nations, the Marshall Plan, NATO, and programs like Food for Peace, international human rights and international environmental standards. The world admired not only the bravery of our Marine Corps but also the idealism of our Peace Corps.

Our word was as good as our gold. At the start of the Cuban Missile Crisis, former Secretary of State Dean Acheson, President Kennedy's special envoy to brief French President de Gaulle, offered to document our case by having the actual pictures of Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba brought in. "No," shrugged the usually difficult de Gaulle: "The word of the President of the United States is good enough for me."

Eight months later, President Kennedy could say at American University: "The world knows that America will never start a war. This generation of Americans has had enough of war and hate ... we want to build a world of peace where the weak are secure and the strong are just."

Our founding fathers believed this country could be a beacon of light to the world, a model of democratic and humanitarian progress. We were. We prevailed in the Cold War because we inspired millions struggling for freedom in far corners of the Soviet empire. I have been in countries where children and avenues were named for Lincoln, Jefferson, Franklin Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy. We were respected, not reviled, because we respected man's aspirations for peace and justice. This was the country to which foreign leaders sent not only their goods to be sold but their sons and daughters to be educated. In the 1930's, when Jewish and other scholars were driven out of Europe, their preferred destination - even for those on the far left - was not the Communist citadel in Moscow but the New School here in New York.

What has happened to our country? We have been in wars before, without resorting to sexual humiliation as torture, without blocking the Red Cross, without insulting and deceiving our allies and the U.N., without betraying our traditional values, without imitating our adversaries, without blackening our name around the world.

Last year when asked on short notice to speak to a European audience, and inquiring what topic I should address, the Chairman said: "Tell us about the good America, the America when Kennedy was in the White House." "It is still a good America," I replied. "The American people still believe in peace, human rights and justice; they are still a generous, fair-minded, open-minded people."

Today some political figures argue that merely to report, much less to protest, the crimes against humanity committed by a few of our own inadequately trained forces in the fog of war, is to aid the enemy or excuse its atrocities. But Americans know that such self-censorship does not enhance our security. Attempts to justify or defend our illegal acts as nothing more than pranks or no worse than the crimes of our enemies, only further muddies our moral image. 30 years ago, America's war in Vietnam became a hopeless military quagmire; today our war in Iraq has become a senseless moral swamp.

No military victory can endure unless the victor occupies the high moral ground. Surely America, the land of the free, could not lose the high moral ground invading Iraq, a country ruled by terror, torture and tyranny - but we did.

Instead of isolating Saddam Hussein - politically, economically, diplomatically, much as we succeeded in isolating Khadafy, Marcos, Mobutu and a host of other dictators over the years, we have isolated ourselves. We are increasingly alone in a dangerous world in which millions who once respected us now hate us.

Not only Muslims. Every international survey shows our global standing at an all-time low. Even our transatlantic alliance has not yet recovered from its worst crisis in history. Our friends in Western Europe were willing to accept Uncle Sam as class president, but not as class bully, once he forgot JFK's advice that "Civility is not a sign of weakness."

All this is rationalized as part of the war on terror. But abusing prisoners in Iraq, denying detainees their legal rights in Guantanamo, even American citizens, misleading the world at large about Saddam's ready stockpiles of mass destruction and involvement with al Qaeda at 9/11, did not advance by one millimeter our efforts to end the threat of another terrorist attack upon us. On the contrary, our conduct invites and incites new attacks and new recruits to attack us.

The decline in our reputation adds to the decline in our security. We keep losing old friends and making new enemies - not a formula for success. We have not yet rounded up Osama bin Laden or most of the al Qaeda and Taliban leaders or the anthrax mailer. "The world is large," wrote John Boyle O'Reilly, in one of President Kennedy's favorite poems, "when its weary leagues two loving hearts divide, but the world is small when your enemy is loose on the other side." Today our enemies are still loose on the other side of the world, and we are still vulnerable to attack.

True, we have not lost either war we chose or lost too much of our wealth. But we have lost something worse - our good name for truth and justice. To paraphrase Shakespeare: "He who steals our nation's purse, steals trash. T'was ours, tis his, and has been slave to thousands. But he that filches our good name ... makes us poor indeed."

No American wants us to lose a war. Among our enemies are those who, if they could, would fundamentally change our way of life, restricting our freedom of religion by exalting one faith over others, ignoring international law and the opinions of mankind; and trampling on the rights of those who are different, deprived or disliked. To the extent that our nation voluntarily trods those same paths in the name of security, the terrorists win and we are the losers.

We are no longer the world's leaders on matters of international law and peace. After we stopped listening to others, they stopped listening to us. A nation without credibility and moral authority cannot lead, because no one will follow.

Paradoxically, the charges against us in the court of world opinion are contradictory. We are deemed by many to be dangerously aggressive, a threat to world peace. You may regard that as ridiculously unwarranted, no matter how often international surveys show that attitude to be spreading. But remember the old axiom: "No matter how good you feel, if four friends tell you you're drunk, you better lie down."

Yet we are also charged not so much with intervention as indifference - indifference toward the suffering of millions of our fellow inhabitants of this planet who do not enjoy the freedom, the opportunity, the health and wealth and security that we enjoy; indifference to the countless deaths of children and other civilians in unnecessary wars, countless because we usually do not bother to count them; indifference to the centuries of humiliation endured previously in silence by the Arab and Islamic worlds.

The good news, to relieve all this gloom, is that a democracy is inherently self-correcting. Here, the people are sovereign. Inept political leaders can be replaced. Foolish policies can be changed. Disastrous mistakes can be reversed.

When, in 1941, the Japanese Air Force was able to inflict widespread death and destruction on our naval and air forces in Hawaii because they were not on alert, those military officials most responsible for ignoring advance intelligence were summarily dismissed.

When, in the late 1940's, we faced a global Cold War against another system of ideological fanatics certain that their authoritarian values would eventually rule the world, we prevailed in time. We prevailed because we exercised patience as well as vigilance, self-restraint as well as self-defense, and reached out to moderates and modernists, to democrats and dissidents, within that closed system. We can do that again. We can reach out to moderates and modernists in Islam, proud of its long traditions of dialogue, learning, charity and peace.

Some among us scoff that the war on Jihadist terror is a war between civilization and chaos. But they forget that there were Islamic universities and observatories long before we had railroads.

So do not despair. In this country, the people are sovereign. If we can but tear the blindfold of self-deception from our eyes and loosen the gag of self-denial from our voices, we can restore our country to greatness. In particular, you - the Class of 2004 - have the wisdom and energy to do it. Start soon.

In the words of the ancient Hebrews:

"[i]The day is short, and the work is great, and the laborers are sluggish, but the reward is much, and the Master is urgent[/i]."
- http://www.commondreams.org/v...

A Time to Weep

06.22.04 (7:50 am) [edit]

A Time to Weep

06.22.04 (7:49 am) [edit]

World's Nuclear Powers Decried as Hypocrites

06.22.04 (7:44 am) [edit]

[b]World's Nuclear Powers Decried as Hypocrites

UN agency chief says reliance cripples push to halt proliferation[/b]

The world's nuclear powers have failed to reduce their reliance on atomic weapons, creating a double standard that plagues international efforts to reduce their spread, the United Nations top nuclear watchdog said yesterday.

With the growing availability of weapons of mass destruction materials and expertise to states and terrorist groups, one of the largest obstacles to countering nuclear proliferation is the hypocrisy at the heart of global nuclear policy, said Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency. The nuclear powers pressuring countries like Iran and North Korea to forgo nuclear arms are clinging to the weapons as the centerpiece of their own security, despite pledges more than 30 years ago to reduce their dependence on them, he said.

The time is long overdue to "abandon the unworkable notion that it is morally reprehensible for some countries to pursue nuclear weapons but morally acceptable for others to rely on them," ElBaradei said in a speech to the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace http://www.ceip.org/ in Washington.

ElBaradei's agency is responsible for verifying that nuclear treaties are followed, and has received high marks from around the world for his dogged efforts to rein in Iran and Libya's programs. He is awaiting the outcome of six-party talks with North Korea to restart inspections there.

But he said recent attempts to keep nations from developing nuclear weapons are seriously hampered by the fact that the very countries pressuring them are themselves no closer -- and possibly even further -- from reversing their own nuclear ambitions.

He called on the international community to establish a new strategy for "verified, irreversible nuclear disarmament."

Such a goal is required by the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty signed more than three decades ago that called on the declared nuclear states -- the United States, Russia, China, Britain, and France -- to take immediate steps toward full nuclear disarmament.

Many government officials and specialists say such a lofty goal is unrealistic. There are currently more than 30,000 useable nuclear weapons around the globe, according to UN estimates.

ElBaradei said the United States' search for a new class of nuclear weapons is a prime example of this double standard, which some specialists say deepens desires by other countries to join the club of nuclear powers.

"If such efforts proceed, it is hard to understand how we can continue to ask the nuclear have-nots to accept additional nonproliferation obligations and to renounce any sensitive nuclear capability as being adverse to their security," he said at a conference of international nonproliferation specialists.

Taking steps to reduce the US reliance on these weapons will be a primary focus of a speech today by Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts. Kennedy, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, will call on the Bush administration to end its work on developing a bunker-busting "mininuke" in making a series of proposals to beef up international nonproliferation efforts.

"They don't strengthen our military options, and they send precisely the wrong signal to the world about America's nuclear intentions," the senator will say, according to a draft of his speech.

These activities have also made it more difficult to persuade undeclared nuclear powers such as India, Pakistan, and Israel to come to the negotiating table, according to ElBaradei.

ElBaradei described an international community that, despite the nature of the nuclear threat, has taken a haphazard approach to dealing with the problem.

"The trend has been toward inaction or late action on the part of the international community, selective invocation of norms and treaties, and unilateral and self-help solutions on the part of individual states or group of states," he said. "Against this background of insecurity and instability, it should not come as a surprise to witness the continued interest . . . in the acquisition of nuclear weapons." - http://www.commondreams.org/h...

World's Nuclear Powers Decried as Hypocrites

06.22.04 (7:43 am) [edit]

World's Nuclear Powers Decried as Hypocrites

06.22.04 (7:42 am) [edit]

World's Nuclear Powers Decried as Hypocrites

06.22.04 (7:39 am) [edit]

Hypocritical Clinton-Bashers Return (But Bush Has Committed Far More Heinous Crimes!!!)

06.21.04 (7:22 am) [edit]

[b]Clinton-bashing returns[/b]

Every one of the Sunday shows decided to split their time between two topics: the infuriating findings of the independent 9/11 Commission and Bill Clinton's autobiography, due out on Tuesday. Naturally, the sloppy, lazy celebrity press corps fell back on the bad habits they showed during the Clinton Administration and especially the Lewinsky flap, namely character assassination and adherence to a narrative that sounded as if it were written by Newt Gingrich and Tom DeLay. How dare Clinton criticize Starr! How dare he say that he apologized and sought forgiveness for a personal lapse that should have had him ejected from the White House!

It was an entirely expected reminder of why most people no longer trust the "liberal" press. No balance, no genuine analysis, and especially Novak.

The one Republican who showed up this weekend to not talk 9/11, Sen. Bill Frist (R-serial kitty killer), was on FOX News Sunday to push opposition to stem cell research and try to bolster opposition to gay marriage, which -- let's face it -- just isn't setting anyone on fire, including Evangelicals, as a wedge issue. And opposing stem cell research by claiming that scientists are "wrong"? How can they be wrong when we just begun to understand the full potential of stem cells yet?

[b]The Full Story [/b]- http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

[b]P.S. Clinton's Monica Lie Didn't Kill Anybody. Bush's Terrorism Lies Have Resulted In The Massacre of Over 800 American Soldiers and Over 16,000 Innocent Iraqi Civilians. Where are the hypocritical right-wing so-called "moralists [[i]sic[/i]]" now?[/b]

Hypocritical Clinton-Bashers Return (But Bush Has Committed Far More Heinous Crimes!!!)

06.21.04 (7:20 am) [edit]

Hypocritical Clinton-Bashers Return (But Bush Has Committed Far More Heinous Crimes!!!)

06.21.04 (7:19 am) [edit]

Hypocritical Clinton-Bashers Return (But Bush Has Committed Far More Heinous Crimes!!!)

06.21.04 (7:17 am) [edit]

Bush/Cheney's Pentagon Broke Contract Laws To Help Halliburton

06.21.04 (7:10 am) [edit]

[b]HalliburtonWatch: Pentagon Broke Contract Laws To Help Halliburton[/b]

WASHINGTON - June 15 - The GAO told Congressional investigators today that Pentagon officials "overstepped the latitude provided by competition laws" before the war by awarding oil-related work to Halliburton under a pre- existing global logistics contract (LOGCAP).

Testimony before the House Committee on Government Reform hearing confirmed today that Bush administration political appointees overruled career contracting officials in the Pentagon by giving Halliburton the oil-related task order months before the invasion of Iraq.

The hearing came two days after Pentagon officials admitted that Pentagon political appointees notified Vice President Cheney's chief of staff of the decision to award Halliburton a no-bid contract to repair Iraq's oil infrastructure.

Contracting experts say it is highly unusual for political appointees to be involved in the contracting process since contracts are normally awarded by career civil servants with expertise in government contracting. Involvement by Cheney's chief of staff in the contracting process contradicts Cheney's assertion that he had no role in awarding contracts to his former company.

At the same time, the committee's failure to call Halliburton whistleblowers to testify underscores Congress' continuing failure to hold the company accountable for contracting abuses and potential fraud.

Rep. Tom Davis (R-Va.) refused to allow five former Halliburton employees with additional evidence of waste, fraud and abuse to testify today. The former employees (as well as an employee of a Halliburton subcontractor) have brought serious charges of abuse by Halliburton subsidiary KBR to the attention of Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), including billing $45 per six pack of soda, the use of a five-star hotel in Kuwait, a $100 charge per bag of laundry, and the torching of brand new $80,000 trucks.

The abuses are spelled out in a new letter sent by Rep. Waxman yesterday to Davis, and posted at: http://www.halliburtonwatch.o...

"While the Bush administration failed to adequately plan for the safety of our troops -- as proven by its failure to provide sufficient body armor -- it made certain that Halliburton would make a killing long before the war began," said HalliburtonWatch project coordinator Jim Donahue.

[b]CONTACT:[/b] HalliburtonWatch
Jim Donahue, 310-56-3692
Charlie Cray, 202-387-8030 - http://www.commondreams.org/n...

Bush/Cheney's Pentagon Broke Contract Laws To Help Halliburton

06.21.04 (7:09 am) [edit]

World Bank Rebuked for Fossil Fuel Strategy

06.21.04 (7:07 am) [edit]

The World Bank's drive to promote fossil fuel-generated power for 1.6 billion people lacking electricity will drive developing countries deeper into debt, a report by a development thinktank claims today.

Fossil fuels, such as oil, gas and coal, will never provide enough power for developing nations because of the cost of connecting remote communities to a national grid, whereas renewable forms of electricity generation could provide a cheaper solution, the [i]New Economics Foundation [/i] http://www.neweconomics.org/ says.

The subsidies paid by the World Bank and export credit agencies to fossil fuel industries to expand in the developing world, particularly Africa, are driving countries deeper into debt rather than helping the poor as is the declared intention, stresses the foundation. It criticizes the president of the World Bank, James Wolfensohn, who has dismissed renewables as an expensive solution. The report says Mr Wolfensohn "at best has a bad grasp of basic economics and at worst reflects the entrenched interests of the Bank's major donors, the fossil fuel industries".

Rural communities in poorer countries, particularly in Africa, are often many miles from any kind of power grid. On current trends, in 2030 there will be more people relying on wood and dung for cooking and heating than there are now, according to the International Energy Agency.

But with small-scale hydro-electric schemes, wind and solar power, developing world villages could become self-sufficient in power. And the death rate among women and children from respiratory diseases brought on by fumes from unsuitable stoves would fall dramatically.

Already one scheme, in Rajasthan, India, has given 130 remote villages, home to 15,000 people in all, solar power in place of kerosene and candles, allowing 200 women to gain work via electrically powered spinning wheels.

On Mindanao, in the Philippines, where there was no hope of a grid connection, a micro-hydro scheme is providing power to 110 households and public buildings, cutting out the need for diesel. On the island of Sagar, Bengal, five solar-powered photovoltaic plants produce electricity for various outlets, including 1,600 families. Wind power is being added to the energy mix to pump water.

These communities are able to exercise a greater degree of self determination, says the report. Renewables not only improve quality of life and reduce carbon dioxide emissions, they provide educational opportunities as well as political independence.

This path out of poverty contrasts with the route offered by the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the World Trade Organization, where alongside large-scale coal, gas and oil power projects, corruption can leave little of the money generated in the hands of local people and much of the profit passed on to developed countries.

For the poorest countries, one advantage of renewables lies in not increasing debts by importing ever more fuel. Once installed, renewable energy facilities incur only maintenance costs. In a further step, reduced debt and spending on energy imports lessen the need to generate foreign exchange revenue through exports and local economies can focus on meeting domestic needs, the report says.

Currently less than 3% of the £25bn spent annually on energy investment in developing countries goes to renewables. Providing solar electricity to a village of 50 households in sub-Saharan Africa costs an average of £17,000.

There are about 500 million people in Africa without electricity, but one year's spending on fossil fuel by the World Bank, redirected to renewables, would provide power for 10 million, the report says. - http://www.commondreams.org/h...

Experts Blast Administration Setback to Wild Salmon Survival

06.20.04 (5:57 am) [edit]

The Bush administration has once again rejected its obligations under the federal plan to save wild salmon in the Pacific Northwest. On June 8, the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) announced a revised proposal for big cuts in the "summer spill" on the Columbia and Snake river systems.

Reducing spill—the amount of water diverted from power-generating hydroelectric dam turbines to go over the dam spillways--imperils juvenile salmon as they migrate to the sea, further reducing the chances of survival for endangered salmon stocks.

"Slashing summer spill spurns the unanimous scientific advice of Northwest fishery agencies and Indian tribes. This continues a three-year pattern of failure of this administration to implement its own salmon plan," says Pat Fox, executive director of Portland, Oregon-based Save Our Wild Salmon.

"This is a scientifically irresponsible and indefensible decision," says Jim Martin, former chief of fisheries with Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, now on the National Wildlife Federation's board of directors. "...BPA continues to disregard the hugely positive economic impact spill has on fishing communities, and takes the politically expedient route to pad the agencies' bottom line."

The BPA claims that "offsets" will make up for the harm caused by the reduced spill, but fish biologists across the Northwest disagree. There is scientific evidence that one such measure, removing Snake River chinook from the river to barge and truck them around dam turbines, ultimately increases the mortality rate of juvenile salmon. Also, BPA has "double-counted" by including the Hanford Reach Protection Program, a Columbia River salmon preservation plan, as an offset to the eliminated summer spill. The Hanford program is already required as an offset under a different agreement. [1]

"Our overall assessment is that the analyses of biological impacts [by BPA] are fundamentally flawed, and available scientific data collected in the Columbia Basin do not support the Federal Agencies' findings," the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife wrote in a comment to the BPA in February.

The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife wrote that it was "extremely concerned that the recently developed [Hanford Reach] agreement is being proposed as an offset measure...Mitigation simply cannot be double counted." A joint team of state, federal and tribal agencies noted that "[T]he offset analysis and predicted benefits from the proposed offsets are highly speculative...the agencies and tribes do not believe that there is adequate technical basis to support the projected benefits of the BPA proposed offsets." [2]

The BPA claims that the reduced spill will mean lower power generation costs, which will be passed on to Northwest residents as savings on electricity bills. However, the BPA included projected earnings from selling electricity to California when it estimated power costs with the full summer spill. While the BPA may earn $26 million more this summer under the reduced spill plan, Northwest ratepayers would likely see extremely minor savings on their electric bills--as little as $0.08 to $0.36 per month. [3]

This is not the first time the Bush administration has ignored science in decisions affecting endangered Northwest salmon. As reported by BushGreenwatch on May 27, a controversial fish counting method supported by the administration threatened to remove federal protection from 15 of 26 salmon stocks listed under the Endangered Species Act. The administration also proposed cutting the budget for wild salmon restoration by 40% in the 2005 budget. [4]

###

[b]TAKE ACTION:[/b]

Visit Save Our Wild Salmon http://www.wildsalmon.org/ to learn more about the BPA's summer spill plan, and how to submit comments on the plan.

###

[b]SOURCES:[/b] - http://www.bushgreenwatch.org...

[1] Save Our Wild Salmon press release, Jun. 8, 2004.
[2] "What Scientists Say about Cutting Summer Spill," Save Our Wild Salmon.
[3] "Putting the Power System Benefits of Reduced Summer Spill into Perspective," NW Energy Coalition and Save Our Wild Salmon, Jun. 8, 2004.
[4] BushGreenwatch, Feb. 11, 2004.

Bush's Exploitation of Christianity is Sinful

06.20.04 (5:51 am) [edit]

Bush's Exploitation of Christianity is Sinful

06.20.04 (5:50 am) [edit]

Cheney Faces Possible Indictment over Nigerian Bribery Lies ...

06.20.04 (5:46 am) [edit]

[b]Cheney in firing line over Nigerian bribery claims [/b]

A British lawyer is emerging as a key witness in a $180 million bribery investigation that could lead to the indictment of US vice president Dick Cheney.

Last week, US oil corporation Halliburton cut all ties with a former senior executive, Albert Stanley, after it emerged he had received as much as $5m in 'improper personal benefits' as part of a $4bn gas project in Nigeria. Halliburton also sacked a second 'consultant', William Chaudan in connection with the bribery allegations. At the time of these alleged payments, Cheney was chief executive of the corporation.

French investigating magistrate Renaud van Ruymbeke is examining a stream of payments surrounding the controversial project which was built during the regime of the late dictator Sani Abacha. The judge has uncovered a $180m web of payments channelled through offshore companies and bank accounts.

The Nigerian project to build a huge gas plant was signed with an international consortium that included Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root. Cheney retired from the chief executive post in 2000.

The French judge is considering summoning Cheney to give evidence in his probe to ascertain whether the US vice president knew about the alleged commission payments.

Van Ruymbeke has been investigating why the consortium, which built the gas plant, paid up to $180m to a Gibraltan company set up by British solicitor Jeffrey Tesler, a partner in law firm Kaye Tesler & Co, based in Tottenham, north London. Van Ruymbeke wants to know whether the Gibraltar firm, TriStar Investments, was used to distribute bribes to win the contracts. Tesler has declined to answer media questions about his role in the project.

The Nigerian deal to build a $4bn liquefied natural gas plant is already subject to a formal investigation by both the US department of justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Halliburton's decision to sever ties with Stanley and Chaudan recognises the firm's difficulty with the corruption allegations. When the claims initially arose in France the firm denied any improper activities. A spokesman for Halliburton said the two executives were dismissed because they had broken the firm's 'code of business conduct'.

A statement added: 'While we do not know all of the facts related to the issue we are taking these actions in response to the facts that we do have and to protect our investors, employees, customers and vendors as several investigations proceed.'

The acknowledgement that Stanley was receiving payments as part of the Nigeria deal brings the allegations uncomfortably close to Cheney. Stanley was chairman of Kellog Brown & Root - one of Halliburton's most important subsidiaries. The company denied that Stanley - who retired as chairman in December but remained a consultant - would have reported directly to Cheney.

Neither Stanley, Chaudan or their lawyers have made any comments on the allegations and the two US directors do not currently face any legal action. - http://observer.guardian.co.u...,6903,1243393,00.html

Cheney Faces Possible Indictment over Nigerian Bribery Lies ...

06.20.04 (5:44 am) [edit]

Why Osama backs Bush ...

06.20.04 (5:42 am) [edit]

[b]Saudi power struggles are holding back attempts to defeat terrorism[/b]

Picture the scene: in November, as polls close across the United States, an anxious Osama bin Laden awaits the first predictions of the result. If President Bush loses, will the world's most famous terrorist claim victory? No. He will more likely be despondent. Bin Laden sees his struggle with the US in apocalyptic terms.

The US is the supporter of the House of Saud, the Saudi royal family, which Bin Laden and his al-Qa'ida followers regard as both politically and religiously corrupt.

It is hard to work out whether Bin Laden either grossly overestimates his own strength or is cannily playing his limited hand as part of some grand scheme. After so many setbacks, much of his strength is the continuing perception that he is a Lenin-like figure, seeing only progress in chaos.

The world vision of John Kerry, Bush's challenger, as much as it can be discerned, does not involve the apocalypse. If international diplomacy in 2005 switches to trying to understand militant Islam, Bin Laden will have to work harder to find new recruits. Kerry's world will still be anathema to al-Qa'ida but the global nature of the problem may appear to diminish for a while. By this analysis there is a curious coincidence between what is good for Bin Laden and what is good for George Bush. The President's strategists probably consider another attack on the US as beneficial to his chances. Equally, capturing or killing Bin Laden might be perceived as ending the "War on Terror" and allowing for a change in domestic political preferences.

To President Bush's credit, he probably doesn't think like this. His world is more good versus bad; black and white. Hence his comments late on Friday after learning of the beheading of the American hostage, Paul Johnson: "We must pursue these people and bring them to justice." Bold words, good for the American electorate, but potentially embarrassing for the Saudi authorities that even in better times preferred American support to be low-key.

Diplomatically, the Americans are in a quandary. Relations with the Saudis are already poor. Yet the House of Saud cannot just be ignored. The kingdom has a quarter of the world's oil reserves and accounts for 11 per cent of world oil production. If the Saudis are no longer able or willing to produce oil at current levels, the consequences are almost too scary to imagine: world energy crisis leading to world economic crisis, leading to calls for military intervention.

Washington's challenge is made worse because the senior princes appear to be disconnected from reality. While thousands of police searched Riyadh in a desperate search to find Johnson before the hostage-takers' deadline expired, Crown Prince Abdullah, the de facto ruler, was in Jeddah to watch football.

Saudi Arabia's security appears to be in the hands of Abdullah's younger half-brother, Prince Nayef, the interior minister. He guards his control of the police and security forces jealously. His reputation for toughness is matched only by his apparent tolerance of inefficiency, incompetence and even treachery in his own ranks.

Nayef's motives are assumed to be twisted by his determination that the ailing King Fahd is not succeeded by Abdullah but rather by Prince Sultan, the defence minister and a full brother of Nayef. Fahd, Sultan and Nayef are all members of the so-called Sudairi Seven, the most important sub-group of many sons of the kingdom's founder, Ibn Saud, who seem to think the crown belongs them alone.

Poor old Fahd, who suffered the first of a series of debilitating strokes in 1995, is widely assumed to owe his continued life to the determination of the Sudairis that he should be kept alive. Sultan's recent 18-day hospital stay, reportedly for the removal of a stomach polyp, would not worry Nayef so much. Diplomats widely assume he is number four in the line of succession, although chanceries across the world prefer another, but younger, brother, Salman, the governor of Riyadh province.

Washington wants tough police action to continue. With the reported death of Abdul-Aziz al-Muqrin, the leader of the al-Qa'ida cell that murdered Johnson, the immediate problem might be over. Prince Turki al-Faisal, the Saudi ambassador in London, said last week that only one cell was still operating in the kingdom. Saudi police are also blaming al-Muqrin for the attack on the BBC crew that left cameraman Simon Cumber dead and correspondent Frank Gardner seriously injured.

But journalists trying to cover the kingdom and expatriates living there are learning the hard way that the initial Saudi version of an event often turns out to be far from the truth. After the terrorist incident in al-Khobar at the end of May, in which 22 died, the initial version was that helicopter-borne commandos had ended the siege, SAS-style. It later turned out that the terrorists had been allowed to walk free hours earlier in a deal "to avoid further casualties". A wounded terrorist, left behind, was nearly sprung from his hospital bed a few days earlier in another attack that was not opposed.

The Saudi royals appear to be hoping that, apart from an occasional shoot-out, the threat from al-Qa'ida can be overcome using Saudi traditional methods of defusing crises - the involvement of the militants' own families and tribes.

The House of Saud is also seeking to delegitimise the Islamic credentials of the terrorists. The Saudi religious leadership keeps issuing fatwas (religious rulings) against them. The Saudi princes calls them "deviants" or, eye-poppingly in an international context, "Zionists".

The key to predicting the future may well be in gauging sympathy for al-Qa'ida and Bin Laden in the kingdom. The Saudi authorities say the terrorists have little support; anecdotal evidence suggests the contrary.

Al-Qa'ida can tap into a deep xenophobic seam in Saudi society, especially towards non-Muslims. The conservative nature of the average Saudi also suggests that government proposals for "reform" are either misplaced or merely insincere gestures towards local liberals. Proposed changes have so far turned out to be musings rather than promises.

If recent Saudi history is anything to go by, crises slip by rather than develop. The socio-economic indicators - high-birth rate, few employment opportunities - remain gloomy in the long term. But the crucial tests will be an absence of al-Qa'ida attacks for a while and the return of expatriates after vacations in the cooler climes of Europe.

Like Iraq, President Bush does not want Saudi Arabia to be an issue in the November polls. Better to campaign on the notion that the world is potentially a dangerous place than a really dangerous place. Bush needs to force more effective, albeit low-key, security co-operation on the Saudis, preferably securing Nayef's replacement. And keep going after Osama bin Laden so that his dying thought might be that he miscalculated American determination. - http://argument.independent.c...

Why Osama backs Bush ...

06.20.04 (5:39 am) [edit]