From mstainsby at tao.ca Wed May 1 03:44:34 2002 From: mstainsby at tao.ca (Macdonald Stainsby) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:18 2006 Subject: [R-G] Greetings on May Day Message-ID: <030e01c1f0f4$cd387400$291f5318@vc.shawcable.net> To all the workers on the lists both retired and current A great May Day... and may we all sew the great days ahead. The tide is already turning back our way, much faster than many of us anticipated. Let us take back our holiday. Can someone remind me of the time/start of the Anti Poverty Committee action here in Vancouver? rev greetings, ------------------------------------------- Macdonald Stainsby http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international "Simply BEING a Palestinian in what used to be Palestine is a form of suicide...slower and more painful than using a bomb to blow up yourself [...]." - American Jew writing to others, email correspondence. ---- In the contradiction lies the hope. --Bertholt Brecht From shniad at sfu.ca Wed May 1 17:19:11 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:18 2006 Subject: [R-G] France Takes a Right Turn - AlterNet Message-ID: <200205012319.g41NJBTf025160@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12971 AlterNet April 29, 2002 France Takes a Right Turn The lesson? That when a government of the left carries out the economic policies of the right, the subsequent disillusionment opens the door to the extreme right. By Doug Ireland, In These Times By defeating Socialist Prime Minister Lionel Jospin in the April 21 first round of France's presidential elections to become the only candidate in the runoff against conservative President Jacques Chirac, the neo-fascist Jean-Marie Le Pen has dramatically underscored the insidious rise of rampant racism engulfing Continental Europe. He has confirmed for skeptics the dangers posed by the mushrooming growth of xenophobic, ultra-nationalist parties of the extreme right from the Atlantic to the Black Sea, and shaken France's democratic institutions to their very core. One in five French voters, in the privacy of the voting booth, chose one of the two neo-fascist parties (Le Pen's National Front, which rolled up an impressive 16.9 percent, and the tiny splinter party of former Le Pen deputy Bruno Megret, which got 2.4 percent). Le Pen is the linear descendant of Vichy France's collaborationists with the Nazis (he got his start in politics as a young lieutenant in the crypto-fascist political formation led in the '50s by Tixier-Vignancourt, the lawyer for Marshal Petain at his treason trial); a notorious anti-Semite (he wrote a forward to the neo-Nazi tract published by Franz Schönhuber, the former SS officer and leader of Germany's fascist Republican Party in the '70s and '80s -- later declared illegal); an ex-paratrooper who tortured Algerians during the former French colony's war for independence; and a politician whose bashing of France's Arab and black African immigrant population is his stock in trade. Le Pen won nearly a million votes more than his score in the 1995 contest for chief of state, despite the toll the actuarial charts have taken on his traditional core electoral base of nostalgics of Vichy and the Latin mass (and despite the presence of other candidates who nibbled away at his vote, including Megret; Jean Saint-Josse, leader of the Hunting-Fishing-Nature-Tradition Party, which casts itself as the representative of rural interests -- 4.3 percent; and Christine Bottin, an anti-homosexual demagogue of the Catholic right -- 1.5 percent). Now France is faced with the nauseating choice between Le Pen and the odiferous Chirac, who has been named in eight separate investigations of political corruption, and who has been saved from likely indictment and trial only by his presidential immunity. In the days after Le Pen's victory, France was engulfed by largely spontaneous demonstrations in the principal cities across the country, the first wave led by tens of thousands of lyceéns, most not of voting age, chanting their favorite slogan: "Votez escroc, pas Facho!" ("Vote for the crook, not the fascist!"). Chirac will be re-elected without difficulty (and thus stay out of jail for another five years), thanks to the support of the left parties, who have called for "blocking the road" to Le Pen by voting for their recent adversary. This bizarre spectacle is made even more so by the recent revelation that, at a secret meeting during Chirac's 1988 campaign against Socialist President Francois Mitterand, Chirac sought Le Pen's support in the runoff. In that same campaign, in an appeal to the racist vote, Chirac referred to the bad "odors" of the immigrants (even the cuisine-mad French didn't believe him when he later tried to explain that he was only talking about their cooking). Omnia Gallia in tres partes divisa est, says the adage known to every Latin student -- all Gaul is divided into three parts, and that is true of the French political landscape today. Only a third of France's registered voters cast a ballot for the traditional governing parties of the left and right; another third either abstained or cast blank ballots (a record in French presidential elections); while the remaining third cast a protest vote for one of the minor party presidential candidates in the unusually crowded field of 16. This slap-in-the-face rejection of the political establishment of left and right by two-thirds of the potential electorate, which allowed Le Pen his breakthrough, is dominating political debate in the European press and provoking a recomposition of the French political scene. Most significant, however, is the debacle of Jospin's governing "plural left" coalition. Jospin's calculation that he could win the presidency (which he lost in 1995 by 6 percent) by governing to the center-right on economic matters was proven wrong. Instead he created legions of alienated left voters who wanted to kick the Socialists back to the left, inflating the combined score of two Trotskyist candidates -- Arlette Laguiller, perennial candidate for three decades of the ultra-sectarian Workers' Struggle Party; and Olivier Bésancenot, an attractive 28-year-old mailman put forward by Alain Krivine's less-strident Revolutionary Communist League (LCR) -- to a surprising 10 percent. The Communist Party in particular paid for its participation in Jospin's government, losing part of its electorate to the Trotskyists and part to Le Pen. The party that was once France's largest achieved only a pitiful 3.4 percent -- and by failing to win the 5 percent of the vote necessary to keep its public campaign subsidies (after having lost most of its remaining mayoralties -- a key patronage source -- to the right in last year's municipal elections) is now on life support. Indignity of indignities, the Communists are even considering merger with their former sworn enemies, the Trots of the LCR, to create a new party "on the left of the left." Jospin's other important coalition partner, the Greens, also saw their score drop to just over 5 percent, losing four points from their last national electoral outing (in the elections for the European Parliament). Le Pen got twice as many working-class voters as Jospin did, according to exit polls, and also a majority of the unemployed (53 percent). And, with opinion polls having shown that between two-thirds and three-quarters of the electorate could find no difference between the programs of Chirac and Jospin, many disgusted left voters simply stayed home or waited for the runoff -- having been assured by all the pollsters that it would be a Jospin-Chirac duel. That too helped Le Pen beat Jospin by just 195,000 votes. Jospin (and his allies) were thus penalized for having failed to learn the lesson of Italian politics -- that when a government of the left carries out the economic policies of the right (a fact of which Jospin brutally reminded the electorate at the beginning of the campaign, when he agreed to the privatization of the publicly owned electricity company), the subsequent disillusionment opens the door to the extreme right. Deposed by the race-baiting Silvio Berlusconi and his extreme-right allies (the post-fascist Alleanza Nationale and the xenophobic Northern League), the Party of Democratic Socialism and its coalition partners in Italy have been relegated to the sidelines in the struggle against Berlusconi's attempt to create a corporate-media state. But in March, a remarkable revolt of Italian "civil society," disgusted with the flaccid impotence of the traditional left parties, saw the birth of a nearly spontaneous mass movement in protest against Berlusconi's policies. A group of women -- some veterans of the 1968 student rebellions, some never before political -- sparked the new protest movement when, in conscious imitation of the tricotteuses of the French Revolution, they created the girotondo-- demonstrations encircling the buildings that house threatened political institutions (the Justice and Education ministries, the headquarters of Italy's three public television networks and the like). The agitation, spread by word of mouth and the Internet, was given a further boost when the popular film director Nanni Moretti used the microphone at a rally sponsored by the center-left Olive Tree coalition to denounce its political leadership for their feeble irrelevance. Soon, intellectuals (normally absent from Italian public life) and former judges evicted by Berlusconi for trying to pursue political corruption and tax fraud cases against him and his business associates-- all emerged as leaders of the new movement, which organized huge demonstrations in the major cities on the peninsula, their ranks swelled by people from all social classes. This unexpected revolt created the climate in which Sergio Cofferati, the leader of Italy's largest union federation (the CGIL) felt confident enough to call a one-day, eight-hour general strike on April 15, to protest Berlusconi's attempt to eliminate a law protecting workers from being fired "without just cause." The strike paralyzed the entire country and drew 3 million Italians into the streets to demonstrate -- and Cofferati has now become the most important leader of the civil contestation. April also saw good news from Hungary, where Istvan Csurka's extreme-right MIEP party won less than 5 percent of the parliamentary vote -- but only because conservative Prime Minister Viktor Orban had adopted its xenophobic and ultranationalist themes, including making menacing expansionist noises about the ancient Hungarian lands of the Sudetenland and Transylvania. Thankfully, Orban was beaten by a left-center coalition of the Socialists (ex-Communists) and the Free Democrats (ex-refuseniks) -- if only by an eyelash. But on the same day Le Pen won in France, the German land of Saxony-Anhalt saw the electoral crushing of the incumbent Social Democrats -- considered a harbinger of defeat for Gerhard Schröeder. In Slovakia, the ultra-nationalist SNS of former prime minister Vladimir Meciar is mounting in the polls after a cosmetic political facelift (and thanks in part to Orban's threats). And even in the normally tolerant Netherlands, the resignation en masse of Socialist Prime Minister Wim Kok's coalition government over the Srebrenica affair creates even more fertile ground for the parliamentary ticket led by openly gay xenophobic demagogue Pim Fortuyn in the upcoming Dutch elections, which will undoubtedly see him enter into parliament with a bloc of seats large enough to become the balance of power. Europe's turn to the right continues with a vengeance. Editor's Note: To find out more about the rise of the right in Europe, read Doug Ireland's "Europe's Right Turn," and Dario Fo's Mussolini's Ghost. From shniad at sfu.ca Wed May 1 17:20:20 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:18 2006 Subject: [R-G] Schröder alarm at speed of EU integration - The Guardian Message-ID: <200205012320.g41NKKTf026198@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.guardian.co.uk/eu/story/0,7369,707865,00.html The Guardian May 1, 2002 Schröder alarm at speed of EU integration By Ian Black in Brussels and John Hooper in Berlin Gerhard Schröder, the German chancellor, has warned that pushing citizens into too much European integration too fast could fuel more gains by the extreme right after the success of the National Front in France. Mr Schröder also said, after talks with Romano Prodi, the president of the European Commission, that he wanted greater understanding in Brussels for German heavy industries and special interests. The chancellor implied that the commission had to take care not to alienate ordinary Europeans by pursuing an ultra-liberalising economic agenda - a theme that has been seized upon by both the far-right and the anti-globlisation left. "I made clear that we are having this discussion against the alarming background of 20% of French people voting for an anti-European," he said. Mr Schröder has been sniping at the EU for months as he approaches his own election in the autumn. He cited the success of Jean-Marie Le Pen, as an example of rising nationalism in a backlash against European integration. "As Europeans we have to be careful, because the tempo of change is so fast that the capacity of citizens to absorb it often doesn't keep pace," he said. The chancellor called for an "early warning system" whereby the commission would hold talks with member governments before taking sensitive decisions that affected the quality of life. The warning from Mr Schröder is all the more striking in that it comes from a leader who, in recent years, has pushed more than any other for rapid and comprehensive European integration. Only last month, he called for a more powerful European executive that could levy taxes directly. He said there was "no reasonable alternative" to a federal model. A "strong executive" was needed, he said - counterbalanced by a "strong overseeing body, namely the [European] parliament". In that integrationist aim, Mr Schröder has been opposed by Paris as well as London. Mr Schröder's aides stressed last night that he was calling for more explanation of the commission's goals rather than a change in the goals themselves. Indeed, he deplored what he called "a swing towards a return to national policies, xenophobia, the rejection of tolerance and openness". Yet the chancellor's critics in Brussels and beyond are likely to argue that he has himself assisted a return to national policies, by his special pleading on behalf of Germany. The chancellor's remarks about extremism, however, will strike a chord across Europe. Mr Schröder has been working to outlaw the National Democratic Party, accused of promoting neo-Nazi ideology in Germany. Mr Prodi yesterday rejected Mr Schröder's warning of a rush to integration. "It's not a problem of velocity," Mr Prodi said. "It's enough for a policy to be clear and consistent." He argued that the answer to the rise of the far right was more cooperation to address the concerns of ordinary citizens. "You can't fight the right wing by ignoring problems," he said. "The response is not to have less Europe, but to have more Europe." From shniad at sfu.ca Wed May 1 17:21:59 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:18 2006 Subject: [R-G] Dishonorable conduct in war - Haaretz Message-ID: <200205012321.g41NLxTf027650@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> Haaretz May 2, 2002 Dishonorable conduct in war While the government is conducting a difficult campaign to guarantee that the IDF's good name will not be besmirched by a UN investigation of the events at the Jenin refugee camp, it turns out that some IDF soldiers brought shame on themselves, and the army, through acts of vandalism and, in some cases, looting during Operation Defensive Shield. By doing so, they cast a shadow over the many soldiers who made an effort to behave properly and with humanitarian sensitivity during the campaign. Reports about destruction of property by soldiers, which allegedly took place outside the course of the fighting itself, have unfortunately now been confirmed by the army. There were more than a few occasions in which private property owned by Palestinian families was vandalized indiscriminately, and without any visible purpose other than vandalism for its own sake. Apparently, there were also cases where soldiers purloined money and electronic equipment from homes and offices. Particularly in Ramallah, the acting capital of the Palestinian Authority, soldiers vented their rage on computers found in PA offices and in offices of various civilian agencies. The damage to the computers, monitors, keyboards, office equipment and furniture went far beyond the original mission of a specific intelligence unit assigned to find and recover computer hard disks that might contain valuable intelligence information. To achieve that end, there was no need, as senior IDF officers admitted to Ha'aretz correspondent Amos Harel, to break and smash computer systems, damaging the fabric of knowledge that forms the foundations of civic society. According to those same officers - and judging by any moral and logical criteria - there was no command or guidance for soldiers to carry out such acts of destruction, and certainly not to loot. There is no justification for relaxing military discipline, even during combat, nor is there any room for turning a blind eye to criminal behavior. And there surely can be no tolerance for it after the fighting has ended. Nor does the bitter emotional atmosphere in the country, a result of the chain of suicide bombings preceding the operation, justify or excuse any of those phenomena. Thus, the awkward question must be asked: Where were the commanders, both senior and junior, when these intolerable acts were committed? The Palestinians, and many others around the world, deduced from the scenes of vandalism that even without an explicit command, the soldiers understood they were required to sow complete destruction in the PA's offices, in banks and in other public institutions, in order to fundamentally undermine the authority's government infrastructure. Both army commanders and government officials outrightly reject that interpretation, noting that criminal procedures have been begun against some soldiers suspected of looting. But to buttress the official explanation, and, even more importantly, to reinforce proper norms of purity of arms in the IDF, a much more vigorous and wide-scale investigation is required. Trials must be conducted and heavy sentences imposed to deter those who vandalized and looted, and by doing so, trod under foot both the good name of the army and the honor of the state. http://news.haaretz.co.il/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=158010&contrassID=2 &subContrassID=3&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y&itemNo=158010 From shniad at sfu.ca Wed May 1 17:22:59 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:18 2006 Subject: [R-G] Jenin 'massacre' reduced to death toll of 56 - Washington Times Message-ID: <200205012322.g41NMxTf028509@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.washingtontimes.com/world/20020501-5587072.htm The Washington Times May 1, 2002 Jenin 'massacre' reduced to death toll of 56 By Paul Martin Jenin, West Bank - Palestinian officials yesterday put the death toll at 56 in the two-week Israeli assault on Jenin, dropping claims of a massacre of 500 that had sparked demands for a U.N. investigation. The official Palestinian body count, which is not disproportionate to the 33 Israeli soldiers killed in the incursion, was disclosed by Kadoura Mousa Kadoura, the director of Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement for the northern West Bank, after a team of four Palestinian-appointed investigators reported to him in his Jenin office. [Two weeks ago, when European and particularly London newspapers were reporting estimates of "hundreds" massacred, Israeli sources in Washington said they expected the Palestinian toll to reach "45 to 55."] U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan suggested yesterday, in the wake of the Palestinian body count, that he may disband a U.N. fact-finding team that was to visit the camp to determine whether a massacre had taken place. Mr. Annan was responding to a decision by the Israeli security Cabinet earlier in the day not to cooperate with the U.N. team. The U.N.-Israeli dispute appeared unrelated to the Palestinian admission there had been no massacre. The Palestinians had suggested that most of the bodies were buried beneath the rubble of houses bulldozed by Israeli troops. No digging for bodies was taking place here, and there was no stench that could have come from decaying human flesh. The earlier Palestinian claims had sparked international outrage and prompted the Bush administration to press Israel to accept a fact-finding mission by the United Nations, an organization that the Jewish state regards as having a pro-Palestinian bias. Mr. Kadoura yesterday showed a reporter for The Washington Times the official Palestinian list of those who died. It contained 50 names. Six additional bodies, he said, had not been identified. He no longer used the ubiquitous Palestinian charge of "massacre" and instead portrayed the battle as a "victory" for Palestinians in resisting Israeli forces. "Here the Israelis, who tried to break the Palestinian willpower, have been taught a lesson," Mr. Kadoura said. He insisted that Israel had tried but failed, thanks to the heavy fighting, to destroy the entire warren of homes in the camp that had housed 11,000 people. The destruction, pictured graphically on television, appeared linked to Israeli bulldozing of the houses from which the remnant of the resistance forces were firing. In fact, it covers the size of a large football field and constitutes only about 10 percent of the housing in the camp, and a far smaller proportion of the housing in the city, which was largely left untouched by the Israeli incursion. The figures shown to The Times included 233 injured persons, mainly men. The figures revealed that 18 persons had been injured and one had died after the fighting had ended, the result of accidentally detonating either shells left after the fighting, or booby traps that were set by Palestinian gunmen throughout the camp. A British expert attached to the International Red Cross said these booby traps were almost identical to those used by the Irish Republican Army. The British claim suggested to analysts that IRA guerrillas were schooled in terrorist weaponry and irregular warfare, as were many radical guerrilla movements, in Palestinian, Syrian and Iranian training camps in Lebanon. >From behind a desk bedecked by portraits of Mr. Arafat, a string of past "martyrs" and of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, the Palestinian chief official in the city, who is also the Fatah leader, portrayed in an interview the events as another chapter in a long saga of resistance to foreign invaders - from Crusader times onward - that, he said, had made Jenin "the heart of Palestine" for centuries. The propaganda war continues, meanwhile, in the refugee camp itself. Families whose homes had been destroyed were ordered to sit and lie inside tents pitched near the destruction, to be available for interviews and filming with foreign reporters and photographers. At dusk, with the press opportunities concluded, they returned to houses offered to them in the undamaged city or in the rest of the refugee camp. Other young men, members of various factions, have been on duty in the camp's narrow streets, eager to conduct foreign correspondents to places where they say Israelis killed militants after they surrendered or had been captured. Others in the city say the resistance to the Israeli incursion had been carried out by only about 10 percent of the militants who had originally been in the area. Most had retreated into the hills or into city back streets as the Israelis entered the area, they said. Families living in houses directly opposite the destroyed area have told The Washington Times that Israeli soldiers, who temporarily occupied their houses just before the final battle began, treated them without violence and assured them: "You will not be harmed." They confined the 36 members of the Abu Khalil family to two rooms, allowing them out one by one, and set up a snipers' point upstairs through two holes in the wall - under a family framed message in Arabic: "There is No God but Allah and Mohammed is His Messenger." They confiscated identity cards but left them on the table before slipping out during the night. At the United Nations in New York, Undersecretary-General Kieran Prendergast said "a thorough, credible and balanced report on recent events in Jenin refugee camp would not be possible without the cooperation of the government of Israel." "Since it appears from today's Cabinet statement by Israel that the difficulties in the way of deployment of the fact-finding team will not be resolved anytime soon, the secretary-general is minded to disband the team," he told reporters after briefing the U.N. Security Council. Diplomats said Mr. Prendergast told council members that Mr. Annan was leaning toward disbanding the three-member team, which has been joined by numerous advisers. The team, which was to have arrived in Jenin on Saturday, remained in Geneva yesterday. The Security Council is to take up the issue of whether or not to disband the mission at a meeting today. The United States put forward the resolution adopted by the Security Council welcoming the dispatch of a U.N. team to find out what happened in Jenin during the Israeli military's attacks. Israel initially agreed to the idea, but subsequently raised questions over the composition of the team, its scope of inquiry, who could be called as a witness and what documents would be presented to the panel. Mr. Prendergast said that "with every passing day, it becomes more difficult to determine what happened" in Jenin. U.S. Ambassador John Negroponte said Mr. Annan was considering whether to let the fact-finding team begin its work in Geneva or "simply abandoning the mission on the assumption that satisfactory terms of reference could not be worked out." From shniad at sfu.ca Wed May 1 17:23:45 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:18 2006 Subject: [R-G] U.N.: Israelis blocking aid to camps - Fox News Message-ID: <200205012323.g41NNjTf029166@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.foxnews.com/printer_friendly_story/0,3566,51516,00.html Fox News Tuesday, April 30, 2002 U.N.: Israelis blocking aid to camps Geneva - Aid agencies are having trouble getting assistance to tens of thousands of Palestinians in desperate need of help following the Israeli incursions, U.N. officials said Tuesday. Rene Aquarone, spokesman for the U.N. Relief and Works Agency that looks after Palestinian refugee camps, blamed Israeli security measures such as road blocks that restrict access to and limit movement within Palestinian areas. "This is a crisis on top of an emergency," Aquarone said. Aquarone said the agency was having to rely on its international staff to drive aid convoys because its Palestinian staff was barred from entering Israel. "We are using everybody, from accounting staff to assistant secretaries-general, to make the convoys go," he said. There are severe shortages of food, cement and animal feed, he said. The agency has donated 275 tons of flour to the Palestinian authorities because they are unable to obtain it themselves. The lack of cement has forced the agency to stop 54 of 67 projects to generate jobs for Palestinians, he added. The World Bank estimates $300 million of damage was done to the Palestinian territories during the incursion, Aquarone said. That includes $42 million in the Jenin refugee camp and $111 million in the town of Nablus. Ross Mountain, the top U.N. relief coordinator in Geneva, said the biggest problems were unexploded ordnance - especially in Jenin and Nablus - and lack of shelter for those who have lost their homes. The Palestinian deputy health minister, Munzer Sharif, has expressed particular concern about the lack of access for health workers, a spokeswoman for the World Health Organization said. The collapse of immunization programs could lead to an outbreak of measles, while the lack of safe drinking water puts people at risk of getting cholera and other waterborne diseases, said the spokeswoman, Fadela Chaib. Chaib a plane carrying emergency health kits that had been blocked in Amsterdam for nearly a week because Israel refused to let it land had now been diverted to Amman, Jordan. "We are trying to get the kits to the West Bank by road," she said. The World Food Program said it was trying to buy 2,800 tons of flour for an emergency distribution to 265,000 particularly vulnerable Palestinians. Spokeswoman Christiane Berthiaume said WFP had not been able to make its normal deliveries of food for the past month. "We have reached about 100,000 people, but the big majority of them - 94,000 - are in Gaza. In the West Bank we have only been able to reach people in institutions like hospitals," she said. In Nablus, WFP estimates that 40,000 people - more than a third of population - are in urgent need of food aid, Berthiaume said. In Qalqilyah, 70 percent of the population is estimated to be living below the poverty line. From shniad at sfu.ca Wed May 1 17:24:57 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:18 2006 Subject: [R-G] Criticism does not equal anti-Semitism - SJ Mercury News Message-ID: <200205012324.g41NOvTf000146@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/news/opinion/3166209.htm The San Jose Mercury News April 30, 2002 Criticism does not equal anti-Semitism By Richard Cohen If I weren't a Jew, I might be called an anti-Semite. I have occasionally been critical of Israel. I have occasionally taken the Palestinians' side. I have always maintained that the occupation of the West Bank is wrong and while I am, to my marrow, a supporter of Israel, I insist that the Palestinian cause -- although sullied by terrorism -- is a worthy one. In Israel itself, these positions would hardly be considered remarkable. People with similar views serve in Parliament. They write columns for the newspapers. And while they are sometimes vehemently criticized -- such is the rambunctious nature of Israel's democratic din -- they are not called either anti-Semites or self-hating Jews. I cannot say the same about America. Here, criticism of Israel, particularly anti-Zionism, is equated with anti-Semitism. The Anti-Defamation League, one of the most important American Jewish organizations, comes right out and says so. "Anti-Zionism is showing its true colors as deep-rooted anti-Semitism," the organization says in a full-page ad that I have seen in The New Republic and other magazines. "No longer are the Arab nations camouflaging their hatred of Jews in the guise of attacking Israel." I feel compelled to pause here and assert my credentials. Few people have written more often about Arab anti-Semitism than I. I have come at this subject time and time again, so often that I have feared becoming a bore. Arab anti-Semitism not only exists, it is often either state-sponsored or state-condoned and it is only getting worse. It makes the Arabs look like fools. How can anyone take seriously a person who believes that Jews engage in ritual murder? But that hardly means that anti-Zionism -- hating, opposing, fighting Israel -- is the same as anti-Semitism, hating Jews anywhere on account of supposedly inherent characteristics. If I were a Palestinian living in a refugee camp, I might very well hate Israel for my plight -- never mind its actual cause -- and I even might not like Jews in general. After all, Israel proclaims itself the Jewish state. It officially celebrates Jewish holidays, including the Sabbath on Saturday. It allows the orthodox rabbinate to control secular matters, such as marriage, and, of course, it offers citizenship to any person who can reasonably claim to be Jewish. This so-called right of return permits such a person to "return" to a place where he or she has never been. Palestinians must find this simply astonishing. To equate anti-Zionists or critics of Israel in general with anti-Semites is to liken them to the Nazis or the rampaging mobs of the pogroms. It says that their hatred is unreasonable, unfathomable, based on some crackpot racial theory or some misguided religious zealotry. It dismisses all criticism, no matter how legitimate, as rooted in prejudice and therefore without any validity. No doubt there has been an upsurge of anti-Semitic incidents in Europe. But there has also been upsurge of legitimate criticism of Israel that is not in the least anti-Semitic. When Israel jailed and then deported four pro-Palestinian Swedes, two of whom are physicians, under the misguided policy of seeing all Palestinian sympathizers as enemies of the state, that is an action that ought to be condemned -- and the Swedes who have done so ought not be considered anti-Semites. When the same thing happened to a Japanese physician, that too ought to be condemned -- and it was, as it happens, in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz. A column by Gideon Levy made the point that Israel cannot reject and rebut all criticism by reciting the mantra, "The whole world is against us." The same holds for American Jews. To turn a deaf ear to the demands of Palestinians, to dehumanize them all as bigots, only exacerbates the hatred on both sides. The Palestinians do have a case. Their methods are sometimes -- maybe often -- execrable, but that does not change the fact that they are a people without a state. As long as that persists, so too will their struggle. The only way out of the current mess is for each side to listen to what the other is saying. To protest living conditions on the West Bank is not anti-Semitism. To condemn the increasing encroachment of Jewish settlements is not anti-Semitism. To protest the cuffing that the Israelis sometimes give the international press is not anti-Semitism, either. To suggest, finally, that Ariel Sharon is a rejectionist who provocatively egged on the Palestinians is not anti-Semitism. It is a criticism no more steeped in bigotry than the assertion that Yasser Arafat is a liar who cannot be trusted. That does not make me anti-Arab -- just a realist who is sick and tired of lazy labels. Richard Cohen is a columnist for the Washington Post. From LAMZ at sympatico.ca Thu May 2 11:46:01 2002 From: LAMZ at sympatico.ca (Lysander Zimmerman) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:18 2006 Subject: [R-G] 1.5 Million French Rally vs. Le Pen Message-ID: <003201c1f201$39e98960$33378d18@Indy1> ----- Original Message ----- From: "t r u t h o u t" To: "t r u t h o u t" Sent: Wednesday, May 01, 2002 9:08 PM Subject: 1.5 Million French Rally vs. Le Pen > t r u t h o u t | 05.02 > > 1.5 Million French Rally vs. Le Pen > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.02A.French.Rally.htm > > Fighting Erupts Near Bethlehem Church > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.02B.Fighting.Erupts.htm > > Levin Statement | Gas Prices: How Are They Really Set? > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.02C.Gas.Prices.htm > > Leahy, Kennedy, Boxer | Letter to Thompson on Medical Privacy > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.02D.Medical.Privacy.htm > > Reid Calls on President to Match Education Rhetoric with Resources > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.02E.Match.Education.htm > > Paul Krugman | Herd on the Street (The Economic Recovery That Isn't) > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.02F.PK.Street.htm > > Geoffrey Gray | The Carlyle Connection > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.02G.GG.Connection.htm > > Mike Ferner | War, Inc. > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.02H.MF.War.htm > > White House Stonewall: Day 68 > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.02I.Stonewall.htm > > NEW t r u t h o u t Petition / Poll | Should a 911 Probe Include the White House? > Results -- YES: 5551 -- NO: 80 | Keep it Coming - Spread the Word! > http://www.truthout.org/poll/911Probe.htm > > t r u t h o u t, is a non-profit independent news source. > http://www.truthout.org > > t r u t h o u t - Newsletter Sign-up (Free) : > https://www.truthout.org/membership/membership.htm > > _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/ > > t r u t h o u t | 05.01 > > Ridge Snubs Senate; Byrd Lashes Out > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.01A.Ridge.Byrd.htm > > Rice Defends Venezuelan Coup > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.01B.Rice.Coup.htm > > U.S. Promise on Jenin Won Arafat's Freedom Bush Offered Help With U.N. Fact-Finding > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.01C.US.Promise.htm > > Jordan Court Convicts Palestinians > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.01D.Court.Convicts.htm > > NRDC Issues Subpoena to Former Head of Energy Task Force > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.01E.Task.Force.htm > > Leader of 9/11 Probe Resigns Suddenly > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.01F.Leader.Resigns.htm > > Congress Cool to Bush Proposals > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.01G.Congress.Cool.htm > > U.S. Troops Land in Georgia > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.01H.Troops.Land.htm > > Vandals Attack British Synagogue > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.01I.Vandals.htm > > t r u t h o u t, is a non-profit independent news source. > http://www.truthout.org > > t r u t h o u t - Newsletter Sign-up (Free) : > https://www.truthout.org/membership/membership.htm > > _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/ > > t r u t h o u t | 04.30 > > American Navy 'Helped Venezuelan Coup' > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/04.30A.Coup.htm > > Deal to Free Arafat as Israel Enters Hebron > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/04.30B.Free.Deal.htm > > Musharraf: US Troops Are in Pakistan > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/04.30C.US.Troops.htm > > Powell Faces Opposition at Home > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/04.30D.Opposition.htm > > Salman Rushdie | France: Dangerous Illusions . . . > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/04.30E.Illusions.htm > > White House Stonewall: Day 66 > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/04.30F.Stonewall.htm > > ENRON Continued to Fill GOP Pockets While Under Investigation > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/04.30G.Enron.GOP.htm > > As Elections for Governor Loom, G.O.P. Leaders Worry > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/04.30H.GOP.Worry.htm > > Senate Probe Shows Gas Price Hiking > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/04.30I.Price.Hiking.htm > > t r u t h o u t, is a non-profit independent news source. > http://www.truthout.org > > t r u t h o u t - Newsletter Sign-up (Free) : > https://www.truthout.org/membership/membership.htm > > _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/ > > > --- > > Reader Comments : > > You are currently subscribed to truthout as: lamz@sympatico.ca > To remove click here mailto:leave-truthout-1220086U@lists.truthout.com > From LAMZ at sympatico.ca Thu May 2 11:51:15 2002 From: LAMZ at sympatico.ca (Lysander Zimmerman) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:18 2006 Subject: [R-G] Are you READY for May 4? Message-ID: <009d01c1f201$fdda5d40$33378d18@Indy1> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mike Pesa" To: Sent: Thursday, May 02, 2002 10:54 AM Subject: Are you READY for May 4? > *****Please forward EVERYWHERE!***** > > ARE YOU READY FOR MAY 4? > > The Kent State Anti-War Committee's Protest Against the Endless War is only a > few days away! Here is a MAJOR update. > > ****************************** > NOTE: Info on housing, rides, child care, legal issues, directions, weather, > food, and other issues that are not included in this email are all available > online at http://www.ksawc.org We strongly encourage anyone interested in our > events to visit the website. > > Also, if anyone is planning on attending the protest and can give someone a > ride, PLEASE sign up on the ride board (online) or email one of the people on > that board that needs a ride. > ****************************** > > ---------- > Contact the Kent State Anti-War Committee at: > > Website: http://www.ksawc.org (all of the info in this email is available > online) > Email: ksawc@yahoo.com > Phone: (330) 701-1833 > OCL Box 16, KSU, Kent, OH, 44240 > ---------- > > In this email: > > 1. Important changes in plans for protest > 2. Schedule of Events (including full list of speakers and musicians) > 3. Other Events on May 4 > 5. Latest list of endorsers (lots of new additions!) > > ---------- > > IMPORTANT CHANGES IN PLANS FOR PROTEST > > The rally will no longer be held on Front Campus! Given our options at the > time, we have decided it will be best to move the protest to Manchester Field, > in the center of campus, right behind the Student Center (see directions at > http://www.kent.edu/frntMaps/Search.asp ) There will be parking available > nearby, and signs directing people to the appropriate locations. > > Directly after the Rally, we will march across campus (starting at around 6:00 > PM), stopping at strategic and historic sites, including a "Pledge of > Resistence" at the place where four students were killed by the National Guard > on May 4, 1970. This march will end at the rock on Front Campus, at which > time the official protest will end. Any other events that may take place > (with the exception of Sunday's Anti-War Organizing Conference) are not the > responsibility of the Kent State Anti-War Committee. > > Below is the full list of events: > > ---------- > > SCHEDULE OF EVENTS > > There will be a Rally at 2:45 PM and a March at 6:00 PM. There will also be an > open participation Anti-War Organizing Conference on Sunday, May 5 at 10:00 > AM. Details below. (Also see Other Events on May 4.) > 2:45 PM: Permitted Rally at Manchester Field (note location change!) > > DJ Visine and DJ Diddle will spin. > > Welcome Speech by Kent State Anti-War Committee > > Rita Lasar (sister of WTC victim) > Jeff Patterson (first GI to resist Gulf War) > Holly Severson (for upcoming Michigan summit against repression of immigrants) > Manal Badwan (President of Muslim Student Association KSU) > > Music by Sue Jeffers > > Tom Grace (shot by National Guard on May 4, 1970) > Janette Habashi and Steve Sosebee (Palestinian Children's Relief) > Staughton Lynd (long-time labor rights activist from Youngstown, OH) > Burning River Revolutionary Anarchist Collective > > SOLIDARITY SPEECHES FROM: > > ~Mitchell Cohen (Green Party) > ~Kelli (Student Environmental Action Coalition) > ~All-African People's Revolutionary Party > ~Deb Calhoun > ~Letter from Mumia Abu-Jamal (political prisoner on death row) > read by Jeff Johnson (vice president-elect of Black United Students) > ~Revolutionary Communist Youth Brigade > > Music by Little Neddy Goes to War > > Chris Mahin (history columnist for the People's Tribune) > C. Clark Kissinger (former National Secretary of Students for a Democratic > Society) > Kent State Anti-War Committee Closing Speech > > MARCH TO END THE WAR > > March begins around 6:00 PM, starting from Manchester Field (directly after > the rally), going through campus, stopping at historically significant sites, > and ending at Front Campus. > > > SUNDAY, MAY 5 > > 10:00 AM Open participation Anti-War Organizing Conference > Governance Chambers (in Student Center) > > ---------- > > OTHER EVENTS ON MAY 4 > > ***** > Note: These are seperate events organized by other groups. They are not > affiliated with our protest, but we encourage everyone to attend them. > ***** > > 1. May 4th Task Force 32nd Annual Commemoration (including events on May 3rd) > > See http://dept.kent.edu/may4/32nd/32.htm > > 2. The Annual Jawbone Open Poetry Readings > > Brady's Cafe (Corner of Main and Lincoln) > Friday, May 3 and Saturday, May 4 @ 8:00 PM (sign up at 7:30 PM) > Sunday, May 5: Poetry/Potluck @ Fred Fuller Park (2:00 PM) > This free speech event has been an annual tradition in Kent for over 20 years. > All are welcome. > Call 330-673-6060 or 330-678-7473. > > 3. "Earth in Precarious Balance" Art Opening (May 4) > > N. Water St. Gallery (257 N. Water St.) > The Gallery is a treasured progressive enclave and a cool place to hang out. > There will also be a show in the connected Mantis "concert hall" that night. > Call 330-673-4970. > > Other events to be announced. > > ---------- > > LATEST LIST OF ENDORSERS > > Co-sponsors: > > KSU Muslim Student Association > KSU College Democrats > KSU Student Anti-Racist Action > > Endorsers: > > African United Front Circle > All-African People's Revolutionary Party > American Friends Service Committee African American Cultural Action Program > Buffalo State Students for Peace > Burning River Revolutionary Anarchist Collective > Cleveland Anti-Racist Action > Coalition for a Humane And New Global Economy > Coastal Convergence Society > Committee for Peace and Human Rights, Boston > Green Party USA > International Socialist Organization > Mad Anarchist Bakers' League > Mad Grandparents for Peace and Justice > North Texas Coalition for a Just Peace > Northeast Ohio Radical Action Network > Peaceful Booger Flingers > People's Fightback Center > Refuse and Resist! > SOA Watch NE > Student Environmental Action Coalition > Student Peace Initiative > Students Taking Action for a New Democracy (STAND) > Revolutionary Communist Party Youth Brigade (Cleveland chapter) > Touta Anarchist Collective (Toronto) > Towson Action Group > U.S. Greens Abroad (Tokyo) > Unknown News > Why War? > > Aaron Pieman Kay > Alice Copeland-Brown > Anna Gustavson > Brittany Conner > Carol Schiffler > Chris Pelton > Dennis Baer > Dr. Erk Erginer > Eric Sunde > Greg Coleridge > Holly Severson (Brooks) > Howard Zinn > Jessica Hamilton-Bowne > John Duerk > Katarina > Lori Price > Mary Kay A. Dranzo > Markham Wilson > Mitchel Cohen > Monica Edwards > Nathan Tice > Nick Speelman > Patricia Hilliard > Priscilla Schiltz > Priscilla Smith > Richard Chilson > Robert Patrick > Roger Pszonowsky > Ron Jacobs > Sue Jeffers > Steve Hamilton > Tom Walls > Trudy Bond > Walter Davis > > ********************************** > **** FORWARD THIS EVERYWHERE! **** > ********************************** > > Kent State Anti-War Committee > Website: www.ksawc.org > Email: ksawc@yahoo.com > Phone: (330) 701-1833 > OCL Box 16, KSU, Kent, OH, 44240 > > ----- > "You must be the change you wish to see in the world." > -Mahatma Gandhi > > http://www.kentchange.org (Economic Justice) > http://www.kentseed.org (Environment) > http://www.defenders.org (Endangered Species) From LAMZ at sympatico.ca Thu May 2 12:23:32 2002 From: LAMZ at sympatico.ca (Lysander Zimmerman) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:18 2006 Subject: [R-G] "Ratbots": Big Brother's Little Pet Message-ID: <000501c1f206$78520010$33378d18@Indy1> IF YOU THINK THIS MADNESS WILL BE LIMITED TO SEARCH AND RESCUE, THINK AGAIN!! If you think that this will be limited to rodents and animals, keep thinking...........THIS IS ONLY THE BIGINNING! ___________________________________________________________ Scientists unveil the Ratbot, a robot with whiskers http://www.independent.co.uk/story.jsp?story=291019 Rodent with newly developed brain implants and radio backpack could be used to find earthquake victims or detect land mines By Steve Connor Science Editor, Independent 02 May 2002 The age of the robotic rodent is upon us. A study has shown the movements of a live rat can be controlled by using a laptop computer, a radio and a set of microelectrodes implanted into the animal's brain. "Ratbot", as the creature has been named, could one day be used to rescue earthquake victims buried under rubble, seek out land mines or even, with the help of miniature video cameras, spy inside secret installations. Scientists used brain implants and tiny radio "backpacks" to guide five rats through a complex maze, composed of ladders, steps, hoops and ramps, from a distance of more than 500 yards. Human operators were able to steer the Ratbots through the obstacle course as if they were guiding intelligent robots, said Sanjiv Talwar, a researcher at the State University of New York, who helped to run the study, published in the journal Nature. "One can think of the guided rat as a very good robot platform capable of traversing terrain that modern robots are unable to do," Dr Talwar said yesterday. The experiment involved exploiting the principle that an animal can be trained to do tasks by stimulating "reward" regions of the brain that normally respond to food, drink and sex. Professor Patrick Bateson, an expert on animal behaviour at Cambridge University, said: "It's been known for a long time that animals will work like anything to get these rewards." In conventional animal training, a morsel of food can be used as a reward "re- inforcement". In laboratory tests going back 40 years scientists have shown that direct electrical stimulation of the brain's pleasure centres is just as good or even better. In this latest experiment, microelectrodes implanted directly into the reward centre of the rat's brain - a region called the medial forebrain bundle - were stimulated each time the rat made a move in the "correct" direction. At the same time, the scientists implanted another set of electrodes into the brain regions receiving nerve impulses from the right and left set of whiskers. The rats were trained to move to each side depending on which set of whiskers was stimulated. If they did it correctly they were given a "reward" to the medial forebrain bundle. The rats also quickly learnt to associate the stimulation of their brains' reward centres with simply walking forwards, even if this involved climbing or descending ladders or steps, or moving into the centre of a brightly lit room - something that most rats would avoid. Dr Talwar said, however, that there were clear limits to what each rat could be made to do. "The rats worked within their instincts. They appeared to finely calibrate their awareness of a difficult obstacle versus the pleasure they would receive if they overcame it," he said. Nevertheless, the rats were easily guided through pipes and across elevated runways and ledges, and could be instructed to climb, or jump from, any surface with a good foothold, such as a tree, the scientists write in Nature. "We were also able to guide rats in systematically exploring large, collapsed piles of concrete rubble, and to direct them through environments that they would normally avoid, such as brightly lit, open areas," they say. John Chapin, the leader of the research team and professor of physiology and pharmacology at the State University of New York, said that the rats could be made to "search" for an hour without showing any signs of getting tired or bored. "A search-and-rescue dog costs $60,000 [?43,000] to maintain and you cannot use them in very tight spaces," Dr Chapin said. "Nor could you use a dog to discover land mines, since the weight of the animal would detonate the explosive. A rat, however, being small and light, could sit on the mine without exploding it. "In addition, rats are more mobile than mechanical robots, which are often stymied by obstacles such as fences, rocks and debris. While robots would be useful in environments where a living thing could not survive, such as where there are fires or poisonous gases, the rat has rather sophisticated navigational skills developed over 200 million years of evolution. It makes sense to make good use of the animal's abilities," Dr Chapin said. The Chapin team published work in 1999 showing that rats could be trained to operate a robotic arm using the power of thought alone. In this experiment, each rat had microelectrodes implanted into the region of the brain that controlled the movement of its limbs. The animals were then trained to operate a lever with a foot to release food. After a period of time, the operation of the lever was taken over by a mechanical arm and each rat quickly learnt that the mere thought of using its limbs to operate the lever still resulted in access to the food. Another set of experiments a year later on monkeys showed that the same principle could be applied to primates. In this test the scientists even managed to get the monkeys to use mind control to operate robotic arms over the internet some 600 miles away. One aim of the research is to develop a means whereby severely paralysed patients could control the movements of robot arms and other devices by the power of thought alone. According to Dr Talwar, the latest work on Ratbot could lead to a way of controlling a robotic arm with the extra help of the sense of touch. "The larger idea behind the study was to continue our research in neurorobotics," Dr Talwar said. "We wanted to get an idea about how effectively can animals sense brain- stimulation cues. This would enable us to evaluate the feasibility of a 'sensory' prosthesis, which could enable paralysed patients to experience sensations such as touch and so be able to better control an artificial limb through a suitable brain-machine interface," he said. If this research continues to advance, the age of Ratbot could be a prelude to the day when paralysed humans could operate artificial limbs, just like the half-human cyborgs of science fiction. Animal Magic: From dogs to dolphins Search-and-rescue dogs The St Bernard is thought to be the oldest working dog specifically bred for search-and-rescue missions. Its origin is inextricably linked to the Great St Bernard Pass which provides a snow-bound route between Switzerland and Italy. Guide dogs for the blind Dogs were trained as guides for the blind as early as 1819 in Vienna but it took a further 100 years for the movement to take hold internationally, boosted by the number of blinded soldiers returning from the First World War. Workhorse elephants Training of elephants begins when they are three years old and is carried out by a "mahout" and his apprentice who will bond with the animal for life. A mature elephant can lift 1,500lb (700kg) and haul a log for more than half a mile. Cormorant fishing Cormorants are first-rate fishing birds and are easily able to seek out and capture their prey. Chinese fishermen train their cormorants to fish off boats, tying their necks with string to prevent the birds swallowing their catch. Military dolphins At the height of the Cold War both the US and the USSR had secret programmes involving dolphins. The Soviet navy had a stable of about 70 dolphins stationed in the Black Sea, trained to hunt down divers in military ports. http://www.independent.co.uk/story.jsp?story=291019 From debsian at pacbell.net Thu May 2 14:08:45 2002 From: debsian at pacbell.net (michael pugliese) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:18 2006 Subject: [R-G] FW: History of May Day by Peter Linebaugh Message-ID: <020502122.47323@webbox.com> >--- Original Message --- >From: michael pugliese >To: asdnet@igc.topica.com >Date: 5/2/02 11:21:30 AM > > > http://slash.autonomedia.org/article.pl?sid=02/05/02/1029240 > > > >------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> >Buy Stock for $4 >and no minimums. >FREE Money 2002. >http://us.click.yahoo.com/orkH0C/n97DAA/Ey.GAA/kCpqlB/TM >---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> > > > > From shniad at sfu.ca Thu May 2 17:06:12 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:18 2006 Subject: [R-G] China awards medals to entrepreneurs - FT Message-ID: <200205022306.g42N6CTf024246@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> The Financial Times May 1, 2002 China awards medals to entrepreneurs By Richard McGregor in Shanghai China's ruling Communist party has extended its official embrace of private enterprise by awarding May Day "Labour Medals" to four businessmen for their contribution to the mainland's "socialist economy". The awards follow the pioneering decision last year by Jiang Zemin, China's president, to allow entrepreneurs to join the party, a decision which legitimised the existing membership of many business people. Two of the four businessmen given the May Day medal are already party members. Another 17 businessmen in Shaanxi province were also named "model workers" on Wednesday. "This is a breakthrough," said Li Qisheng, vice-chairman of All China Federation of Trade Unions. "Those entrepreneurs, who operate legally, and work hones tly, are also contributors to socialist construction. The awards have to keep pace with time and tide." As recently as last year, a move to award labour medals to entrepreneurs was rejected. The party and its organs are playing catch-up to the most significant trend in the Chinese economy, the blossoming of the private sector, which now accounts for an estimated one third of output. The private economy has grown despite many constraints, like the continuing difficulty of getting loans from state banks used to lending to government enterprises, and an absence of transparent and legally-secure property rights. The four businessmen are a wine maker, the boss of a fruit juice company, a leather shoemaker and pharmaceutical executive. Two are from Zhejiang province, near Shanghai, which has a thriving private economy, partly because state-owned enterprises have traditionally been weak there. Private companies now account for about half of the enterprises in Shanghai, the commercial capital. The private sector has long been associated by some party officials with lawlessness, which would have been intolerable in Shanghai, a showcase for the whole country. One of the businessmen awarded the medal was Wang Zhentao, of the Zhejiang Aokang Group, a shoe maker in Wenzhou, where the majority of companies are famously private. "The status of us private entrepreneurs has really been raised," he said. Despite Wenzhou's reputation for counterfeiting, Mr Wang has run his own innovative anti-piracy campaign by giving each pair of shows a coded number to authenticate its brand. http://news.ft.com/ft/gx.cgi/ftc?pagename=View&c=Article&cid=FT381LZBP0D&liv e=true&tagid=ZZZC19QUA0C&subheading=asia%20pacific From shniad at sfu.ca Thu May 2 17:04:30 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:18 2006 Subject: [R-G] The Imperial Counter-offensive - James Petras Message-ID: <200205022304.g42N4UTf022918@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.canadiandimension.mb.ca/frame.htm Canadian Dimension vol.36 no.2 March/April 2002 The Imperial Counter-offensive: Contradictions, Challenges and Opportunities by James Petras The commonly heard expression, "After September 11, 2001 the world has changed," has been given many different meanings. The most frequent sense explicitly stated by Washington, echoed by the European Union, and amplified by the mass media is that as a result of September 11, a whole new era is ushered in, a new "historical period" in which a new set of priorities, alliance and political relations are "established." The clear intent of the Bush Administration was to launch a worldwide crusade against opponents of U.S. power, and, in the process, reverse the decline in order to rebuild a new imperial order. Washington's perspective of periodicizing a new historical era from September 11, however, reflects its own losses and vulnerabilities. From the perspective of the Third World (and perhaps beyond) the "new era" starts on October 7, 2001, the date of the massive U.S. intervention and carpet bombing of Afghanistan. October 7 is important because it signals the start of a major worldwide offensive against adversaries of the U.S. under a very elastic and loose definitions of "terrorism", "terrorist havens," and "terrorist sympathizers". It clearly marks a new military offensive against opponents and competitors to U.S. imperial power, including domestic dissent. It is important to understand the meaning of the term "new epoch" because much of what is happening is not new but rather a continuation and deepening of ongoing imperial military aggression, which precedes September 11 and October 7. Several significant factors establish the parameters and content for this essay. The first is the decline in U.S. political and economic power throughout the 1990s in key areas of the world, particularly in the mid-East/Gulf region, Latin America, Asia and Europe . This decline was accompanied by an increase in U.S. influence in the less important Balkan states of Kosova, Macedonia and Serbia. The second factor is the vast expansion of U.S. economic interests via its multinational corporations (MNCs) and banks into the Third World and the gradual weakening of the client regimes supporting that expansion. Clearly the international financial institutions (IFIs) like the World Bank (WB) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) had so drained the wealth of local economies via their structural adjustment policies (SAP), free-trade doctrines and privatization directives that the client states were fragmenting and weakening and rife with corruption as private-sector elites and politicians pillaged the treasury. The weakening of the imperial "control structure" meant that the traditional, almost exclusive dependence on the IFIs for surplus extraction was becoming inadequate. The decline of "indirect" imperial control over the impoverished and devastated Third World states required a "new imperialism," according to Financial Times journalist Martin Wolf. As Wolf argues "To tackle the challenge of the failed [pillaged and depleted] state what is needed is not pious aspirations but an honest and organized coercive force." In other words imperial wars, like in Afghanistan, Yugoslavia, etc., must be accompanied by new imperialist conquests - recolonization is the "new imperialism", a process already underway in Latin American air, land and sea space. DECLINING U.S. POWER >From the end of the Gulf War and the Bush (Senior) Presidency to October 7, 2001, the U.S. won military conflicts in the Balkans and Central America (peripheral regions) while suffering a serious loss of influence in more strategic regions. Similarly the U.S. economy went through a miniature speculative boomlet between 1995 and 1999 and then suffered a deepening recession entering the new Millenium. The combined peripheral victories and speculative bubble hid the deepening structural weakness. The losses in U.S. influence can be briefly summarized. In the Middle East, the U.S. strategy of overthrowing or isolating the Iranian government and the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein was a total failure. The regimes not only survived but effectively broke the U.S. boycott. U.S. sanctions against Iran were de facto broken by most of U.S. "allies" including Japan, the EU, the Arab states, etc. Iran was accepted among the revitalized OPEC countries and signed nuclear power agreements with Russia and oil contracts with Japan. Iran signed investment and trade agreements with every major country except the U.S. and even there American MNCs, working through third parties, became involved in Iranian trade. Iraq was reintegrated into OPEC and was accepted as a member at meetings of the Gulf States, at Arab summits and at international Islamic conferences. Iraq sold million of "clandestine" barrels of oil via "contrabandists' through Turkey and Syria, clearly with the foreknowledge of the "transit regimes' and the Western European consumers. The Palestinian uprising and the unanimous support it received from Arab regimes (including U.S. clients) isolated the U.S., which remained closely tied to the Israeli state. In North Africa, Libya developed strong economic ties with the EU and its oil companies, particularly with Italy, and diplomatic relations with many NATO countries. These three strategic oil-producing countries, labeled as prime targets of U.S. policy, increased their influence and ties with the rest of the world, thus weakening the U.S. stranglehold in the region immediately following the Gulf War. Clearly Bush Senior's "New World Order" was in shambles. Another major sign of declining U.S. power was found in the massive growth of trade surpluses accumulated in Asia and the EU at U.S. expense. In the year 2000 the U.S. ran up a $430-billion trade deficit. Western Europe's 350 million consumers increasingly purchased European-made goods - over two-thirds of EU trade was inter-European. In Latin America, European MNCs, particularly the Spanish outbid U.S. competitors in buying up lucrative privatized enterprises. Politically, especially in Latin America, U.S. dominance was being severely tested particularly by the formidable guerrilla movements in Colombia, by Venezuela's President Chavez and by the mass movements in Ecuador, Brazil and elsewhere. The collapse of the Argentine economy, the general economic crises in the rest of the continent and the significant loss of legitimacy of U.S. client regimes were other indicators of a weakening of U.S. power in its neo-colonized provinces. The massive growth of the "anti-globalization movement" particularly its "anti-capitalist" elements throughout Western Europe, North America and elsewhere, challenged the power of Washington to impose new, imperial-friendly, new investment and trading rules. GOING UNILATERAL Faced with its declining influence in strategic regions, a growing economic crises at home, the end of the speculative (IT, biotech, fibre-optic) bubble, Washington decided to begin militarizing its foreign policy (via Plan Colombia) and to aggressively pursue comparative advantages via unilateral state decisions: abrogating treaty agreements (the ABM missile agreement with Russia, the Kyoto Agreement, the International Human Rights Court, the anti biological warfare and anti-personnel/mining agreements, etc). Unilateral action was seen as a way of reversing the relative decline, combining regional military action and economic pressure. To counter the decline of U.S. influence in Latin America and increase its control, Washington pushed the Latin American Free Trade Agreement (ALCA in Spanish) to limit European competition and increase U.S. dominance. However opposition was strong in four of the five key countries in the region; Brazil, Venezuela, Colombia and Argentina. September 11, (following the bombing of the U.S. battleship Cole in Yemen, the attacks on American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania and the previous attempt to bomb the World Trade Center) was another indication of the relative decline in U.S. power, this time of Washington's incapacity to defend the centres of financial and military power within the empire. September 11 is and is not a significant date. It is not because it continued to mark the relative decline of U.S. influence. It is because it becomes the turning point for a major counter-offensive to reverse the decline and reconstruct a U.S.-centered "New World Order." THE OCTOBER 7 COUNTER OFFENSIVE Washington's declaration of war against Afghanistan has two important phases: the engineering of a U.S.-dominated broad alliance based on opposition to the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, and later the conversion of this anti-terrorist front into a political instrument to support the U.S. military intervention in Afghanistan and beyond. The clear intent of the Bush Administration was to launch a worldwide crusade against opponents of U.S. power, and, in the process, reverse the decline in order to rebuild a new imperial order. From the onset, the massive bombing attacks and the invasion by hundreds of Special Forces, on kill-and-destroy missions, were intended to obliterate domestic objections to future ground wars and new military interventions. Equally important, the massive slaughter and displacement of millions of civilians served the explicit purpose of political intimidation directed at forcing real or imagined state adversaries to accept U.S. dominance and control over their foreign and domestic policies, as well as to threaten social movements that the same violence could be directed against them. WASHINGTON'S WAR ALLIANCE The so-called "anti-terrorist alliance" has been melded into a War Alliance (including all the major NATO countries). All the major military and political decisions down to the tactical level are taken exclusively and without the least consultation by Washington. In other words, the War Alliance is a continuation of Washington's previous unilateralism, only now they have successfully re-asserted dominance over the EU countries. While Tony Blair's hyper-kinetic activity on behalf of Washington's war has elicited praise from the President and the U.S. mass media, it has not in the least led to any sharing of decision-making power. At least in this first phase of the U.S. counter-offensive, Washington has reasserted its domination over Europe. By making "anti-terrorism" the dominant theme in every international and regional forum (APEC, UN, OAS) Washington hopes to undermine horizontal divisions between rich and poor countries and classes and replace it with a vertical ideological-military polarization between those who support or resist U.S. defined "terrorist" adversaries and military intervention. A WAR AGAINST DISSENT Many regimes have already seized upon this military definition of socio-economic realities to repress popular and left movements and liberation organizations in the Middle East, Latin American and Central Asia. The multiplication of "anti-terrorist" purges by several client regimes serves Washington's policy perfectly, as long as the newly labeled terrorist movements also oppose U.S. policy and as long as their authoritarian clients accept the New Imperial Order. Washington's threat of indefinite and extended wars of imperial conquest has been predictably accompanied by repressive legislation that in effect confers dictatorial powers upon the President. All Constitutional guarantees are suspended and all foreign-born terrorist suspects become subject to military tribunals in the U.S. - no matter what their particular geographical location. There is a broad consensus that the war-making powers assumed by the Executive violate the letter and intent of the Constitution and the norms of a democratic regime. The argument by the defenders of authoritarianism that these clearly dictatorial measures are temporary is not convincing given the President's position that we are in for a long and extended period of warfare. In other words, authoritarianism and engagement in aggressive imperialist wars go together, obliterating the democratic republican vision of the American Revolution. MILITARY KEYNESIANISM WILL NOT WORK The resurgence of empire building at a time of deepening economic recession is a problematic strategy. While the Administration slashes taxes for the rich, the war increases public expenditures - putting deep strains on the budget and the mass of taxpayers. Military Keynesianism may stimulate a few sectors of the economy but will not reverse the sharp decline in profits for the capitalist sector as a whole. Moreover, stretching the repressive apparatus of client regimes to secure their acquiescence. will not expand overseas markets for U.S. exports. In fact, overseas conflicts will shrink markets, deepening the negative external accounts of the U.S. economy. More significantly the current military approach to empire building in the post Afghan period (phase two) threatens to destabilize the economies of Europe, Japan and the U.S.'s mid-East states. A military attack and occupation of Iraq would certainly disrupt the flow of oil to Europe and Japan, destabilize domestic politics in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf and Middle Eastern countries. Fear of the destabilizing effects of phase-two empire building has already led to dissent even among Washington's most servile European followers in England. Nevertheless, given Washington's imperial vision, unilateral approach and access to alternative sources of oil (Mexico, Venezuela, Ecuador, Alaska, Canada, etc.) a military attack on Iraq could serve two strategic objectives - weaken European competitors and eliminate Iraq as a potential regional rival. Bombing Iraq would damage EU economies and alienate its two major Arab clients (Saudi Arabia and Egypt) but Washington has demonstrated it can brush off European objections and still secure their acquiescence. A new U.S. war, however, could create uncertainty among investors worldwide. A war induced European decline might improve the relative position of the U.S., but its economy would decline in absolute terms. In focusing exclusively on pursuing a handful of supposed terrorists, President Bush strains at gnats and swallows camels. The overall damage to both the EU and the U.S. economies resulting from a new war far exceeds any possible losses resulting from terrorists. The collapse of the financial architecture and energy supplies of imperial states can bring down an empire far more quickly and with greater certainty than any real or imagined terrorist network. THE COUNTER-OFFENSIVE: LATIN AMERICA The imperial counter-offensive is worldwide. In the hierarchy of regions to reconquer, Latin America stands out as second, after the Middle East. It is the region that has provided the U.S. with its only favourable trade balances. Its ruling and affluent classes have drained hundreds of billions in illegal transfers to U.S. banks, and the U.S. economy has received almost a trillion dollars in profits, interest payments, royalties and other transfers over the last decade. Latin American's client regimes usually support U.S. positions in international forums and provide nominal military forces in its interventionary forays, thus providing a fig leaf for what are in effect unilateral actions. Washington identified the Colombian peasant based guerrilla movements (the FARC/ELN), the most powerful challenge to its dominance in the hemisphere as a "terrorist" group. Controlling or influential in over 50 per cent of the country municipalities by the mid-1990s, the advance of the FARC/ELN, together with the independent foreign policy of the Chavez regime in Venezuela and the revolutionary government in Cuba, represent an alternative pole to the servile peon presidents of the continent serving the empire. Beginning in the late Clinton's Presidency and deepening during the Bush Administration, the U.S. declared total war on the popular insurgency. Plan Colombia and later the Andean Initiative were essentially war strategies that preceded the Afghan War but served to highlight the new imperial counter-offensive. Washington allocated $1.5 billion in military aid to the Colombian military and its paramilitary surrogates. Hundreds of special forces were sent to direct operations in the field. U.S. mercenary pilots were subcontracted from private firms to engage in chemical warfare in the poppy fields of Colombia. Paramilitary forces multiplied under the protection and promotion of the military command. Air space, sea coasts and river estuaries were colonized by U.S. armed forces. Military bases were established in El Salvador, Ecuador and Peru to provide logistical support. U.S. officials established a direct operational presence in the Defense Ministry in Bogota. The worldwide counter-offensive of October 7 deepened the militarization process in Colombia. Under U.S. direction the Colombian air force violates the airspace over the demilitarized zone where the FARC and the Pastrana regime negotiate. Illegal cross-border forays into the zone led to conflicts. The State Department labeling the FARC/ELN as "terrorists" puts them on the list of targets to be assaulted by the U.S. military machine. Under the Bush-Rumsfeld Doctrine, half of Colombia is a haven for terrorists, and thus subject to total war. The imperial war fever caused the State Department to send an official delegation to Venezuela to bludgeon the Chavez government to support the imperial offensive. According to officials in the Venezuela Foreign Ministry, when Chavez condemned terrorism and the U.S. war, the State Department threatened the government with reprisals in the best traditions of mafia dons. Latin America is today half colonized: its bankers, politicians, generals and most of its bishops stand by and for the Empire. They want deeper "integration". The other half of Latin America, the vast majority of its workers, peasants, Indians, lower-middle-class public employees and, above all, its tens of millions of unemployed who are exploited by the empire, reject and resist it. We are entering a period of intensified warfare, constant military threats, savage bombings, wholesale massacres, and tens of millions of displaced persons. The sites of violent social conflict are no longer confined to the Third World, though that is where the people will pay the heaviest price. Will this period of war also be a period of revolutions - as in the past? Can the U.S. sustain a sequence of wars without undermining its own economy? Can it survive by destabilizing its European and Japanese competitors but also its trading and investment partners? THE IMPERIAL STATE IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN EVER There are clear indications that the economic bases of the U.S. empire are weakening. Economically the U.S. manufacturing sector has been in recession for 18 months and continuing into 2002. Hundreds of billions of dollars invested in information technology, fibre optics and biotech ventures have been lost. As revenues plummet thousands of firms go bankrupt. Both the "old" and "new" economies are in deep and prolonged crises. The financial and speculative stock market sectors are heavily dependent on volatile political-psychological circumstances in the U.S. and in the world economy. The vertical decline in the stock market following September 11, and the sharp recovery following October 7, reflect the volatility. Overseas wealthy investors as well as their U.S. counterparts invest in the U.S. as much for political as for economic reasons: they seek safe and stable havens for their private fortunes. September 11 shook their confidence, because it demonstrated that the very centres of economic and military power were vulnerable to attack and destruction. Hence the massive flight. The October 7 attack, the massive world-wide counter-offensive of the Empire, and the destruction of Afghanistan, restored investor confidence and led to a significant influx of capital and the temporary recovery of the stock market. The total-war strategy adopted by the Pentagon was as much to restore investor confidence about the invincibility and security of imperial power as it was for any political reason or even any future oil pipeline. Stock-market behaviour, particularly large-scale, long-term foreign investors in the U.S. stock and bond market, seem to be influenced as much by "security and safety reasons as the actual performance of the U.S. economy. There are limits, however, to this political basis of investment. Prolonged negative growth and declining profits (or increasing losses) will most certainly eventually end the recovery and produce a sharp decline in the stock market. As the economic foundations of empire weaken, the role of the imperial state increases. The empire becomes even more dependent on state intervention, revealing the close ties between the imperial state and investors, including the MNCs. Equally significant, the military components of the imperial state play an increasingly dominant role in re-establishing "investor confidence" by smashing and intimidating adversaries, buttressing faltering neo-colonial regimes, and imposing favourable economic accords (LAFTA) for U.S. investors and prejudicial to Euro-Japanese competitors (by military action in the Gulf and Middle East). The old imperialism of the eighties and nineties that depended more on the IFI's (WB and IMF) is being supplanted and/or complemented by the new imperialism of military action: the Green Berets replace the bow tie functionaries of the IMF/WB. The centrality of the imperial state in conquering and expanding U.S. power has refuted the assumptions of those leading theoreticians of the anti-globalization movement like Susan George, Tony Negri, Ignacio Ramonet, Robert Korten, etc, who think in terms of the "autonomy of global corporations". Their emphasis on the central role of the world market in creating poverty, dominance and inequality is in the present context an anachronism. As the Euro-American imperial states send troops to conquer and occupy more countries, destroy, displace and impoverish millions, there is a great need to shift from anti-globalization to anti-imperialist movements, from the false assumptions of autonomous MNC-dominated "superstates" to the reality of MNCs tied to imperial states. The new imperialism is based on military intervention (Afghanistan/Balkans), colonization (military bases) and terror (Colombia). From the wars in Iraq and the Balkans to Afghanistan, the imperial juggernaut advances, each more horrendous human catastrophe justified by an even greater barrage of propaganda about humanitarian missions. The imperial offensive after October 7 is based on strategic and economic imperatives and has nothing to do with the "clash of civilizations". The U.S. empire includes Muslim states (Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey, Morocco, Bosnia, Albania, etc.), Jewish states (Israel), as well as secular, nominally Christian regimes. What defines the U.S. imperial offensive is not permanent allies (of one religion/civilization or another), but permanent interests. In the Balkans and earlier in Palestine and Afghanistan, Washington promoted fundamentalist Muslims and drug traffickers against secular nationalists and socialists. Yesterday's Muslim clients (Taliban) are, in some places, today's enemies. The thread that unifies these changing alliances is the need to defend imperial spheres of domination. The apparent "hypocrisy" or "double standard" of the imperial elites exists only in the eyes of the beholder who mistakenly believed in the original propaganda of the empire and now feel "betrayed" by the switch in imperial clients. CONTRADICTIONS OF EMPIRE While the military machinery of the imperial state promotes and defends the interests of American MNCs, it is not the most cost-efficient service provider. The multibillion-dollar overseas expenditures far exceed the immediate benefits to the MNCs and neither reverse the declining rate of profits nor open new markets, particularly in the regions of maximum military engagement. Military intervention expands the regions of colonization without increasing the returns to capital. The net result is that imperial wars, in their current form, undermine non-speculative capitalist investment, even as it symbolically assures overseas investors. As in Central America, the Balkans and now in Afghanistan and Colombia, the U.S. is more interested in destroying adversaries and establishing client regimes than in large-scale, long-term investments in "reconstruction." After large military spending for conquest, budget priorities shift to subsidizing U.S. MNCs, and lowering taxes for the wealthy - there are no more "Marshall Plans." Postwar reconstruction does not intimidate possible adversaries; B-52 carpet bombing does. The military victor in the present conjuncture leaves unsettled the consolidation of a pro-imperial client regime. Just as the U.S. financed and armed the fundamentalist victory over the secular nationalist Afghan regime in 1990 and then withdrew, leading to the ascendancy of the anti-Western Taliban regime, today's victory and withdrawal is likely to have similar results within the next decade. The gap between the warmaking capacity of the imperial state and the weakness of its capacity to revitalize the economies of the conquered nations is a major contradiction. An even more serious contradiction is found in the aggressive effort to impose neoliberal regimes and policies especially as the export markets they were designed to service are collapsing and external flows of capital are drying up. The deepening recession in the U.S., Japan and the EU has severely damaged the most loyal and subservient neoliberal client states, particularly in Latin America. The prices of the "specialized" exports that drive the neoliberal regimes have collapsed: exports of coffee, petrol, metals, sugar, as well as textiles, clothes and other manufactured goods elaborated in the "free trade zones," have suffered from sharp drops in prices and glutted markets. The imperial powers have responded by pressing for greater "liberalism" in the South while raising protective tariffs at home and increasing subsidies for exports. Tariffs in the imperial countries on imports from the Third World are four times higher than those on imports from other imperial countries. The highly visible role of the imperial state in imposing the neomercantilist system politicizes the growing army of unemployed and poorly paid workers, peasants and public employees. The collapse of overseas markets means that less foreign exchange can be earned to pay foreign debts. Less exports sold, means less capacity to import essential foodstuffs and capital goods to sustain production. In Latin America the export strategy upon which the whole imperial edifice is built is crumbling. Unable to import, Latin America will be forced to produce locally or do without. But the definitive rupture with the export strategy and subordination to empire will not come about because of internal contradictions. It requires political intervention. OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES FOR THE LEFT In the short run the Left faces the full thrust of Washington's imperial counteroffensive, with all that implies in terms of increased bellicosity, threats and greater subservience from ruling client elites. Nevertheless, while this new military-led imperialist effort at "reconquest" is underway, it faces serious practical, ideological and political obstacles. For one thing, the offensive takes place in the face of a major political resurgence of the left in various strategic countries and a serious decline in the neoliberal economies. In Colombia, Brazil, Argentina, Ecuador and Bolivia, powerful socio-political movements have emerged and have consolidated influence over important popular constituencies, while the incumbent client regimes are deeply discredited, in many cases with single-digit popularity ratings. This situation presents dangers and opportunities. Dangers from the increasingly militarized and repressive response pushed by Washington and echoed by its Latin client regimes. Opportunities from the fact that the resurgent Left has not suffered a major defeat in this period (comparable to 1972-76) and is in a strong position to make the leap from protest to power. The current crisis is systemic. It not only affects workers and unemployed, but the very mechanisms of capital accumulation. What capital is accumulated in Latin America is stored in overseas accounts as "dead wealth." It is evident to any but the most willfully blind academics, of which there are not a few, that neoliberalism is dead and that the new, neomercantilist imperial system offers no room for "market choices." In this perspective, what is essential for converting these objective opportunities into substantial structural changes is political power. The social movements have mobilized millions. They have realized innumerable changes at the local level, created a new and promising level of social consciousness . In some cases they control or influence local governments and have secured concessions via mass pressure from the dominant classes. However there are several as-yet-unresolved issues before these movements can be said to prefigure a political alternative to state power. First, politically the movements espouse a series of programmatic demands and alternatives which are positive and importa From shniad at sfu.ca Thu May 2 17:11:53 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Waging Imperial War - Harvard Magazine Message-ID: <200205022311.g42NBrTf028798@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.harvardmagazine.com/on-line/050218.html Harvard Magazine May-June 2002 Volume 104, Number 5 The Future of War and the American Military Demography, technology, and the politics of modern empire by Stephen Peter Rosen The people who run the American military have to be futurists, whether they want to be or not. The process of developing and building new weapons takes decades, as does the process of recruiting and training new military officers. As a result, when taking such steps, leaders are making statements, implicitly or explicitly, about what they think will be useful many years in the future. It is not easy being a futurist. The first effort by the Bush administration to review defense policy, in 2001, did not change much. It was "conservative," and assumed that the world would change slowly and incrementally. Sometimes it does, but often it has not, as events at the end of the Cold War and in September 2001 demonstrated. In 2002, the war in Afghanistan will encourage a harder look at that conservative approach. Yet it is not easy to think clearly about how to change. Often, when we think we are making bold leaps of imagination, we are only projecting the recent past out into the indefinite future. Before September 11, much of the thinking in the Pentagon about the future anticipated replays of the 1991 war against Iraq, along with limited peacekeeping operations. After September 11, we now act as if the future of war will be dominated by the fight against terrorism. In both cases, there was a powerful tendency to assume that what had happened most recently would continue to happen. How might we try to think differently about the future for military planning purposes? One useful way to begin is to identify trends-ongoing processes that have considerable momentum-that are likely to continue into the future with relatively limited, or only gradual, changes. Demographics is one of them. The demographic decline and collapse of public health in Russia are well underway, and it is hard to see how they could be reversed in one generation. This is a trend that makes a resurgence of Russian national power in the next 20 years unlikely. The aging and contraction of the population of Europe and Japan are also striking, and make them unlikely centers of power in the future. The position of Europe is particularly interesting, since the countries across the Mediterranean from Europe are growing in population, and there are already large Islamic populations in Europe with higher birth rates than the non-Islamic populations. The advances in information technology will continue, along with the diffusion of the ability to construct nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons. Politically, the dominance of democracies and international institutions in Europe seems likely to insure relative international peace, while the comparative rarity of stable democracies in Asia-from Turkey to Korea-together with the social dislocations associated with the process of industrialization and economic growth, suggest a more turbulent future for that populous continent. These observations have some obvious implications for defense planners. The United States has begun to shift its military focus away from Europe to Asia. The diffusion of technologies relevant to the construction of weapons of mass destruction was the driving force behind efforts to develop defenses against ballistic missiles, and the attacks of September 11 and the anthrax attacks will increase the effort to thwart less conventional ways of delivering these weapons as well. Countering such weapons will mean not only shooting down missiles, but also finding and perhaps destroying them before they are launched. Even before September 11, a group of officers and defense intellectuals existed who advocated military transformation, a "Revolution in Military Affairs," or RMA, a term coined by Andrew Marshall, director of the Office of Net Assessment in the Pentagon. That office, more than any other, tries to focus on long-term problems of analysis and planning. RMA advocates argued that rapid improvement in information technologies-sensors, communications, data processing-would make it possible to find most large military systems, such as air bases, aircraft carriers, and tanks, and to destroy quickly whatever you could find. Maximizing mobility: a prototype second-generation unmanned Predator B surveillance craft in test flight The General Atomic Aeronautical System, Inc. The events of September 11 and thereafter would appear to strengthen their case. The use in Afghanistan of small, covert teams of soldiers, supported by high-tech sensors and long-range, highly accurate missiles, was very much like what RMA advocates within the U.S. Marine Corps had proposed in 1994 in a concept called "Sea Dragon." The use of unmanned aerial vehicles armed with precision-guided munitions, another RMA concept, has actually been employed in Afghanistan. Combining data collected from a number of sources and sending it in real time to bombers in flight toward Afghanistan to attack hidden or mobile targets was yet another RMA concept that was accelerated as a result of the war. The possible need to find Pakistani nuclear weapons, if the government of Pakistan turns against the United States, will also increase funding for information technologies that can obtain data about hidden weapons. The desire to identify and track individuals who may be embarked on terrorist missions will also push information technologies, probably combined with biotechnology, to the point where specific individuals can be pursued. The fact that the United States has such impressive military technology will lead adversaries who cannot match our technology to find an equalizer. Terrorism may be one, and nuclear weapons another. But war is not primarily about geography and technology. War is about politics, and the second way to begin thinking about the future of America's wars is to see our political goals as clearly as possible. It can be difficult for the United States to see itself accurately and to state its goals objectively. Let us start with some basics. The United States has no rival. We are militarily dominant around the world. Our military spending exceeds that of the next six or seven powers combined, and we have a monopoly on many advanced and not so advanced military technologies. We, and only we, form and lead military coalitions into war. We use our military dominance to intervene in the internal affairs of other countries, because the local inhabitants are killing each other, or harboring enemies of the United States, or developing nuclear and biological weapons. A political unit that has overwhelming superiority in military power, and uses that power to influence the internal behavior of other states, is called an empire. Because the United States does not seek to control territory or govern the overseas citizens of the empire, we are an indirect empire, to be sure, but an empire nonetheless. If this is correct, our goal is not combating a rival, but maintaining our imperial position, and maintaining imperial order. Planning for imperial wars is different from planning for conventional international wars. In dealing with the Soviet Union, war had to be avoided: small wars could not be allowed to escalate, or to divert us from the core task of defending Europe and Japan. As a result, military power was applied incrementally. Imperial wars to restore order are not so constrained. The maximum amount of force can and should be used as quickly as possible for psychological impact-to demonstrate that the empire cannot be challenged with impunity. During the Cold War, we did not try very hard to bring down communist governments. Now we are in the business of bringing down hostile governments and creating governments favorable to us. Conventional international wars end and troops are brought back home. Imperial wars end, but imperial garrisons must be left in place for decades to ensure order and stability. This is, in fact, what we are beginning to see, first in the Balkans and now in Central Asia. In addition to advanced-technology weaponry, an imperial position requires a large but lightly armed ground force for garrison purposes and as reassurance for allies who want American forces on their soil as symbols of our commitment to their defense. Finally, imperial strategy focuses on preventing the emergence of powerful, hostile challengers to the empire: by war if necessary, but by imperial assimilation if possible. China is not yet powerful enough to be a challenger to the American empire, and the goal of the United States is to prevent that challenge from emerging. China will be a major economic and military power in a generation, if it does not collapse into internal disorder as a consequence of economic, political, and religious grievances now clearly visible. If Chinese political reforms are successful, and the Chinese government ceases to be a dictatorship, it is likely that there will be a large-scale movement of power away from Beijing toward the provinces or regions that have their own ethnic or religious identities. The government of China will concentrate on improving the lives of its own people, and participating in the world order led by the United States. If, on the other hand, China continues to grow in power, but remains governed by a repressive dictatorship that sees enemies at home and threats abroad, it may try to intimidate Taiwan or Japan or India or South Korea. The United States could, if this problem emerged, wish to do what it does now: reassure its friends in Asia that we will not allow Chinese military intimidation to succeed. But this will be increasingly difficult, militarily, in the future, if China grows stronger, since China is geographically close to these countries, while the United States is far away. To make our Asian allies feel secure, defensive capabilities-to neutralize offensive missiles, sea mines, and submarines, for example-are likely to be especially valuable, despite the fact that the United States is now primarily in the business of generating offensive military power. Our country will need a strategy that enables it to demonstrate, as visibly as is possible, that it has the capability to defend its friends. We may also want unconventional weapons with which to remind China that activities that menace other Asian countries might do it more harm than good. For example, more sophisticated forms of information warfare, already visible in the interactions between Taiwan and China, might become an important component of the American arsenal. There is an alternative to empire. Instead of guaranteeing order around the world, the United States could help other countries defend themselves. The United States could, for example, decide that even though China should not be allowed to use its military capabilities to intimidate its Asian neighbors, we should not reassure those countries with American military power. But if we choose not to defend these countries, we cannot be sure they will continue to observe nuclear nonproliferation agreements. The United States now uneasily tolerates British, French, Israeli, Russian, North Korean, Indian, and Pakistani nuclear weapons. We may have to learn to tolerate nuclear weapons in the hands of one or more additional Asian democracies. In this world, the United States may choose to do less to safeguard the Asian balance of power, but will have less influence in Asia. Such a world may be riskier than the world we now live in. But as Pericles pointed out to his fellow Athenians, they might think it a fine thing to give up their empire, but they would find that empires are like tyrannies: they may have been wrong to take, but they are dangerous to let go. Stephen Peter Rosen '74, Ph.D. '79, is Kaneb professor of national security and military affairs and director of the Olin Institute for Strategic Studies in the department of government. From shniad at sfu.ca Thu May 2 17:48:07 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Likud ministers fear party vote against Palestinian state - Haaretz Message-ID: <200205022348.g42Nm7Tf026053@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> Haaretz May 3, 2002 Likud ministers fear party vote against Palestinian state By Yossi Verter, Ha'aretz Political Correspondent Senior Likud ministers have expressed concern about an upcoming Likud Central Committee vote against the establishment of a Palestinian state. Some were referring Wednesday night to the possibility that the party's central committee would vote "against any Palestinian state between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean," seeing it as a "political disaster." The ministers said that while the central committee could not prevent Prime Minister Ariel Sharon or any other prime minister from reaching an agreement with the Palestinians on such a state, the decision of the committee would be "greatly significant." "The world could interpret it as an unequivocal statement by a ruling party against any chance for peace with the Palestinians in the present and future," said one minister. "Because if the proposal is accepted, none of Sharon's statement's about agreeing to the establishment of a Palestinian state or 'painful concessions' for peace, will have any meaning." Senior ministers in the party said the world took official party decisions in Israel "seriously." One minister recalled a meeting a few months ago with German Foreign Minister Joschke Fischer that took place after the Likud bureau, which has no statutory powers in the party, decided against a Palestinian state. "Fischer was very worried and asked me what ramifications there would be to the decision. I told him that it was meaningless. But a central committee decision in the Likud is another matter entirely." Nonetheless, the ministers are pinning hope on their memory of Sharon telling the chairman of the party bureau, Public Security Minister Uzi Landau, during a meeting of Likud ministers two months ago, that a Palestinian state would be established, with support from the entire world, even if the Likud bureau didn't like the idea. http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=158435&contrassID =1&subContrassID=0&sbSubContrassID=0 From shniad at sfu.ca Thu May 2 18:33:53 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] The terrifying naivety of Blair the great intervener - Guardian Message-ID: <200205030033.g430XrTf025931@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4404183,00.html The Guardian Tuesday April 30, 2002 The terrifying naivety of Blair the great intervener The prime minister risks turning Britain into the Pentagon's useful idiot By Hugo Young What Tony Blair sees when he looks at Iraq is a country that has the ingredients to be a good and happy one. It has 60 million people and 9% of the world's oil reserves. It could be one of the world's attractions rather than its principal pariah, and would be so if only it weren't ruled by a murderous psychopath, the worst villain in contemporary history. The world needs protection from this evil maniac but, just as important, Iraq and Iraqis need help. Here is the moral challenge of the hour, and perhaps the supreme task facing political leaders in 2002. Occupying this place in Mr Blair's mind, Iraq exemplifies the most extraordinary change in British life since he was elected prime minister five years ago tomorrow. You can keep class sizes, hospital waiting lists, cuts in car crime or the fine-tuning of economic progress. These are tasks all governments take on with variable success, and any shifts, though important, are at the margin. What's new is Britain's evolution, entirely at the personal hand of the PM, into an eager player anywhere in the world where there is work, usually moral work, to do: whether with a handful of retired security men in Israel/ Palestine; a few hundred troops camped permanently in Sierra Leone; a couple of thousand in Afghanistan; or, potentially, any number of thousands one day in Iraq. For Mr Blair is a driven intervener. He believes in that role for Britain, and defines the national interest more broadly than any leader since Gladstone. Mrs Thatcher's sense of the national interest confined it to the defence of Britain's shores and possessions. Mr Blair reaches beyond that, beyond our local continent, into the far blue yonder, anywhere the world might be made a better place by the benign intervention of a good, stable, rich and militarily capable country like Britain. Iraq is the place where this philosophy looks like next being tested. Such zeal for intervention, as a way of making the world better rather than the nation stronger, is unique in modern Europe. You never find it among French or German leaders. Even De Gaulle didn't really fit the category, being more of a pallid Metternich than a pious Gladstone. But the comparison also stands against contemporary America. The Bush administration's performance since September 11 has been driven not by a desire to improve the world but to make American territory safe from the world, and the world safe for American domination. The world will get some benefit. But those non-travelling Republicans on the Hill, like Bush himself, do not have a developed concept of disinterested idealism. If they go into Iraq, they will leave when the business is done. The only business that matters is to kill off Saddam and thus protect Americans, coupled with the name of Israel. Mr Blair's impulse is different. Several conversations with high officials persuade me that we misunderstand what, from his viewpoint, the Iraq option is really about. London tends to be seen as a restraining force on Washington, a wise tactical adviser on the side of caution. In the early tactics against al-Qaida - notably the ultimatum to the Taliban and the binding in of Putin and Russia - Mr Blair did, I can believe, have an influential voice. But over Iraq, the dynamic is to some extent reversed. Rather than being a restrainer, Mr Blair is quite eager for action. His catalogue of infamy against Saddam and the Iraqi arsenal of mass-destruction weapons, including Saddam's imminent nuclear capacity, is not qualified by doubt. The moral crusader offers a clarity of vision that makes some, though not all, officials in Washington tremble. Sometimes it almost seems as though the US is helping the UK rather than vice versa. If America can help the great intervener, so much the better. Here we have a leader delighted to have at his disposal the greatest power on earth, abetting any moral cause in which he believes. Another consideration pushes him the same way. He believes it is Britain's duty to ensure that the US is not isolated in its great geo-political campaign against terrorism. He hears America accused of unilateralism, and counts it as a virtue on Britain's part to stand as the visible guarantor that this is not the case. On trade issues, abrasiveness is permissible. But on global security, irrespective of the substance, Britain's gift to America is to demonstrate, by standing shoulder-to-shoulder or flying wing-to-wing, that the unilateralist calumnies emanating from the Middle East and Europe are false. This Blairite attitude has a public history. Kosovo prompted him to articulate a doctrine of moral interventionism, and September 11 drew a great oration to the Labour party conference. But these impulses have deepened and spread. He would think nothing, if he could persuade the Americans to go along, of organising an Anglo-American expeditionary force to move round Africa, training local police and armies a la Sierra Leone, and thus at modest cost shoring up the democracies that could be the basis of African economic recovery. The vision of the moralist demands nothing less. An Iraq left in peace to prosper on its oil and educate its citizens in democratic values naturally belongs there too. However worthy this vision may seem - to some inspiring, maybe - its insouciance strikes me as terrifyingly naive. Brazen words to say to a five-year prime minister, but two reasons support them. First, the interventionist compulsion is producing policies that have been little discussed. Nobody minds sending a few retired officers to detain Palestinian terrorists. Even Sierra Leone is paying virtuous dividends. But an army, or an air force, against Iraq? Where are the frontiers of this moral vision, and how much are we prepared to pay to make it come to pass? How does it relate to Mr Blair's other driving priority, his alleged intimacy with his European partners? Romano Prodi will doubtless be scorned on many sides for his reproving words yesterday, asking Britain where she stands on the EU. But the point was correctly made. It may be true, as Blair insists, that Britain must remain in good odour with both Americans and Europeans. History and geography still allow that possibility. But dreams of wiping out Saddam Hussein smack more of a mesmerised attachment to American power than any serious attention to what Europe needs and wants. Second, what leverage does Gladstonian ambition retain for a country that lost Gladstonian power a century ago? The danger Blair faces is that, when the time comes, he will have none. Britain will turn out to have been the useful idiot for the Pentagon's big project, supporting it in the name of a virtuous imperialism for which Washington has no stomach, and dragged into battle according to timetables that suit America's domestic needs not Europe's or Britain's - which most other EU countries will possibly oppose. Blair is deciding, if not saying, where he stands, because of a singularly personal idea about the purpose of politics in the modern world. Some day soon, Washington will eat him for breakfast, along with the morality it then spits out. h.young@guardian.co.uk From furuhashi.1 at osu.edu Fri May 3 02:49:23 2002 From: furuhashi.1 at osu.edu (Yoshie Furuhashi) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Tue., May 7: _Frontiers of Dreams and Fears_ Message-ID: Critical Perspectives of Wars, Classes, & Empires Screening: _Frontiers of Dreams and Fears_ (Dir. Mai Masri, 2001) Shot during the liberation of South Lebanon and the beginning of the Al Aqsa Intifada, _Frontiers of Dreams and Fears_ accompanies two young girls on an extraordinary journey to the borders of exile, which separate them from each other and from their homeland. Mona (from the Shatila refugee camp in Beirut) and Manar (from Bethlehem's Dheisha camp) begin to communicate and build a friendship, despite the barriers separating them. Their remarkable relationship begins with email and culminates in their dramatic meeting at the Israeli/Lebanese border. Through their correspondence, we learn of their dreams and fears -- thoughts that they share with their friends in both camps. Tuesday, May 7, 7:30 PM 264 MacQuigg Lab, OSU 105 W. Woodruff Ave., Columbus, OH Sponsors: the Student International Forum and Social Welfare Action Alliance. Co-sponsor: the OSU Committee for Justice in Palestine. OSU Campus Map . Calendar of Events: . Contact info: Yoshie Furuhashi, , 614-668-6554; & Keith Kilty, , 614-292-7181. Download the flyer for _Frontiers of Dreams and Fears_ at . Download the flyer for other upcoming SIF/SWAA events at . Please spread the word. -- Yoshie * Calendar of Events in Columbus: * Anti-War Activist Resources: * Student International Forum: * Committee for Justice in Palestine: From jim at autonomedia.org Thu May 2 08:34:31 2002 From: jim at autonomedia.org (Jim Fleming) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] The Incomplete, True, Authentic & Wonderful... Message-ID: ...History of May Day, by Peter Linebaugh http://slash.autonomedia.org/article.pl?sid=02/05/02/1029240 -- Jim@autonomedia.org http://www.autonomedia.org From mstainsby at tao.ca Fri May 3 10:52:27 2002 From: mstainsby at tao.ca (Macdonald Stainsby) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Israel holds Reuters journalist for third day. Message-ID: <005101c1f2c2$e93311e0$291f5318@vc.shawcable.net> Reuters. 2 May 2002. Israel holds Reuters journalist for third day. JERUSALEM -- Israeli forces kept a Reuters journalist in detention for a third day on Thursday without explanation. The Israeli army detained Jussry al-Jamal, a Palestinian cameraman, in the West Bank city of Hebron on Tuesday afternoon together with award-winning Reuters cameraman Mazen Dana. Dana was released on Wednesday after being forced to spend the night in the open air in a confined space with about 200 other detainees. He was handcuffed and blindfolded. Israeli officials declined to explain why Jamal, 23, had been detained and gave no details of his whereabouts. The army and the Israeli Government Press Office (GPO) did not respond to a protest by Reuters demanding Jamal's release. Reuters described the treatment of its journalists as a "blatant violation of international standards for conduct towards journalists legitimately doing their jobs." The Israeli authorities have also held Hossam Abu Alan, a Palestinian photographer with the French news agency Agence France Presse, for eight days without providing any explanation. The Foreign Press Association in Israel has expressed grave concern over the treatment of the three journalists. The GPO has refused to accredit all but a few Palestinian journalists this year. It has dismissed criticism, saying its policies are required for security reasons because of the 19-month-old Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation. ------------------------------------------- Macdonald Stainsby http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international "Simply BEING a Palestinian in what used to be Palestine is a form of suicide...slower and more painful than using a bomb to blow up yourself [...]." - American Jew writing to others, email correspondence. ---- In the contradiction lies the hope. --Bertholt Brecht From mstainsby at tao.ca Fri May 3 11:06:20 2002 From: mstainsby at tao.ca (Macdonald Stainsby) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Colombian Rebels widen targets Message-ID: <005b01c1f2c4$d9487200$291f5318@vc.shawcable.net> AP. 2 May 2002. Colombian Rebels Bomb Train Carrying Coal From World's Largest Open-Faced Coal Mine. BOGOTA -- A rebel bomb derailed a coal train and damaged a stretch of track, halting the transport of coal from one of the world's largest open-face mine, the mine's operator said Thursday. The attack Wednesday night derailed 20 cars of the loaded coal train, Dow Jones Newswires reported. The train carries 70,000 tons of coal daily between the mine and a seaport. "Fortunately, the explosion didn't cause injuries, but it damaged a stretch of the rail line," Intercor, the multinational operator of the Cerrejon Zona Norte mine, said a statement. Repairs to the tracks, which run from the mine in northern La Guajira province to Puerto Bolivar on the Caribbean coast, will take about five days. The mine is owned by the CZN consortium, made up of Glencore International AG, of Switzerland; Anglo American PLC, of South Africa; and BHP Billiton Ltd, of Australia. With output last year of 19.4 million metric tons of coal, Cerrejon is the world's largest operating open-faced coal mine, its operator says. In a radio interview, army Gen. Gabriel Diaz blamed the attack on the country's largest rebel group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC. The FARC, which raises money by producing cocaine [read: taxes coca agriculture much as the Bush administration taxes abortion clinics], kidnapping and extortion [read: expropriating the rich every chance they get], has stepped up attacks on the country's infrastructure. The Bush administration says it wants to expand military aid to this beleaguered South American nation beyond counternarcotics assistance, including training an army brigade to protect an oil pipeline that has been frequently sabotaged by the rebels. Colombia's 38-year war pits the U.S.-backed military and an outlawed right-wing paramilitary group [note the implied alliance] against the FARC and a smaller rebel faction. ------------------------------------------- Macdonald Stainsby http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international "Simply BEING a Palestinian in what used to be Palestine is a form of suicide...slower and more painful than using a bomb to blow up yourself [...]." - American Jew writing to others, email correspondence. ---- In the contradiction lies the hope. --Bertholt Brecht From furuhashi.1 at osu.edu Fri May 3 11:14:07 2002 From: furuhashi.1 at osu.edu (Yoshie Furuhashi) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Wed., May 8: Women in Afghanistan (Lecture by Margaret Mills) Message-ID: Critical Perspectives on Wars, Classes, & Empires "WOMEN IN AFGHANISTAN" Speaker: Margaret Mills Chair, Near Eastern Languages and Cultures, OSU Margaret Mills is widely regarded as a leading specialist in the popular culture of the Persian and Farsi-speaking world. Her book, Rhetorics and Politics in Afghan Traditional Storytelling, won the 1993 Chicago Folklore Prize for best academic work in folklore. Wednesday, May 8, 5:30 PM The Ohio Union (Buckeye Suite CDE, 3rd fl.) 1739 North High St. (High St. & 12th Ave.), Columbus, OH Sponsors: the Student International Forum and Social Welfare Action Alliance Calendar of Events: . Ohio Union: . Contact info: Yoshie Furuhashi, , 614-668-6554; & Keith Kilty, , 614-292-7181. Download the flyer for the event at . Download the flyer for other upcoming SIF/SWAA events at . Please spread the word. -- Yoshie * Calendar of Events in Columbus: * Anti-War Activist Resources: * Student International Forum: * Committee for Justice in Palestine: From mstainsby at dojo.tao.ca Fri May 3 12:31:38 2002 From: mstainsby at dojo.tao.ca (Macdonald Stainsby) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Venezuelan Says Revolt Hasn't Derailed His Plans Message-ID: <20020503183139.E560317DD52@dojo.tao.ca> New York Times May 3, 2002 Venezuelan Says Revolt Hasn't Derailed His Plans By JUAN FORERO CARACAS, Venezuela, May 2 — Relaxing with a cigarette, wearing jeans, loafers and leisure jacket, President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela hardly looked like he had been to the edge of the political abyss and back. But in an interview away from the presidential palace, Mr. Chávez said the experience of being ousted from office last month in a popular uprising, then restored to power two days later, had not fundamentally changed him. "It is the same Chávez, the same Chávez as always," the president, speaking in the third person as he often does, said late Wednesday. Two weeks after retaking office in triumph, Mr. Chávez, 47, said his self-proclaimed peaceful revolution continued on the same path, with the goal of reforming Venezuela's oil-dependent "neo-liberal" economy and funneling revenues into social programs to bring social equality to a country he says has been pillaged by the rich for most of its history. "We have resumed the Bolivarian project," said Mr. Chávez, as he sat back in a comfortable chair at a palatial government house overlooking Caracas. Spicing his talk with quotes from his hero, Simón Bolívar, the 19th- century South American liberator, the president said that the "most perfect system of governments is one that gives its people the greatest quantity of political stability, the greatest quantity of social security, the greatest quantity of happiness. "When you ask what we want with the revolution, well, that is what we want, brother," Mr. Chávez said. "The essence of a revolutionary process, peaceful and democratic, is to give our people, to all without exception, without exclusion of anyone because of class, skin color or religious beliefs, the greatest quantity of happiness possible." Mr. Chávez's efforts to bring that happiness, though, comes as Venezuela emerges from its most serious political crisis in a decade, one that exposed the country's raw and angry divisions between the great masses of poor people who support the president and an antagonized middle and upper class that despises him. Though Mr. Chávez said that the economy would grow and that his government was firmly in place, Venezuela is in a precarious political and economic quandary. The International Monetary Fund said the economy would contract by nearly 1 percent this year, which economists attribute to capital flight and falling production at the state-owned oil company. In the National Assembly, the president's allies, who once dominated the chamber, now have a bare majority. An opposition movement of labor leaders, business people and intellectuals — many of whom helped mount protests against Mr. Chávez — are promising a referendum seeking his recall within two years. Venezuelans are also watching to see if the military, whose leaders opened the way to his downfall when they withdrew their support in the aftermath of protests that turned violent on April 11, will remain loyal to the president. "He does find himself more constrained than he was," said Michael Shifter, who follows Venezuela for the Inter-American Dialogue, a Washington policy analysis group. "The question is whether he recognizes the situation he's in and the choices that he faces and whether it's possible for him to respond in a much more moderate and pragmatic way." Mr. Chávez has, since his return, seemed to acknowledge that the ground beneath him has shifted. He has asked the opposition, which he often denigrated in the past, to join his government in "a great debate" and he has promised to "sheathe" his sword, acknowledging that his harsh language has hurt people. He has also taken tangible steps welcomed by the most influential sector among his opponents, the business class. He appointed Ali Rodríguez, the well-respected secretary general of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, and a new board of directors to head the state oil company, gestures that were accommodating to company executives whose rebellion against government interference helped set off protests. The president has also promised to shake up his cabinet with a new economic team, while allies in Congress say several economic laws that were bitterly opposed by businessmen may be reformed. "I think he's learned from this," Representative William Delahunt, Democrat of Massachusetts, said in an interview last weekend after he and two other members of Congress, Representative Cass Ballenger, Republican of North Carolina, and Senator Lincoln Chafee, Republican of Rhode Island, met with Mr. Chávez. "I think he understands that healing and reconciliation are the true qualities of leadership, not division." Some of Mr. Chávez's closest aides said he understood the need to change his style, if not the social policies the government had put in place to remake this country of 24 million. Tarek William Saab, a congressman and foreign policy adviser to the president, said Mr. Chávez's jolting experience had strengthened his conviction that he was destined to play a role in history. But Mr. Saab said the president also believed that he had to find new ways of dealing with political opponents. "He is a person who has been thinking profoundly, who recognizes his faults and errors," Mr. Saab said. "And as a human being, he is rectifying and asking for help. He knows he cannot do it alone, though." Opponents said Mr. Chávez had offered to open the doors to his opponents in the past, only to revert to what critics say is an autocratic style, complete with insults and threats. "His dialogues are really monologues," said Alberto Garrido, the author of several books on the president and his movement. "Chávez is a man with a thermometer in his hand, trying to see how far he has to go. There will not be profound changes." In a wide-ranging talk, Mr. Chávez rattled off his government's achievements and calmly offered his views on a range of subjects, from his days as a young soldier to his rocky relationship with neighboring Colombia. But when he spoke of his country's great political divide, Mr. Chávez gesticulated to make his points, sounding conciliatory one moment and dismissive the next. He played down the strength of his opposition, even though he was removed from office in a popular uprising that had been in the making for months. "There is no serious political opposition," he said. "I do not have here in the opposition someone I can call to sit here with me to talk about themes in depth, someone who is a serious, honest leader who has the leadership in the opposition." Still, Mr. Chávez said he was "dedicating more time to listening to criticism and ideas" and working harder to consider the policy views of the "economic powers, political sectors, the opposition." He also said he was not opposed to a nascent movement by opponents to mount a referendum on his rule, explaining that such a measure was legal in 2004 under the Constitution. Speaking of the United States, which receives most of Venezuela's oil exports, Mr. Chávez said his government had to do a better job to improve its image in Washington. Bush administration officials, irked by Mr. Chávez's dalliances with President Fidel Castro of Cuba and Saddam Hussein of Iraq, seemed pleased in the hours after Mr. Chávez was ousted. "There is a false perception in Washington of what Chávez and Venezuela is," said the president. "We have to work harder so they perceive us as we are: a democratic country, with a legitimate president, respectful of human rights, with liberty of expression." Mr. Chávez, however, said relations with the United States were going "through a difficult moment" because of suggestions that American officials were involved in what the government here considers a coup. Bush administration officials have denied playing any role in Mr. Chávez's removal. Mr. Chávez said it would be "horrible" if the United States was involved. "What I have said is that I ask God that it turns out to be false." -- Macdonald Stainsby check the "ten point platform" of Tao at: http://new.tao.ca "`Order rules in Berlin.' You stupid lackeys! Your `order' is built on sand. Tomorrow the revolution will rear ahead once more and announce to your horror amid the brass of trumpets: `I was, I am, I always will be!'" -Rosa Luxemburg, 1918. From LAMZ at sympatico.ca Fri May 3 13:22:12 2002 From: LAMZ at sympatico.ca (Lysander Zimmerman) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] More 911 Investigation Features on Portland IMC Message-ID: <002f01c1f2d7$d3ba0ac0$33378d18@Indy1> FBI Chief Says 911 Hijackers 'Left No Paper Trail' Whatsoever http://portland.indymedia.org/archive/features/2002/05/2002-05.html#3590 Why Does The Indymedia Network Ignore the Call For a 911 Investigation? http://portland.indymedia.org/archive/features/2002/05/2002-05.html#3589 From LAMZ at sympatico.ca Fri May 3 15:39:05 2002 From: LAMZ at sympatico.ca (Lysander Zimmerman) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Indymeda.nl refuses to remove links to Radikal site despite being summoned Message-ID: <000e01c1f2ea$f366bc70$33378d18@Indy1> Press release Indymeda.nl refuses to remove links to Radikal site despite being summoned to do so by Deutsche Bahn (German Rail) Tuesday 23 april the newsmedium Indymedia NL has received a letter from a lawfirm representing Deutsche Bahn AG demanding the removal of an internet page. The page in question contains some links to mirrors of the -long defunct- german periodical Radikal. Two articles contained in those mirrors have been the subject of a lawsuit last week. Full Text Here: http://www.indymedia.nl/2002/04/3508.shtml From shniad at sfu.ca Fri May 3 16:49:57 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] NY Times/vintage page (fwd) Message-ID: <200205032249.g43MnvTf018186@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> The New York Times May 2, 2002, p. A25: Half-page paid advertisement: "We People of Faith Stand Firmly with Israel," by Ralph Reed, identified as "Chairman of the Georgia Republican Party and...senior advisor to the Bush campaign." The advertisement is presented as "brought to you as a public service by ADL [Anti-Defamation League]." From shniad at sfu.ca Fri May 3 17:06:22 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Iraq and the UN talk about weapons inspectors - WP Message-ID: <200205032306.g43N6MTf029800@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A11484-2002Apr30.html Iraq and U.N. to Talk Today About Weapons Inspectors By Howard Schneider and Walter Pincus Washington Post Foreign Service Wednesday, May 1, 2002; Page A20 BAGHDAD, Iraq, April 30 -- Iraq will begin negotiations in New York on Wednesday on the possible return of U.N. weapons inspectors, a step that may offer the country its best chance of avoiding, or at least delaying, a military showdown with the United States. Iraq's public stance remains rigid, with officials in Baghdad insisting that President Saddam Hussein's government will readmit the inspectors only if their return is linked explicitly to an end to 12-year-old international economic sanctions and a halt to U.S. military overflights of northern and southern Iraq. However, Iraq's language has moderated noticeably since even a few months ago, when it categorically rejected the return of weapons teams. Diplomats in Baghdad say they believe the country is on the verge of trying to strike a deal to let the inspectors resume work after a four-year absence. The Iraqi delegation is headed by Foreign Minister Naji Sabri and includes experts who were involved in Baghdad's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons development. "These are serious people who know what happened," said Charles Duelfer, former deputy chairman of the U.N. Special Commission, the international weapons inspection group that left Iraq in 1998. "They may be authorized to make proposals." The Iraqis are scheduled to meet with U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan and Hans Blix, executive chairman of the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission, which was established in 1999 to replace the Special Commission. After the discussions on Wednesday, the schedule calls for talks to resume on Friday. If progress is made, results of the talks could be made public by the end of the day. "The issue of inspection teams is not the sole subject. Iraq has other issues. Lifting the embargo totally. Stopping the daily aggression" of U.S. warplanes, Iraqi Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan told reporters this week. "There are demands. The other side has demands. We are dialoguing in a comprehensive way." The Bush administration, which appears united behind the concept that Hussein should be removed from power, has publicly split over whether a resumption of inspections would be fruitful. Pentagon officials, starting with Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, have doubted their utility, while Secretary of State Colin L. Powell has said pursuing inspections could help the United States develop a coalition of nations against Iraq if it decides to take military action. The United States has rejected Iraqi demands that sanctions be lifted as inspections resume, arguing that the search for evidence of biological, nuclear or chemical weapons programs should be completed before the country's isolation is lifted. Duelfer said that he doubts the inspection teams could uncover the entirety of Iraq's weapons programs even if Hussein were to permit visits to military sites and allow surprise inspections. "They will probably argue after three months [that] if nothing is found, they will want sanctions ended and they get their oil money back," Duelfer said. Russia appears to be central in determining what happens next. Foreign Minister Sabri and Blix both spent last weekend in Moscow, separately discussing the upcoming negotiations with Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov. Russia has recently cooperated with the United States in developing what have been termed "smart sanctions" that would limit embargoed trade with Iraq by other nations, some of whom are evading the provisions now in place. A new resolution adopting those provisions has yet to pass the Security Council. The effectiveness of the sanctions is dwindling as Arab states, Russia and some European nations have started increasing trade with the Iraqi government. Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, meanwhile, the Bush administration has signaled a desire for Hussein's ouster. U.S. officials argue that the absence of U.N. inspections has given Iraq four years to try to reconstitute its weapons program, and should not be left unwatched any longer. Ramadan, the vice president, this week repeated Iraqi denials that his country is seeking to build biological, chemical or nuclear weapons. Pincus reported from Washington. © 2002 The Washington Post Company ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Buy Stock for $4 and no minimums. FREE Money 2002. http://us.click.yahoo.com/orkH0C/n97DAA/Ey.GAA/KDUrlB/TM ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: iggydog-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ From shniad at sfu.ca Fri May 3 17:20:31 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Doonesbury Message-ID: <200205032320.g43NKVTf009113@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.doonesbury.com/strip/dailydose/index.htm Check out Doonesbury, May 3, on Sharon as "man of peace". From shniad at sfu.ca Fri May 3 17:22:46 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Israelis held hostage by settlements - Baltimore Sun Message-ID: <200205032322.g43NMkTf010882@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> The Baltimore Sun Thursday, May 2, 2002 Israelis held hostage by settlements by Tom Ackerman Masada, Israel - After a week of traveling up and down Israel, I've found it to be a nation mired in a despair it has never known. Nothing captured that mood like a stop at Masada. Overlooking the Dead Sea, the mountaintop fortress is where Jewish zealots killed themselves rather than surrender to Rome's mighty legions. It has become an archaeological shrine to Zionist determination never again to leave Jews vulnerable to their enemies. Yet even Masada has fallen victim to the Palestinian intifada. Though this monument lies well within Israel's original borders, the tourist buses that carried Jews and gentiles no longer venture there, and its vast parking lot stands deserted, as even Israelis have opted to stay close to home. For all their outer stoicism and a broad consensus that backs a fierce response to the suicide bombers, an unsparing realization has struck a majority of those Israelis who don't put their faith in divine destiny or messianic ideology. They are struggling to cope with an emerging awareness of the true price of Israel's 35-year hold on the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Outraged over a decisive shift in international sympathy toward the Palestinians, many Israelis accept their government's dismissal of this as just the world's latest spasm of blind prejudice against Jews. But a cold eye might also perceive this reaction as self-pity. Self-pity also marks their grumbling as the bill for re-tightening Israel's grip on the territories literally comes due. The government has just called for more tax hikes and cuts in education and welfare programs to pay for Operation Defensive Wall, the military offensive into the West Bank. Now the country's political factions are haggling over the fairest way to share the fiscal pain. But while most Israelis strongly assent to what they judge as elemental self-defense, much as Americans have endorsed the strikes in Afghanistan, many of them rue the decision to subsidize more Jewish settlements deep inside land that is still deemed by the government to be negotiable. Yet during the past year, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has added at least three dozen more outposts, each requiring security deployments that demand a price in money and blood. And only last week, Mr. Sharon told his Cabinet that to withdraw from a single isolated settlement deep in the Gaza Strip -- Netzarim -- would be no more acceptable than giving up Tel Aviv. But more settlements offer no more security, as even their supporters tacitly admit. Just a few days after declaring the first stage of Defensive Wall successfully completed, four settlers in Adora, near the West Bank city of Hebron, became the latest to die in a Palestinian assault. And the government told them to expect more terrorist attacks. Three decades ago, when previous governments sanctioned the first settlements, Israeli pragmatists justified them as prudent first lines of resistance that could hold off the Arab armies bent on driving the Jewish state into the sea. Yet today, with Israel's outer frontiers unchallenged, the settlements, which house more than 200,000 Jews, have become its soft underbelly, no longer providing either a buffer or a bargaining chip. Instead, the settlements have become hostages, in constant need of Israel's protection. And in a cruel paradox, all Israelis find themselves hostages of the settlers for as long as their presence remains a central obstacle to political agreement with the Palestinians. Tom Ackerman, a Washington correspondent for Belo Broadcasting, was based in Israel as a correspondent for seven years in the 1970s. From shniad at sfu.ca Fri May 3 17:23:54 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] House Leader endorses ethnic cleansing of Palestinians Message-ID: <200205032323.g43NNsTf011580@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> MSNBC Hardball with Chris Matthews May 1, 2002 Interview with House of Representatives Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-TX): ARMEY: I'm content to have Israel grab the entire West Bank. MATTHEWS: Well, where do you put the Palestinian state, in Norway? Once the Israelis take back the West Bank permanently and annex it, there's no place else for the Palestinians to have a state. ARMEY: No, no, that's not--that's not at all true. There are many Arab nations that have many hundreds of thousands of acres of land and--and soil and property and opportunity to create a Palestinian state. MATTHEWS: So you would transport--you would transport the Palestinians from Palestine to somewhere else and call it their state? ARMEY: I would be perfectly content to have a homeland, just as--most of... MATTHEWS: But not in Palestine? ARMEY: Most of the people who now populate Israel were transported from all over the world to that land and they made it their home. The Palestinians can do the same, and we're per--perfectly content to work with the Palestinians in doing that... MATTHEWS: Right, no. No, that's not the question and that's not your answer. The question here is: What is the future of the Palestinians who are fighting Israel right now? You say there future is somewhere besides Palestine. That runs in the way of US policy going back to 1948. It runs--it runs completely against the president's policy and every policy I've heard a president take, which is that Israel has to give up its settlements on the West Bank and give it back to the Arabs in exchange for peace. You say the deal should be the Palestinians leave? ARMEY: That's right...I happened to believe that the Palestinians should leave. MATTHEWS: Have you ever told George Bush, the president from your home state of Texas, that you think the Palestinians should get up and go and leave Palestine and that's the solution? ARMEY: I'm probably telling him that right now. MATTHEWS: Well, just to repeat, you believe that the Palestinians who are now living on the West Bank should get out of there? ARMEY: Yes. From shniad at sfu.ca Fri May 3 17:24:57 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] ADL denounces French Foreign Minister's attempt to intimidate American Jews Message-ID: <200205032324.g43NOvTf012369@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.adl.org/PresRele/IslME_62/4081_62.asp Press Release Israel/Middle East ADL denounces French Foreign Minister's attempt to intimidate American Jews New York, N.Y., April 25, 2002 ... The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today denounced comments reportedly made by French Foreign Minister Hubert Vedrine, as "baseless and offensive" to all Americans and called on French President Jacques Chirac to reject the foreign minister's efforts against Israel and the American Jewish community. Mr. Vedrine called for European nations to put "political pressure" on the Bush Administration, as a counter-move to American Jewry's pro-Israel activities, which he labeled "intransigent." He also attacked Israeli Prime Minster Ariel Sharon's policies during a meeting of European foreign ministers in Valencia, Spain. "By attempting to intimidate American Jews, Mr. Vedrine has gone beyond his usual anti-Israel rhetoric," said Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director. "His claim that American Jewish organizations are not on the path to peace is baseless. His suggestion that European leaders make concerted efforts to influence the Bush Administration to distance its policies away from those of American Jewish organizations, is offensive and unacceptable. Given the current political climate in France, one has to wonder whether Mr. Vedrine has decided to compete with the views of Le Pen on Jews and Israel. We call on President Chirac to reject Mr. Vedrine's comments." The Anti-Defamation League, founded in 1913, is the world's leading organization fighting anti-Semitism through programs and services that counteract hatred, prejudice and bigotry. From shniad at sfu.ca Fri May 3 17:25:51 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] The Road to Nowhere - NY Review of Books Message-ID: <200205032325.g43NPpTf013136@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.nybooks.com/articles/15340 The New York Review of Books May 9, 2002 The Road to Nowhere By Tony Judt In 1958, at the height of the Algerian crisis, with Arabs bombing French cafés in Algiers, Paris tacitly condoning the use of torture by the occupying French army, and paratroop colonels demanding a free hand to end terror, the French philosopher Raymond Aron published a small book, L'Algérie et la République.[1] Cutting through the emotive and historical claims of both sides, Aron explained in his characteristically cool prose why the French had to quit Algeria. France lacked both the will and the means either to impose French rule on the Arabs or to give Arabs an equal place in France. If the French stayed the situation would only deteriorate and they would inevitably leave at some later date-but under worse conditions and with a more embittered legacy. The damage that France was doing to Algerians was surpassed by the harm the Republic was bringing upon itself. However impossible the choice appeared, it was nonetheless very simple: France must go. Many years later Aron was asked why he never engaged the heated questions of the time: torture, terrorism, the French policy of state-sponsored political assassination, Arab national claims, and the colonial heritage of the French. Everyone, he replied, was talking about these things; why add my voice? The point was no longer to analyze the origins of the tragedy, nor assign blame for it. The point was to do what had to be done. In the cacophony of commentary and accusation swirling around the calamity in the Middle East, Aron's icy clarity is sorely missed. For the solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict is also in plain sight. Israel exists. The Palestinians and other Arabs will eventually accept this; many already do. Palestinians can be neither expunged from "Greater Israel" nor integrated into it: if they were expelled into Jordan, the latter would explode, with disastrous consequences for Israel. Palestinians need a real state of their own and they will have one. The two states will be delineated in accordance with the map drawn up at the Taba negotiations in January 2001, according to which the 1967 borders will be modified, but nearly all of the occupied territories will come under Palestinian rule. The Israeli settlements in the occupied territories are thus foredoomed, and most of them will be dismantled, as many Israelis privately acknowledge. There will be no Arab right of return; and it is time to abandon the anachronistic Jewish one. Jerusalem is already largely divided along ethnic lines and will, eventually, be the capital of both states. Since these states will have a common interest in stability and shared security concerns, they will learn in time to cooperate. Community-based organizations like Hamas, offered the chance to transform themselves from terrorist networks into political parties, will take this path. There are numerous precedents. If this is the future of the region, then why is it proving so tragically hard to get there? Four years after Aron's essay, De Gaulle extricated his countrymen from Algeria with relative ease. Following fifty years of vicious repression and exploitation, white South Africans handed over power to a black majority who replaced them without violence or revenge. Is the Middle East so different? From the Palestinian point of view, the colonial analogy fits and foreign precedent might apply. Israelis, however, insist otherwise. Most Israelis are still trapped in the story of their own uniqueness. For some, this lies in the primordial presence of an ancient Jewish state on the territory of modern Israel. For others it rests in a God-given title to the lands of Judea and Samaria. Many still invoke the Holocaust and the claim that it authorizes Jews to make upon the international community. Even those who reject all such special pleading point to geography in defense of their distinction. We are so vulnerable, they say, so surrounded by enemies, that we cannot take any risks or afford a single mistake. The French could withdraw across the Mediterranean; South Africa is a very large country. We have nowhere to go. Finally, behind every Israeli refusal to face the inevitability of hard choices stands the implicit guarantee of the United States. The problem for the rest of the world is that since 1967 Israel has changed in ways that render its traditional self-description absurd. It is now a regional colonial power, by some accounts the world's fourth-largest military establishment. Israel is a state, with all the trappings and capacities of a state. By comparison the Palestinians are weak indeed. While the failings of the Palestinian leadership have been abysmal and the crimes of Palestinian terrorists extremely bloody, the fact is that Israel has the military and political initiative. Responsibility for moving beyond the present impasse thus falls primarily (though as we shall see not exclusively) on Israel. But Israelis themselves are blind to this. In their own eyes they are still a small victim-community, defending themselves with restraint and reluctance against overwhelming odds. Their astonishingly incompetent political leadership has squandered thirty years since the hubris-inducing victory of June 1967. In that time Israelis have built illegal compounds in the occupied territories and grown a carapace of cynicism: toward the Palestinians, whom they regard with contempt, and toward a United States whose erstwhile benevolent disengagement they have manipulated shamelessly. Israel poses no lasting threat to Syria or to the Hizbollah in Lebanon, the military wing of Hamas or any other extremist organization. On the contrary, these have long thrived on its predictable reaction to their attacks. But the present government of Israel has come close to destroying the Palestinian Authority. After the events of the last month Palestinian politicians foolish enough to take Israelis at their word will be castigated as quislings, and dispatched accordingly. The state of Israel has largely deprived itself of credible Palestinian interlocutors. This is the distinctive achievement of Ariel Sharon, Israel's dark Id. Notorious among soldiers for his strategic incompetence-his tactical success with bold tank advances was never matched by any grasp of the bigger picture-Sharon has proven as bad as so many of us feared. He has repeated (or in the case of the expulsion of Arafat, tried to repeat) all the mistakes of his 1982 occupation of Lebanon, down to the very rhetoric. Sharon's obsession with Yasser Arafat brings to mind Victor Hugo's Inspector Javert, his life and career insanely given over to the destruction of Jean Valjean at the price of all measure and reason, including his own (the literary comparison flatters Sharon and Arafat alike). Meanwhile he has single-handedly raised Arafat's international stature to its highest point in years. If he ever gets rid of Arafat, and the bombers keep coming, as they will, what will Sharon do then? And what will he do when young Arabs from Israel itself, inflamed by Israel's treatment of their cousins in occupied Jenin and Ramallah, volunteer for suicide missions? Will he send the tanks into the Galilee? Put up electric fences around the Arab districts of Haifa? Sharon and the Israeli political establishment-not to mention the country's liberal intelligentsia who, Pilate-like, have washed their hands of responsibility-are chiefly to blame for the present crisis, but they are not alone. Precisely because the Israelis assume that they have a blank check from Washington, the US is willy-nilly a party to this mess. All serious efforts in the past thirty years to find peace in the Middle East, from Henry Kissinger to Bill Clinton, have begun with American urging and intervention. Why, then, did the Bush administration step aside for so long, provoking international ire and jeopardizing its future influence? Why did the American president continue to confine himself in late March and early April to the disingenuous suggestion that "Arafat should do more" to rein in suicide bombers, while the leader of the Palestinian Authority sat imprisoned in three rooms, a single cell phone at his disposal? Why, during the buildup to the present crisis, did a man of the sophistication and intelligence of Colin Powell docilely accept Sharon's cynical demand for an arbitrary period of "absolute calm" (saving sporadic Israeli assassinations) before any political discussions could begin? Why has the US stood by while, as The New York Times put it on April 9, "more than 200 Palestinians have been killed and more than 1,500 wounded since Israeli tanks and helicopter gunships rolled into the West Bank on March 29"? Why, in short, has the US voluntarily attached itself to a leash marked "terrorism" with which Sharon can jerk it to and fro at will? The answer, sadly, is September 11. Until then, even Bush was mindful of the need to warn Israelis against "targeted assassinations," as he did last August. But since September 11 the very words "terrorism" and "terrorist" have silenced rational foreign policy debate. Ariel Sharon had only to declare Yasser Arafat the head "of a terrorist network" for Washington to fall sheepishly in line behind any military action he takes. We are mesmerized by the new rhetoric of this "war on terror": any politician who can convincingly label his domestic or foreign critics as "terrorists" is guaranteed at least the ear of the American government, and usually something more. "Terrorist" risks becoming the mantra of our time, like "Communist," "capitalist," "bourgeois," and others before it. Like them, it closes off all further discussion. The word has its own history: Hitler and Stalin typically described their opponents as "terrorists." Terrorists really exist, of course, just as there are real bourgeois and genuine Communists; terror against civilians is the weapon of choice of the weak. But the problem is that "terrorist," like "rogue state," is a protean rhetorical device which can boomerang: Jewish terrorists were among the founders of the state of Israel and it may not be long before the United Nations passes a resolution defining Israel as a rogue state. The first stage of any solution in the Middle East, then, is for the United States to abandon its self-defeating rhetorical obsession with a war on terrorism, which has put US foreign policy into Ariel Sharon's back pocket, and start behaving like the great power it is. Instead of being blackmailed into silence by the Israeli prime minister, Washington must require of him and any Palestinian representatives who have survived his attentions that they begin talking. Two years ago, even one year ago, it might have been reasonable to demand of the Palestinian Authority that all bombings halt before such talks begin. But thanks to Ariel Sharon, no Palestinian open to negotiations is in a position to meet such a demand. So it must be talks and a peace agreement with or without bombings. The Israelis, of course, will ask how they can speak to men who have condoned suicide bombings of Israeli civilians. Palestinians will retort that they have nothing to say to those who claim to want a permanent peace but have built thirty new colonial settlements in the past year alone. Both sides have good grounds for mistrust. But there is no alternative; they must both be made to talk.[2] And then they will have to start forgetting. There is much to forget. Palestinians remember the mass expulsions of 1948, land expropriations, economic exploitation, the colonization of the West Bank, political assassinations, and a hundred petty daily humiliations. Israelis remember the war of 1948, the Arab refusal to recognize their state before 1967 and since, reiterated threats to drive the Jews into the sea, and the terrifying, random civilian massacres of the past year. But Middle Eastern memories are neither unique nor even distinctive in their scale. For two decades the Irish Republican Army regularly shot to death Protestant civilians on their doorsteps, in front of their children. Protestant gunmen responded in kind. The violence continues, though much reduced. This has not stopped moderate Protestants from talking publicly to their Sinn Fein counterparts; Gerry Adams and Martin McGinnis are now accepted as legitimate political leaders. Elsewhere, less than six years after the 1944 massacre at the village of Oradour, where the SS burned alive seven hundred French men, women, and children, France and Germany came together to form the core of a new European project. In the final convulsions of World War II, hundreds of thousands of Poles and Ukrainians were killed or expelled from their respective territories by neighboring Ukrainians and Poles, in a frenzy of intercommunal violence unmatched by anything ever seen in the Middle East; at their present rate it would take Jews and Arabs many decades to reach comparable death tolls. Yet today Poles and Ukrainians, for all their tragic memories, live not only at peace but in growing collaboration and cooperation along a tranquil border. It can be done. In the Middle East today each side dwells within hermetically sealed memories and national narratives in which the other side's pain is invisible and inaudible. But so did the Algerians and the French, the French and the Germans, the Ukrainians and the Poles, and, especially, Protestants and Catholics in Ulster. There is no magic moment when the walls come down, but the sequence of events is clear: first comes the political solution, typically imposed from outside and above, often when mutual resentment is at its peak. Only then can the forgetting begin. The present moment, with Ariel Sharon about to set in motion a long cycle of death and decay across the region, may be the eleventh hour, as the American president has belatedly acknowledged. It surely is for Israel. Long before the Arabs get their land and their state, Israel will have decayed from within. The fear of seeming to show solidarity with Sharon, which already inhibits many from visiting Israel, will rapidly extend to the international community at large, making of Israel a pariah state. Bad as he is for the Palestinians, they will survive Sharon. The prospects for Israel are less sure. For the rest of the world the Middle East crisis represents an enhanced risk of international war, and a likely guarantee that America's war on terror, however described, will fail.[3] Well-meaning observers of the contemporary Middle East sometimes place their faith in the enlightened self-interest of the warring parties. Palestinians, they suggest, would be so much better off accepting Israeli hegemony in return for material prosperity and personal security that sooner or later they will surely abandon their demands for full independence. To the extent that there is a strategic calculation behind Sharon's tanks, this is it: sufficiently cowed, the Arabs will see how much they have to lose by fighting and agree to a peaceful life on Israel's terms. This is perhaps the most dangerous of all colonial illusions. There is little doubt that most Algerian Arabs would have been better off under French rule than under the repressive indigenous regimes that replaced it. The same is true for the citizens of many of the postcolonial states once ruled from London. But the measure of the well-lived life is not readily taken by calculations of income, longevity, or even safety. As Aron observed, "It is a denial of the experience of our century to suppose that men will sacrifice their passions for their interests." That is why, in their treatment of their Arab subjects, the Israelis are on the road to nowhere. There is no alternative to peace negotiations and a final settlement. And if not now, when? - April 11, 2002 Notes [1] Paris: Plon, 1958. See also his La Tragédie algérienne (Paris: Plon, 1957). [2] One real impediment is that Ariel Sharon is on record as opposing any final peace settlement remotely acceptable to anyone outside Israel. He cannot negotiate in good faith. The Israelis need to find someone who can. [3] American commentators and officials are quick to deny any link between anti-Americanism and the Israel- Palestine conflict. But to just about everyone else in the world the relationship is grimly obvious. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- From hunterbadbear at earthlink.net Fri May 3 17:57:07 2002 From: hunterbadbear at earthlink.net (Hunter Gray) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Are you coming, Woody? Message-ID: <000901c1f2fe$3d1229a0$3970fa43@ibm22761429477> Note by Hunterbear: This concerns a great big piece of turf in what's called the United States: the Great Plains. When we visited some of my mother's relatives back in Kansas and Oklahoma in the late 1930s, I saw -- as a very small child indeed -- the skies filled with gritty dust for days and the blowing soil drifting like high snow along the fence lines. I can remember, in that setting, water-soaked handkerchiefs being placed over my nose and lower face. A good part of my home town of Flagstaff, Arizona -- on Highway 66 -- wound up being populated by refugees from the Dust Bowl of Oklahoma, western Arkansas, much of Kansas. Some initially stopped in that cool, high pine timber country and others, blocked by California gunmen on the Colorado River state border well to the west of Flag, turned east again and stopped to live and work in the lumber woods of our Northern Arizona setting. Many of the kids who went to school with me were "Okies" -- a broad term covering multi-state disaster. Looks like it could all being coming again -- via extremely extensive drought and high winds. And it's coming in the wake of years of economic malfunction and corporate greed that have seen many thousands of ranchers and farmers in, say, the Dakotas lose their land in the last twenty years. [I have many of my mother's kin in North Dakota -- as well as many friends there in my own right -- and keep up with that situation pretty well. So far they haven't been that dry -- but anything can happen and much of Eastern Montana is in bad shape.] Here in Idaho, we've had more than two years of really tough drought. Fires have played hell. Game has either been pushed far up into the very high country where it generally rains even if it doesn't anywhere else -- or 'way down and practically into town. However, this past winter -- which started in earnest in early November and saw snow here as recently as two days ago -- was heavy and wet and persistent enough to lead to my very frequent 4WD Jeep use. So, maybe, the cards are breaking well for us here in this part of the Inter-Mountain West. Maybe. But the Plains are something else again at this point -- something that's beginning to look as dark and foreboding as the skies I saw when I was five years old. =============================== May 3, 2002 Dry High Plains Are Blowing Away, Again By TIMOTHY EGAN New York Times Correspondent http://www.nytimes.com LAMAR, Colo. - A hypnotist was the featured guest at the soil conservation district's annual meeting here a few weeks ago, a fitting diversion for a place where it has not rained for nearly a year and the land seems to be in a hard trance. Across the state line from this southeastern Colorado town, in Syracuse, Kan., a crowd packed into the school gym to hear Dusty Dowd, a crop-duster, lead a prayer for rain. "Lord, we ask that you might again bless us with the general, beneficial rains that are so vital to our crops and our lives," the prayer went. The soil is on the move again in the High Plains, drifting over a swath of the American midsection calcified by drought. For some, it is reviving memories of a time when the world seemed to blow away. There have been serious droughts here before, some as fierce as the dry spells of the 1930's. But this drought is among the worst, and in some counties, particularly in the northern plains, it is the most devastating in more than a century. In eastern Montana, more than a thousand wheat farmers have called it quits rather than try to coax another crop out of ground that has received less rain over the last 12 months than many deserts get in a year. Blinding dust storms have forced drivers off the road, dozens of businesses have folded in withered communities, and the entire state has been declared a federal disaster area for farmers. Wyoming is much the same. Here in southeastern Colorado, in the heart of the old Dust Bowl, the ground is so dry that agriculture officials say most of this state will not even produce a wheat crop. "We've had severe drought before, but never four years in a row of terrible drought," said Jesse Aber, who directs Montana's drought task force. John Stulp, a farmer from this flat, wind-chipped corner of Colorado, added: "It's drier around here than it has been for a hundred years. We've chiseled up the ground on land where we usually have wheat coming up, just to bring dirt clods up to hold the soil down." Drought is no stranger to much of the country this year, with 29 states suffering through a prolonged dry spell. The East, from Maine to Georgia, has been particularly hard hit. But what makes the drought stand out in the western Plains is the blowing dust, a haunt of the Dirty Thirties when brown blizzards carried sand all the way to the Atlantic Ocean and prompted more than three million people to leave their homes. While the storms this year have not been nearly as epic or debilitating as the brown clouds that rolled over the flatlands during the Depression, they have been fierce - and they have come as something of a surprise for people who believed the land had been stabilized. Two weeks ago, Herb Homsher pulled his car over by the side of the road in the midst of a dust storm near the Colorado-Oklahoma border. It was the kind of duster Mr. Homsher had not experienced in years. "You couldn't see the end of your car," he said. In Montana, heavy dust this year caused a similar brownout, resulting in a traffic pileup that killed two television reporters. According to the latest assessment by federal officials, half of Montana, all of Wyoming, nearly two-thirds of Colorado, half of Kansas, a third of Texas and most of New Mexico are in the midst of a drought labeled severe to extreme. Wildfires are racing through the eastern front of Colorado. With 280 fires already this year, Colorado has had four times as many fires as normal. On much of the High Plains, the prairie grass was long ago plowed under to grow dry land wheat, a grain that depends entirely on what falls from the sky, with no help from irrigation. "My father was born in 1918 and all my life he's been talking about how we should be careful, we could have another 1930's," said Lochiel Edwards, a wheat farmer from near Havre, Mont. "Well, now it's as dire as I've seen in my life, and my father just the other day said it's as bad as 1936." The aridity may be worse than it was in the 1930's, but the dust storms do not compare. Up to 10 million acres lost at least the upper five inches of topsoil in those years, according to federal surveys. During one storm in 1934, more than 350 tons of airborne dust was galloping across the prairie. Wheat was never replanted on much of the land, which was reseeded with native prairie grass. Now the government pays thousands of farmers to keep the ground untilled, as part of the conservation reserve program. Without the last half-century of federally directed soil conservation, much of the old Dust Bowl would be windblown again, many officials and farmers say. Even so, Mr. Edwards said, many of his neighbors have lost topsoil to the new dust storms. "Their land has gotten away from them, and I don't think it's their fault," he said. "This drought is just a killer." To counties already hit by declining population and depressed farm prices, the days without rain are just one more piece of bad luck. In much of eastern Montana, Wyoming and Colorado, less than an inch of rain has fallen since last June. The soil is dry down to two feet in some areas. "It's a cumulative thing," Mr. Aber of Montana's task force said. "Four years without much rain at all. Even during the 30's, there were some fairly normal rainfall years, so this is almost unprecedented." Bridges cross over dry beds labeled rivers. Fields that usually turn green with the first spring rains are as brown as the skin of a baked potato. Rivers that drain snowmelt from the Rockies and flow east - like the Platte and the Arkansas - are running thin, and are so overtaxed that in some places only people with water rights dating to the 19th century are likely to get their regular share. Some small towns, like Melstone, Mont., have lost their municipal water supplies, the first time anyone can remember this happening. River rafting companies on the Front Range, where the prairie meets the mountains, talk about "what water" instead of white water. Fishing guides worry that the winter's snow will not bring nearly enough water to make for a successful year on the region's trout streams. "Everyone knows it's dry here, but it is the extreme, prolonged dry times that makes this such a disaster," said Jeff Tranel, an agronomist with Colorado State University. Prowers County, where Lamar is, is already a federal disaster area, making farmers eligible for subsidized loans because of the weather. This week, Gov. Bill Owens of Colorado asked the federal government to declare the entire state a disaster area. But few people want to take on more debt. "We're in trouble," said Steve Wertz, who has 3,000 acres in wheat and corn near this town on the old Santa Fe wagon trail. "I've been farming for 25 years and never seen it like this." The quirks of global agriculture are such that even though dry land wheat, the crop that first brought white settlers here to break the prairie sod, is in trouble, grain prices remain depressed because of a worldwide glut. Senators from the region are pressing for $2.4 billion in disaster payments for farmers who will not be able to grow a crop this year. But with so many subsidies already directed at failing agricultural operations, a new payment for drought-related losses faces stiff opposition in Congress. Looking to the white sky, farmers shrug and wonder if a new Dust Bowl will soon be upon them. "The attitude out here is bad," said Mr. Edwards, the third-generation Montana wheat farmer. "It's just a depressing time to be on the prairie." A joke making the rounds has it that the ducks who live in the cotton-mouthed counties in eastern Montana have yet to learn to swim. Most people say the line with a straight face. Copyright 2002 The New York Times From LAMZ at sympatico.ca Fri May 3 23:04:39 2002 From: LAMZ at sympatico.ca (Lysander Zimmerman) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] San Francisco, May Day: Pictures of "Black Bloc" Cop Infiltrator in Action Message-ID: <000501c1f329$329ea130$33378d18@Indy1> Beware of this at the next demo you attend!!! Cop Saboteur Mayday Arrest: Here are some preliminary photos of the undercover "black bloc" police agent who arrested an indymedia reporter. http://sf.indymedia.org/news/2002/05/125609.php From adurrani at YorkU.CA Sat May 4 00:02:40 2002 From: adurrani at YorkU.CA (Atif Durrani) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] 'Heir to the Holocaust: Bush and the Nazis' In-Reply-To: <200205032324.g43NOvTf012369@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> Message-ID: http://www.clamormagazine.org/issue14.3_feature.html full story in link, excerpts below Toby Rogers: 'Heir to the Holocaust: The story of Prescott Bush and the Nazis' By Toby Rogers While the Enron scandal currently unfolds, another Bush family business scandal lurks beneath the shadows of history that may dwarf it. On April 19, 2001, President George W. Bush spent some of Holocaust Remembrance Day in the Capital Rotunda with holocaust survivors, allied veterans, and their families... ...But while President Bush publicly embraced the community of holocaust survivors in Washington last spring, he and his family have been keeping a secret from them for over 50 years about Prescott Bush, the president's grandfather. According to classified documents from Dutch intelligence and US government archives, President George W. Bush's grandfather, Prescott Bush made considerable profits off Auschwitz slave labor. In fact, President Bush himself is an heir to these profits from the holocaust which were placed in a blind trust in 1980 by his father, former president George Herbert Walker Bush. Throughout the Bush family's decades of public life, the American press has gone out of its way to overlook one historical fact that through Union Banking Corporation (UBC), Prescott Bush, and his father-in-law, George Herbert Walker, along with German industrialist Fritz Thyssen, financed Adolf Hitler before and during World War II. It was first reported in 1994 by John Loftus and Mark Aarons in The Secret War Against the Jews: How Western Espionage Betrayed the Jewish People... ...However, Prescott Bush's banks were not just financing Hitler as previously reported. In fact, there was a distinct business link much deeper than Mr. Higham or Mr. Loftus knew at the time their books were published. A classified Dutch intelligence file which was leaked by a courageous Dutch intelligence officer, along with newly surfaced information from U.S. government archives, "confirms absolutely," John Loftus says, the direct links between Bush, Thyssen and genocide profits from Auschwitz. The business connections between Prescott Bush and Fritz Thyssen were more direct than what has been previously written. This new information reveals how Prescott Bush and UBC, which he managed directly, profited from the Holocaust. A case can be made that the inheritors of the Prescott Bush estate could be sued by survivors of the Holocaust and slave labor communities. To understand the complete picture of how Prescott Bush profited from the Holocaust, it is necessary to return to the year 1916, where it all began. (more in link) From hunterbadbear at earthlink.net Sat May 4 08:43:03 2002 From: hunterbadbear at earthlink.net (Hunter Gray) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Utopia and Movement and Organizing: Over The Mountains Yonder Message-ID: <001001c1f37a$00859a40$1d70fa43@ibm22761429477> Note by Hunterbear: Early morning thoughts stimulated at ASDnet and Idaho: The search for Utopia -- no matter how fanciful it may seem to the tired and the cynical and those of "smart" clever tongue -- is, along with an activist and effective recognition of the on-going class struggle, an integral dimension of any viable and vital social justice Movement. To correlate "utopianism" with inevitable war and repression -- as a few have on ASDnet -- strikes me as not only grievously wrong but a key component of the rationale/retreat from a bona fide democratic socialist perspective, and, indeed, often from any militancy at all, into the pallid and frequently militaristic and hardly civil libertarian box-canyon/dead end world of the Tony Blairs and Bill Clintons and Al Gores, their predecessors and their successors. Socialism is the public ownership and operation of the means of production and distribution -- and it also carries the very strong promise of the old, time-honoured tribal communalism in an essentially industrial context. And all of that is something that's far, far above simply pork-chops and pie-cards. A Movement -- a great transcendent, surging wave for which people will fight, and, if necessary die -- is a Flow that draws from -- and stimulates -- meaningful local efforts. A Humanistic Movement scatters its sparks and seeds to the very Four Directions and those, fueled by the winds of a religiosity grounded on the thrust for an infinitely and profoundly radical "better world," in turn spark and fuel a myriad of new grassroots rivulets that make up the stubbornly ever-persistent River of Change in the Save the World Business. It has always struck me that, in addition to the necessary and enduring attributes of integrity and courage and commitment, any really effective social justice organizer seeks to get grassroots people together -- and does; develops on-going and democratic local leadership; deals solidly with grievances and individual/family concerns; works with the people to achieve basic organizational goals and develop new ones. And very, very fundamentally -- that genuinely flint-sharp and fire-building social justice organizer builds a sense of the New World To Come Over The Mountains Yonder and how all of that relates to the shorter term steps and how those relate to it. What we still refer to as "The Labor Movement" was neither initiated nor fueled, say, in the virulently hostile 1910s and 1930s, by people who were searching solely for short-term relief. People did not risk their very lives in the Southern Civil Rights Movement for a cup of coffee or a job at a cash register. The promise of The Internationale, and the assurance in "We can bring to birth the new world from the ashes of the old" of Solidarity Forever, and the dream of the "Beloved Community" were -- and very much still are -- the Utopian Vision that continues to shine with enduring and compelling brightness in the hearts and minds of always struggling Humanity no matter how many mountain ranges and canyons and swamps loom between us and It. Hunter Gray [ Hunterbear ] www.hunterbear.org ( social justice ) Protected by Na?shdo?i?ba?i? From shniad at sfu.ca Sat May 4 12:13:33 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Scientists' deaths are under the microscope - G&M Message-ID: <200205041813.g44IDYTf017086@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> The Globe and Mail Saturday, May 4, 2002 Scientists' deaths are under the microscope By Alanna Mitchell, Simon Cooper and Carolyn Abraham It's a tale only the best conspiracy theorist could dream up. Eleven microbiologists mysteriously dead over the span of just five months. Some of them world leaders in developing weapons-grade biological plagues. Others the best in figuring out how to stop millions from dying because of biological weapons. Still others, experts in the theory of bioterrorism. Throw in a few Russian defectors, a few nervy U.S. biotech companies, a deranged assassin or two, a bit of Elvis, a couple of Satanists, a subtle hint of espionage, a big whack of imagination, and the plot is complete, if a bit reminiscent of James Bond. The first three died in the space of just over a week in November. Benito Que, 52, was an expert in infectious diseases and cellular biology at the Miami Medical School. Police originally suspected that he had been beaten on Nov. 12 in a carjacking in the medical school's parking lot. Strangely enough, though, his body showed no signs of a beating. Doctors then began to suspect a stroke. Just four days after Dr. Que fell unconscious came the mysterious disappearance of Don Wiley, 57, one of the foremost microbiologists in the United States. Dr. Wiley, of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at Harvard University, was an expert on how the immune system responds to viral attacks such as the classic doomsday plagues of HIV, ebola and influenza. He had just bought tickets to take his son to Graceland the following day. Police found his rental car on a bridge outside Memphis, Tenn. His body was later found in the Mississippi River. Forensic experts said he may have had a dizzy spell and have fallen off the bridge. Just five days after that, the world-class microbiologist and high-profile Russian defector Valdimir Pasechnik, 64, fell dead. The pathologist who did the autopsy, and who also happened to be associated with Britain's spy agency, concluded he died of a stroke. Dr. Pasechnik, who defected to the United Kingdom in 1989, played a huge role in Russian biowarfare and helped to figure out how to modify cruise missiles to deliver the agents of mass biological destruction. The next two deaths came four days apart in December. Robert Schwartz, 57, was stabbed and slashed with what police believe was a sword in his farmhouse in Leesberg, Va. His daughter, who identifies herself as a pagan high priestess, and several of her fellow pagans have been charged. Dr. Schwartz was an expert in DNA sequencing and pathogenic micro-organisms, who worked at the Center for Innovative Technology in Herndon, Va. Four days later, Nguyen Van Set, 44, died at work in Geelong, Australia, in a laboratory accident. He entered an airlocked storage lab and died from exposure to nitrogen. Other scientists at the animal diseases facility of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization had just come to fame for discovering a virulent strain of mousepox, which could be modified to affect smallpox. Then in February, the Russian microbiologist Victor Korshunov, 56, an expert in intestinal bacteria of children around the world, was bashed over the head near his home in Moscow. Five days later the British microbiologist Ian Langford, 40, was found dead in his home near Norwich, England, naked from the waist down and wedged under a chair. He was an expert in environmental risks and disease. Two weeks later, two prominent microbiologists died in San Francisco. Tanya Holzmayer, 46, a Russian who moved to the U.S. in 1989, focused on the part of the human molecular structure that could be affected best by medicine. She was killed by fellow microbiologist Guyang (Matthew) Huang, 38, who shot her seven times when she opened the door to a pizza delivery. Then he shot himself. The final two deaths came one day after the other in March. David Wynn-Williams, 55, a respected astrobiologist with the British Antarctic Survey, who studied the habits of microbes that might survive in outer space, died in a freak road accident near his home in Cambridge, England. He was hit by a car while he was jogging. The following day, Steven Mostow, 63, known as Dr. Flu for his expertise in treating influenza, and a noted expert in bioterrorism, died when the airplane he was piloting crashed near Denver. So what does any of it mean? "Statistically, what are the chances?" wondered a prominent North American microbiologist reached last night at an international meeting of infectious-disease specialists in Chicago. Janet Shoemaker, director of public and scientific affairs of the American Society for Microbiology in Washington, D.C., pointed out yesterday that there are about 20,000 academic researchers in microbiology in the U.S. Still, not all of these are of the elevated calibre of those recently deceased. She had a chilling, final thought. When microbiologists die in a lab, there's a way of taking note of the deaths and adding them up. When they die in freakish accidents outside the lab, nobody keeps track. Suspicious deaths The sudden and suspicious deaths of 11 of the world's leading microbiologists. Who they were: 1. Nov. 12, 2001: Benito Que was said to have been beaten in a Miami parking lot and died later. 2. Nov. 16, 2001: Don C. Wiley went missing. Was found Dec. 20. Investigators said he got dizzy on a Memphis bridge and fell to his death in a river. 3. Nov. 21, 2001: Vladimir Pasechnik, former high-level Russian microbiologist who defected in 1989 to the U.K. apparently died from a stroke. 4. Dec. 10, 2001: Robert M. Schwartz was stabbed to death in Leesberg, Va. Three Satanists have been arrested. 5. Dec. 14, 2001: Nguyen Van Set died in an airlock filled with nitrogen in his lab in Geelong, Australia. 6. Feb. 9, 2002: Victor Korshunov had his head bashed in near his home in Moscow. 7. Feb. 14, 2002: Ian Langford was found partially naked and wedged under a chair in Norwich, England. 8. 9. Feb. 28, 2002: San Francisco resident Tanya Holzmayer was killed by a microbiologist colleague, Guyang Huang, who shot her as she took delivery of a pizza and then apparently shot himself. 10. March 24, 2002: David Wynn-Williams died in a road accident near his home in Cambridge, England. 11. March 25, 2002: Steven Mostow of the Colorado Health Sciences Centre, killed in a plane he was flying near Denver. From shniad at sfu.ca Sat May 4 12:10:28 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] BC health union targeted for blacklist, labour says Message-ID: <200205041810.g44IASTf015914@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> The Vancouver Sun Saturday, May 4, 2002 Health union targeted for blacklist, labour says Health minister shocked by accusations against private firms By William Boei and Jim Beatty Two companies wanting to provide privatized health-related services in B.C. were accused Friday by labour leaders of planning to blacklist 20,000 or more members of the Hospital Employees Union who now do the work. The unionists released transcripts of phone calls in which representatives of the companies indicated they wouldn't hire HEU members because their expectations for wages and benefits would be too high, and there was a danger they would sign up with the same union again. Calling the plans "offensive, illegal and immoral," the B.C. Federation of Labour demanded the provincial government halt the privatization process and call a public inquiry. Health Services Minister Colin Hansen said he was shocked by the union charges. "We will not tolerate any organization, in any field in British Columbia, breaking the law," Hansen said. "If there are tactics that are in violation of the Labour Code, or any other piece of legislation, that would be totally unacceptable ... we expect the rules to be followed." The B.C. Government and Service Employees' Union said it was approached this week by two companies -- the Canadian branch of French multinational Sodexho and a management consulting firm representing an unnamed Canadian company -- that hope to win contracts for health support services in B.C. The BCGEU said both companies wanted to sign "sweetheart" union agreements for lower wages than HEU members now earn, and both indicated they would not hire any current HEU members to do the work. Union leaders said the companies are proposing to pay wages in the $10-per-hour range for work that now earns HEU members about $17 per hour. BCGEU officials handed out sworn affidavits saying they had recorded phone calls with company representatives, as well as transcripts of the recordings. Gary Steeves, the union's director of organizing and field services, said he recorded a call with Spencer Green, the Tsawwassen-based regional operations director of Sodexho Marriott Services. In the transcript, Steeves mentions that "the corporate proposal was HEU employees wouldn't be hired." Green responds: "Well, I'm saying it's everybody, and I ain't hiring them." Green also says: "We're trying to figure where to get all these bodies from, but ... you can't be hiring people with those kinds of pays and benefits and think they're going to come and work for you for, ah, a third of the cost, you know, and be happy." In the second conversation, BCGEU official Jaynie Clark said she talked to Luciano Anjos, a management labour-relations consultant with a Burnaby company called The Fifth Option, representing an unnamed Canadian company. In the recording, Clark says the company will probably want to hire experienced HEU members if it wins a laundry contract with a B.C. health authority. Anjos responds, "No, they prefer not to, I think." He then agrees with Clark that ex-HEU members could be expected "to vote the HEU back in." Anjos is president of the B.C. Industrial Relations Association, and Clark is vice-president. Green did not return The Vancouver Sun's calls Friday. The Fifth Option said Anjos was away until May 21. A message left for another company official was not returned. B.C. Federation of Labour president Jim Sinclair called the phone calls "evidence of the terrible consequences of Premier Gordon Campbell's drive to privatize and cut health care." He said the companies propose to black-list thousands of employees just because they belong to the HEU, and to replace them with an entirely new, unskilled work force at wages 30 per cent below those now paid. BCGEU president George Heyman said the companies implied in the phone calls that their goal of cutting the HEU out of the picture is shared by the regional health authorities that are restructuring health care in B.C. for the provincial government. "We believe that Premier Gordon Campbell and his Liberal government, through their explicit plans to privatize health care services in B.C., are orchestrating the sell-out of major parts of our public health system to multinational corporations," Heyman said. "Gordon Campbell and his Liberals appear to us to support firing and then black-balling many thousands of experienced and committed health workers." He demanded Campbell disassociate his government from the corporations' plans, slap a moratorium on privatization of health care services, and call a public inquiry. Hansen did not respond to those demands, and said he will not rule out Sodexho playing a role in the reorganization of B.C.'s health system. "I certainly wouldn't want to be black-balling any particular company based on reports that come through the media," he said. If health authorities consider contracting out services, they should do so with reputable firms that are capable of providing quality services, Hansen said. The scene for privatization was set in January by Bill 29, provincial legislation that overrides no-contracting-out clauses in public service union contracts and eliminates the unions' successor rights to represent employees hired to do privatized work. The government has said wages for support services in B.C.'s health care system are out of line compared to those paid in other provinces. In many cases, support staff such as cleaners and laundry workers in B.C. earn 30 per cent more than the national average. The government believes contracting out these services is a way to save millions -- money that could then be put into the delivery of health care. Although Hansen and Campbell regularly complain about the high wages paid to support workers, Hansen said there is no effort to ban HEU employees from taking jobs with companies that provide contracted services. "I would certainly think that some of the workers who have been in the system would be prime candidates to pick up those jobs because they have the experience," Hansen added. Sinclair said he expects all unions affiliated with the B.C. Federation of Labour to reject any overtures for sweetheart deals with companies wanting to offer health-related services, and that the companies might turn to so-called "rat unions" that operate outside the federation. "It's very possible that they would sell their souls for ... more dues," Sinclair said. HEU president Fred Muzin said it is folly to think quality health care services can be delivered "by serving up McDonald's-level wage rates." "This is not about improving health care," Muzin said. "It's about padding corporate profits at the expense of patient care and the jobs of thousands of women and men." Phone Excerpt The following is an excerpt from the transcript of a phone conversation between B.C. Government and Service Employees' Union official Jaynie Clark and management labour-relations consultant Luciano Anjos. The discussion is about whether an unnamed Canadian company that's bidding for B.C. hospital laundry contracts would hire members of the Hospital Employees' Union who now do the work. Anjos: "They, uh, they probably wouldn't want to." Clark: "Wouldn't want to hire HEU members?" Anjos: "Yeah, because they know what's going to happen, right?" Clark: "But they'd vote the HEU back in." Anjos: "Bingo, bango." From shniad at sfu.ca Sat May 4 12:12:06 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] BC teachers' union says 57 schools may be closed Message-ID: <200205041812.g44IC6Tf016578@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> The Vancouver Sun Saturday, May 4, 2002 Teachers' union says 57 schools may be closed BCTF blames inadequate funding By Janet Steffenhage The B.C. Teachers' Federation says 57 public schools are threatened with closure in the fall because of inadequate education funding from the provincial government. Federation president David Chudnovsky said that number is unprecedented in B.C. "We have never had anything like 57 schools close in one year in this province. The responsibility for these changes lies with the provincial government." Education Minister Christy Clark disputed the figure, saying some districts are consulting with their communities about closures that may never happen. And she argued that the reason for some school closures is declining enrollments. "This will only be fixed by revitalizing our economy," she said in an interview. Gordon Comeau, president of the B.C. School Trustees Association, said that while tight budgets are forcing some boards to consider school closures, it's also true that many of those schools are small. For example, his district of Nicola-Similkameen is considering closing a school, but the school has only nine students. Some of the 57 schools identified by the BCTF would be in a similar situation, he suggested. "A large number of those (schools) would have had to close over time." Previously, districts were encouraged to keep small schools open because the provincial funding formula included a grant based on the square footage of its buildings. "Sometimes you actually made money keeping (those small schools) open," Comeau noted. But that changed in the spring when the Liberals brought in a funding formula based largely on student numbers. The new formula and the unexpected costs that were dropped on school boards by the Liberals are forcing districts to consider closures, he said. While the student population isn't falling dramatically across the province, Comeau said it is shifting as rural and small-town workers move to larger centres in search of work. Although Chudnovsky and Clark disagree on the reason for school closures, both commented on the disruptive impact on students and their families. "Parents and students are tremendously attached to their schools," the minister said. "It's got to be a wrenching experience to move your child." Chudnovsky said parents and teachers are angry. He noted the Prince George school district has the "dubious distinction" of having the largest number of schools on the chopping block -- one junior secondary and 11 elementary. jsteffenhagen@pacpress.southam.ca From mstainsby at tao.ca Sat May 4 16:43:37 2002 From: mstainsby at tao.ca (Macdonald Stainsby) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Mayworks editorial Message-ID: <004b01c1f3bd$2e7877e0$291f5318@vc.shawcable.net> (Mordecai Briemberg, April 2002) Connections, not conspiracies Seattle to Quebec to Genoa: our numbers, our capacities, our optimism were growing. Those with power publicly worried, indeed quarrelled among themselves over how to respond, with carrots or sticks or both. Yet today we in B.C. have barely noticed, let alone celebrated, the largest-ever anti-globalization protest, the gathering of between 300 to 500,000 people in Barcelona in March. Between Genoa and now was . September 11. September 11 marks a reconfiguration of the political culture, the division into "the good" and "the evil". Stimulating a profound popular xenophobia, the American state publicly proclaimed a policy of permanent war-making, war without geographic or time limits. This was the beginning of their major counter-offensive against our movements, our campaigns focused on halting the acronyms: FTAA, NAFTA, MAI, IMF, WTO. The power-holders displayed a face little evident to our movements against the acronyms. Their state, that some imagined to be in the process of dissolution, supplanted by acronyms, reappeared - active and aggressive. To paraphrase Mark Twain, the rumours of the death of the state had been greatly exaggerated. And its apparatus of repressive laws was significantly expanded, with little opposition. War with its massacre of civilians in the attacked country also makes a profound appeal to racist passions, directed abroad and at home; it refurbishes as well a male-dominant, soldier-culture, whittling away without direct attack the advances feminists have made in the recent decades. Yes, for a brief moment there was an anti-war movement that filled the breach of the paralyzed anti-globalization movement. And this anti-war movement made some beginning effort to challenge the racism at home and abroad of the war-makers. But the anti-war movement soon fizzled. This was not the first but the third time in the last decade an anti-war movement fizzled. The movement against the first United Nations' war on the people of Iraq fizzled; the movement against the NATO war on the people of Yugoslavia fizzled next. Now when it is so clear that the fourth major war of the "new world order" has been meticulously planned, to target the people of Iraq once again, it has been only the heroic popular resistance of the Palestinian people in the Israeli occupied territories that has derailed the timing of a U.S.-U.K. invasion. Here, where we are, there is a bare murmur of an anti-war movement. Now our energies seem focused on a much needed response to the Campbell attacks. Corporate globalization, or the capitalist destruction of the commons and the common good, has come home with a vengeance. As the slogan says: they are all Enron, we are all Argentina. There is much to do. It seems there is "too much to do". Corporate globalization, war-making and empire building, racist profiling, soldier culture, and repressive laws. For those in power these fronts of attack are a co-ordinated strategy. They too have a lot to do, but they see the connections and they focus their energies. We are at a point when we must do the same. We must discover the connections to be able to focus our energies, without simply hopping from one foot to the other. We are at a time when thinking is practical, when we need better ideas to understand the major facets of our world and their connections. Honest, open, tough-minded thinking, thinking together democratically, is a priority. Mayworks is an important opportunity for us to do this. Make time to contribute. ------------------------------------------- Macdonald Stainsby http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international "Simply BEING a Palestinian in what used to be Palestine is a form of suicide...slower and more painful than using a bomb to blow up yourself [...]." - American Jew writing to others, email correspondence. ---- In the contradiction lies the hope. --Bertholt Brecht From mstainsby at tao.ca Sat May 4 16:46:05 2002 From: mstainsby at tao.ca (Macdonald Stainsby) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Anti-Poverty Committee demonstrates against Training Wage Message-ID: <005f01c1f3bd$989bcb40$291f5318@vc.shawcable.net> From: Anti-Poverty Committee Re: May Day Demonstration Anti-Poverty Committee demonstrates against Training Wage On Wednesday May 1st, the Anti-Poverty Committee held a 'May Day' action against the training wage. The demonstration started at Victory Square in Vancouver. Organizers from different groups spoke about the need fight the training wage and the importance of May Day as a celebration of international solidarity. "On International Labour Day 2002, we stand with all workers and oppressed people of the world and declare our continued commitment to heighten our resistance against imperialist globalization," said Carlo Sayo of the Philippino-Canadian Youth Alliance. The protesters then marched to the McDonald's restaurant on Granville, where they blocked the entranceways of the restaurant for about an hour, shutting down business. Many people from the Anti-Poverty Committee and other labour/community groups spoke out against the training wage, the history of McDonald's union-busting, and the racist treaty referendum. After the visit to McDonald's, the demonstration marched towards the art gallery. In an action that was not planned or approved by the Anti-Poverty Committee, a group of individuals marched into the Pacific Centre Mall, chanting '6 bucks sucks, 8 is not enough.' The police arrested one man, who was dragged away spitting blood. Some of the demonstrators marched to the police station to show support for the arrested demonstrator. The police attacked this group at Main and Hastings, a traditional site for police brutality, and arrested three more people. At the time of this press release, all four people are still in custody. The Anti-Poverty Committee demands their immediate and unconditional release. The Anti-Poverty Committee also demands an end to the training wage, and today was the start of their 'end the training wage' campaign. They will be targeting McDonald's and other business that paying the training wage, putting pressure on them until they stop using it. "Big business invested millions of dollars in the Liberal election campaign. These same rich business owners make millions by paying starvation wages to the people who work for them," said Ivan Drury, an organizer with the group. "The $6 minimum wage is an attack on the poor and working people. The Anti-Poverty Committee is fighting back. Business can't make money if they can't do business." The Anti-Poverty Committee is an organization that came together in January to fight against the cuts being made by the provincial government. To date they have organized a number of successful demonstrations, including a 'Picnic at the Premier's' on April 1st, where over 700 people rallied at Premier Gordon Campbell's house in protest against the BC Liberal agenda. They also organized the occupation of a welfare office that took place last Friday to protest the cuts made to welfare by the BC Liberals. - 30 - ------------------------------------------- Macdonald Stainsby http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international "Simply BEING a Palestinian in what used to be Palestine is a form of suicide...slower and more painful than using a bomb to blow up yourself [...]." - American Jew writing to others, email correspondence. ---- In the contradiction lies the hope. --Bertholt Brecht From mstainsby at tao.ca Sun May 5 13:39:13 2002 From: mstainsby at tao.ca (Macdonald Stainsby) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Judge beaches Makahs' whaling trip Message-ID: <000901c1f46c$89ac4ba0$291f5318@vc.shawcable.net> (Fwd From M Krebs) Temporary restraining order blocks hunting of gray whales By Associated Press http://www.spokesmanreview.com/news-story.asp?date=050402&ID=s1142241&cat=sectio n.tribal_news SEATTLE _ A federal judge granted a temporary restraining order Friday barring Makah Indians from hunting gray whales, thwarting the tribe's plans to continue an ancient tradition that has sparked fierce opposition in recent years. U.S. District Court Judge Franklin D. Burgess in Tacoma issued the 10-day order two days after whaling opponents filed their request. "Plaintiffs have made a sufficient showing that serious questions are raised and that the balance of hardship tips in their favor," Burgess wrote. "There is a public interest in determining that an (environmental assessment) adequately addresses all of the ways the whale hunting proposal could adversely affect the human environment." Anti-whaling activists applauded the ruling. "We're absolutely thrilled," said Michael Markarian, vice president of the New York-based Fund for Animals. Reached by phone at the reservation in Neah Bay, Tribal Council President Gordon Smith said he had no comment. "It's something we feel strongly about, but a comment's not going to do us any good," Smith said, noting that the council has not yet issued a whaling permit this year. The tribe's Seattle-based lawyer, John Arum, called the restraining order a bitter disappointment, criticizing the judge's failure to mention the treaty rights that give legal backing to the Makah's centuries-old whaling tradition. "It's evident from the judge's ruling that this is very preliminary, and he hasn't even considered the merits of the case," Arum said, "so I don't think anyone should take this decision as an indication of how he will ultimately rule." The judge also scheduled a May 15 hearing on The Fund for Animals' recent request for a preliminary injunction, which would last longer than a temporary restraining order. The preliminary injunction seeks to prevent the Makah from hunting whales while a lawsuit challenging the tribe's right to whale makes its way through the courts. The Makahs' right to whale is outlined in their 1855 treaty. The tribe moved to resume the hunt when the whales were taken off the Endangered Species List in 1994. After making their case to the International Whaling Commission, Makah whalers were allocated 20 whales through 2002, but no more than five per year. They killed one, on May 17, 1999, their first in more than 70 years. They tried again in the spring of 2000, but were unsuccessful. There was no whaling last year, while a court-ordered environmental study was under way. That study cleared the hunts to resume, as well as expanding whaling territory. Whaling opponents accuse the National Marine Fisheries Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association of violating two laws: the National Environmental Policy Act and the Marine Mammal Protection Act, which allows only Alaska tribes to hunt whales. The fisheries service has defended the study, saying it showed that allowing the Makah to hunt no more than five gray whales per year would not harm a population of 26,000 whales. ------------------------------------------- Macdonald Stainsby http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international "Simply BEING a Palestinian in what used to be Palestine is a form of suicide...slower and more painful than using a bomb to blow up yourself [...]." - American Jew writing to others, email correspondence. ---- In the contradiction lies the hope. --Bertholt Brecht From hunterbadbear at earthlink.net Sun May 5 18:00:48 2002 From: hunterbadbear at earthlink.net (Hunter Gray) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] EARTH , MOUNTAINS, WIND AND OPTIMISM Message-ID: <000301c1f491$16e18c00$ec70fa43@ibm22761429477> "Nothing lives long, only the Earth and the Mountains," goes a traditional Cheyenne death song -- sung at Sand Creek in Eastern Colorado when the blood-thirsty Colorado militia led by Colonel John Chivington [a Protestant minister] swept in on a November day in 1864 and slaughtered almost 500 unarmed and peacefully encamped Cheyenne and Arapaho. Many killed were children and Chivington's cynical rationale which he gave to the Denver press -- "Nits breed lice" -- stands starkly as Mortal Sin on the Land of the Free. The Earth and the Mountains are continuing to live -- and are doing just fine. We've been 'way up there and we've just seen them. When my head's full -- thinking thoughts profound and otherwise; dealing with the responsibilities of New Century Life; fending off human mosquitoes even as I, along with many other committed souls, try to cut a new trail or two to the Sun -- I like to go back to Roots. And some of those are the Earth and the Mountains -- where all of the contours of geography blend together in a natural, mutually strengthening Solidarity. And that's a message to Humanity -- deep and high. Solidarity. And then there's a very special family place up there. Very, very special indeed. The cold west wind was blowing at least 60 or 70 mph early this morning when my oldest daughter, Maria, and I and our faithful Shelty topped-out on one of the very high rocky, cedar ridges in the far-up rough country that rises rapidly for miles right out our back door. I've got a top-grade wide-brimmed, high-crown hat for this land of super-wind, wild rain and snow, and often relentless sun: an Akubra Cattleman -- from Australia. But if it didn't have its braided Kangaroo chincord -- adjustable and, if necessary, neckskin tight -- that great hat would likely be sitting somewhere in a cloud over Wyoming right now. I should add that Size 15 high lace-up steel-braced Vasque Mountain boots often keep me from heading to Wyoming on the Wind Sea as well. We had come up earlier, just two weeks ago -- right after most of this winter's continual, drought-killing heavy snowfall accumulation had finally begun to fade. Green grass has had to struggle hard through these past two years of tough and bitter and gritty dryness. But two weeks ago, after this long and wet winter, grass was just pushing up all over -- spotted with the first arrivals of a full color spectrum of wildflowers. Water was flowing everywhere and the wild animals were happy. From one high point I had looked 250 yards or so down to another, lower ridge -- and saw, for us an always good sign: a large, gray coyote trotting along. Dark, heavy clouds were moving in and we'd no sooner returned down to our still far-up and on-the-edge home, than heavy rain began to fall -- followed a day later by a great deal of wet and formidable snow. Four-wheel drive time for my Jeep, once again. Almost all of that recent snow was gone this morning. The green grass and flowers are now everywhere -- along with even more water. The animals, moving up into the high country for the summer and early fall, are very happy indeed -- except for the lion-killed deer whose remains we saw. And the lion, of course, is happy -- as are the coyotes that had obviously scattered portions of the deer while finishing off the lion's leavings. And happy, too, are certain birds that aren't vegetarians. It's a kind of Utopia -- for almost everything. I've often thought of bringing my one-half Bobcat cat, Cloudy, a non-spayed female up with me into this generally pleasant setting -- hoping that perhaps a young Bobcat male might come bouncing out of the trees and give us the litter we'd like. But, I then remember -- from many decades ago -- what happened to my good and close coyote buddy. He'd been given to me as a gift in a northern/western state -- a tiny pup with his eyes still closed -- by people for whom I'd done some effective social justice activist work. A mother dog with her own litter took him in until he was weaned and then he and I left for the copper country of Utah and then Arizona -- where, increasingly big and impressive, he became very well known. He received all of his medical shots and lived congenially with me -- never as a pet but as a full equal -- for a long time, in a number of challenging settings. And then, when I was situated work-wise in extremely rough and isolated mountain country on the Arizona / New Mexico border, he met one of the much smaller Arizona coyotes -- a lady of course -- and left me pronto. He did return briefly to me, a few times, but always with her -- and was also seen frequently by cowpunchers and woodsmen and the several prospectors who always recognized him because of his considerable size, and who never harmed him, and who gave us reports. The only coyote in that vast region with all of his shots, I'm sure he lived long and productively -- and I know I'm now related some way to every coyote from Alpine, Arizona down into the old Clifton-Morenci copper mining district and over into the high and vast Mogollon Mountains of New Mexico. But I miss him. And so I think for my Bobcat mix, Cloudy, we'll find a relatively domesticated Bobcat male at stud and see how that goes. I'll contribute much to the Earth and the Mountains -- but I won't contribute her. But, Wind! -- was that wind up there this morning really strong. Super, super strong! And even as it battered and pounded and pushed, it also swept through me with a cleansing intensity that left me lighter -- but very, very clear-headed. And as I saw the green grass growing and the water flowing and the Earth blending and the animals fending [productively] and the trees bending and the Sun sending -- I felt a great wave of optimism. And that powerfully positive force took root in me, deep and high. And I know Humanity will make it -- and make it just fine. May well take time but we'll get there -- into the Circle of the Sun. But there is something else Up There where we go so often -- something very, very special. The Family Place. The Special Valley. That gave many years of winter camp protection for some very important direct ancestors of ours. And because it did, we're here -- literally -- on Earth. And that Valley gives much, much Courage and Strength and Vision to us today. It always will. So here's something of mine on that: Why we came here, Why we stay: [ Note by Hunterbear: This published article of mine was written a little over a year ago -- and now, of course, five years have passed since the Great Dakota Flood which brought us back to the Mountain West and into Idaho. ] IDAHO AS PLACE [HUNTER GRAY] PUBLISHED IN THE MAY/JUNE 2001 ISSUE OF NORTHWEST ETHNIC VOICE Almost four years have passed since that day in mid-May, 1997, when my wife, Eldri, and I stood and looked at the massive floodwaters of the Red River of the North. Those, born of a dozen blizzards, and after having engulfed virtually all of Grand Forks, N.D. -- forcing the evacuation of over 50,000 people -- had stopped only three hundred yards east of our way-out-on-the-far-edge home. I had never trusted the Red River. We decided then to move -- and back to the Mountain West. I had grown up in the tough, racist, quasi-frontier Northern Arizona mountain town of Flagstaff -- a half-breed Indian kid with a deep rebel streak that led me to wander the West early on and become a life-long socialist in my late teens; join what was left of the old-time I.W.W. in the mid-1950s; develop my innate organizer's gift and a thousand related skills in a mounting number of hard-fought social justice campaigns. I went to college at different points, married Eldri with her Saami/Finnish background and values similar to mine. We went off on our own River of No Return which shifted back and forth between my full-time organizing/part-time teaching -- and full-time teaching and full-time organizing. When we looked that day at those hungry Red River floodwaters, I had recently retired from Indian Studies at the University of North Dakota. We picked Idaho - Southeastern Idaho -- Pocatello. I knew the town -- railroad center, phosphorous mining and refining -- from my early wanderings and a few later ones. I certainly remembered hearing once -- from someone, somewhere -- that Big Bill Haywood had taken his bride, Nevada Jane, to Pocatello for their honeymoon. But it was the rough country around Pocatello that pulled me especially -- hell, yanked with the greatest poignancy. The major "culture hero" in my own family -- the great role model -- had been and still is a St. Regis Mohawk [Iroquois] ancestor from up-state New York, my great/great/great grandfather, John Gray [Ignace Hatchiorauquasha] who, with his 16 year old Mohawk wife, Marienne Neketichon [Mary Ann Charles] had come into the Columbia and Snake River country in the early 19th century with the fur trade. It was he who organized the other Iroquois fur hunters into what were essentially strike actions [ among the first ever in the Far West] against the fur bosses -- Alexander Ross in 1824 and Peter Skene Ogden in 1825 -- and ended a viciously exploitative pricing system and quasi-indentured servitude. John Gray was tough -- the sharp and cutting toughness of Mohawk flint. He was also a hell of a formidable knife fighter. The Grays had maintained a key Southeastern Idaho camp in an upper valley surrounded by high, rough ridges -- very good indeed for lookout scouting -- not far to the west of the Portneuf River: and now, generations later, just west of Pocatello. And it was there, in that rugged and high up cedar-spotted valley that always faces the eastern sun, that my great/great grandfather was born -- the oldest of the Gray sons. The family records indicate his arrival in succinct but fascinating fashion: "Peter Gray, born 1818, born in the Rocky Mountains." [My youngest son is named for him.] In the mid-1830s, John Gray, with the other Iroquois, took his family 'way east of the Rockies to French Settlement on the Missouri, later to become Westport and finally Kansas City. There they faced floods and many human enemies and, although John Gray got back briefly to the Rockies in 1841, he was murdered at Westport two years later. And I always felt that he and his family regretted at so many many points ever having left the secure and rugged country west of the Portneuf. And so we came to Pocatello in the summer of '97: myself and Eldri; our youngest daughter, Josie; and my oldest daughter, Maria, and her two children -- Thomas and Samantha. Rescued by me just before the Red River flood struck, Maria and her little group had lost everything. Our families now joined, we brought our cats, our rabbits, and a turtle on the long westward trek out of the Western plains and into the Montana mountains and down into Southeastern Idaho. And I bought a home 'way far up on the western frontier of Pocatello -- right on the very edge -- and less than an hour's up-hill hike to the special valley and protective ridges of my ancestors. And that is exactly how and why we came here. But, no sooner did we arrive, than it became clear that my reputation as a "known agitator" had preceded me. Police began almost immediate surveillance. We began having weird phone problems -- sometimes with a crudeness reminiscent of our civil rights years in the Deep South. Heavy mail delays -- including innumerable stalled and sometimes opened Priority packages -- became commonplace. [Three detailed complaints on my part to regional postal inspectors at Seattle have gone unanswered, unacknowledged.] Our garbage has been surreptitiously searched. Idaho State University -- here at Pocatello -- has fled whenever I've sounded it out about part-time teaching. All of these -- and much much more -- including harassing phone calls -- are continuing. But with only an exception or two, our immediate neighbors -- people who've gotten to know us on a personal basis -- are friendly and fine. And the sky is a very deep blue. When I look out my front picture window, almost all of Pocatello is well below me, and I see far above it -- over to the many mountains. And I can go out our back door and be in cedar country in a couple of minutes -- and on my way up, ever up, to the high ridges that surround our special valley. And all of us here -- myself, Eldri, children, grandchildren -- have made other friends: a special rattlesnake buddy [about whom -- and about our human enemies -- I wrote an essay which Against The Current published in its January/February 2001 issue], mule deer, bobcats, mountain lions whose tracks we always see, special coyotes. And, always, there is the very special valley and the protective ridges. I was still a kid when I learned the enduring importance of the old Wobbly motto: "Better to be called Red than be called Yellow." Some years ago, I recovered, via FOIA/PA, around 3,000 pages of my FBI file [1950s to 1979] -- not counting several hundred pages they still won't give me. I've survived FBI witch-hunting, and many social justice arrests, bad beatings, an effort in Mississippi to kill me which left me seriously injured. And much more. So we stay here and we keep fighting -- just like we always have: Native rights, worker rights, civil rights, civil liberties. And always, too, there are the spirits of my ancestors -- always with us, always around. They walk with us -- very glad indeed that we have finally come back. And that we'll stay for a good while. Hunter Gray [Hunterbear] Micmac / St Francis Abenaki / St Regis Mohawk ===================================================================== This excellent Northwest Ethnic Voice is very capably edited by union organizer Bob Rossi. Its address is Northwest Ethnic Voice Box 2766, Salem, Oregon 97308. E-mail: rjrossi@navicom.com Subs are $10.00 a year. Make checks payable to Bob Rossi. Hunter Gray [ Hunterbear ] www.hunterbear.org ( social justice ) Protected by Na?shdo?i?ba?i? From miyachi9 at gctv.ne.jp Sun May 5 19:01:45 2002 From: miyachi9 at gctv.ne.jp (miychi) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Abolition of money and socialist revolution Message-ID: Abolition of money and socialist revolution ( Below is insufficient for analyzing secrets of commodity itself, so I will post in next article on fetishism of commodity) There are not a few discussions about abolition of money or capitalist mode of production; as for money, it is caused from its magical and mystifying functions and as for the latter, from the experience from the realistic contradictions forced by its historical and realistic developments and the idealistic phenomena induced by them. As for commodities, however, there have been few discussions for their abolition. Of course, apart from the bourgeois economists who look upon a commodity as an eternal truth or axiom or the modern economists who surely put on academic dress but are just their vulgar successors, among Marxian economists, there are many who recognize logically-although somewhat form-logically-that in the commodities or the commodity production itself the contradictions are immanent, and advocate their abolition based on this fact. But for Marx, however, there are none who assert their abolition in principle and on criterion just from the commodity or commodity production. Why? From the standpoint of a history of theory, it is caused from the complete misreading of the famous beginning paragraph of $B!H(JCapital$B!I(J;$B!I(J Wealth of the societies where the capitalist mode of production prevails commodity appears as $B!H(J an immense collection of commodities$B!I(J, and each commodity appears as an original form of of such wealth. Therefore our research will begin with the analysis of commodities$B!I(J What Marc told about is that the original form of wealth-that is the mode of production -reproduction of material life and its result (the products)-is a commodity. These all forms of material life show themselves in the commodities, or crucibles in which all phenomena of the world is dissolved. Once the commodity world is established, a constitutional principle of commodities would dominate all the material world. Therefore we must analyze its internal constitutional principle. It is the reason why the theory of commodities of $B!H(JCapital$B!I(J is so voluminous and difficult to understand. To tell more easily. within the commodity world and capitalist world people interrelate socially one another only by mean of the commodities(=wealth). Therefore, all aspects of the societies are integrated within the commodity relations. And once the commodity world is established, commodities integrate the society by means of their internal criterion, which maintains itself just like the criterion that the light velocity is invariable within the cosmos of the relative theory. Commodities are brought into the world through contradictions in the social nature of the society, and at the same time an inevitable but fictitious form of solution and evolution. Once the commodity world is established, movements of commodities would maintain and fix this fictitious form. Thus on a exact meaning of the words and thus dialectically, the commodities-commodity world should be abolished , but to achieve this we must analyze the internal constitutional principle of the commodities cosmos of the commodities, or the content of truth and fiction. Conventional Marxism which has concentrated tremendous effort on interpretation of the $B!H(Jcommodity world$B!I(J in the first chapter of $B!H(JCapital$B!I(J ,but could not analyzeformation and evolution of the fiction of the equivalent exchange-and the equivalent exchange of labor which support its content. For this reason they can$B!G(Jt understand the framework of these problems.( It goes without saying that it is caused from commodities themselves. They are the crucibles which dissolve all the full picture of th society, and at the same time have their own logic and form to conceal this fact. For this we shall mention later) Although they prosecuted for the capitalist mode of of production without asserting the abolition of commodities and thus advocated various unessential merkmals for prosecution. ,it is on the account of this that the following discussions became popular: negation of commoditification of labor power(which is produced from the commodity production. Or, according to their assertion, can the simple commodity production without such commodification be affirmed?). The conversion theory of proprietary laws( which also affirms the commodity producing world without dictarship of capital. They distorted the conversion theory of Marx), and theory of fetishism ,or materialization, and at last Eurocommunism which makes the commodity production an inevitable element. For considering the internal cosmos of the commodities logically, focusing points are value and labor. The conventional theory of commodities has also focused these two points. This theory makes much of equivalent labor exchange and the subjectivity who invest labor from the political end of emancipation of the workers theoretically and on real life, from somewhat esoteric understanding of materialism(that is ,from the the solid belief that labor is foundation of all things) and thus consider the value directly on labor. Therefore, firstly the value is looked upon goodness and in spite of or procecution against capitalist exploitation, the production of commodity and value which makes its real basis has been neglected.. ( In a sense, this is caused from usual usage of the word of value cultural value, academic value etc., all of which have a positive meaning),Secondly, goodness of value is indivisibly related to that labor. Labor itself might surely be good. However, labor expressed in commodity isn$B!G(Jt irrelevant to labor accomplished by its subjectivity but at the same time is the result that such labor is arranged really-logically. Without making clear the structure of arrangment and with deep attachment to labor and its subjectivity, you will get to the wrong conclusion for the commodity world and the world at a whole. Truth is the contrary. Human society cannot sponsor the commodity world. As long as the commodity world integrates human society, its social structure cannot surpass the commodity world-the principle of commodities(its arrangement structure). Although the commodity world inevitably appeared from the historical legacy and the development of productive power. the principle of commodities has rather estranged the development of social structure with the development of capitalism. And in this context faults of that principle can be detected and finally you can lead the conclusion that the commodity world should be abolished. Incidentally, we$B!G(Jll point out how the wrong explanation of the world has been made by those conventional theory of labor value. Firstly, as for humanism versus anti-humanism; From above discussion, the fault of so-called humanism is already clarified. And yet we cannot assert that anti-humanism should be right. Because hey wouldn$B!G(Jt penetrate into the inner structure of commodities but wrongly interpret the various kinds of phenomena based on the commodity world as effects of some systems. By the way we don$B!G(Jt ask whether they are symbolized as a trace of Stalinism personally, artificially or as something mechanical in modern ways. Or without realizing the social nature which creates the commodity society and the corelation of the social nature within the commodity, they would explain the principle of the world with a fantastic idea using such theory as $B!H(JExclusion of the Third item$B!I(J. Secondly, while admitting the equivalent exchange of labor, they often maintain that the exchange of labor-power commodity violate the principle of the commodity exchange. Surely bargaining of the labor-power commodity does not represented the value relation of commodity, but although on the promise of the class relation,it is produced from the commodity world and to social nature which has produced that world practically and logically. Thus it does not violate the principle of commodity exchange=law of value. In simple speaking, the inner structure of the commodity world gives birth to the labor power-commodity. Therefore it isn$B!G(Jt the labor-power commodity but the commodity itself should first of all be abolished. Thirdly, the standpoint of the theory of the division of labor is surely useful for explaining the history, but the commodity world cannot be clarified from this. Because, the division of labor surely constitutes the premise of the commodity world, but if you explain the commodity world from this view, the commodity-money becomes just a medium with which the society maintains itself, and thus you cannot clarify the defect contained in the commodity-money. And thus, in accusation of capitalism as a whole, you cannot help depending on the theory of materializationb or fetishism. After all you cannot understand the content of the society of division of labor unless you explain the division of labor from the commodity and find in the latter. By the way, as the last discussion of this section, we need to see the idea of the commodity world of Stalinism, which has not been analyzed sufficiently yet. Faced with the false experience for abolition of the commodity world and the capitalism, they have discussed the peculiar theory of commodity production ,and the theory or discussion that the commodity production in general should not be abolished, while capitalism must be accused, has been in very popular. Consequently, the civil socialists who advocate the transformation of the civil society into capitalism, the modern economists who eternize the market economy, and Euro-communists who advocate coexistence of socialism with market economy are also swaggering about. Incidentally, it is no denying that under proletarian dictarship the commodity economy might be introduced as a political program, as shown in the NEP period. To put it strongly, there has been no discussion about abolition of commodity in Stalinism. For they has advocated the overthrowing of the capitalist dispossession and abolition of exploitation,but they could not analyzed the inner structure of commodities. However, it is hard to understand why they introduced such a curious program for the commodity world, which realized small commodity production after the Revolution. Why they hastened the farm collectivization by attackin peasantry as small commodity producers as well as clerk? Even if they accomplished the collectivization violently, we cannot say they had the logic for abolition of commodities. To tell the truth, the leaders of Russian revolution thought that their social nature which is just an idea of the consciousness of proletariat; that of barely propertyless worker, soldier, and peasantry could win over the social nature of small commodity producers as well as clerks(consciousness of the owners of small property and commodities). In fact, on the idealized consciousness of proletariat, they believed just an esoteric materialism which condensed the unsophisticated materialism poetically and politically. At first despite of a little confusion for procurement of food during the civil war, such materialism did not run against vulgar materialism of peasantry on behalf of the leadership of the party. But on the course of the NEP, they collided on whole scale each other,about the procedure of resources of industry and food for civil dwellers. And at last the forced collectivization began, which corresponded to the social nature of that materialism. You may as well rate the view of Sadao Mino to some extent high who called this nature of the esoteric materialism as $B!G(Ja private ownership of labor$B!G(J . A critical mind of Lenin ,who, on the course of the NEP economy,had proved into the logic of abolition of commodities through discussion on labor on Saturday or cooperatives, cannot be found in this materialism. Thus the collectivization and nationalization which did not contain the progressive measures for abolition of commodities characterized with value through working hours conceived various kinds of contradictions as a matter of course. And the Soviet economists have explained them using the logic of commodities or the theory of socialist commodity production. Therefore the logic of abolition of commodities is lacked in Stalinism. False of the theory of united front in Stalinism , Euro-Communism, and the theory of four lines for modernization in China are logically all originated from the same problem; lack of the logic for abolition of commodities. Now we$B!G(Jll discuss theoretical problem about the inner structure of commodity. As mentioned above, the focusing point is the labor and the value. Let see the labor at first. An false of the established Marxsian economists is that they are the living labor producing commodity. As a logical consequence they consider that commodities are something good produced by labor as our universal action or as an equal amount of labor invested, unless the equal exchange is accomplished artificially.(See the theory of the monopoly capitalism of Stalinism) Thus there is no contradiction in commodity production . However, in fact, although the commodity world cannot be materialized without the living labor and the amount of labor which constitutes the value is determined by the labor expressed in commodities after the living labor is arranged in a peculiar structure. Firstly productivity of the individual workers is ignored through this arrangement structure, and secondly differences of productivity and working conditions of individual workers or companies (manufacturing neasures, allocation of company, etc.) are also ignored. The agricultural products have the another arrangement structure as shown in the theory of rent. And finally differences from the scale of company are ignored and arranged. As a result labor expressed in the commodities as value is quite different from the amount of the living labor. In this sense, the equal exchange in the commodity world is just a form, and under this formal equality how inequality is produced is neglected. For example, as Marx describes in the third volume of $B!H(JCapital$B!I(J, in the country where the free-holders who got rid of the bond of the feudalism occupy the majority, they can qualify as commodity producers in this meaning, but commodities they produce are exchanged as a price less than a product cost. However, all kinds of discrimination and difference of the social structure or social nature, from individual abilities to production scale or based on a historical legacy ,are arranged formally in this way, and thus are really retained. To say frankly, the inner standard of commodities, that is, formal equalization of labor with value, contains the principle of discrimination in itself. Now the value theory of the new Kantesian school, which distorts the subjective theory and the labor theory of Marx with philosophy of consciousness but , in the fact,is just an object theory, asserts that each producers accomplished equal exchange based on the recognition of the amount of labor they invest. On the contrary, the value of commodity is determined through a long detour of the law of value, which is the principle of macro cosmos of the commodity world, while we may say call the formal arrangement above mentioned as a principle of micro cosmos. That theory has also advanced viewpoints like the trade theory on the comparative producing cost of Ricardian school and the theory of international division of labor, but they extended this formal realm into the world-wide scale. In a country the law of labor expressed in the criterion of the commodity world, the value of commodities, neglected inequality of the conditions of labor or production ,stratifyed composition of labor under the formal equality and transformed the inequality into a social structure. Now these fixation and structization have been accomplished world-widely. And these economic conditions also constitute a basis of various political affairs. As for the unequal exchange in the theory of the third world, we must say that under the imperialistic world there has been no unequal exchange between metropolis and satellite countlies. It is no denying that as a result of various political situations there have been some conditions which might be called as an unequal exchange . But on the whole we can say that the equal exchange has been dominated between them according to the logics and ethics of the commodity,apart form the critics for their special usage. On the contrary they should say that the primary products and oil are surely exchanged equally, and that ,however, they know the fallacy of the principle of equal exchange, which is the criterion of the commodity world. Thus they can call for the unequal exchange politically and one-sidedly. If they say so, they will be reasonable in their way. However, their theory of revolution cannot exceed the logics of economics or the commodity world. We must declare that on examination of the problems raised from the theorists of the Third World we cannot produce a true theory of the world revolution unless we find the logics of the commodity world and the viewpoint of the abolition of the commodities. We$B!G(Jll discuss about the average labor power, which is the actualization and materialization of the value of commodities determined by the abstract labor, and about the arrangement structure of the value mechanism with the average labor power, different from that of the abstract labor, which is the more concrete structure of discrimination and inequality immanent in the commodity world, and finally about the principle of the commodity and its abolition by analyzing the value, the second focusing of commodity. MIYACHI TATSUO Psychiatric Department Komaki municipal hosipital 1-20.JOHBUHSHI KOMAKI CITY AICHI PREF. 486-0044 TEL:0568-76-4131 FAX 0568-76-4145 miyachi9@gctv.ne.jp From miyachi9 at gctv.ne.jp Sun May 5 19:03:53 2002 From: miyachi9 at gctv.ne.jp (miychi) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Marx=?ISO-2022-JP?B?GyRCIUcbKEo=?=s critique of the fetishism Message-ID: Marx?s critique of the fetishism ????????? In Theory & Psychology, Volume 9, Number 3 June 1999, the commodity fetishism, the ideology, the false consciousness, and the theory of need are separately argued. But these categories have a common cause and an inner connection. I begin with analyzing the value-form, especially the equivalent form of value, show the mysterious character of commodity-form, and finally show the critique of the fetishism of the commodity. As for the fetishism of the capital, and interest-bearing capital, I only point out the basic mechanism different from that of the commodity. But since some articles analyze the fetishism incorrectly, I reply these arguments. They are swayed by the sphere of the exchange and the circulation, and ignore the critique of the immediate production process and the fetishism of the capital, as a result, They legitimize the capitalist mode of production. 1. On the equivalent form of value In the value-form in Capital, Marx wrote about the equivalent form: The relative value-form of a commodity, the linen for example, express its value-existence as something wholly different from its substance and properties, as the quality of being comparable with a coat for example; this expression itself therefore indicates that it conceals a social relation. With the equivalent form the reverse is true. The equivalent form consists precisely in this, that the material commodity itself, the coat for instance, express value just as it is in everyday life, and is therefore endowed with the form of value by nature itself. Admittedly this hold good only within the value-relation, in which the commodity linen is related to the commodity coat as its equivalent. However, the properties of a thing do not arise from its relation to other things, they are, on the contrary, merely activated by such relations. The coat, therefore, seems to be endowed with its equivalent form its property of direct exchangeability, by nature,.just as its property of being heavy or its ability to keep us warm. Hence the mysteriousness (R?tesellhafte-quoter) of equivalent form(Caipital,1,p.149) This is the first peculiarity of equivalent form from which use-value becomes the form of appearance of its opposite, value.(First substitution-Quidproquo) About the second peculiarity of equivalent form, Marx wrote: In order to express the fact that, for instance, weaving creates the value of linen through its general property of being human labour rather than in its concrete form as weaving, we contrast it with the concrete labour which produces the equivalent of linen, namely tailoring. Tailoring is now seen as the tangible form of realization of abstract human labour(Capital,1,p.150). In this substitution concrete labour becomes the form of manifestation of its opposite, abstract human labour. In this form, the relation of the abstract and the concrete is reverse. This is the second substitution(Quidproquo-quoter) . And the third peculiarity of equivalent form is that private labour takes the form of its opposite, namely labour in its directly social form: Because this concrete labour, tailoring, counts exclusively as the expression of undifferentiated human labour, it possesses the characteristic of being identical with other kinds of labour, such as the labour embodied in the linen. Consequently, although, like all other commodity-producing labour, it is the labour of private individuals, it is nevertheless labour in its directly social form. It is precisely for this reason that it presents itself to us in the shape of a product which is directly exchangeable with other commodities(Capital,1,p.150) This is the third substitution. 2. On the mysterious character(Das Geheimnisvolle-quoter) of the commodity-form About the mysterious character of commodity-form, Marx wrote: the mysterious character of the commodity-form therefore simply in the fact that commodity reflects the social characteristics of men?s own labour as objective characteristics of the products labour themselves, as the socio-natural properties of these things(Dinge-quoter). Hence it also reflects the social relation of the producers to sum total of labour as a social relation between objects, a relation which exists apart from and outside the producers. Through this substitution, the products of labour become commodities, sensuous thing(Ding), which are at the same time suprasensible or social(Capital,1,p.164) To understand this Geheimnisvolle of this commodity-form have to be premised on understanding the R?tesellhahte of equivalent form, and the problem is previously resolved in the part of value-form, in which the equivalent form seems to have its property of direct exchangeability by nature just as the material properties. So R?tesellhafte of equivalent form meets the Geheimnisvolle of the commodity-form. 3. From equivalent form to money-form The purpose of analyzing the value-form is to show the origin of money-form by tracing the development of the expression of value. The degree of development of relative form of value, and that of the equivalent form, correspond. But we must bear in mind that of the development of the equivalent form is only the expression and the result of the development of the relative form. The simple or isolated relative form of value of one commodity converts some other commodity into an isolated equivalent. The expanded form of relative value, that expression of the value of one commodity in terms of all other commodities, imprints those other commodities with the form of particular equivalents of different kinds. Finally, a particular kind of commodity acquires the form of universal equivalent, because all other commodities make it the material embodiment of their uniform and universal form of value?The universal equivalent form is a form of value in general. It can therefore be assumed by any commodity.?On the other hand, a commodity is only to be found in the universal equivalent form(form C), if, and in so far as, it is excluded from the ranks of all other commodities, as being their equivalent. Only when this exclusion becomes finally restricted to specific kind of commodity does the uniform relative form of value of the world of commodities attain objective fixedness and general social validity. The specific kind of commodity with those natural form the equivalent form is socially interwoven now becomes the money commodity, or serve as money? The only difficulty in the concept of the money form is that of grasping the universal equivalent form(Capital 1, p.139) And the difficulty in the concept of equivalent form is that of grasping simple value form between two commodities. In money-form, gold and silver are not seen as representing a social relation of production, but in the form of natural objects with peculiar social properties. This substitution makes the social relation of production being natural things. 4. Versachlichung der Personen and Personifizierung der Sache About Versachlichung der Personen, Marx wrote: Whence then, arise the enigmatic( r?tsellhafte-quoter) character of the product of labour as soon as it assumes the form of a commodity? Clearly, it arises from this form itself. The equality of the kinds of human labour takes on a physical form in the equal objectivity of the products of human labour as values; the measure of the expenditure of human labour-power by its duration takes on the form of the magnitude of the value of the products of labour; and finally the relationship between the producers, within which the social characteristics of their labour are manifested, take on the form of a social relation between the products of labour(Capital 1, p.164) And about Personfizierung der Sache: Commodities cannot themselves go to market and perform exchanges in the their own right. We must, therefore have recourse to their guardians, who are possessors of commodities. Commodities are things(Dinge-quoter) and therefore lack the power to resist man. If they are unwilling, he can use force; in other words, he can take possession of them. In order that these objects may enter into relation with each other as commodities, their guardians must place themselves in relation to once another as persons whose will resides in those objects, and must behave in such a way that each does not appropriate the commodity of the other, and alienate his own, except through an act to which both parties consent. The guardian must therefore recognize each other as owners of private property. This juridical relation, whose form is the contract, whether as part of a developed legal system or not, is a relation between two wills which mirror the economic relation. The content of this juridical relation( or relation of two wills) exist for one another merely as representative and hence owners, of commodities(Capital,1. P.178) In this context, subjectivity is on the side of commodity, not person. As guardian of commodity, person?s will resides in those objects, which become the subject of relation, and person merely act for commodities behavior. This substitution is the mode of unintentional government of person?s will. Therefore the bearer of commodities are not free person, but is ruled by commodities behavior This is the Personfizierung der Sache. 5. On the fetishism of commodity Versachlichung is followed by fetishism. Marx wrote: The mysterious(Geheimnisvolle) character of the commodity-form consists therefore simply in the fact that the commodity reflects the social characteristics of men?s own labour as objective characteristics of the products of labour themselves, as the socio-natural properties of these things. Hence it also reflects the social relation of the producers to sum total of labour as a social relations of objects, a relation which exists apart from and outside the producers. Through this substitution, the products of labour become commodity?The commodity-form, and the value-relation of the products of labour within which it appears, have absolutely no connection with the physical nature of commodity and the material relations arising out of that. It is nothing but the definite social relation between men themselves which assumes here, for them, the fantastic form of the relation between things. In order, therefore, to find an analogy we must take flight into the misty realm of religion. There the product of the human brain appear as autonomous figures endowed with a life of their own, which enter into relations both with each other and with the human race. So it is in the world of commodities with the products of men?s hands. I call this the fetishism which attaches itself to the products of labour as soon as they are produced as commodities, and is therefore inseparable from the production of commodities(Capital,1, p.164) The appearance form of commodity relation produces the fantastic form of relation between things. Therefore Versachlichug produces Verdinglichung. Now, fundamentally speaking, Simple value form provide the basis of the fetishism as false semblance independently of this relation: We have already seen, from the simplest expression of value, x commodity A= y commodity B, that the thing in which the magnitude of the value of another thing is represented appears to have the equivalent form independently of this relation, as s social property inherent in its nature. We followed the process by which this false semblance became firmly established, a process which was completed when the universal equivalent form became identified with the natural form of a particular commodity, and thus crystallized into the money-form. What appears to happen is not that a particular commodity becomes money because all other commodities express their values in it, but, on the contrary, that that all other commodities universally express their values in a particular commodity because it is money. The movement through which this process has been mediated vanishes in its own result, leaving no trace behind( Capital,1,p.187) Thus Ding appear to have the social force by nature. The fetishism of commodity and money is completed. Now about fetishism of capital, and interest-bearing capital, this theme is beyond my argument, but the basic mechanism is not that of the fetishism of commodity and money, but I only point out that the substitution of relation of means of production and labour is the root of fetishism of capital in which the separation of means of production from producer occurs.. Thus, the fetishism is itself an ideology, which justify the capitalist mode of production. Marx wrote: We have already shown in connection with the most simple categories of the capitalist mode of production and commodity production in general, in connection with commodities and money, the mystifying character that transforms the social relations for which the material elements of wealth serve as bearers in the course of production into properties of these things themselves(commodities), still more explicitly transforming the relation of production itself into a thing(money). All forms of society are subject to this distortion(Capital,3,p.965) . 6. The fetishism and every day life consciousness On the basis of the fetishism, the actual producer?s consciousness is determined. Marx wrote: : It is also quite natural, on the other hand, that the actual agents of production themselves feel completely at home in these estranged and irrational forms of capitalist-interest, land-rent, labour-wages, for these are precisely the configuration of appearance in which they move, and with which they are daily involved(Capital,3,p.969) But, on the same time, on account of Versachlichung, the capitalist mode of production appear to them as overwhelming natural law, governing them irrespective of their will. Obeying natural law as such gravity is natural action, so false semblance of freedom is established.. But, on the other hand, since the social power that governs people is Sache, Deversachlichung movement emerges. Ecologies, consumer and worker?s cooperative, and many social movements generally pursuit Deversachlichung unconsciously or consciously to establish the new organization of society in which the social labour need not to receive the form private labour, and need not to mediate the product of labour in order to prove his own labour in abstract form as socially approved 7. Reply to argument of Martha Augoustinous on Ideology . M.Augoustinous argues about ideology.?At first, she sends away the theories of ideology such as ideology as the set of political beliefs and value, ideology as system justification, ideology as false consciousness, and ideology as social cognition. And she adopts ideology as false consciousness as an ideological critique of society. About ideology as political beliefs , she says: By restricting the definition of ideology to a coherent system of political beliefs as embodied within rhetoric of western democratic political parties, this tradition of research focuses only upon formal political conflicts and the formal process of political decision-making. While this is a legitimate area of research and inquiry in itself, it fails to consider the everyday politics of ordinary person?s life, thereby stripping the concept of ideology of its critical component. (p.297) She correctly point out the limitation of ideology as political beliefs. Secondly, she argues about ideology as system justification ?such theoretical perspectives have emerged largely from structural Marxist accounts of ideology?(p.297) on the basis of Marx?s German ideology. But this notion is ? criticized for being too economically determinist and reductionist?(p.298) But the theme of German ideology lies in critique of Hegelian tradition, and the understanding of class struggle emerging from material relation, separating its political, religious, ideological form. Thus, Marx said that it is necessary to separate the material conflict from its political,religious form to understand class-struggle. It is not reductionist theory. Thirdly, she argue about ideology as false consciousness The working classes were seen to have failed to recognize their ?true? economic and political interests by internalizing the bourgeois values of their oppressors. Ideology(falsity) was contrasted with science(truth). Many social theorists have seized on this vulgarized concept of ideology, equating it with all that is false, distorting and mystifying. Like the concept of false consciousness, the Gramiscian notion of hegemony has been to understand the widespread perceived legitimacy and support that contemporary capitalism and parliamentary democracy receive from the general public( Gramsci,1971)? The hegemonic process can be described as the way in which a particular world view or moral philosophical outlook diffuses throughout society, forming the basis of what is 299) She criticizes the notion of the false consciousness: The notion of false consciousness suggests that ideology itself is a matrix of falsefoods, a view which only a few Marxists would adhere to today. For example, Eagleton(1991) argues??In short , successful ideologies must be more than imposed illusion, and for all their inconsistencies must communicate to their subjects a version of reality which is real and recognizable enough not to be simply rejected out of hand? (p.300-301) But she and Eaglton don?t refer to the content of so-called reality. Since they don?t argue the content of the so-called reality, they cannot point out the false consciousness. Next, she criticizes the ideology as social cognition.: Jost(1995), for example, documents a body of social psychological research demonstrating that many disadvantaged and oppressed group in society hold beliefs which are contrary to their own self-and group interest; that is beliefs which justify, rationalize and legitimate their own subordination. These documented social psychological phenomena include: belief in a just world(Lerner,1980)-associated with a tendency among oppressed groups not to perceive their own injustice and disadvantage(Elster,1987); political fatalism and acquiescence-linked to beliefs about the futility of protest and the unlikelihood of social change(Cunningham,1987); actual resistance to change?reflected in phenomena such as cognitive conservatism(Greenwald,1980), and behavioural compliance; the tendency for society?s victims to blame themselves(Janoff-Bulman, 1992) or to blame and scapegoat other disadvantaged persons or groups(Tajfel, 1978); identification with and preference for ?the oppressor? or more powerful outgroups(Hinke&Brown, 1990) ;and finally, the justification of social roles and the legitimation of existing inequities between different social groups(Jost&Banaji, 1994)? She criticizes the social cognition that ?Psychological accounts of false consciousness primarily locate distortions and mystification within the perceptual and cognitive domain of the individual subject. The individual subject is viewed as failing to perceive reality accurately and failing to recognize his or her true self-and group-based interests. Such individualistic approaches to subjectivity fail to acknowledge that reality construction is not an isolated cognitive task involving the direct and unmediated perception of the world. People are constantly and actively engaged in a complex and socially situated process of constructing reality, but they do this by using the cultural and ideological resources that are available to them( Gergen,1982; Harr? 1983; Shotter, 1984).(p.301-302) But by social cognitionist, important documents are observed. The problems here are not criticize them as individualist but to interpret their observations from the perspective of Versachlichung and the fetishism of Sachen( commodity, money and capital). The fetishism attribute the capitalist mode of production to a socio-natural property. Under this fantastic form, individual adapts to the relation as if adapt to natural law. But on the other hand, The bearer of the commodity reside their will in the commodity, the subjectivity is on the side of commodity. In the market, the commodity of high productivity has high price, and the converse is true, so that commodity form allows the bearer of commodity to recognize their value in so far as their abstract labour, and treat the concrete person?s labour discriminately. Labour?s price is in fact reproductive cost of labourer, but for the fetishism, it appears to arise from labour?s use value. Since labourer?s natural differences such as skin?s color, or labour?s characteristics appear to decide the price of labour, many discrimination occurs within the working class. Besides, on the oppressed side of social relation, the oppressed drive to oppose to the social relations, but this opposition appear to unnatural such as to oppose the gravity in the person swayed by the fetishism of Sachen, so that the opposition turns upon to himself or the same groups. And discriminations within the working class occur. Finally, She adopt the notion of the false consciousness as an ideological critique of society: Marx later writings which located ideology not in peoples minds or their consciousness, but in the social and material reality of capital itself.(p.305) She quotes Eagleton who says: Marx is not claiming that under capitalism commodities appear to exercise a tyrannical sway over social relation; he is arguing that they actually do(p.305) She also quote Geras who says: If then the social agents experience capitalist society as something other than it really is, this is fundamentally because capitalist society presents itself something other than it really is(p.305) She says that mystification , then, is embedded in the very nature of capitalist society, in reality itself, and not in the minds of people. But her and Eagleton?s argument surrenders the fetishism of capital, because they approve the Sachen?s tyrannical social force as if natural disaster. While Marx?s critique of fetishism is to criticize the socio-natural appearance form of social relation as fantastic form of a relation between things which is derived from mysterious character of commodity-form, they surrender the fetishism of Sachen. In addition, their notion of reality is unclear. What is the content of the reality.? According to her argument, paradoxically,the false consciousness is the consciousness of the reality, so she must returns back to the beginning with interpreting the so-called reality. ? ??8?Reply to argument of Michael Billig on commodity fetishism and of Brenda Goldberg on a psychology of need and the abstraction of Value Michael Billig argue that for fetishism of commodity, social forgetting occurs, and in late capitalism or consumer capitalism, postmodern, consumer capitalism has lost its capacity to retain its own past. Along side what Jameson calls a ?historical amnesia?, a sociological amnesia can be detected. The very term ?consumer capitalism? exemplifies this absent-mindednes: .My memory can include the production of my self through my consumption: I can tell stories of how I acquired the means to be my present self. But I have little or nothing to say about the production of my jealously owned commodities?My sense of being a possessive self is not derived from my relation with those who produce the means of these pleasure. Quite contrary, it is to be derived from the relation between my commodities, conceived as material object, and the commodities of others. It is precisely this type of relationship which Marx identified at fetishist.(p.319-320) To remember Marx is to remember the condition of daily exploitation. We should remember that the fetishized commodities whose daily consumption is so important to us and to our sense of ourselves are produced by unnamed ?Others?. Our routines of life , not to mention our habits of interpretation, distract us from this remembering.? Thanks to such routines, we can habitually forget that our many possessions have been produced by the labour of repressed Others.(p.327) Firstly, his reading of fetishism of commodity is incorrect. He says: the value of a commodity derives from the labour which has produced the commodity. Instead of understanding the value of the commodity in terms of the social relation of which have produced it, the commodity?s value is understood in relation to other commodities, such as money or the goods that money can purchase. In this way, the labour expended in the production is forgotten in the everyday understanding of the value of commodity. The social character of labour appears ? as an objective character stamped upon the product of that labour. Consequently, ? a definite social relation between men assumes?the fantastic form of a relation between things? ?He(Marx-quoter) wrote that ? the determination of the magnitude of value by labour-time7 becomes secret? and, thus, money ?actually conceals, instead of disclosing, the social character of private labour?(p.315) In the first place, value of commodity don?t derives from labour, but abstract labour. In the value form, the characteristics of abstract labour is expressed by equivalent form of value. And that the social character of labour appears as objective character stamped upon the product of that labour is the substitution(Quidproquo) of relation. Similarly, Brenda Goldberg?s understanding of fetishism of commodity is incorrect. She says: the abstract concept of value, which is the most basic form of exchange, two commodities stand, as it were, eye to eye( or ?I? to ?I?),caught in a specular relationship. In order for the two objects, commodity ?A? and commodity ?B?, to be exchanged they must express a relation of both relative and equivalent value. Since commodity ?A? cannot express its own value, it must seek its value through the bodily form of opposing image. One commodity can only have value when compared to another commodity, which stand in relation to itself in a different qualitative form, and so a second object, commodity ?B?, must serve as the physical embodiment through which the value of ?A? is expressed. Within this elementary form of exchange there is a division of roles, one commodity taking the active ?A? and one the passive ?B? role. The function of the passive object is to act as a mirroring surface reflecting back the other value. Second, however, for two commodities to be deemed exchangeable, they must also some identical or equivalent substance. The substance which is common to both elements is , according to Marx, abstract human labour power. The expanded form of value occurs when the social network of commodity relations develops such that commodity ?A? can find its relative and equivalent value in a variety of other commodities(p.357) Firstly, relation of commodities is not premised on real exchange, or exchange process. Marx, at first, analyzed one commodity, and reduced it to abstract labour.as crystals of this social substance which is value. Then, he analyze the value form, in which this social substance appear. Because commodities possess an objective character as values only in so far as they are all expressions of an identical social substance, human labour, that their objective character as values is therefore purely social. From this it follows self-evident that it can only appear in the social relation between commodity and commodity. In the simple form of value, two commodity play two different parts. The linen express its value in the coat; the coat serves as material in which that value is expressed. The relative form of value and the equivalent form are two inseparable moments, which belongs to and mutually condition each other; but at the same time, they are mutually exclusive or opposed extremes, i.e. poles of the expression of value. Thus, commodity ?A? cannot play both roles in the same time, which Goldberg suggest to be possible. Because he cannot analyze the peculiarity of the equivalent form of value, he says: the commodity are all relative to each other? ? In order to give unity and true abstraction to the system, a third element is needed(p.358) This confused explanation is derived from disregarding the analysis the equivalent form of value. Now about social amnesia, Billig point out the relation of consumption and production. But he ignores the fetishism of the capital. About the labour process and the valorization process, Marx wrote: The labour process, as we have just presented it in its simple and abstract elements, is purposeful activity aimed at the production of use values. It is an appropriation of what exists in nature for the requirement of man. It is the universal condition for the metabolic interaction between man and nature, everlasting nature-imposed condition of human existence, and it is therefore independent of every form of that existence?.The labour process, when under the control of the capitalist consumes labour power, exhibits two characteristic phenomena. First, the worker works under the control of the capitalist to whom his labour belongs?.Secondly, the product is the property of the capitalist and not that of the worker, its immediate producer(Capital.1.p.290-291) But for the fetishism of the capital, the valorization process appear to the simple labour process, so that workers appear to work in a socio-natural production process. Since Billig is swayed by the sphere of commodity exchange, the true relationship of commodity exchange and the immediate process of production of surplus-value is vague. His insistence that to remember Marx is to remember the condition of daily exploitation ignores the force of the fetishism of capital and confuse the level of commodity consumption with commodity production. Commodity consumption is not necessarily followed by social amnesia. Rather, social amnesia may occurs from the process of accumulation of capital in which : As soon as this metamorphosis has sufficiently decomposed the old society throughout its depth and breadth, as soon as the workers have been turned into proletarians, and their means of labour into capital, as soon as the capitalist mode of production stands on its own feet, the further socialization of labour and the further transformation of the soil and other means of production into socially exploited and therefore communal means of production, takes on a new form.(Capital.1.p.928) If society maintains communal character, social, historical memory don? t vanish. In capitalist society, in which individuals are reciprocally alienated , collective and historical memory is impossible. Now, Billig?s argument on repression and social amnesia ignores the the critique of fetishism of immediate process of production even its mysterious form, so that he legitimize the capitalist mode of production in general and fail to explain the reason of social amnesia. Likewise, Goldberg?s argument on commodity confuses the fantastic form of relation between things with fetishism of capital. Since her understanding of value-form is incorrect, she fails to grasp the Versachlicung der personen und Personifizihrung der Sache. In the Personifizihrung der Sache, the Sache governs person?s will. .Person only act for commodity?s behaviour. And she says: as Marx also observed, although it is during the production stage that exploitation occurs and ?surplus? value is created, this exploitation can only full express itself and reap its ?return? when the commodity passes into the realm of circulation and consumption(p.364) Here, she is swayed by the false semblance of the capital circulation. Capital circulation, commodity-capital, productive-capital, and money-capital only realize, not ?express? or ?emerge?. Nevertheless she says: It is in the sphere of circulation that the class and race interests ? hidden? within the independent body of commodity are ?personified? and psychology?s subjects are metamorphosed through its form in an assessment of their ?value(p.364) In the sphere of exchange, commodity-value only realize, and in the circulation, three forms of capital only realize. She sees in the sphere of circulation the class and race interest, but it is incorrect. Marx wrote: the value and surplus-value contained in these commodities must first be realized in the circulation process. Both the restoration of the values advanced in production, and particularly the surplus-value contained in the commodities, seem not just to be realized only in circulation but actually to arise from it. This appearance is reinforced by two circumstances in particular: firstly, profit on alienation, which depends on cheating, cunning, expertise, talent and a thousand and one market conjunctures; then the fact that a second determining element intervenes here besides labour-time, i.e. the circulation time. Even though this functions simply as negative limit on the formation of value and surplus-value, it gives the appearance of being just as positive a ground as labour itself and of involving a determination independent of labour that arise from the nature of capital. In Volume 2, of course, we had to present this sphere of circulation only in relation to determination of form it produces, to demonstrate the further development of the form of capital that takes place in it.(Capital,3,p.966) In contrast with this argument, she ignores the critique of immediate production. As a result, she legitimize the capitalist mode of production process as well as Billig. After all, Billig and Goldberg consider that the exchange process conceal the exploitable character within the sphere of immediate production process. But, important is to understand how to be possible to conceal the exploitable character of capitalist mode of production within the sphere of immediate production process. The fetishism of capital make it possible. In this article, I tried to show Marx?s critique of the fetishism of commodity, and it is itself ideology which justify the world of commodity in which commodity appears as socio-natural thing.. As for the fetishism of the capital and interest-bearing capital, I only pointed out the basic mechanism. The some articles about the fetishism of commodity and ideology are insufficient. My reply shows these incorrectness. MIYACHI TATSUO Psychiatric Department Komaki municipal hosipital 1-20.JOHBUHSHI KOMAKI CITY AICHI PREF. 486-0044 TEL:0568-76-4131 FAX 0568-76-4145 miyachi9@gctv.ne.jp From adurrani at YorkU.CA Sun May 5 19:46:12 2002 From: adurrani at YorkU.CA (Atif Durrani) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Remember the Palestinians - Reese King Message-ID: Remember The Palestinians, 3 May 2002 Knowing how much Americans are worried about the loss of innocent life in Palestine, I thought I'd summarize the number of Palestinians killed in the past 17 months. This number does not include all those killed in Israel's most recent military invasion of the West Bank. They are still finding bodies in the rubble. This number represents only those killed through March 9, 2002. The toll of Palestinian children 15 and younger is 151. That's a lot of Little League teams. Many of these children were shot through the head by Israeli snipers who, 200 yards away in armored vests and helmets, apparently feared a rock thrown by a 12-year-old that landed many yards short. I can easily imagine killing people. After all, I was in the Army. I cannot imagine lining up a child's head in the scope of my rifle and squeezing the trigger. Another 138 Palestinians ages 16 to 18 also have been killed by the Israelis. The total number of Palestinians killed during this period is 1,286, of whom 83.8 percent were civilians. The rest, 208, were members of the Palestinian police and security forces, which might be one reason Yasser Arafat has had some trouble controlling terrorists. The bulk of these innocent men, women and children were killed by the Israeli Defense Force, some by Jewish settlers in the occupied territories and the rest by ordinary Israelis. Apparently, it is open season on Palestinians. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has said 419 Israelis have been killed during the same time period, although he is counting the soldiers killed in the recent invasion, and I am not counting those Palestinians, since a definitive number is not known. Sharon is known inside Israel as a man whose word is not to be trusted (I read a column in an Israeli newspaper about Sharon's lying). Nevertheless, let us take his figure, 419, and you can plainly see that the Israelis have killed three times as many Palestinians. The Palestinians, I'm sure, would appreciate it if a few Americans would acknowledge that their lives are just as precious as those of the Israelis. The Palestinians have given up on the U.S. government. It has shown itself to be about as sympathetic to their loss of life as Sharon. But I have a question: If Israel has killed three times as many Palestinians, the bulk of them unarmed civilians and the rest police officers with pistols and rifles, how can it be that Israel is fighting "for its survival"? The prime minister says it is. A lot of cheap American politicians are saying it is. What I want to know is how a few despairing teen-agers with homemade bombs can threaten the survival of a nation that has the strongest military force in the Middle East. According to the British Broadcasting Corporation in a recent story, Israel has the following assets: 134,000 army troops, 32,000 air force, 7,000 navy and 8,000 border police. The reserves are 400,000 for the army, 20,000 for the air force and 5,000 for the navy. In addition, Israel has 440 combat aircraft, 3,900 main battle tanks, 130 helicopters, 9,600 artillery tubes and 100 or more nuclear bombs. Since the Palestinians have no army, no air force, no navy, no aircraft, no tanks, no helicopters and no nukes, one has to wonder indeed how these defenseless civilians can threaten Israel's existence. Gosh, you don't suppose Israeli and American politicians are lying, do you? Perish the thought. I guess the Israeli army snipers must have been ordered to shoot all those children, for Palestinian children must be the toughest kids in the universe. I never heard of any other group of children able to frighten a whole nation like that. That's funny, too, because all of the pictures I've seen of Palestinian children - dead, dying, bleeding or paralyzed - show kids who look like American children their age. Check out www.palestinemonitor.org for a different view of the world. http://reese.king-online.com/Reese_20020503/index.php From adurrani at YorkU.CA Sun May 5 19:47:24 2002 From: adurrani at YorkU.CA (Atif Durrani) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Rogue nation" US to renounce World Tribunal - NYT Message-ID: Rogue nation: U.S. to renounce its role in pact for world tribunal -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- By Neil A. Lewis, New York Times WASHINGTON, May 4 - The Bush administration has decided to renounce formally any involvement in a treaty setting up an international criminal court and is expected to declare that the signing of the document by the Clinton administration is no longer valid, government officials said today. The "unsigning" of the treaty, which is expected to be announced on Monday, will be a decisive rejection by the Bush White House of the concept of a permanent tribunal designed to prosecute individuals for genocide, crimes against humanity and other war crimes. The administration has long argued that the court has the potential to create havoc for the United States, exposing American soldiers and officials overseas to capricious and mischievous prosecutions. "We think it was a mistake to have signed it," an administration official said. "We have said we will not submit it to the Senate for ratification." The renunciation, officials said, also means the United States will not recognize the court's jurisdiction and will not submit to any of its orders. In addition, other officials said, the United States will simultaneously assert that it will not be bound by the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, a 1969 pact that outlines the obligations of nations to obey other international treaties. Article 18 of the Vienna Convention requires signatory nations like the United States to refrain from taking steps to undermine treaties they sign, even if they do not ratify them. As with the treaty for the International Criminal Court, the United States signed but did not ratify the Vienna agreement. A government official said the administration planned to make its decision known on Monday in a speech by Under Secretary of State Marc Grossman in Washington and in a briefing for foreign journalists by Pierre-Richard Prosper, the State Department's ambassador for war crimes issues. Representatives of human rights groups also said they expected the decision, which was first reported by Reuters news service on Friday, to be announced then. The pointed repudiation of the International Criminal Court, while not unexpected, is certain to add to the friction between the United States and much of the world, notably Europe, where policy makers have grumbled ever more loudly about the Bush administration's inclination to steer away from multinational obligations. Despite the strong stance by the United States, the International Criminal Court will begin operations next year in The Hague. More than the required number of 60 nations had signed the treaty as of last month, and the court's jurisdiction will cover crimes committed after July 1 of this year. It will become the first new international judicial body since the International Court of Justice, or World Court, was created in 1945 to adjudicate disputes between states. Until now, individuals were tried in ad hoc or specially created tribunals for war crimes like those now in operation for offenses committed in Rwanda and the countries that formerly made up Yugoslavia, both modeled on the Nuremberg trials of Nazi officials following World War II. Harold Hongju Koh, a Yale law professor and a former assistant secretary of state in the Clinton administration, said the retraction of the signature on the treaty would be a profound error. "The result is that the administration is losing a major opportunity to shape the court so it could be useful to the United States," Mr. Koh said. "Now that the court exists, it's important to deal with it. If the administration leaves it unmanaged, it may create difficulties for us and nations like Israel." He described the opportunity as similar to the United States Supreme Court's 1803 decision in Marbury v. Madison that courts could subject the other branches of government to its jurisdiction, decisively defining its role in the new nation. "This is an international Marbury versus Madison moment," he said. John R. Bolton, the under secretary of state for arms control, who has been a leading voice in opposing American participation in the International Criminal Court, wrote extensively about the subject before he took office, calling it "a product of fuzzy-minded romanticism" and "not just nave, but dangerous." Mr. Bolton, in an article in The National Interest in 1999, argued that the court would force the United States to forfeit some of its sovereignty and unique concept of due process to a foreign and possibly unrestrained prosecutor. He said that it was not just American soldiers who would be in the most jeopardy, but "the president, the cabinet officers who comprise the National Security Council, and other senior civilian and military leaders responsible for our defense and foreign policy." Palitha Kohona, the chief of the treaty section for the United Nations, said it was unheard of for a nation that signed a treaty to withdraw that signature. David J. Scheffer, who was ambassador at large for war crimes and who signed the treaty for the Clinton administration, said that withdrawing the signature exceeded even the actions of the Reagan administration, which in 1987 decided it would not seek ratification of an amendment to the Geneva Conventions that the Carter administration had signed. The action concerned a document known as Protocol 1, which would have extended protections to soldiers of insurgent movements. "There has never been an attempt to literally remove the document," he said. Mr. Scheffer said the Bush administration's actions would not only undermine international justice but also damage American interests. "The perception will be that the United States walked away from international justice and forfeited its leadership role," he said. "It will be a dramatic moment in international legal history." One official said the Bush White House was prepared to say last September that it would withdraw the signature on the treaty, but the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon that month delayed an announcement. Officials were not only occupied with the sudden fight against terrorism but also thought that renouncing the treaty would appear unseemly, the official said. Most democratic nations and all European Union countries have ratified the treaty - except Greece, which is in the process of doing so - along with Canada, New Zealand and a number of African, Eastern European and Central Asian countries. Israel has signed it but not ratified. Egypt, Iran and Syria have signed. India, Pakistan and China have neither signed nor ratified. Russia has signed but not ratified. Reprinted from The New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2002/ 05/05/international/05TRIB.html From adurrani at YorkU.CA Sun May 5 19:49:10 2002 From: adurrani at YorkU.CA (Atif Durrani) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] A dubious link: Bushies find military aid to Colombia - Boston Blobe Message-ID: A dubious link: Bushies finds a palatable word for military aid to Colombia -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- By Bryan Bender, Boston Globe WASHINGTON - Members of Congress and top Bush administration officials, seeking to broaden US aid to the Colombian military, are increasingly painting that country's battle against leftist insurgents and drug traffickers as part of the larger struggle against terrorism. To bolster their argument, the officials are accusing the Colombian guerrillas of having links to some of the same global groups that are the target of Washington's expanding war on international terrorism. The new aid for Colombia, being considered on Capitol Hill, would for the first time allow the US military to help and train forces in the battle against the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, the largest Colombian guerrilla group, which controls about 40 percent of the country. US law has limited American assistance to the Colombian government to fight the drug trade. But critics of expanding US military aid from counternarcotics to broader counterinsurgency operations say that alleged ties between Colombian guerrillas and such global terror groups as the Al Qaeda network are weak at best, and that supporters of a shift in policy are taking advantage of the Sept. 11 attacks to make their case. Calling for a "unified campaign against narcotics traffic and terrorist activities," the administration in March requested more than $500 million in supplemental spending to expand US military assistance in Colombia to counterinsurgency. The request was made after the government of President Andres Pastrana moved military forces back into a demilitarized zone that had been ceded to the FARC three years ago in an effort to jump-start peace talks. Spurred in part by a recent House committee report that found Colombia "a potential breeding ground for international terror equaled perhaps only by Afghanistan," top administration officials are now frequently using the US-led war on terrorism to help build the case for a greater US military role in Colombia's struggle against the FARC and other guerrilla groups linked to the drug trade. The groups have been blamed for hundreds of attacks on government forces, including kidnappings, assassinations, and hijackings. "In the past year, there's a lot of fertilization taking place between different terrorist organizations and, with each passing day, you can begin to see different connections emerge that have to be pursued," Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said in testifying before the Senate Appropriations Committee last week. "We have to have the flexibility it needs to go after this kind of threat" in Colombia. Powell's comments followed a report April 24 by the Republican staff of the House International Relations Commitee alleging connections between the FARC and various international terrorist organizations and supporters, including the Irish Republican Army, Iranian agents, the Lebanese Hezbollah, and Al Qaeda. The staff said they based the allegations on intelligence reports. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, in testimony April 18 before the House Appropriations Committee, said Al Qaeda supporters have been active in the tri-border area of Colombia, Peru, and Ecuador. He did not specify what evidence the United States has to support the allegation. Other administration officials have weighed in. Attorney General John Ashcroft, announcing the indictment of FARC leaders for the slaying of three American citizens in 1999, last week called the insurgents a "fiercely anti-American terrorist organization." John Walters, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, later told reporters that the Colombian rebels and other groups dependent on the illegal drug trade are closely tied to global terrorist groups. Although US officials have not gone so far as to say the FARC and other Colombian guerrillas are terrorist organizations with global reach - a point that has been emphasized in the campaign against Al Qaeda - their statements underscore a growing sentiment that the war on terrorism is being viewed as a broad struggle against a wide array of threats. "It is certainly clear that there is nobody willingly supporting the FARC other than terrorists and militants," said Alberto Alesina, a specialist on Colombia at Harvard University. "The view of the left that these people are some sort of freedom fighters is totally misguided. Like terrorists, they have no interest in negotiating. The change in policy is to eliminate them militarily." Critics who warn that the United States could be walking into a quagmire question whether global terrorism is truly at play in Colombia. They accuse the White House and Republicans in Congress of using the war on terrorism to further their goal of greater US intervention in South America. "I think it's strained," US Representative William D. Delahunt, Democrat of Quincy, said in a recent interview. The FARC "has transformed itself more into a criminal organization, but it is not a terrorist group with global reach," he said, citing recent intelligence briefings. "To call it that is an effort to secure more involvement and military assistance to Colombia." A US intelligence official, asked about potential links between the FARC and global terrorist groups, said there is no strong evidence of any linkage. "It's a very lawless, Old West-type of place and every type of bad person operates there," the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said of the border region. "But as for direct links between the FARC and Al Qaeda or Hezbollah, those kinds of groups, the experts just laugh." A recent report published by the Council on Foreign Relations said "there is no evidence linking the Islamists of Al Qaeda to the FARC" or two right-wing paramilitary groups in Colombia, the National Liberation Army, and the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia. Delahunt said he worries that additional military assistance, such as training the Colombian Army to protect oil pipelines from attack, eventually could include more direct US military involvement. Copyright 2002 Globe Newspaper Company. Reprinted from The Boston Globe: http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/125/ nation/US_finds_a_palatable_word_ for_military_aid_to_Colombia+.shtml From adurrani at YorkU.CA Sun May 5 19:50:24 2002 From: adurrani at YorkU.CA (Atif Durrani) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Ian Williams: 'The U.S. hit list at the United Nations' - Middle East News Online Message-ID: Ian Williams: 'The U.S. hit list at the United Nations' -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- By Ian Williams, Middle East News Online Quietly, and without the fanfare that accompanies the campaign in the mountains of Afghanistan, the administration has begun a long march through multilateral institutions. At the UN and elsewhere, the U.S. has mounted a campaign to purge international civil servants judged to be out of step with Washington in the war on terrorism and its insistence that the U.S. have the last word in all global governance issues. The first and most prominent to go was Mary Robinson, the former Irish president whose work as UN High Commissioner for Human Rights has been acclaimed by human rights groups across the world. Officially, she retired after a one-year renewal of her contract. In fact, the U.S. ferociously lobbied against here reappointment. UN officials and Western diplomats also said she was "difficult to work with" - the usual euphemism for not taking dictation. Most human rights activists see this as precisely her strength in an organization where not rocking the boat seems to be genetically engineered into many officials. The U.S. could not forgive her for her stands on the Middle East issues or for her endorsement last year of the results of the UN's Durban Conference on Racism, which both the U.S. and Israel walked out of. The rest of the world stayed and adopted a toned-down document, and subsequently Washington began its campaign to force Robinson out. Another recent victim of the U.S. campaign was Robert Watson, the much-respected chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. On April 19, the U.S. administration succeeded in replacing him with Rajendra Pachauri, an Indian economist. The panel is (or perhaps was is the correct tense) an independent scientific body established to assess the degree of climate change and the contribution made by human activities such as burning fossil fuels. The panel's work had come to a consensus, not shared by the Bush administration, that human activity is a factor in climate change. A leaked memo from ExxonMobil had previously asked the White House, "Can Watson be replaced now at the request of the U.S.?" The memo goes on to recommend that the administration "restructure the U.S. attendance at upcoming IPCC meetings to assure none of the Clinton/Gore proponents are involved in any decisional activities." Apparently, the administration heeded ExxonMobil's recommendation. Pachauri himself attributes his selection to being the developing world candidate, but environmental NGOs ascribe it to U.S. lobbying. A few days later, on April 22, the U.S. right achieved a new level of success with the deposition of Jose Mauricio Bustani, the head of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), a mere year after he had been unanimously elected for a second five-year term. The voting was 48 votes to 7 with 43 abstentions. The OPCW was created by the Chemical Weapons Convention, which outlaws the production of chemical weapons. It arranges regular inspections of member countries' facilities to ensure that no one is cheating. Bustani, a Brazilian, has headed it from its creation five years ago, and his inspectors have overseen the destruction of two million chemical weapons and two-thirds of the world's chemical weapon facilities in the past several years. They have carried out 1,100 inspections in more than 50 nations. >From the beginning of 2002, however, the U.S. has treated Bustani almost as if he were some form of bureaucratic Bin Laden. Bush administration officials accused him of "ongoing financial mismanagement, demoralization of the Technical Secretariat staff, and ill-considered initiatives." Only last year he had been reelected unanimously, with plaudits from all, including Colin Powell. Moreover, his staff pointed out that the organization's finances and management were controlled not by Bustani but by a U.S. government appointee. So what had changed? Not Bustani, but Washington. His main persecutor was John Bolton, Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security. Bolton earned his right-wing credentials when he served as the house UN-basher for the Heritage Foundation. But his anti-UN convictions have never stopped him taking money from the organization himself. Most recently he served as assistant to James Baker on the failed Western Sahara mission. For years, Bolton had argued that the U.S. should get out of the United Nations. At the same time, however, Bolton served as a consultant to Taiwan advising the government how it could get into the UN, according to The Nation. Although Bolton may have flexible principles, like many of Bush's hard right entourage he has a rigid line in grudges and he soon developed a major one against Bustani. Having Bolton in charge of disarmament is like letting a pyromaniac have the run of a fireworks factory--as his recent hardnose attitude to nuclear limitation talks with Russia, and staunch advocacy of the "Star Wars," Strategic Defense Initiative suggests. Bustani first started running into problems when he resisted American efforts to dictate the nationality of the OPCW inspectors assigned to investigate American facilities. What's more, he had opposed a U.S. law allowing the president to block unannounced inspections in the United States and banning OPCW inspectors from removing samples of its chemicals. Diplomats suggest that Bustani's biggest "crime" was trying to persuade Iraq to sign the convention, which could mean that OPCW inspectors would inspect Iraqi facilities. The hawks in the administration resented these "ill-considered initiatives." If Iraq would sign the convention and allow UN inspectors, it would deprive Washington of a quasi-legal justification for military action against Baghdad. Earlier this year the U.S. asked Brazil to recall him, but the Brazilian government pointed out that Bustani was not a Brazilian appointee but rather was elected unanimously by the entire OPCW. Then Bolton, personally, asked Bustani to resign. After he refused, the U.S. then attempted to have the OPCW Executive Council sack him. Failing that, Washington called for a special session of member states to fire him, threatening that the U.S. would not pay its dues if he were reappointed. Faced with losing an effective and popular disarmament agency, a majority of states succumbed to this blackmail. This acquiescence to Washington was is in stark contrast to the willingness of so many countries to defy the U.S. by ratifying the Rome Treaty establishing the International Criminal Court only two weeks before. In the end, it seems most members of the OPCW, with varying degrees of pragmatism and reluctance, decided that the survival of one of the most successful disarmament organizations was more important than the fate of its director. However, they set an ominous example--and possibly gave the hawks in Washington a strong scent of blood to follow. As Bustani presciently told the kangaroo court, "By dismissing me an international precedent will have been established whereby any duly elected head of any international organization would at any point during his or her tenure remain vulnerable to the whims of one or a few major contributors. They would be in a position to remove any Director-General, or Secretary-General, from office at any point in time." To Play, U.S. Must Get Its Way The right wing has long had a reflex hostility to international and multilateral organizations. But during the Reagan administration, which was the first time that the right wing exercised such control over U.S. policy, there was the fear that the U.S. could not pull out of the UN and leave it in the hands of its cold war enemy. Today, however, the U.S. has no counterweight at the UN, and the Bush administration officials are unabashedly insisting on exercising the influence that comes from being the world's only superpower. Playing upon its indispensability in this unipolar world, the Bush team is playing hard ball at the UN-in effect, threatening to render the multilateral organization impotent unless it gets its way. It bodes ill for global affairs the way the administration has managed to achieve these recent coups with little or no public awareness, let alone discussion. In the case of Mary Robinson, the U.S. did fear that any open campaign to unseat her would upset Irish American voters. Instead of tapping its public diplomacy, the administration used stealth tactics against Robinson. Human rights organizations complained, but this administration has successfully sidelined these organizations from foreign policy decisionmaking and now routinely dismisses the concerns of these organizations. Who is the next target? It may be Hans Blix, who heads UNMOVIC, which is the UN organization established at the end of the Persian Gulf War to inspect Iraqi arms facilities. It's been reported that Paul Wolfowitz, Under Secretary of Defense, ordered a CIA investigation of Blix. One reason that the administration is concerned is that under the framework supported by Powell, if Blix's team goes into Iraq and gives the regime a clean bill of health, then the sanctions regime against Iraq will be largely terminated. For Wolfowitz and other hardliners, this eventuality would remove another main causus belli against Baghdad. Deposing the highly respected Blix, who formerly headed the International Atomic Energy Authority, would facilitate the administration's case for launching a war on Baghdad. It's also likely that included on the administration's hit list are the individuals on the proposed fact-finding mission to Jenin that have found disfavor with the Sharon government. One was Mary Robinson, who has already been ousted. The others were Terje Roed Larsen, one of the main agents in establishing the Oslo channel that led to what was once the peace process, and currently the UN's special coordinator for the peace process. Although half-heartedly defended by Shimon Peres, it will be difficult to keep him in position when he has "lost the trust" of Sharon, and presumably his allies in the U.S. administration. The third person the Israelis regarded as biased is Peter Hansen, the recently reappointed Commissioner General of UNRWA, the U.S.-funded agency that helps Palestinian refugees. Hansen was appointed by the Secretary General Kofi Annan, who angrily sprang to the defense of all three individuals criticized by Israel. But Annan may find it hard to stand behind monitors criticized by the U.S. and Israel, especially if the U.S. would threaten to cut off its funding of UNRWA, which would likely result in starvation in the Palestinian refugee camps. Kofi Annan, himself, may also be targeted soon. Even though he has only just started his second term, and even though he is immensely popular, Kofi Annan has recently become stronger in his public exasperation with Sharon's behavior. Given the recent pattern of arrogant American diplomacy, one cannot help but suspect that, but for Colin Powell and Shimon Peres--who have a strong rapport with the secretary-general--the anti-Iraq and pro-Sharon hardliners in the Bush administration will soon begin a campaign to invite Annan to retire. It's likely that they will first suggest that he could retire with honor and that this decision would be for his own good. If that strategy doesn't work, they will likely accuse him of managerial incompetence and inability to work well with member states combined with yet another threat to withhold dues. If the U.S. purges continue and rise to higher levels, other UN member nations may regret their pandering to Washington as they see the entire post-World War II framework of multilateralism start to disintegrate. (Ian Williams writes for Foreign Policy In Focus and is the author of The UN for Beginners.) 2002 [Foreign Policy In Focus(Washington DC)]. Reprinted from Middle East News Online: http://www.middleeastwire.com:8080/ storypage.jsp?id=6155 From adurrani at YorkU.CA Sun May 5 19:51:21 2002 From: adurrani at YorkU.CA (Atif Durrani) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:19 2006 Subject: [R-G] Daniel Ruth: 'Before Persian Gulf War II, just a few questions' - Tampa Tribune Message-ID: Daniel Ruth: 'Before Persian Gulf War II, just a few questions' -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- By Daniel Ruth, Tampa Tribune You'll find precious little argument that Saddam Hussein is the goo of the "Axis of Evil." Were the Iraqi thug to fall down an elevator shaft, or eat some rat poisoned couscous, or have a Daisycutter fall on his head, the world would certainly be a better place. About the only positive thing you can say about Hussein is at least he isn't in control of a bigger country. Recent news accounts citing "senior Bush administration officials" have suggested that by fall as many as 250,000 American troops could well be on the ground in Iraq to dispose of Saddam Hussein once and for all. While the goal of eliminating one the world's foremost degenerate, twisted criminals against humanity is worthy, laudable and justified, one would hope President Bush might ask himself a few simple questions before committing a quarter of a million American lives to what promises to be some of the ugliest combat situations since the Vietnam War. Just Asking And what might some of those questions be? 1. Adhering to the Powell Doctrine - what is the exit strategy? Will U.S. troops be expected to engage in nation building? And if so, how long is America's military presence expected to last in a foreign land? See: Bosnia. 2. What is the politically acceptable level of U.S. military deaths? There is a number, you know. So, what is the number of returning body bags containing the youth of America at Dover Air Force Base that will result in George W. Bush becoming a one-term president? 3. Does the death of Saddam Hussein have to be accomplished in order for the Iraqi mission to be deemed successful? What happens if he slips (a la Osama bin Laden) away into the night? And if Hussein has to wind up on a slab, doesn't the same apply to his sons, his family, his inner circle and anyone else he ever had a kind word for? 4. What happens if Iran decides to enter the fray on the side of Iraq? Is this an "uh oh" moment? How many more U.S. troops would be required to wage an expanding war in a region, where just about everybody hates our guts? 5. How many Iraqi civilian casualties are politically acceptable? To be sure, after Sept. 11 that number is probably a rather liberal one, but as images of the carnage begin to filter across television screens, especially if Hussein remains at large, at what point does the concept of electoral marginal returns apply to dead Baghdad school children? Victory? A few more. 6. Allies? Do we have any in this fight? Sure the British are always helpful and the Turks are expected to let us use their bases, but the rest of the Islamic world seems pretty content to sit on their gold bidets and let the United States do their dirty work for them. 7. Since the Gulf War 12 years ago, the United States has waited for Hussein to be overthrown. We're still waiting. There are probably plenty of reasons for this, but in the end, if Hussein is removed from power - who replaces him? There doesn't appear to be a groundswell of Jeffersonian disciples in Iraq. 8. On the off chance Hussein is taken alive, what then? Would the United States permit him to go into exile, hopefully in a country that is a worse rat hole than Iraq? Or would he be tried at The Hague for war crimes or sent off to Guantanamo to face a military tribunal? 9. Although this is not a reason not to go after Hussein, has anyone in the Bush administration considered that a full scale military assault on Iraq might well result in more terrorism both in the United States and especially Israel? 10. Publicly at least, the predicate for a military invasion is based on Hussein's continued refusal to permit United Nations arms inspectors into the country to search for and destroy weapons of mass destruction. But we all know even if they were allowed into Iraq, the teams probably wouldn't find all that much anyway since Hussein has had plenty of time to hide stuff. Suppose, at the 11th hour Hussein expresses a change of heart and allows the dubious inspections. Oh and just one more question. 11. Given the historical vagaries of the Middle East, after all the killing, all the bloodshed and even the elimination of Saddam Hussein and his equally insane sons from the scene and we declare victory - how will we know for sure? Reprinted from The Tampa Tribune: http://www.tampatrib.com/ MGAHGAT7U0D.html From adurrani at YorkU.CA Sun May 5 19:52:46 2002 From: adurrani at YorkU.CA (Atif Durrani) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Congress accuses CIA and Justice Department of hindering 9/11 investigation- LA Times Message-ID: Congress accuses CIA and Justice Department of hindering 9/11 investigation -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The lawmakers leading the investigation voice concerns that the CIA and Justice Department are undermining efforts. By Greg Miller, Los Angeles Times WASHINGTON -- Lawmakers leading the investigation of intelligence agencies' failures surrounding the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks are increasingly concerned that tactics by the CIA and the Justice Department are actively impeding their efforts, congressional sources said Friday. Members of the Senate and House intelligence committees are so frustrated with the tactics, sources said, that they intend to complain directly to CIA Director George J. Tenet and Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft. Sen. Richard C. Shelby (R-Ala.), vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, declined to discuss the committee's concerns with the CIA and the FBI in detail but said: "There are problems we are going to have to address." The flare-up centers on obstacles congressional investigators say the agencies have strewn in their path. The CIA, for example, has refused to allow investigators to send their contact information to agency employees by e-mail to make it easier for the employees to volunteer information, congressional sources familiar with the investigation said. At the Justice Department, the intelligence committees' requests for records take weeks to wind their way through the department's bureaucracy and sometimes are simply not acted upon, according to sources familiar with the investigation. The perceived heel-dragging has bogged down an inquiry that already was sidetracked last week by the resignation of its lead investigator. Congressional investigators are under pressure to complete their work before ranking Intelligence Committee members' terms expire at the end of the year. "There's no time to waste," one source said, adding that the targets of the inquiry seem intent on exploiting that deadline. Although the agencies have cooperated somewhat, he said, their recent tactics are a significant impediment. CIA officials flatly rejected the suggestion that they are less than cooperative. "The CIA has provided extraordinary support to the investigation staff," CIA spokesman Bill Harlow said. "We have provided thousands of pages of documents, facilitated numerous interviews, housed members of their staff in our headquarters and provided briefings on counterterrorism, all while fighting a war. "We have had 15 members of the agency staff working full time since before there was a congressional investigation collecting material to aid their efforts." Justice Department officials also brushed aside investigators' complaints. "The attorney general has worked cooperatively with Congress on all matters related to Sept. 11 and will continue to do so," said Barbara Comstock, director of public affairs. Members of the intelligence committees discussed the perceived lack of cooperation in meetings this week. Describing the mood among members, one aide said, "You have to use the word 'angst.'" By Friday, the ranking members of the committees had agreed to take the issue directly to the heads of the CIA and the Justice Department. Sens. Bob Graham (D-Fla.) and Shelby, and Reps. Porter J. Goss (R-Fla.) and Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) were going to request meetings. A CIA official, who asked not to be identified, said he was unaware of any planned meetings: "I can tell you that none of the leadership of these committees have called Director Tenet to advise him of any unhappiness." The friction underscores the stakes of an investigation that could yield embarrassing details about what the nation's $30-billion intelligence community knew or didn't know leading up to the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The congressional probe was launched in February. It aims to determine whether the terrorist attacks could have been prevented, and to consider ways to improve the nation's intelligence capabilities. Sources close to the investigation said they recently obtained documents indicating that an FBI agent in Arizona had warned headquarters concerning his suspicions about Arabs training at area aviation schools months before the attacks. Small teams of investigators have been based at the Justice Department and the CIA, gathering documents and conducting interviews. They have come back with a litany of complaints about tactics they say are designed to slow their progress and restrict their access to documents and potential informants, sources said. All interviews with agency employees are supervised by CIA officials who have prevented investigators even from collecting business cards or phone numbers from interview subjects, sources said. The CIA official said employees have been urged to cooperate with the probe and that a notice listing investigators' contact information is scheduled to be distributed next week. Investigators also complain that they have been stationed in a location at the agency where employees cannot get to their offices without passing by, and probably attracting the notice of, the CIA's congressional affairs staff. "In a sense, they've put a wall up so no one can get to the investigators," a congressional source said. The CIA official acknowledged that investigators were placed near the agency's congressional affairs office but said that was to assist the investigators. Investigators also say their requests for certain documents have been rebuffed, often by agency employees who explain that they first need clearance from all other spy agencies that contributed material to the documents. And when investigators do get to view documents, sources said, it has been only under the supervision of CIA staffers. Former CIA officials say that they would be surprised if the agency were intentionally hindering the investigation and that much of the tension might be because of legitimate security concerns. "In my experience, I have been absolutely astonished at the amount of detail the intelligence community and the CIA in particular give the Congress," said Jeffrey Smith, a former general counsel for the CIA. He said the only exceptions tend to be when there is a need to protect sensitive information. As for the intelligence agency refusing to circulate investigators' contact information, Smith said, partly in jest: "Frankly, anybody at CIA who wants to leak to the committee who can't figure out how to do it" probably shouldn't be working there. Reprinted from The Los Angeles Times: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/ nation/la-000031609may04.story? coll=la%2Dheadlines%2Dnation From adurrani at yorku.ca Mon May 6 09:38:29 2002 From: adurrani at yorku.ca (adurrani@yorku.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Le Monde Maps - Excellent Resource Message-ID: <1020699509.3cd6a3759d578@mymail.yorku.ca> >From Le Monde, an excellent resource for maps on different topics, including crime, world poverty, oil, refugees, regional conflicts and the environment: http://mondediplo.com/maps/ Check out the maps provided on the Middle East: http://mondediplo.com/maps/mappingtheconflict200109 Those are the 'bantustans' Norman Finkelstein speaks of, surrounded by Israeli occupied territory and settlments. A picture of 'apartheid'. Atif From furuhashi.1 at osu.edu Mon May 6 10:04:59 2002 From: furuhashi.1 at osu.edu (Yoshie Furuhashi) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Thu., May 9: A War without an End?: Plan Colombia and Beyond Message-ID: Thursday, May 9 "A War without an End?: Plan Colombia and Beyond" Speaker: Sanho Tree, Director, The Institute for Policy Studies Drug Policy Project Sanho Tree will discuss the social, political, economic, and environmental consequences of the "war on drugs" and the "war on terrorism." About the Speaker: Sanho Tree has worked as a military and diplomatic historian and co-authored with Dr. Gar Alperovitz _The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb and the Architecture of an American Myth_ (1995) and with Uday Mohan "The Construction of Conventional Wisdom" (anthologized in _Hiroshima's Shadow_ 1998). From 1997-98, he was Associate Editor of CAQ (CovertAction Quarterly), an award-winning magazine of investigative journalism. In the late 1980s he worked at the International Human Rights Law Group in Washington. His current work concerns pursuing drug policy reform by reaching out to non-traditional allies and employing innovative tactics to promote a sustainable, constitutional, and humane drug control policy. The project's mission is to help foster a paradigm shift replacing the punitive and coercive "social control model" of drug policy with a public health and community economic development model. Time: 5 PM Location: Evans Lab (Room 1008), 88 W. 18th Ave., OSU, Columbus, OH Directions: From High Street, just south of Lane, turn west onto Woodruff. Turn left at the first traffic light onto College Road. You can park in Arps Parking Garage which will be on your left. Evans Lab is just across the street from Arps Parking Garage. Enter on the 18th Avenue side. Sponsors: Students for Sensible Drug Policy, Student International Forum, & Social Welfare Action Alliance. OSU Campus Map: . Contact info: Sean Luse, , 614-291-1026; Yoshie Furuhashi, , 614-668-6554; & Keith Kilty, , 614-292-7181. -- Yoshie * Calendar of Events in Columbus: * Anti-War Activist Resources: * Student International Forum: * Committee for Justice in Palestine: From mstainsby at tao.ca Mon May 6 10:50:04 2002 From: mstainsby at tao.ca (Macdonald Stainsby) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Anti-war/anti-guerre conference in Montreal Message-ID: <003b01c1f51e$12bbb500$291f5318@vc.shawcable.net> This is both a last announcement and a call out for any who are already going to the Montreal conference of May 9-12 in Concordia and McGill Universities. The website and schedule for the conference are available on the internet at: http://www.awag2002.com http://www.awag2002.com/schedule_e.html Names that may be familiar to people include Michel Chussodovsky and Jaggi Singh among many different panels and discussions. The final note is that as I will be heading out on Wed, any who might like to meet up in Montreal to shake hands or something of the sort please drop a mail immediately! Hope to see you all in Quebec. ------------------------------------------- Macdonald Stainsby http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international "Simply BEING a Palestinian in what used to be Palestine is a form of suicide...slower and more painful than using a bomb to blow up yourself [...]." - American Jew writing to others, email correspondence. ---- In the contradiction lies the hope. --Bertholt Brecht From shniad at sfu.ca Mon May 6 11:26:18 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Mapping the conflict between Israel and Palestinians Message-ID: <200205061726.g46HQITf027199@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> What Israel actually offered at Camp David: http://mondediplo.com/maps/mappingtheconflict200109 From shniad at sfu.ca Mon May 6 16:51:21 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Seymour Hersh on the war in Afghanistan Message-ID: <200205062251.g46MpLTf021343@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.chicagomag.com/pressbox/pressbox_story.htm May 2, 2002 Seymour Hersh: …… "We didn't win the war in Afghanistan; I don't care what George Bush says. I don't care that George Bush doesn't know much, but the people around him should know more who don't seem to know more. That bothers me. We didn't win the war in Afghanistan. Right now, we're not being told very much. We're sort of pacified, because we're all scared, too, and we don't know what's going to happen, and we don't like what happened to us. "We have men, our Delta Force, who are seeing combat every day. They're engaged every day. They're going into Pakistan. They've been engaged for two or three months, in heavy combat, hand-to-hand sometimes. "We've had many more casualties than they've told you about. We've had no discussion of the casualties among our special forces, where we have as many as 1,800 people operating there. And the Brits have people there, the Australians have people there, the Canadians have people there, the New Zealanders have teams there. All of them have suffered casualties that you don't know about. "Al Qaeda was not destroyed in the war. Afghanistan was. Is our country doing anything significant to rebuild the country, nation-building, all those things? Anything that would suggest that when we move on to Iraq it might do some good? Iraq might emerge better? If the model of going into Iraq is Afghanistan, boy, you can understand why people might be very worried. ……. From shniad at sfu.ca Mon May 6 16:51:58 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Norman Finkelstein on the IDF's behaviour Message-ID: <200205062251.g46MpwTf021972@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/id122.htm To repress Palestinian resistance, a senior Israeli officer earlier this year urged the army to "analyze and internalize the lessons of…how the German army fought in the Warsaw ghetto." (Haaretz, 25 January 2002, 1 February 2002) Judging by the recent Israeli carnage in the West Bank - the targeting of Palestinian ambulances and medical personnel, the targeting of journalists, the killing of Palestinian children "for sport" (Chris Hedges, New York Times former Cairo bureau chief), the rounding up, handcuffing and blindfolding of all Palestinian males between the ages 15 and 50, and affixing of numbers on their wrists, the indiscriminate torture of Palestinian detainees, the denial of food, water, electricity, and medical assistance to the Palestinian civilian population, the indiscriminate air assaults on Palestinian neighborhoods, the use of Palestinian civilians as human shields, the bulldozing of Palestinian homes with the occupants huddled inside - it appears that the Israeli army is following the officer's advice. -- Norman Finkelstein From shniad at sfu.ca Mon May 6 16:51:35 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Critics say mission could turn into Britain's Vietnam - The Guardian Message-ID: <200205062251.g46MpZTf021569@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4406333,00.html The Guardian Friday May 3, 2002 Critics say mission could turn into Britain's Vietnam By Nicholas Watt, political correspondent Senior government sources, who boasted last year that the net was tightening around Osama bin Laden and the al-Qaida leadership, have become noticeably less confident in recent months. As 1,000 Royal Marines embarked on the largest offensive deployment since the Gulf war in the mountains of south-eastern Afghanistan, the government made clear yesterday that the allies were facing a long battle to root out al-Qaida. "A substantial offensive is under way," the prime minister's official spokesman said, hours after the announcement that Operation Snipe had started. "It is in very difficult mountainous territory and there are very real risks of casualties." Labour MPs, who have raised fears that British troops are in danger of being sucked into a Vietnam-style civil war in Afghanistan, warned last night of the dangers of "mission creep". Ronnie Campbell, the Labour MP for Blyth Valley who has warned of British troops being "bogged down" in Afghanistan in the same way as the Soviets in the 1980s, said last night: "Only time will tell what will happen. But the difference is that we have the best troops in the world." A leading military expert defended Operation Snipe, insisting that it would play a highly significant role in helping to stabilise Afghanistan ahead of the loya jirga, or traditional assembly, which will decide on the composition of the next government in mid-June. Christopher Langton, the head of defence analysis at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, said: "It is crucial to keep up the pressure on the Taliban and al-Qaida to make sure that they are kept in the hills. If they were allowed to re-infiltrate the Pashtun heartlands and cause trouble the loya jirga would probably get off to a poor start." Col Langton said that the length of the British deployment would depend on the success of the assembly. "There is an argument that Afghan troops, trained by the west, could take over if the loya jirga is a success," he said. "But some people doubt that that can be achieved very quickly because the administration is dominated by Tajiks. They cannot operate in Pashtun areas and there are not enough Pashtuns who would be able to take on al-Qaida and the Taliban." Critics have raised questions about why Britain is taking on such a hazardous job when the US is leading the war in Afghanistan. Col Langton said: "Even the US has finite resources. The Royal Marines are probably the best high-altitude foot soldiers in the western world." Nigel Vinson, the head of the UK defence programme at the Royal United Services Institute, said that Operation Snipe will intensify the debate about the future role of the British army. He said: "Will we concentrate on nation building, as we are doing with Isaf [the International Security Assistance Force] in Afghanistan or will we develop our rapid-reaction forces to fight in the way the Royal Marines are? Unless we are prepared to give extra resources, what we are doing is unsustainable in the longer term." From shniad at sfu.ca Mon May 6 16:52:16 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Sharon and Arafat have nothing to offer each other - Robert Fisk Message-ID: <200205062252.g46MqGTf022432@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.independent.co.uk/story.jsp?story=291708 The lndependent Saturday, May 4, 2002 Sharon the merciless and Arafat the corrupt have nothing meaningful to offer each other by Robert Fisk in Jerusalem Self-delusion has crossed the Atlantic. George Bush is having visions again - just as he did before the most recent bloodbath in Israel and Palestine - and Colin Powell, whose latest Middle East mission was a wholesale disaster, wants to devise "a set of principles" for an Arab-Israeli peace. And, as usual, it is the occupied, not the occupier, who is warned this is the "last chance" for peace. That the United States wants to enlist the Europeans, Russia and the UN in its plans for a Middle East peace conference is perhaps the only sign of realism in the initiative. Otherwise, it's the same old twaddle. Yasser Arafat has to earn "trust" - this from the White House spokesman, Ari Fleischer - and will not, for the moment, receive any invitations to the White House. He has to curb "terror". But Ariel Sharon, whose army was accused of war crimes in Jenin by Human Rights Watch yesterday, will be joshing with Mr Bush in Washington next week. It was impossible, in Jerusalem yesterday, to take any of this seriously. Mr Arafat had just emerged from his Ramallah headquarters to call the Israelis "Nazis" while Mr Sharon, only two days earlier, had announced that Netzarim, the illegal Jewish settlement in the Palestinian Gaza Strip, was the same as Tel Aviv. Since Mr Sharon came to power, no fewer than 34 new settlements or outposts for Jews, and Jews only, on Arab land, have been constructed. A glance at the events of the past 24 hours shows just how far the Bush administration has strayed from reality. For days, the US President demanded that Israel withdraw its troops from West Bank cities. Mr Sharon simply ignored him. "When I say withdraw, I mean it," Mr Bush snapped at one point. Mr Sharon ignored him. Yesterday, as Mr Powell warned Mr Arafat that it was his "last chance" to show his leadership, the Israeli Prime Minister was sending an armored column to re-invade the Palestinian city of Nablus for the second time in two weeks. There was to be no "last chance" for Mr Sharon; only for the iniquitous Mr Arafat. And what on earth, one wondered, was the point in parading the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, alongside Mr Powell on Thursday night? The UN Security Council resolution calling for an Israeli withdrawal from Palestinian Authority areas of the West Bank - supported by the United States - is still being flagrantly ignored by Israel. Only a day earlier, Mr Annan was forced, in utter humiliation, to disband his fact-finding mission to Jenin after Israel refused to accept it. So what was his presence supposed to mean? The impotent secretary general just stood next to the equally impotent US Secretary of State. The squalid, corrupt little dictator of Ramallah, Mr Arafat, and the brutal, merciless leader of the Middle East's mightiest army, Mr Sharon, have nothing to offer each other. Mr Arafat cannot fulfill his required role of colonial governor - to "control his own people" - while Mr Sharon cannot fulfill his promise to provide Israelis with security. As one of his legal advisers admitted hours after Washington's call for a peace conference, the diminution in Palestinian violence "won't last for ever". Never, since the end of the 1991 Gulf War, have Israelis and Palestinians been so far apart. So what possible inducements can Washington extend to either side? If Mr Arafat wants an end to occupation and to settlements on Palestinian land, and a capital in east Jerusalem, Mr Sharon will not oblige. If Mr Sharon wants to go on building settlements and maintaining the occupation and claiming all of Jerusalem as the "eternal and unified capital of Israel", Mr Arafat will not oblige. Meanwhile, the Americans blissfully hope that Mr Bush's "visions" - of Israeli and Palestinian states happily co-existing side by side - will survive the next two months. How is this possible? It is only a matter of time before the next vicious Palestinian suicide bomber blows up himself or herself in an Israeli city. And thus only a matter of time before Israel smashes its way into West Bank cities all over again. In fact, Israel doesn't need an excuse to do this any more. Yesterday's thrust into Nablus was another precedent. Far from being a retaliation, Israel did not invade Palestinian territory in response to Palestinian attacks. It said it had entered Nablus to prevent "future" attacks. Needless to say, the nature of this precedent went unreported. So we are back to the "last chance". But "last chance" for what? If Mr Arafat does not earn that all-purpose American "trust", what is supposed to happen? Is he to be liquidated? Will the Americans choose another Palestinian leader? Or will they just let the Israelis build more settlements (something the Israelis are doing anyway) and abandon the "visions" and walk away from the Palestinians, leaving them to the mercy of Mr Sharon and his dreams of a Greater Israel? From shniad at sfu.ca Mon May 6 16:51:06 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] The Abyss in Argentina - Roger Burbach Message-ID: <200205062251.g46Mp6Tf021098@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> 5 May 2002 The Abyss in Argentina By Roger Burbach Buenos Aires. Argentina is in the midst of an unprecedented upheaval. In office for just four months, President Eduardo Dudalde last week reshuffled his cabinet, appointed a new economics minister, and called for yet another austerity program designed to meet the demands of Washington and the International Monetary Fund. But virtually no one here believes that the new economic measures will be implemented or that the IMF will provide Argentina with the necessary funds to resuscitate the country's moribund economy. As Manrique Salvarrey, a political analyst and congressional consultant for the opposition stated: "The country is bankrupt, the government will not be able to deliver on the IMF demands, and few think Duhalde will survive for long, regardless of how many times he changes his cabinet. New elections could be called at any moment that will lead to even more uncertainty and instability. We are in an abyss from which there is no apparent exit." Major protests, representing every social sector, occur on a daily basis in this country of 36 million inhabitants. Since the beginning of the year an average of nineteen major demonstrations have occurred per day according to one survey. This week the largest agricultural federation is on strike, with landowners blocking roads with tractors and farm implements. Unemployed workers, called piqueteros, are shutting down other major traffic arteries around the country, demanding jobs, and in some cases, plots of land so they can set up community cooperatives to produce food for their hungry families. And in the province of San Juan, public employees are occupying government offices, demanding salaries that have not been paid for months. In Buenos Aires, popular assemblies are regularly convened in all the major barrios, calling for the replacement of the entire government, including the Congress and the Supreme Court as well as the President and his cabinet. Other protestors in the capitol, mainly from the upper middle class, bang on boarded bank windows and walls, demanding the payment of their frozen savings accounts. "We are a shattered country," says Lidia Pertieria, a social psychologist who participates in the popular assemblies. Beggars roam the streets, and in the once elegant commercial district of downtown Buenos Aires, every block has shuttered storefronts of bankrupt businesses. Groups of children and elderly people wait at fast food chains like McDonalds, not to buy hamburgers, but to get the remnants of food tossed into garbage cans. Official statistics reveal that 49 percent of Argentines now live below the poverty line in a country that once enjoyed the highest per capita income in Latin America. Argentina now ranks ninth, behind countries like Brazil, Chile and Peru. Along with the political leadership, the major financial and international economic institutions are held responsible for the devastation of Argentina. The Federation of Bank Employees in Buenos Aires slaps stickers on bank walls proclaiming: "No More Extortion by Foreign Banks and the International Monetary Fund." Jose Luis Coraggio, an economist and the rector of a university in Buenos Aires, angrily declares: "The leadership in Washington which dominates IMF policy is responsible for this economic catastrophe. We are to be made an example of because Argentina has no strategic importance, no major oil reserves, no illegal drugs, and we do not flood the U.S. with immigrants. Our political class bankrupted the country in the 1990s by implementing Washington's neo-liberal economic prescriptions. Now we are told that the only solution is to turn over the bits and pieces that remain of our national economy to foreign lenders and to slash government social spending even further to get 'rescue financing' from the IMF." As is to be expected in a time of crisis and upheaval, the opposition is fragmented into a wide variety of social and political groups ranging from organizations on the left, like the Workers Party, to political formations like Alternatives for a Republic of Equality (ARI), which contains many dissidents from the two dominant political parties, the Radicals and the Justicalistas. The popular assemblies, while reflecting a surge in participatory democracy, find it difficult to coordinate their disparate activities and to articulate a unified national program. Even the militant piqueteros are split into three main groups. No major figure among the opposition commands wide respect as an alternative to the current political leadership. The most charismatic figure in the opposition, Elisa Carrio of ARI declares the country is in the midst of a "hurricane" that is leveling everything: "We are facing the final disintegration of Argentina's traditional political identity, the final destruction of the old economic order, and an institutional crisis never witnessed before." She calls upon the entire political leadership to resign, to schedule elections for a legislative assembly to establish "a new social contract" that will be based on "justice, truth, … social inclusion, equality and the rule of law." This process will be "chaotic," she says, but it is necessary. While Carrio says little about concrete economic policies, there is a growing belief among many groups and organizations that Argentina needs to build a fundamentally different type of economic system from the ground up. The largest trade union in the opposition movement, the Argentine Workers Confederation, is calling for "shock redistribution" to reactivate the economy. An initiative launched by the National Front Against Poverty which has over 60,000 members, this economic approach asserts that the only way to reactivate the economy is by putting funds into the hands of the country's poor and the unemployed, not by slashing social programs and public employment as demanded by the IMF. A leading economist of the workers confederation, Claudio Lozano, proclaims: "We will not get out of this crisis without an absolutely different approach. Shock redistribution means providing employment and minimal financial support to all families, making the tax system more equitable, and redefining our relationship to the international economy." A new grass roots economy has already taken hold, born out of necessity. Three and a half million Argentines, one-tenth of the population, now participate in what are called nodos, or barter exchanges, and the number is expected to double by years end. Some popular assemblies issue degrees to divert taxes to local hospitals and medical facilities while forbidding the foreclosure of local businesses. Textile and ceramic factories that were once shuttered have been reopened by their workers and are now operating at full capacity. Torcuato Di Tella, an eminent sociologist who has advised past Argentine leaders, declares: "We need to find a solution without the help of the IMF, to mobilize our own resources, including state intervention in the financial system and the market place." Argentines also needs to look to "regional trade blocks like Mercosur including Brazil," while rejecting U.S. dominated trade initiatives "such as the Free Trade Area of the Americas." This path "will not be pretty and it will mean more violence and a decline in the standard of living at first" says Di Tella, but it is the only approach that will lead Argentina out of the abyss. From shniad at sfu.ca Mon May 6 17:23:49 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Pakistani clerics threaten US troops - The Guardian Message-ID: <200205062323.g46NNnTf020209@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.guardian.co.uk/pakistan/Story/0,2763,710759,00.html The Guardian Monday May 6, 2002 Pakistani clerics threaten US troops By Rory McCarthy in Islamabad Islamist clerics in Pakistan's tribal areas have threatened to attack American troops who are mounting secret raids to track down senior al-Qaida commanders. In the past month the war against the remnants of the Taliban and al-Qaida has crossed into Pakistan's deeply conservative tribal areas for the first time. US and Pakistani troops launched the operation with a raid near the border town of Miram Shah on a madrassah (religious seminary) owned by Jalaluddin Haqqani, a former Taliban minister who is now high on America's most-wanted list. The raid has enraged tribal elders. On Saturday Maulana Mohammed Dindar, a cleric and former politician from the hardline Jamiat Ulema-i Islami party, told a large gathering of armed supporters at a meeting near Miram Shah that US forces should be stopped. "We will not allow the religious institutions to be desecrated by US and Pakistani commandos in the guise of the search for wanted Taliban and al-Qaida members," he told the crowd. "We will not allow any American or Pakistani soldier to enter our madrassahs." Last week a rocket was fired at a school in Miram Shah where the US troops have been staying. It missed its target. US forces are following up rumoured sightings of Mr Haqqani and Ayman al-Zawahiri, the head of Egyptian Islamic Jihad and Osama bin Laden's most senior lieutenant. US helicopters and jets fly over the area every night and the raids are expected to spread south into other tribal areas in the days ahead. Miram Shah, in the Pashtun-dominated North Waziristan tribal agency, is just 10 miles from the Afghan border and linked by a network of mountain paths to militant strongholds in Afghanistan. Two decades ago mojahedin troops, backed by the US in the war against the Soviets, used the same paths and mountain hideouts. Now the people of Waziristan regard the Taliban as allies. The writ of the Pakistan government does not run to the tribal areas. The Pakistan army only began operating there in December, for the first time in its history. General Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan's military leader, admitted on Saturday that US troops were operating in the country but he said there were "hardly a dozen" of them, they were helping with communications and they were not special forces soldiers. However, reports from the area suggest that a much larger, heavily armed US contingent is involved in the campaign inside Pakistan. The issue is highly sensitive for Pakistan, where anti-American sentiment now runs deep. So far Gen Musharraf appears to have stifled any criticism from Pakistan's leading Islamist clerics, who were freed without charge a month ago after weeks under house arrest. "We don't want any military actions in Pakistan by anyone other than Pakistani troops," he said. "We want assistance in information, especially from the United States, but the action will be carried out by us." From mstainsby at tao.ca Mon May 6 21:11:11 2002 From: mstainsby at tao.ca (Macdonald Stainsby) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Rad Green moderation Message-ID: <00a801c1f574$d71b8140$291f5318@vc.shawcable.net> I will be heading to a Montreal anti war conference as of tomorrow night, not to return to Vancouver until approximately the end of the month. in the meantime, for those many of you who receive double messages from both Leninist-International and Rad Green, not much will change as the temporary moderator will be my co-moderator (and fine comrade!) from L-I, Yoshie Furuhashi... if you do not know her and need assistance on RG, her email address is furuhashi.1@osu.edu She will be covering the work on the lists- both of them- until my return at the start of next month. For the rest of you, don't feel you need to wait for me to overthrow capitalism. I won't mind if you go ahead without me, promise. Mac ------------------------------------------- Macdonald Stainsby http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international "Simply BEING a Palestinian in what used to be Palestine is a form of suicide...slower and more painful than using a bomb to blow up yourself [...]." - American Jew writing to others, email correspondence. ---- In the contradiction lies the hope. --Bertholt Brecht From mstainsby at tao.ca Mon May 6 21:02:28 2002 From: mstainsby at tao.ca (Macdonald Stainsby) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Fw: Socialism and Democracy Message-ID: <008d01c1f573$9f8014e0$291f5318@vc.shawcable.net> ----- Original Message ----- From: "George Snedeker" Hi Macdonald, would you post the following message on Rad-Green: Socialism and Democracy is looking for someone to review Joel Kovel's new book, The enemy of Nature. if you are interested in writing a review of this book, please contact me at snedeker@concentric.net ------------------------------------------- Macdonald Stainsby http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international "Simply BEING a Palestinian in what used to be Palestine is a form of suicide...slower and more painful than using a bomb to blow up yourself [...]." - American Jew writing to others, email correspondence. ---- In the contradiction lies the hope. --Bertholt Brecht From mstainsby at tao.ca Mon May 6 21:29:42 2002 From: mstainsby at tao.ca (Macdonald Stainsby) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Let Us Bury the Notion of a Shallow Movement Once and For All Message-ID: <00d501c1f577$6e04b480$291f5318@vc.shawcable.net> Let Us Bury the Notion of a Shallow Movement Once and For All Macdonald Stainsby, May 6, 2002. For much of the last nine months, a subliminal surrender had been nagging at me. Perhaps "surrender" is a strong word, but the world situation had clearly advanced to a new level that had not been seen before for this generation of activists. The rapidity with which "the movement" called so often "anti-globalisation" had advanced in terms of both an analysis and creating alternatives had been very exciting- but the entire political spectrum got moved ahead 5 or 10 years by the events of September 11 in New York. Like many other people, when events in October and November indicated that the anti-globalisation movement was going to "push on through"- sticking to the events where our supra-state global dictators met to denounce them in very contemporary terms-- I considered this great, fertile ground, but that the setback was still immense. However, the great lesson of 9-11 is perhaps just how quickly things do indeed change. Let us look at our new crop of activists now. The movement had been beset by several very basic criticisms for several months prior to the WTC attack. The most common, even when extended with the best of intentions, would be that the demonstrators lived in what Billy Bragg called the "North Sea Bubble". The activists were overwhelmingly from the privileged part of the world, they spoke of how the state itself was vanishing, the analysis was far superior to none- yet was still bound up in reformism and saw different policies of "their" governments as the issue- rather than the system itself that spawned these policies. There was a very superficial understanding of an ultimately systemic crisis. The movement was filled with thousands of people at a demonstration- overwhelmingly pushing "their" issues- to the other demonstrators who then handed them a different flyer in return. A flea market of slogans against a smorgasbord of problems- pinned on the "New World Order". While intoxicatingly exciting and new, the feel was still that of a carnival. When the innocence of the movement was lost in the smoldering of the WTC, the bubble was burst. Something wonderful happened. The events in Argentina showed us the way forward, and the collapse of Enron told us why to do it. The anti-globalisation movement (outside of the Trade Union Bureaucracies and the meeker NGO's) produced 20 000 people in the streets of New York against the World Economic Forum at the beginning of February- and produced a slogan: "They are all Enron, we are all Argentina". Okay, so the movement wrote a catchy slogan, but that hardly indicates a watershed change in world view. Or was it simply a beginning? The Argentine masses produced the first Ten Days of World Shaking in the new Millenium- and were doing so to stop the IMF. As opposed to before the 9-11 attacks when our Papa New Guinean brothers and sisters were mowed down by gunfire opposing the IMF dictates with only marginal attention paid to it by First World activists, Argentina became an instant focal point. Even in America- only blocks from Ground Zero-- the global connections were being made. Yet it was still rhetoric, and the bombs dropping on Kabul and Kandahar- ultimately to install a McDonalds next to every Mosque and to take women out from under the veil and throw them under the roofs of sweatshops-- didn't produce a massive anti-war movement drawn from the ranks of the new movement. However, time is now going through Great Leap Forwards of 20 years in a single day. So is a crystallizing of analysis. This has to be the most dangerous era for humanity since the 30's- in fact, with the impossibility of mounting a military defence against the Empire in the fashion that was done against the Third Reich, it is quite possibly the most dangerous era the planet has known. The reason the threat is so stark is the complete global reach of the Empire- a first for humanity-- as it has launched a declaredly permanent war against the aspirations of people everywhere. There are new laws that are being used to try and squash the anti-globalisation movement throughout the First World-- "security" measures all. The media has what is now obviously a clear policy of omission so far as any new manifestations are concerned. The "carnival like settings" -including the "Black Bloc" and similar tactics-- have been all but eliminated and the dreamers have been forced onto the defensive in a fashion not particularly suited to the movement. Or is it? The single greatest demonstration in size "so far" against one of the acronyms of death- in this case, it was the EU-- happened on March 16, 2002 in Barcelona. Several things already are observable by this fact. First off, the corporate media are trying to ignore and belittle the movement into insignificance now that it is clear that neither the mocking and ridicule before 9-11 nor the McCarthyism post is destroying what is a very sincere, deep consciousness swing. That not even mass arrests and black-masked brick-tossing amid tear gas could receive any real press coverage is a declaration of intent to obfuscate the existence of alternative visions of how the world ought to be run. Because TINA is dead now in the real world, TINA is promulgated through distortion far more than ever before. The other news is really two points in one- that some NGO's, TUB's and other social-democratic oriented groups have re-emerged from their shells- and that this re-emergence is a direct reflection of the clear depth, pragmatism, flexibility and sincerity of the young movement. Groups and individuals that wilted under the pressures of the McCarthyist scares of the post 9-11 days have returned thanks to the perpetual motion of the movements' more dedicated and confrontational wing. We are witnessing the continued growth of a movement that wants to target the institutions of the late imperialist era -- institutions that can no more be reformed than Jean-Marie Le Pen's National Front can be multicultural and pluralistic. This growth is not only cause for great hope- it is unprecedented in implication. There has not been a movement that emerged from the heartland of imperialism in such unity of action. The police in Barcelona put the number of demonstrators in Barcelona at 250 000. Other figures doubled that. On every level, the needs of the day are being met. But this isn't the half of it. There IS an alternative, and it is us. The IMF, the World Bank, the WTO- even the EU and the G8 are all institutions that are created to help better manage late imperialism and to try and put a logo on the world so that they might obscure the flags. Of course then, the criticism of the movement that has had the most veracity would clearly be that the analysis was incomplete, shallow; that when people talked about a corporate takeover it was often imagined that this system could be saved and "fixed". If there was not seen to be a systemic problem but rather one of policy, then it was equally impossible for the new movement to make the clear connections between the worsening condition of the First World with the continued immiseration and indeed the military suppression of the so-called Third World. This does not mean that the activists and the voice of the movement were in favor of war, but that the direct (and inter-woven) links between the existence of the imperialist superstructure, colonial wars and the worst aspects of the so-called globalisation era were not understood clearly. While there is much progress still to be made (indeed, the anti-war movement, particularly around the question of the war on the people of Afghanistan, has all-but wilted away in the last few months) there is recently the development of understanding the need to make a front and centre issue of the plight of the Palestinian people and their struggle against Apartheid. Approximately 100 000 protesters converged on Washington DC April 20th combining a message of anti-imperialism in the economic form: anti-IMF and World Bank with imperialism in the colonial-settler form: The Israeli military occupation and national suppression of Palestine. The links being made between the larger issues is an inroad for this movement which single-handedly strengthens the movement in a very clear fashion. It is a major hope, as it is the most important step to be taken in a major analysis. Yet there has been an even more startling and inspirational action taken by the people who associate themselves with the "anti-globalisation" movement in general terms- the putting of their own bodies in between the Israeli Defence Forces and Palestinian civilians in places such as Ramallah and Beit Jala (see "further reading" at the end). The IDF has opened fire on our movement, which has moved the analysis from "the whole world is watching" tear-gas-float-through-the-air in Seattle, to the great maxim of Che Guevara: "Solidarity means sharing the same risks". That people from relatively peaceful (though not just) locales in the First World would converge to stop the Israeli genocide of the Palestinians in a dedication reminiscent of the Spanish Civil War volunteers, but with the tactics and spirit of the modern day activists and their Ruckus Society training, that all this happens right now gives me a personal feeling of deep pride to be associated with these colleagues of my generation that I have a very difficult time expressing. In actions like these, one can see the true growth of this political consciousness and a maturing of world view that can only bring further results. It also allows the inactive first world left to redeem itself and start- although it is more than a long way yet to finish-- to truly take their proper place on the stage of world history. As the War on Terror continues through the Axis of Evil of 1) the Israeli occupation, 2) the War on Terror and 3) the IMF (et al), the newer Axis of Hope builds around three basics: Analysis + Action = Internationalism. That the only solution ultimately is the undoing of the entire imperialist system should give an indication of just how important it remains for the current movement to nurture and promote this internationalist understanding and this supra-national level of solidarity. We have much to address as the Empire continues to work towards yet another war on the people of Iraq, while plodding on dismantling all the global institutions which might hinder their progress, be it economically, politically or judicially. The war on Iraq is planned for the temporary health of their sick and dying imperialist addiction to oil- and the defence of the people of Iraq is coming from the brave resistance of Palestine- who make it impossible for the Empire to shore up support for another war on Iraq, while Israel constantly flouts the United Nations. The coming environmental catastrophe is also going to move along the train of history as it draws ever nearer under an irreformably anti-green economic system- but we can start to really believe to ourselves that the train will not run us down, but indeed be met at every junction, stop and station along the way. The time is now to start to build an anti-war movement, but one of the main reasons for the lack of success in sustaining an anti-war movement in the same fashion that "anti-globalisation" has sustained itself has been our willingness to hedge on what we truly want: Not an end to this war, but an end to war. Not only an end to racist attacks on Muslims, but an end to a global order that thrives on racism and patriarchy. In short, the anti-war movement was a reaction to the threat to obliterate the planet, but didn't create an alternate vision- but creativity and a real vision have been among the greatest single tactics and strategies employed by the anti-globalisation movement, in all countries of the world that have seen the demonstrations and the advent of "People's Summits". As of writing this, a four day conference in Montreal, Canada will take place to give a platform for a possible launch of a North American anti-war movement. We must be honest: We want nothing less than that the imperialist world system step off the stage of history. Why? Because we simply must be reasonable. We have recently seen the defeat of the advances of the Empire in Venezuela and we have ourselves made massive advances in the streets of Barcelona. Some day soon we shall win in Palestine as well. An unanswered question remains in North America, more specifically in Kananaskis Alberta, Canada at the upcoming G8 summit, June 26th and 27th this summer. What will be the reaction of the North American people and supporters in Alberta? What co-operation among groups ("official" and otherwise) will reign? Will there be the same division into "good" and "bad" protesters, promoted as such by the "repectable" labour lieutenants of capital in the Trade Union Bureaucracies? If so, how will the more radical organizers respond? Will the movement continue to mature its understanding in the Rockies? Everyone who wants to hope for the future and fight for a better world should try to organize around this issue, all the while deepening the consciousness of the links- avoiding tokenism and making the real links, on the international level- the only place it will ultimately have an impact. Then, we must take that back home where we are fighting the local battles with a richer understanding. In taking the experience of the "big" demonstrations back to the "small" organizing, we take the world home. Ultimately, that must be the goal. You don't "make" a revolution, you build it. As brilliant young songwriter David Rovics wrote: "we don't want your big machines, we just want the world". It is ours to win, most assuredly. Save the earth? Take it. Further reading: http://www.wsws.org/articles/2001/jun2001/png-j29.shtml http://www.monbiot.com/dsp_article.cfm?article_id=503 http://www.palsolidarity.org/ http://g8.activist.ca http://awag2002.com http://www.iacenter.org/usplan.htm http://members.aol.com/drovics/home.htm ------------------------------------------- Macdonald Stainsby http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international ---- In the contradiction lies the hope. --Bertholt Brecht From hunterbadbear at earthlink.net Mon May 6 21:56:58 2002 From: hunterbadbear at earthlink.net (Hunter Gray) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Traveling into Northern Arizona Indian Country Message-ID: <000901c1f57b$3dee6260$c333e243@ibm22761429477> Note by Hunterbear: Now and then, I get an inquiry regarding travel in Northern Arizona / Western New Mexico Indian Country. A couple of days ago, a very nice person indeed from a socialist list -- planning to go down that way in June with a friend and their three children -- wrote me for detailed info. They'll visit the Grand Canyon and, on the Navajo reservation, the very large, complex and historic Canyon de Chelly. They're obviously extremely interested in this trip from the perspective of developing and broadening the multi-cultural awareness of the children -- and certainly that of themselves as well. Her letter was commendably sensitive and extremely thoughtful. The general region -- Northern Arizona, Western New Mexico, Southern Utah, and Southwestern Colorado -- abounds, of course, with a sweeping variety of spectacular scenery, national monuments, fascinating folks of all ethnicities, first-rate arts and crafts etc. [There are also non-Indian "tourist traps" along the Interstates that are well worth avoiding.] The Navajo Nation reservation land -- mostly in Northeastern Arizona and Northwestern New Mexico -- with a just a bit of Southeastern Utah and Southwestern Colorado -- is vast: larger than the state of West Virginia. The Hopi reservation in Northern Arizona, big in its own right, is surrounded by that of the Navajo. When I was growing up in and around the Navajo world, there were few roads in the region -- virtually none at all paved on the reservations. A great many people there traveled on horseback and via horse and wagon. Horses are still extremely common -- especially among the Navajo -- and so now are pickups. There are more roads these days -- still not very many -- and major routes are paved. Most roads, however, are not. The Navajo and Hopi settings, with the traditional cultures very much intact, are in many respects "other countries." They are certainly friendly -- very much so. But like any trip into "strange lands and friendly people," some advance orientation for outsiders is always helpful. Anyway, for anyone interested, here is my basic -- but not inclusive -- sketch: ============ While there are a number of signal, public events later in the summer in Northern Arizona and Western New Mexico -- Flagstaff Indian Days Pow Wow, Hopi rain ceremonials [a portion of this open to the public], Gallup Indian Ceremonial, Navajo Nation Fair etc -- you won't have any problem at all finding things to see in June. The Grand Canyon is worth it -- I made about 15 trips down into it as a kid, mostly via our intrepid Flagstaff High School hiking club -- some on very remote trails that, even in those days, were formally closed for safety reasons. Many scenic viewpoints are all along the South Rim. I don't know your basic travel itinerary but, if you haven't seen Flagstaff, it's worth spending some time at. You'll see many Indians there -- mostly Navajo. It's very large now -- maybe even 60,000 -- and, when I grew up there, it was 5,000 and we thought it really huge when it reached 7,000. But there are many interesting things right at and right around Flag -- including the excellent Museum of Northern Arizona just north of town. You can go to the Canyon from Williams [ a town west of Flagstaff] north and then come back down to Flagstaff via Highway 89. On the other hand, if you're interested in the Hopi country, you'd probably swing off Highway 89 -- before you get down [southward] to Flagstaff -- at Tuba City [not a city, on the Navajo Res and close to one of the Hopi border points], and then make your way to Canyon de Chelly. You have a couple of choices at Tuba: north to Kayenta and Mexican Water and then down to Chinle [Chin-lee] and Canyon de Chelly -- or, more likely if you are interested in the Hopis as well, from Tuba into and through the Hopi country and back onto the Navajo Reservation, and then, at a junction just before Ganado, north to Chinle and Canyon de Chelly. Or, from Flagstaff you can go east on the Interstate [once Highway 66] and at several points before and at Gallup, NM, make your way to Chinle and Canyon de Chelly. I would suggest either going to Chinle via Tuba City or via Gallup. If you went by way of Gallup, you could stop in the Navajo capital of Window Rock. There are plenty of interesting things there. Be sure to have up-to-date maps, plenty of water, maybe even some spare gasoline, and very good tires. Most people by far are friendly -- some do not know English [and some who do will not concede that to strangers.] But not everyone is friendly, so follow your normal instincts. Since you're new to the general setting, I definitely don't think you'd want to pick up hitch-hikers. Stick to the basic, paved roads -- don't go off paved road. [Could easily get stuck in sand or hung up on high rocks.] Well before you are actually onto the reservations, you'll see plenty of Indians. Many Navajo live in hogans or hogan/cabins -- and many of these are very visible from the roads. The Hopis are mostly in their [pueblo] towns on and around the Mesas. . Chinle, "entrance" to Canyon de Chelly, is still pretty small -- but is full of conventional, day-to-day Navajo life. Spending some time wandering around Chinle would be very interesting. Stopping in a grocery store, even, where there are always Navajo of all ages would be quite worthwhile. There are several in Chinle. [We always got our weekly groceries at Imperial Mart.] A worthwhile side trip would be to go north to Tsaile [Say-Lee] and Dine' College [until recently, Navajo Community College.] It's only about 35 miles north of Chinle and the road is paved, very good, well-traveled. At the college, the Ned A Hatathli Cultural Center and Museum is well worth visiting. There are various books that, ahead of time, would be useful to your children. Here is one in particular that is fine for everyone's age: Evon Vogt and Clyde Kluckhohn, Navaho Means People, Harvard, 1951. This is one of the best ever photographic collections of Navajo life -- full and splendid. [I've had my copy since it came out and, recently, found another on e-bay.] It's not hard to find on ABE -- and I see right now several copies for sale over a wide price range [some not unreasonable.] http://dogbert.abebooks.com/abe/BookSearch The photographs are still very timely. There's been some acculturation since then -- far, far more Navajos now drive pickups ["Navajo Cadillacs"] and the once common horses/wagons are sort of unusual. More people now know English. But the culture is still very much traditional and intact and the photos are still really quite contemporary. The short textual material in the book is dated in certain areas: there are now about 250,000 Navajo [up from the "at least 68,000" given in the book.] In addition to ABE, you might find the book at Humboldt State. I strongly recommend it. The spelling "Navaho" was used much in the late '40s through the '50s -- but its always been pretty much "Navajo." The Navajo are Dine' [Dineh] -- The People. Finally, most of the Indian nations always are glad to see tourists -- and this is certainly true in Navajoland and Hopiland. In fact, things are getting pretty contemporary in that context! Try these tribal tourist offices for advance information: Navajoland Tourism, Box 663, Window Rock, Arizona 86515 -- 520 - 871 - 7371 Hopi Tribe [Tourism], Box 123, Kykotsmovi, Arizona 86039 -- 520 - 448 -2731 Hope this is of some help. Take care, keep in touch, and all best - H Hunter Gray [ Hunterbear ] Hunter Gray [ Hunterbear ] www.hunterbear.org ( social justice ) Protected by Na?shdo?i?ba?i? From mstainsby at tao.ca Tue May 7 02:04:41 2002 From: mstainsby at tao.ca (Macdonald Stainsby) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Fidel on Mayday Message-ID: <02cc01c1f59d$d7c58040$291f5318@vc.shawcable.net> SPEECH BY DR. FIDEL CASTRO RUZ, PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF CUBA, AT THE INTERNATIONAL WORKERS' DAY CELEBRATION IN REVOLUTION SQUARE, HAVANA, MAY 1st 2002 Official Translation - May 3, 2002 Distinguished guests; Dear countrymen: We were condemned in Geneva by those who believe that this sea of people gathered here, which can be seen from every corner of the globe, has been deprived of its human rights. I am certain that not one of those Latin American countries that promoted, co-sponsored or supported this project could gather even 5% of the number here in their respective capitals. Are these fanatic, ignorant and uncultured individuals who lack any historical or political knowledge? If we were to ask this mass of people if there were any amongst them who could not read or write; or if there were any functional illiterate people who had never studied beyond grammar school, not one person could raise their hand. But if we were to ask how many of this same mass have the education of a ninth grader or above, more than 90%, would raise their hands. The only ones who wouldn't raise their hands would be the students who haven't yet reached their 15th birthdays. Our people's glorious tradition of rebellion and patriotic struggle, to which we must today add a full and profound understanding of freedom, equality and human dignity; their solidarity and internationalist spirit; their self-confidence and heroic conduct; 43 years of tenacious and unrelenting struggle against the powerful empire; a broad and solid political culture and an extraordinary humanism --all of these qualities cultivated by the Revolution-- have made Cuba a unique country. Wretched indeed is the destiny of hundreds of millions of people in this part of the world who, from a truly human perspective, have been as yet unable to emerge from humanity's prehistory. And it will not be possible for them to escape such condition while the pillage that slaughtered tens of millions of their native ancestors, successively turning their countries into colonies, neo-colonies and economically dependant and underdeveloped countries, continues to govern their destiny. Events prior to, during and after Geneva are barely distinguishable from the shameful history with which our people have been more than familiar since the very first days after the triumph of the Revolution on January 1st, 1959. Cuba was the last Latin American country to free itself from Spanish colonialism after a heroic and lone struggle. Yet, it was unable to enjoy that victory, as it immediately fell in the hands of the fledgling North American empire, from which it once again liberated itself with the same determination and heroism 61 years later although it would be disgracefully abandoned and betrayed by every other Latin American government. No book by Marx or Lenin could illustrate the anti-national, submissive and treacherous nature of the Latin American oligarchies and the true significance of imperialism for the destiny of our people as clearly as the last 43 years of our Revolution's history. Every oligarchic and bourgeois government joined in the imperialist policy of isolation, blockade and aggression against Cuba, the sole exception being a country that had experienced its own great social revolution some decades before, the same that brought justice and real progress to the people of a nation mutilated by the insatiable expansionism of its northern neighbor and made the martyr on numerous occasions throughout its hazardous and painful history of foreign intervention and conquest. Tragically, this time the exception has become rule. Cuba is no longer the illiterate, uncultured and inexperienced country of those early days. Today, the Latin American population, that numbered 208 millions at that time including the English-speaking Caribbean nations, have swelled to 526 millions. They have also had the opportunity to learn firsthand the meaning of imperialist domination, exploitation, injustice and pillage. Despite the deluge of slander and lies against our exemplary people and their admirable struggle, and in the face of countless capitulations across the globe, there are ever more people who realize that Cuba is a powerful moral force, that defends the truth and shows its solidarity with other people of the world. Our Latin American brothers have repeatedly been told stories as fantastic as those in the "Arabian nights," in which they believe less and less every day. For 50 years they have been told that the hundreds of thousands of children that die every year due to neglect and hunger; the millions that work for pitiful salaries cleaning car windshields or shoes, or being traded or sexually exploited instead of going to school, represent democracy and respect for human rights. That the hundreds of millions of human beings living in poverty despite the immense wealth and natural resources that surround them; the vast number of unemployed and underemployed people and informal laborers who survive without the slightest aid, social security or protection; the medical neglect of mothers, children, old people and the poor population in general; the marginalization, drugs, lack of security and crime, are called democracy; are called respect for human rights. That the death squads, summary executions, torture, and the vanishing and murder of people; that the bribery, misappropriation, diversion and bare-faced robbery of public funds while schools and hospitals are closed, national assets and resources are privatized or often given away to domestic and foreign friends and partners in crime and corruption, constitute the fullest expression of democracy and human rights. It doesn't occur to them that the economic, political and social system that they defend is a total negation of all possibility of equality, freedom, democracy, human dignity and justice. An illiterate person or one whose education barely surpasses 4th grade, or one who lives in poverty or extreme poverty, or is unemployed or lives in shanty towns where the most unimaginable conditions are rife, or a person who wanders the streets exposed to the constant poison of commercial advertising sowing the seeds of fantasies, illusions and the desire for impossible consumption, a person such as this, that indeed could include vast numbers of people in the desperate daily fight for survival, could be the victim of every kind of abuse, blackmail, pressure and deceit and could lack any representative organization or see these crushed. It is certainly unlikely that such a person could be in a position to understand the complex problems of the world and the society in which they live. They are in no position to exercise their democratic rights, nor decide which is the most honest or demagogic or hypocritical candidate, this under a torrent of propaganda and lies where those with the most resources spout the most lies and deceit. No freedom of expression can exist where the principal and most effective media are an exclusive monopoly in the hands of the richest and most privileged sectors, sworn enemies of any economic, political or social change. The enjoyment of wealth, education, knowledge and culture are the preserve of those who, accounting for a tiny fraction of the population, receive the larger part of the goods produced in their countries. It is no coincidence that Latin America exhibits the greatest differences between the richest and the poorest. What kind of democracy and human rights could exist in these conditions? It would be like trying to grow flowers in the middle of the Sahara desert. On the other hand, when the total stripping of natural resources and the appropriation of human labor is presented as the ideal social and development model and the FTAA, i.e. the annexation and absorption of Latin America by the United States and dollarization are offered as the only way, it is clear that the prevailing political and economic system is approaching total crisis. Events in Argentina, that is today embroiled in an unbelievable economic and political chaos that has reduced the country to hunger, with more than 20% unemployment among the working population and where the people's bank savings --especially those of the middle and lower income classes- have been practically confiscated, point to nothing less than the swan song of neoliberal globalization. Such a crisis inevitably produces a complete lack of ethics and values. The behavior of many leaders as they watch their model economies collapse like so many houses of cards is truly obnoxious. People's protests are crushed with amazing violence. Tear gas, people dragged through the streets, brutality exercised against masses by the police armed with shields and swathed in the strangest helmets and outfits giving them the appearance of recent arrivals from a distant planet, are the methods used to defend that democracy and their citizen's human rights. Similar scenes have never been witnessed in our country. Never, over more than four decades, has force been used against our people. The revolutionary process grows out of the closest unity and cooperation of all our people, under a consensus without precedent in any other country in the world, unworkable and even unimaginable in a society of exploiters and exploited. A cultured, rebellious, brave and heroic people such as the Cuban could never be ruled by force, nor a force exist that would rule it because the Cuban people is the force. Never would our people stir up rebellion against themselves because they are the revolution, they are the government, they are the power. It is with their courage, intelligence and ideas that they have defended themselves from the most powerful empire the world has ever known. Such a political phenomenon had never before occurred in our hemisphere. Force has always been used by the oligarchs and the empire against the people. Each and every one of the Latin American countries that condemned us in Geneva or co-sponsored the draft resolution against Cuba are well below achieving the educational, cultural and social rates that are essential for a healthy, decent and just life of their citizens. Not one can match Cuba in a single one of these rates. For the sake of time, I will outline just a few figures for Latin America as a whole as compared to Cuba. - Illiteracy rate: Latin America, 11.7%; Cuba, 0.2% - Inhabitants per teacher: Latin America, 98.4; Cuba, 43, in other words, 2.3 times as many teachers per capita - Primary education enrolment ratio: Latin America, 92%; Cuba, 100% - Secondary education enrolment ratio: Latin America, 52%; Cuba, 99.7% - Primary school students reaching Fifth Grade: Latin America, 76%; Cuba, 100% - Infant mortality per thousand live births: Latin America, 32; Cuba, 6.2 - Medical doctors per hundred thousand inhabitants: Latin America, 160; Cuba, 590 - Dentists per hundred thousand inhabitants: Latin America, 63; Cuba, 89 - Nurses per hundred thousand inhabitants: Latin America, 69; Cuba, 743 - Hospital beds per 100 thousand inhabitants: Latin America, 220; Cuba, 631.6 - Medically attended births: Latin America, 86.5%; Cuba, 100% - Life expectancy at birth: Latin America, 70 years; Cuba, 76 years - Population between 15 and 49 years of age infected with HIV/AIDS: Latin America, 0.5%; Cuba, 0.05% - Annual AIDS infection rate per million inhabitants, i.e. those who develop the disease: Latin America, 65.25; Cuba, 15.6 - The first international study of the Latin American Laboratory of Evaluation of educational quality, carried out in 12 Latin American countries including Cuba, produced the following results. Although these data have been already mentioned, I would like to briefly refer to them in detail: - In Language, 3rd Grade: Cuba, 85.74 points; the remaining 11 countries, 59.11 points - In Language, 4th Grade: Cuba, 87.25; the rest, 63.75 - In Mathematics, 3rd Grade: Cuba, 87.75; the rest, 58.31 - In Mathematics, 4th Grade: Cuba, 88.25; the rest, 62.04 What is or will be the future of those countries? According to these figures, of the seven Latin American countries that voted against Cuba, four --Costa Rica, Chile, Argentina and Uruguay-- that had boasted in the past of being the most advanced in the region, fall well behind Cuban figures. In some of these, they reach or scrape past the half way mark in comparison to Cuba, but in others they are very well below. This is the case of pre-school education for 0-5 year olds, for example, that only reaches 15.8% of the children in that age group in Chile as compared to Cuba's 99.2%. It requires a truly cynical person to join such a Mafia-style adventure, in which they have been involved at the urge of the imperial overlords. The response to the emergence of the Bolivarian Revolution in which the people and the military joined together to unleash a revolutionary and democratic process that is also unprecedented, was a fascist coup d'?tat. The privileged oligarchy, that enjoys the bulk of the country's income and owns the most powerful media, set its followers on the Bolivarian people and the headquarters of the President himself under the influence and support of imperialism. Their goal was a bloody encounter that could be used to justify the coordinated actions of a small but extremely well-placed military force. Miraculously a bloody civil war was averted, thanks to the reasonable and sensible behavior of President Ch?vez, the support of the Bolivarian people and the loyalty of the vast majority of the officers and men of the Armed Forces in that sister nation. A new page in America's complex and arduous history has been turned by the very people that began the process of independence from Spain in this hemisphere. The stripping of Cuba's right to representation in Monterrey, the fascist coup in Venezuela and the disgraceful behavior in Geneva in the order in which they occurred have exposed and offered evidence of the dirty and hypocritical politics of the empire's lackeys. I must point out that the Presidents of Brazil, Ecuador, the Dominican Republic, Haiti and the English-speaking Caribbean countries did not join the celebrations of the coup. In the same way, Bolivia and Colombia joined the above countries in rejecting the deplorable behavior in Geneva. As for the fascist coup, not one condemned it except for the Argentinean President who was perhaps nervous considering his delicate political situation in which even a police Sargent could easily overthrow him. One month later, when the scandal broke out after the shameful Monterrey episode, some leaders maintained a decent silence. Not so the distinguished Secretary General of the discredited and repulsive OAS, as if that organization really existed. He threw poison darts with his support for the abuse sustained by Cuba. What trash are many of those who pretend to be sovereign governors! The honorable history of our Motherland, that once stood alone in battle against practically every one of the predecessors to those governments that voted against Cuba, who had allied themselves to the United States at that time in support of the Bay of Pigs invasion; that heroically resisted without a moment's weakness on the brink of being wiped off the face of the Earth in the October Crisis of 1962; should shame those conspiring with the United States in Geneva, if they still have at least, the freedom to be ashamed of themselves. Neither will they be able to deny without blushing that when the socialist camp collapsed, the USSR disintegrated, the Yankee blockade was tightened to include the sale of medicines and food, classified as a crime of genocide by the 1948 and 1949 Conventions, and all believed that the Cuban Revolution would be on its knees in just a few weeks, our people endured with unprecedented heroism and resilience. Cuba, after withstanding the most unbelievable difficulties and threats, terrorist attacks and risks of all kinds, has never and will never lower its flags before the hegemonic superpower that today hands out orders to its lackeys and bootlickers in this unfortunate hemisphere through a terrorist made Assistant Secretary of State for Latin America, showing an utter lack of respect by the United States government and an utter lack of modesty by its lackeys. When Cuba's honor, morale and credibility were called into question by the disagreement with the host country, it became very clear that hypocrisy and lies are inseparable and almost unique tools of the prevailing political and economic system in Latin America. My decency and ethics were under question when, placed in the dilemma of being loyal to a lie or loyal to the truth; loyal to deceit and slandering manipulation of the facts, or loyal to our people and all peoples of the world, I was loyal to the truth and to the people. The vestal virgins of the temple of hypocrisy tore their clothes in the name of privacy. Even honest men who had been outraged witnesses in the past to electoral incidents and dishonest traps of political adversaries were led to believe that my behavior was inappropriate. I did not invent anything, I called no-one nor laid any trap for anyone. I gave as much warning as I could to those who had challenged me for more than a month with their demands for evidence, evidence and more evidence. Although by no means did I feel bound by what was later proved, in the course of events, to be a deceitful trick to force me into silence and confidentiality over such a significant issue, I clearly demanded the cessation of all offences. Then, when the lies, slander and demands for proof continued over several weeks, I fulfilled the warning I had made. I was also accused of being vengeful because of the unfulfilled promise related to Geneva. All my life I have been a gentleman to my adversaries, even in war situations surrounded by death. I've never humiliated, offended nor wreaked revenge on a single prisoner, not even in the case of the Bay of Pigs while my comrades lay mortally wounded or dead around me. But I do know how to distinguish the ethical from the unethical. I delayed presentation of the evidence demanded from me only out of the desire to cause no harm to a sister country I admire and respect. Representatives from some friendly governments that participated in the Summit chastised me for not having presented the evidence in the conference itself. Lying is and will always be unjustifiable from a political, ethical and religious perspective. >From what I remember of the catechism lessons I received in 1st Grade in a catholic school, it violates the eighth commandment of God's law. One must be honorable. I did not seek any pretexts, and I did not hesitate in expressing the need and duty to leave a historical record of that conversation which they asked me to keep private only once it had already begun. My personal letter to the President was also private, however, it was published without consulting me 48 hours later, on the very same day I left Monterrey. I truly regret having to include this issue in my speech, but I felt it was my duty to do so. High raking officials from that country continue to attack us on a daily basis over this subject, which is still too fresh to consign it to the wastebasket of forgetfulness. To those who so foolishly speak and repeat the imperialists slogan that no democracy and no respect for human rights exist in Cuba, let me repeat: no-one can question the fact that, despite being very small, our country today is the freest, fairest and most supportive country on the planet. It is also by far the most democratic. There is only one Party, but this neither nominates nor elects candidates. This is completely forbidden: it is the citizens from the grassroots level who propose, nominate and elect candidates. Our country enjoys an enviable and ever more solid and indestructible unity. The media is public and does not and cannot belong to private individuals. It carries no commercial advertisements and it does not promote consumerism; it entertains and informs, educates and never alienates. Cuba already occupies world-wide outstanding and hard-to-surpass positions in a growing number of fields essential to guarantee life and the most fundamental political, civil, social, and human rights to ensure the well-being and future of our people. The mass political knowledge of the Cuban people is unrivalled in any other country. Its cultural and social programs and achievements advance at an unprecedented pace. Our dreams become reality. A more humane society is possible, lies and slander notwithstanding. History will bear this out. Long live Socialism! Motherland or Death! We shall overcome! ------------------------------------------- Macdonald Stainsby http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international -- In the contradiction lies the hope. --Bertholt Brecht From Johannes.Schneider at gmx.net Tue May 7 02:37:24 2002 From: Johannes.Schneider at gmx.net (Johannes Schneider) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Strike at Porsche Message-ID: <00c901c1f5a2$6f7796e0$4a1e050a@fgl.atitech.com> The metall workers strike is the dominating issue this week here in Germany. Though it is only about cents and euros, it is the first time since several years there is a full scale stike in the metall industry. Below is a report from today's FAZ on the start of the strike at Porsche. There are other reports on the strike at www.faz.com as well. The BBC story is interesting too, because it shows the wider fears of European capitalist that the strike could spill over: Link to BBC story: Tuesday, 7 May, 2002, 05:32 GMT 06:32 UK EU calls for German wage restraint Engineering workers in Germany have been urged to show restraint in their pay claims to help resolve industrial action. [...] The most prominent onslaught came from Brussels by the economic and monetary affairs commissioner Pedro Solbes. "We have always said that the evolution of wages has to be consistent with the evolution of inflation and productivity," Mr Solbes said. [...] But the main fear in Brussels is that the strike could spread, with copycat actions taken across the European Union (EU). "If it became a widespread phenomenon in Europe it would be disruptive for European growth," the chairman of the European Commission's economic and financial committee, Johnny Akerholm, said. On Tuesday morning, there were early signs that this could be happening. The services union Verdi said it would push on with brief strikes ahead of pay talks and the construction union IG Bau confirmed that pay talks in its sector had broken down ahead of the weekend. Full text at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/business/newsid_1972000/1972063.stm >From the FAZ: 'We're Not Here to Go Down on One Knee' By Susanne Preu? FRANKFURT. The urns are full to the brim with coffee, and in long lines the workers wait patiently for their plastic cups to be filled. The hot drink warms their hands at 5:30 this Monday morning, just before the early shift is supposed to start at the Porsche plant in the city's Zuffenhausen district. The thermometer on the Alcatel building opposite the gate shows the temperature as 4 degrees centigrade (39 Fahrenheit) -- not the most encouraging weather for the first day of a May strike. "I'd have been better off staying in bed," one striker grumbles, although he is not willing to be identified. "You have to show solidarity," he explains. However, about three-quarters of the 2,500 workers who normally turn up for the early shift did in fact stay in bed after being informed over the weekend that some of IG Metall's first strike action would take place at Porsche on Monday. Only 600 to 700 of the workers are on hand for the inaugural strike meeting of the union and to hear IG Metall Chairman Klaus Zwickel and the union's chief wage negotiator in Baden-W?rttemberg, Berthold Huber. Above all, they want to hear Uwe H?ck, who heads the workers council at Porsche. "Uwe, Uwe!" they chant, and he responds: "I am proud to be one of you." Porsche, he says, has shown that there is no need to give up anything. It is a reference to 1992, when the maker of top-of-the-line sports cars plunged headlong into crisis and only narrowly escaped bankruptcy. Back then, says Mr. H?ck, the workers did not insist on the letter of the wage agreement being observed and found other, creative ways to help solve the company's problems. What the strikers are even more aware of is that last year Porsche netted a profit margin of more than 13 percent on sales, the highest of any car maker in the world. "Don't let anybody tell you there's no money," is a typical comment. But while the shareholders (first and foremost the Porsche and Piech families) received a 70 percent higher dividend, Mr. H?ck is not entirely right in saying that Porsche workers did not share at all in the past three record years at the company. The year-end profit-sharing bonus paid to staff members has increased by 30 percent to nearly euro 2,200 ($2,010). But while the strike is about money -- the unions want a 6.5 percent increase, while the employers have officially offered only 2 percent -- it is also about principles, Mr. H?ck says. "Strikes are democracy in practice. We have the right to fight," he says, to the applause of his listeners. "It's not just a question of statistics -- it's also about respect," agrees Berthold Huber, the Baden-W?rttemberg director of IG Metall, which mostly represents workers in metalworking and related industries, including automobiles. "Going down on one knee is not what we're here for," adds Mr. Huber, who is the chief negotiator in pay talks for the more than 800,000 IG Metall members in southwestern Germany. It is not Mr. Huber's first appearance before strikers: He stood beside Erich Klemm, the leader of the DaimlerChrysler workers council, when the strike action began on Sunday night outside the company's huge facility in the Stuttgart facility of Sindelfingen. It marked the start of the first strike in the industry in seven years, and the first walkouts to hit the industry in Baden-W?rttemberg, one of Germany's wealthiest states, in 18 years. At the DaimlerChrysler gate he found only a few dozen picketers, clad in fluorescent yellow jackets, red metalworkers' caps and flaming torches -- more for the benefit of the television cameras than to scare off potential strikebreakers, it seemed. With a cheerful smile, the otherwise careworn-looking Mr. Huber posed for a group photo with the strikers. In the morning, 200 union members at most assemble in front of the gates of the Mercedes-Benz factory, the workplace of some 42,000 people. The inconspicuous nature of these strike parties is matched by the extent of the economic consequences. At DaimlerChrysler, the works council estimates that the strike from Sunday evening through Tuesday morning will leave 2,600 cars unbuilt, meaning lost turnover of euro 35 million to euro 40 million. Even at Porsche, where the claimed production shortfall is 145 sports cars, the loss amounts to euro 10 million. Porsche chairman Wendelin Wiedeking has already declared that this backlog will be cleared by summer at the latest, even if it means extra shifts which would, presumably, give the workers some chance to get back some of their lost income. But strikes make waves, and it is not only the high-profile car makers who are being hit: Within hours of the walkout's start DaimlerChrysler alone had responded by canceling 4,000 trucks carrying shipments from suppliers. "We know exactly how the logistics work here," says Mr. Huber. He claims that IG Metall can cause problems for other employers while actually holding relatively few walkouts of fairly short duration. "We can hold out for a long time," says Mr. Huber. "The union has enough money." As for those locked out by idled employers, people who get no strike pay or income of any other kind, he admits that life could get difficult for them. From adurrani at yorku.ca Tue May 7 09:41:26 2002 From: adurrani at yorku.ca (adurrani@yorku.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] US Extends Axis of Evil: Cuba, Syria and Libya Message-ID: <1020786086.3cd7f5a61bc9d@mymail.yorku.ca> http://www.nzherald.co.nz/./latestnewsstory.cfm? storyID=1843952&thesection=news&thesubsection=world WASHINGTON - The United States has accused three more states -- Libya, Syria and Cuba -- of pursuing weapons of mass destruction and warned it would take action to ensure they do not supply terrorists with such arms. In a speech entitled "Beyond the Axis of Evil," Undersecretary of State John Bolton said in addition to Iraq, Iran and North Korea -- which President Bush several months ago branded an "axis of evil" -- there were other "rogue states" out to acquire weapons of mass destruction, particularly biological weapons. (more in link) From LAMZ at sympatico.ca Tue May 7 11:03:37 2002 From: LAMZ at sympatico.ca (Lysander Zimmerman) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] CIA, DOJ Obstructing 911 Probes Message-ID: <019f01c1f5e9$218872a0$33378d18@Indy1> ----- Original Message ----- From: "t r u t h o u t" To: "t r u t h o u t" Sent: Monday, May 06, 2002 7:43 PM Subject: Charges: CIA, DOJ Obstructing 911 Probes > t r u t h o u t | 05.07 > > Charges: CIA, DOJ Obstructing 911 Probes > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.07A.CIA.DOJ.911.htm > > Leahy | Troubled by Pre-911 FBI Report > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.07B.Leahy.911.htm > > Jacques Chirac's Victory Speech | Full Text > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.07C.Chirac.Text.htm > > BBC | Dutch Far-Right Leader Shot Dead > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.07D.Pim.Dead.htm > > Israel Presents Arafat - Terror Link > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.07E.Atafat.Link.htm > > Ex - Klansman's Murder Trial to Begin > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.07F.KKK.on.Trial.htm > > At Least 39 Children Killed in Colombian Fighting > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.07G.39.Children.htm > > Bob Filner | Celebrating The Legacy Of Cesar Chavez > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.07H.Filner.Chavez.htm > > NEW t r u t h o u t Petition / Poll | Should a 911 Probe Include the White House? > Results -- YES: 6057 -- NO: 83 | Keep it Coming - Spread the Word! > http://www.truthout.org/poll/911Probe.htm > > t r u t h o u t - Newsletter Sign-up (Free) : > https://www.truthout.org/membership/membership.htm > > _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/ > > t r u t h o u t | 05.06 > > It's Ok to Love Israel and Palestine, and Hate Bush > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.05A.Ok.2.Love.htm > > An Environmental Disaster; Bush to Allow All Dumping in All Waterways > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.05B.Waterways.htm > > Bush Renounces, Reverses Clinton on World Tribunal Pact > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.05C.Tribunal.Pact.htm > > Schumer: Justice Dept. Undermining Environment > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.05D.Schumer.Env.htm > > ABC News | White House Staff Given Enron Survey > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.05E.Enron.Survey.htm > > White House Stonewall: Day 70 > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.05F.Stonewall.70.htm > > BBC | Breakthrough 'Soon' in Bethlehem Siege > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.05G.Beth.Soon.htm > > BBC | Al-Qaeda 'Linked to Synagogue Blast' > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.05H.Synagogue.htm > > t r u t h o u t - Newsletter Sign-up (Free) : > https://www.truthout.org/membership/membership.htm > > _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/ > > t r u t h o u t | 05.05 > > Barghouti: Arafat Personally Approved Attacks > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.04A.Attacks.htm > > FBI's Pre 911 Warning Went Unheeded > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.04B.Unheeded.htm > > Chirac Warns French Against Le Pen > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.04C.Chirac.Warns.htm > > BBC | US Joblessness Hits Eight-Year High > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.04D.Joblessness.htm > > Hastert Undermined Clinton's Attempts to Protect Colombian Human Rights > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.04E.Undermined.htm > > Bernard Weiner | A Peek Inside Colin Powell's Personal Diary > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.04F.BE.Powell.htm > > John Kerry Plots Presidential Run > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.04G.Plots.Run.htm > > ABC News | Vast, Right-Wing Cabal? > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.04H.Vast.Cabal.htm > > Shelly Berkley, Democratic Radio Response | Shipping Nuclear Waste to Nevada > http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.04I.Nuclear.htm > > t r u t h o u t, is a non-profit independent news source. > http://www.truthout.org > > t r u t h o u t - Newsletter Sign-up (Free) : > https://www.truthout.org/membership/membership.htm > > _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/ > > --- > > Reader Comments : > > You are currently subscribed to truthout as: lamz@sympatico.ca > To remove click here mailto:leave-truthout-1220086U@lists.truthout.com > From shniad at sfu.ca Tue May 7 16:54:03 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Enron forced up California energy prices, documents show - NYT Message-ID: <200205072254.g47Ms3Tf019780@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> The New York Times May 7, 2002 Enron forced up California energy prices, documents show By Richard A. Oppel Jr. and Jeff Gerth Washington - Electricity traders at Enron drove up prices during the California power crisis through questionable techniques that company lawyers said "may have contributed" to severe power shortages, according to internal Enron documents released today by federal regulators. Within Enron, the documents show, traders used strategies code-named Fat Boy, Ricochet, Get Shorty, Load Shift and Death Star to increase Enron's profits from trading power in the state - techniques that added to electricity costs and congestion on transmission lines. The documents - memorandums written in December 2000 by lawyers at Enron to another lawyer at the company - also describe "dummied-up" power-delivery schedules, the submission of "false information" to the state, and the effective increasing of costs to all market participants by "knowingly increasing the congestion costs." The memos, which provide the first inside look at the complex trading strategies Enron used in California, give strong ammunition to state officials who have long argued that Enron and other power marketers manipulated the state's market and played a crucial role in the crisis that cost California consumers and utilities tens of billions of dollars in 2000 and 2001. The documents state that other power companies used similar techniques. Tonight, Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, said she would ask Attorney General John Ashcroft "to pursue a criminal investigation to determine whether in fact federal fraud statutes or any other laws were violated" by Enron's energy-trading activities. Federal prosecutors are already conducting an inquiry into Enron's accounting, which falsely increased reported profits but ultimately led to the company's filing for bankruptcy protection in December. Enron agreed to sell its energy-trading unit earlier this year to UBS Warburg, a division of UBS, Switzerland's largest bank. Nearly all of Enron's senior executives, and most of its board members, have departed in the last nine months. Enron's senior management learned of the documents in late April, and the company's board decided during a meeting on Sunday to waive attorney-client privilege and turn the memos over to investigators at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, a person close to the company said. The company has also informed the Justice Department, the Securities and Exchange Commission and the attorney general of California about the documents. At a noon meeting today, lawyers for Enron gave the memos to investigators from the regulatory commission, which is examining whether Enron manipulated energy markets in the West. The agency released the documents a few hours later. Officials at the commission declined to comment, but they are continuing their investigation into Enron's effect on power prices and asked the company today to provide additional documents on its electricity and natural-gas trading activities. In a letter sent by officials at the commission today to Enron, investigators at the agency said the documents described how Enron traders were "creating, and then `relieving,' phantom congestion" on California's electricity grid. The documents also detail what investigators described as "megawatt laundering," in which Enron bought power in California, resold the power out of the state and then bought the power back and resold it back into California ¯ allowing Enron to circumvent price caps meant to clamp down on costs. "These documents prove that these companies can manipulate the market," said Loretta Lynch, the president of the California Public Utilities Commission. "Enron prevented California from seeing these documents for years, and now we know why." Ms. Lynch said the documents supported her argument that FERC should leave in place temporary electricity price restraints, introduced last June, which state officials say have played a large role in reining in prices. "I don't see how FERC can remove the boundaries they put in place on our market last June." An outside lawyer for Enron, Robert S. Bennett, said he could not comment on the trading strategies described in the documents. "Because we have sold the trading unit and the people with the knowledge of trading practices are no longer with the company, we do not know what the true facts are, and we do not know which parts of the memoranda are correct and which parts are incorrect," Mr. Bennett said tonight. But he emphasized that the company had agreed to waive that attorney-client privilege because it was trying to cooperate with the various investigations into Enron's business practices. "These memoranda came to the attention of the board and current management in late April, and the board instructed its counsel to not assert the attorney-client privilege and produce these documents to the appropriate government entities," Mr. Bennett said. Another memo written by a separate group of lawyers for Enron in 2001 - apparently in January or February, after soaring wholesale power prices in California pushed the state's largest utilities to the brink of insolvency tried to play down the strategies described in the December 2000 memos. In this later memo, which was written to prepare Enron for the "various investigations and litigation" it faced because of the California power crisis, the lawyers repeatedly tried to play down or cast doubt on the conclusions drawn by Enron's own lawyers in the earlier memos. "Some of the information" in the earlier memos "which resulted in some erroneous assumptions and conclusions, cannot be supported by the facts and evidence which are now known," the later memo stated. In one strategy described in the December 2000 memos, Enron would buy power from a state-run exchange for $250 a megawatt-hour - the maximum under the price caps - and resell it outside California for almost five times as much. "Thus, traders could buy power at $250 and sell it for $1,200," according to one memo. In that document, the Enron lawyers acknowledged that such activity could be playing a big role in causing electricity shortages in the state, but they suggested that was not a significant concern. "This strategy appears not to present any problems," the memo stated, "other than a public relations risk arising from the fact that such exports may have contributed to California's declaration of a Stage 2 Emergency yesterday." The Death Star strategy, as described in the memos, allowed Enron to be paid "for moving energy to relieve congestion without actually moving any energy or relieving any congestion." And the Load Shift strategy allowed Enron to generate about $30 million in profits in 2000 using techniques that, according to the documents, included creating "the appearance of congestion through the deliberate overstatement" of power to be delivered. In the past, Enron officials said the California power crisis was caused by the state's deeply flawed electricity deregulation plan, the lack of new power-generation capacity and by temporary factors, like a drought that drastically reduced available hydropower. Even some economists who think price manipulation was widespread say these other factors contributed to soaring prices. But Enron executives always insisted that absolutely nothing their traders had done contributed to the crisis. In an interview last year, Enron's former chairman, Kenneth L. Lay, dismissed accusations that manipulation was even partly to blame for California's troubles. "Every time there's a shortage or a little bit of a price spike, it's always collusion or conspiracy or something," Mr. Lay said in the interview, which was also taped for " Frontline" on PBS. "I mean, it always makes people feel better that way." From shniad at sfu.ca Tue May 7 16:54:55 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Bin Laden alive and planning say reports - SMH Message-ID: <200205072254.g47MstTf020454@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/05/06/1019441478798.html Sydney Morning Herald May 8, 2002 Bin Laden alive and planning say reports By Kathy Gannon in Peshawar, Pakistan The Saudi militant Osama bin Laden and the Taliban leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar, are alive and planning to regroup their forces, according to separate reports on their whereabouts this week. Commanders in eastern Afghanistan say they have credible reports bin Laden is hiding in Pakistan, Newsweek magazine reported in its latest issue. It quotes Hazrat Uddin, military intelligence chief in the eastern city of Khost, as saying a source told him bin Laden had trimmed his beard and looked healthy. The report came as a Taliban intelligence official in hiding said the Taliban was biding its time under its elusive leader, Mullah Omar, and was regrouping in mountain hideouts, waiting for the present Afghan Government to falter. The deputy intelligence chief, Obeidullah, played a significant part in the Taliban command structure, overseeing Kargai, the military training camp where al-Qaeda and other radicals trained, north of Kabul. Mullah Omar was safe and in Afghanistan, he said. "But the guest could be anywhere. He could be in Afghanistan or Chechnya or Yemen," Mr Obeidullah said in a reference to bin Laden. The Newsweek report is the latest of several indicating that bin Laden and a top lieutenant, Ayman al-Zawahri, are hiding in Pakistan's tribal areas near the Afghan border. But pinpointing the location of the alleged terrorist mastermind has proved difficult. Bin Laden has for more than six months eluded thousands of US and allied troops, and officials in Washington admit they do not know where he is hiding. A small number of US forces is working with Pakistani troops inside Pakistan, searching for bin Laden and other al-Qaeda fighters. However, Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf - who has said in the past that he thought bin Laden was dead - said he believed the al-Qaeda leader was still in Afghanistan. The last time US officials thought they knew where to find bin Laden was late last year, when intelligence strongly pointed to his presence among the fighters defending the mountain stronghold of Tora Bora. "He's kind of like Elvis," Colonel Wayland Parker, the US military liaison between coalition forces and the British-led international security force in Kabul, told Newsweek. "He's here, he's dead, he's there, he's alive. The last time we felt sure about where, he was in Tora Bora. After that he drops off the radar screen." The meeting with Mr Obeidullah took place at his hideout in Peshawar, 50 kilometres west of the Afghan border, where he said senior members of Taliban and al-Qaeda were still able to move relatively freely in Afghanistan. Pakistan's intelligence service "aren't really looking for us but we have to be careful", he said. "I just came from Afghanistan. It was easy." Associated Press, Agence France-Presse From shniad at sfu.ca Tue May 7 16:55:44 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Afghan council faces southern challenge - CSM Message-ID: <200205072255.g47MtiTf021243@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/0506/p07s01-wosc.html The Christian Science Monitor May 6, 2002 Afghan council faces southern challenge Leaders from seven of Afghanistan's provinces are petitioning to stop a national council of elders scheduled for mid-June. By Ilene Prusher Gardez, Afghanistan - A group of influential tribal leaders from seven of Afghanistan's 33 provinces say they're so dismayed at the process by which the loya jirga, or national assembly, is being formed that they will boycott the all-important gathering this June. The leaders are also demanding that the meeting, which will select a 111-person Afghan parliament, be postponed for 18 months. The emergence of the movement represents the first organized opposition to the convening of the jirga, which was agreed upon in the Bonn agreement as the ideal hybrid of democracy and Afghanistan's traditional decision-making institutions. But the leaders of the boycott, representing primarily Pashtun provinces in south and eastern Afghanistan, say that the selection process for the jirga has failed to keep out warlords and others who have committed atrocities. They also claim that the formula for the creation of the jirga is undemocratic: Approximately 500 of the 1,500 delegates to the week-long convention will be selected by 21 loya jirga commissioners, rather than being elected. In a petition to the United Nations and to the loya jirga commission - and made available to the Monitor - the group says the meeting is being convened without heed to traditional guidelines. The leaders claim that it ignores the stipulations in last December's Bonn agreements that an "emergency loya jirga" be based on the country's 1964 constitution. The document called for 216 electoral districts, a number that has climbed to 362 for the upcoming jirga - a shift that has come at the expense of southern Afghanistan, say the petitioners. 'Not following the real traditions' "It is not just us, but also Tajiks, Uzbeks, Hazaras and others around the country who believe there can be no loya jirga now," says Engineer Mohammed Shah Zadran, the head of the union of Pashtun tribal chiefs, surrounded by a crowd of some 50 other tribal elders who gathered around him, nodding in agreement. "They are not following the real traditions of the loya jirga at all. They are just making it up according to their will. The current administration should stay in power for another 18 months until we can have a real loya jirga." The threat could present a stumbling block on the path to a peaceful, governable Afghanistan - one of the international community's primary goals in toppling the Taliban regime after Sept. 11. The petitioners announced this weekend that they will go province to province around the country to persuade others to boycott the jirga. Mr. Zadran says they are also demanding that Mohammed Zahir Shah, the country's recently returned king, be recognized as the nation's leader with interim Afghan leader Hamid Karzai below him. Royalists are restless One root of the dispute may be the radically different expectations Afghans have over how closely this loya jirga should resemble those of years past. Indeed, the last time one was held in accordance with tradition under the king's aegis, in 1964, he could veto the participation of anyone he chose. "Just as the passage of time changes everything, that loya jirga was really very different from the loya jirga of today," says Suraya Parlika, one of the commissioners and a well-known activist for women's rights. "Now there isn't any one person who can oppose someone's participation." It may be difficult to quell complaints, particularly among Pashtuns - an ethnic group that makes up close to half the country's population. Some Pashtun leaders say their strength is being underestimated in the loya jirga process. Each province is awarded seats according to population. But Pashtuns in restive Khost, for example, say that mainly Tajik provinces of the same size are being awarded twice the seats. War criminals hard to identify Moreover, some of the jirga's goals could prove lofty. The guidelines bar anyone who has committed war crimes, but pinning down exactly who falls into that category, in the absence of any form of prosecution for alleged culprits, is next to impossible. "We can ask about the warlords in question in any district because the people there can judge better," says Ms. Parlika. "If the local civilians support someone, we have to support them." Equally controversial are the 500 members who are chosen - not elected - by the 21 commissioners. These include women, refugees, writers and scholars, religious leaders - and 20 seats for "influential personalities" of Afghanistan. "Who is 'influential?' Which part of the country are they from, and who will select them?" asks the petition. The Pashtun tribal leaders are angry that these and many other categories of delegates will be hand-picked by a few commissioners. The guidelines say there will be six religious scholars on the Jirga. "Who, by whom, and from where?" the leaders ask in the petition. There are also 25 seats on the jirga dedicated to nomads. "The nomads of which province?" the organizers demanded to know. "What kind of refugee has the right [to participate]?" The Pashtun tribal leaders also object to the 21 members of the commission participating and voting in the loya jirga, a fact confirmed yesterday at the commission headquarters. "We strongly request the UN to postpone the loya jirga until it is designed and organized according to the 1964 constitution," concludes the four-page letter - signed by several dozen prominent tribal leaders. "Otherwise this loya jirga will bring disaster to the country instead of peace and stability." The UN, which is assisting in the loya jirga, says it has heard several complaints about the selection process, but that the petition had not yet reached their office in Kabul. Most of the commissioners, says Manoel de Almeida e Silva, spokesman for UN special representative Lakhdar Brahimi, are now in far-flung districts in Afghanistan reviewing the selection process. "The complaints we have are regarding seats per district. Some of that comes from the southern region. There was a feeling that they did not have as many seats as they feel they should have," says Mr. de Almeida e Silva. "For some, there is a situation of feeling disenfranchised, which plays a role in this as well." From shniad at sfu.ca Tue May 7 16:56:34 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Tribesmen urged to kill American soldiers - The Times Message-ID: <200205072256.g47MuYTf021892@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2022-289230,00.html The Times (London) May 7, 2002 Tribesmen urged to kill American soldiers From Zahid Hussain in Spin Wam, Pakistan Thousands of tribesmen carrying Kalashnikovs responded with thunderous shouts of Allahu akbar (God is greatest) yesterday as a firebrand mullah called on them to kill American soldiers. They had gathered in this border town in north Waziristan to express their outrage at the presence of US forces in their semi-autonomous tribal area. The US personnel have joined Pakistani troops in a hunt for al-Qaeda and Taleban fugitives. It is the first time that foreign troops have landed in the area, where even the Pakistan Army had not been allowed to operate until recently. "They have violated our tribal honour," Khan Faqir Hason Khel, a tribal leader, said as an emotionally charged crowd chanted "death to America", and "death to British". They vowed to fight back if the American soldiers did not leave the area. Spin Wam is just 15 miles from the eastern Afghan province of Khost, which has been the main centre of operation of the US-led coalition forces against the last vestiges of al-Qaeda. Pakistani and American officials suspect that Osama bin Laden and his men might have been hiding in the Waziristan tribal area, where the former Afghan Taleban regime had strong support. Pakistani troops aided by US personnel began combing the area, but with little success. Until now they have found weapons but apprehended no terrorists. They angered tribesmen last week when they raided an Islamic seminary established by Jalaluddin Haqani, supreme commander of the former Taleban forces. About 200 Pakistani soldiers accompanied by a dozen American soldiers broke through the sprawling compound of the madrassa (religious school) outside Miran Shah, headquarters of the North Waziristan tribal area, about 12 miles from the Afghan border, after reports that it was being used by al-Qaeda as a hideout. Once a major centre for Islamic learning for the Afghan Taleban, the madrassa was closed by the Pakistani authorities in December last year, but later handed over to the local Islamic leaders. In a separate raid, a joint Pakistani and American team held the chief of another madrassa in the town on suspicion of being an al-Qaeda member. The tribes have a force of about 400 armed men to protect other madrassas. "We will not let the Americans enter our religious places again," Mr Khel said. The Pakistani and American operations came as British Marines and Australian troops continued to pursue al-Qaeda and Taleban fighters in eastern Afghanistan close to the Pakistani border. From shniad at sfu.ca Tue May 7 16:59:19 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] ANDDOVUS nations authorize "regime change" for USA - Common Dreams Message-ID: <200205072259.g47MxJTf024176@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0507-07.htm Common Dreams Tuesday, May 7, 2002 ANDDOVUS nations authorize "regime change" for USA Pro-democracy coup to be staged no later than next spring by Dennis Hans Buenos Aires -- The Association of Nations Destroyed, Destabilized or Otherwise Violated by Uncle Sam, or ANDDOVUS, has authorized the ouster of the current U.S. administration by no later than March 2003. Foreign ministers of the 123 nations that make up ANDDOVUS met earlier this week in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where they agreed to appropriate $42.8 billion for what they termed "regime change in the United States." "We'll do just what the CIA has done to so many ANDDOVUS nations," said an aide to the Angolan foreign minister. "We'll use bribes to recruit or subvert the media, labor unions, business groups, political parties or factions within parties, and disaffected officers in the military and police." The basic idea, as mapped out in planning documents marked TOP SECRET, is to gradually turn up the heat on the Bush administration from all sectors and strata of U.S. society until the president has no choice but to step down. At that point, ANDDOVUS will install its own people, dissolve the Congress and set a 2005 date for new -- and publicly financed -- elections. Of course, not every covert operation succeeds, so ANDDOVUS has a forceful backup plan in place: a military invasion from the south, preceded by an uprising in what Vicente Fox calls "the occupied territories of Mexico's North Bank" (what the U.S. calls Texas, Arizona, New Mexico and southern California). The uprising's objective is to gain control of the air and land corridors vital to the invasion. The political and/or military operations will be coordinated by an ANDDOVUS committee known as DUO, or "Do Unto Others." Should DUO succeed, don't look for it to install Al Gore or any other big-name Democrat. "If you watched the foreign-policy debate in 2000," a Guatemalan official observed, "you know that Gore agreed with everything Bush said and vice versa. Now we might find a place in our coup for a Russ Feingold or Dennis Kucinich, but as for the leadership of the Democrats, forget it." The idea of deposing the U.S. government has been broached periodically at ANDDOVUS gatherings. "I believe I was the first, back in 1972," said Diego Gonzales, who at the time was Chile's foreign minister. "The U.S. was in the process of doing to my country what it had done in other Latin nations -- destroying democracy -- so I urged ANDDOVUS to fight fire with fire by replacing Nixon and Kissinger with gringos who believe in the rule of law. Unfortunately, Nixon got wind of the initiative and bought off 35 foreign ministers prior to the vote." Back in 1972, ANDDOVUS had 54 member nations, but it achieved phenomenal growth during the 1980s. "We wanted economic growth, but Reagan gave us cadaver growth," recalled Paulo Santos of Angola. "The man never met a terrorist he wouldn't hail as a 'freedom fighter.'" The challenge facing DUO is finding prominent Americans who pay more than lip service to "self-determination," a concept with two components. "When the U.S. ousted Iraq from Kuwait," said the foreign minister of East Timor, "it sought to uphold what I call 'external self-determination': the right of a small country to exercise sovereignty free from outside interference. The U.S. was right to tell Saddam he had no right to determine who rules Kuwait, just as it was wrong from 1975 to 1999 to allow Indonesia to determine who ruled my country. But a related U.S. goal in the Gulf War was to re-install an undemocratic ruling family -- that is, to help a monarchy deny the Kuwaiti people 'internal self-determination.' The same U.S. that prefers an undemocratic Kuwait now proclaims its devotion to internal self-determination for Iraqis! We prefer -- and will impose -- a U.S. government that regards self-determination as a principle to uphold rather than a soundbite to selectively invoke." "As bad as American politicians are, the media are worse," a South African said. "You saw how the editors of the New York Times welcomed the military coup in Venezuela. In a sane world, columnists as pugnacious as the Times' William Safire and Thomas Friedman would stick out like sore thumbs. But over at the 'liberal' Washington Post there's a veritable 'Fight Club': Jim Hoagland, Charles Krauthammer, Lally Weymouth, Fred Hiatt, Robert Kagan, Michael Kelly and George Will." "I call them 'Kissinger wannabes,'" said a Greek official. "It hasn't dawned on them that their hero is now a 'wannaby': He's 'wanted by' justice seekers for ordering or abetting crimes against humanity in Angola, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Chile, East Timor, Greece, Laos, Kurdistan, South Africa and Vietnam." Given the dearth of public personalities who deny the U.S. the right to unseat any foreign government it labels a threat, or to punish innocent civilians for the crimes of their dictator, DUO is cultivating relatively unknown Americans who possess the requisite humane, democratic values. The plan is to build up their stature and Q-ratings until they are household names. A key figure in the effort is described by DUO sources as "a progressive, white-haired, former talk-show host who had a loyal following of soccer moms." "We paid off a few executives," said one source, "and now he's set for a weeknight show on MSNBC starting this summer. He'll give our people a platform, and those who strike a chord with the public will emerge as the braintrust of the coup regime." According to the secret ANDDOVUS proclamation, the coup planners "envision a U.S. that joins the rest of the world in a no-exceptions ban on landmines and weapons of mass destruction, and works well with others to resolve peacefully -- and with justice -- disputes within and among nations." "It's an easy program to get with," said Chile's Gonzales. "It's a shame the Bush administration won't even try." Dennis Hans is a freelance writer who files fictional reports from places he's never visited. He can be reached at HANS_D@popmail.firn.edu From shniad at sfu.ca Tue May 7 17:05:12 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Some on Harvard, MIT facilities urge divestment in Israel - Boston Globe Message-ID: <200205072305.g47N5CTf029422@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> The Boston Globe May 6, 2002 Some on Harvard, MIT facilities urge divestment in Israel By Jenna Russell, Globe Staff A teach-in on the campus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology today is the latest development in an ongoing protest of Israeli policy by some MIT and Harvard University professors. About 75 faculty members at the two institutions have signed an online petition asking the schools to divest from companies doing business in Israel until its forces withdraw from occupied territories, among other conditions. Noam Chomsky, the well-known linguist and activist, will speak at today's event, along with other critics of Israel. Nancy Kanwisher, an MIT professor of brain and cognitive science and one of the petition's organizers, said she had been ''politically dormant'' until she saw photographs of the Jenin refugee camp, where Palestinians allege Israeli forces massacred hundreds of civilians and violated the international laws of war during a three-week siege. ''I looked to see where the protest was, and I couldn't find it,'' she said. ''I was shocked.'' Working with a Harvard faculty friend and input from Chomsky, Kanwisher modeled the petition after one organized at Princeton University. It states that signers are ''appalled by the human rights abuses against Palestinians at the hands of the Israeli government,'' and that they ''find the recent attacks on Israeli citizens unacceptable and abhorrent.'' ''But these do not and should not negate the human rights of the Palestinians,'' the petition adds. Supporting faculty include members of MIT's departments of linguistics and philosophy, architecture, literature, political science, and mathematics. At Harvard, professors of classics, biology, psychology, and Greek and Latin are among those who have signed the petition. As of yesterday, 40 faculty members at MIT and 39 at Harvard had added their names. Another 81 students, staff, and alumni of the schools have also signed. Paul Nemirovsky, a doctoral student at MIT who grew up in Israel, said he thinks many of the professors who signed the petition don't understand both sides of the Israel-Palestinian conflict. He wrote a response pointing out that other nations responsible for ''infinitely larger'' civilian casualties haven't been similarly condemned, and sent it out by e-mail, he said. ''I felt hurt for who I am, as an Israeli and a Jew,'' he said of reading the petition. ''It was the first time in my adult life that I ever felt these things mattered ... What I really hated about it was the fact that they're using the name of an institution that is by definition apolitical.'' At Harvard, a rally protesting the petition drive is scheduled for noon today in front of the Science Center. After hearing details about the movement in the last few days, some students have labeled it hypocritical. ''It's ridiculous,'' said Paul Gottesman, who recently stepped down as president of the zionist Jewish Law Student Association at Harvard. ''The people who are involved in this divestment campaign are basically trying to impose economic sanctions on Israel. These are the same people who continually oppose economic sanctions against countries like Cuba and Iraq. So I wonder what their motivations are.'' And Harvard Law School professor Alan Dershowitz warns, ''Any effort to divest from Israel would fail because it would destroy any university that attempted it. Faculty would leave, students would refuse to attend, the contributors would refuse to contribute. ''I would not remain at any university that would divest from Israel,'' he declared. Kanwisher acknowledges the controversy and said she's not looking for divestment anytime soon. She pointed to the long years campus activists spent protesting investment in pro-apartheid South Africa. Harvard is widely remembered for what was seen as a slow and reluctant response to the campaign against South Africa. ''It would be a mistake to expect any immediate outcome,'' Kanwisher said. ''If people become more willing to question Israeli policy, that will be a step forward.'' She said she's been contacted by people at other universities, including Tufts, where there is interest in beginning similar efforts. According to the Web site where the petition is posted, www.harvardmitdivest.org, Harvard has more than $600 million invested in US companies that do business in Israel, including McDonald's Corp., International Paper, General Electric, and IBM. Numbers posted for MIT are preliminary, but show a smaller level of investment. http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/126/metro/Some_on_Harvard_MIT_facilities_u rge_divestment_in_Israel+.shtml From shniad at sfu.ca Tue May 7 17:06:10 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Israelis arrest two Americans - WP Message-ID: <200205072306.g47N6ATf000329@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A42283-2002May6.html The Washington Post May 6, 2002 Israelis arrest two Americans Washington -- Israeli authorities have arrested two Americans affiliated with relief organizations, including a Muslim commentator who recently described by telephone and in e-mails the destruction he saw in Jenin, a supporter said Monday. Riad Abdelkarim, a physician from the Los Angeles area, was detained Sunday at Israel's Ben-Gurion International Airport while trying to return to the United States, said Khalid Turaani of the Washington-based American Muslims for Jerusalem. Israeli authorities called his wife in California on Sunday and urged her to hire an attorney, Turaani said. Abdelkarim, who has written opinion pieces on Muslim issues for major U.S. newspapers, serves on the board of American Muslims for Jerusalem and chairman of a new charity, Kinder-USA, organized to provide aid to Palestinian children. Abdelkarim also is the Western region communications director for the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations. The other person arrested during the weekend was Dallal Muhammad of Dallas, Texas, Turaani said. Ms. Muhammad is president of the Kinder-USA organization, he said. The U.S. State Department could not confirm the arrests, an official said. But a U.S. diplomatic source, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed the arrests and said consular officials in Israel were being given proper access. Abdelkarim's family released a statement calling for his release. He has a wife and four children living in Orange, Calif. "The past 36 hours have been an extremely difficult time for our family," the statement said. "Our greatest fear right now is for Riad's safety, given Israel's acknowledged policy of using "physical pressure" in questioning suspects, including American citizens. We urge U.S. government officials and human rights organizations to actively become engaged in this case in securing Riad's safe and immediate release." Turaani said Abdelkarim was touring damaged areas in Jenin with International Medical Corps, a relief organization based in Los Angeles. Abdelkarim's family traces its history to a village near Ramallah, where Israeli troops kept Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in isolation for weeks during their incursion into Palestinian areas. Abdelkarim was in the Palestinians' territory for the past 10 days, Turaani said. Abdelkarim called colleagues April 28 at a fund-raising dinner to describe the destruction he saw while visiting areas of Jenin. He e-mailed similar descriptions. "He reported basically the destruction and smell of death under the rubble," said Turaani, who was at the dinner. "I remember him saying that, 'Words cannot describe the atmosphere. You can smell death wherever you walk.' He was very emotional." Abdelkarim wrote a widely distributed opinion piece Sept. 25 about his questioning by the FBI in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terror attacks about his political views and affiliations with Muslim advocacy groups. "What I do not appreciate is being singled out for questioning merely because of my faith, my ethnicity or my legitimate political activism," he wrote. He wrote that he believed the FBI was "groping wildly for straws in the dark." The Associated Press From adurrani at yorku.ca Tue May 7 23:29:21 2002 From: adurrani at yorku.ca (adurrani@yorku.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Ahmed Rashid: 'Trouble ahead in Central Asia' Message-ID: <1020835760.3cd8b7b102641@mymail.yorku.ca> Ahmed Rashid: 'Trouble ahead in Central Asia' -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Repression and rebellion are on the cards for Central Asia after the U.S., seeking support for its military campaign in Afghanistan, strengthened the region's five authoritarian presidents By Ahmed Rashid, Far East Economic Review For much of the 1990s Boris Sheikmuradov was the must acceptable public face of Turkmenistan's dictatorial regime as he travelled the world as foreign minister. A former journalist, Sheikmuradov was suave, jovial and spoke English fluently--a sharp contrast to his dour, megalomaniacal boss, President Saparmurad Niyazov, who prefers to be called "Turkmenbashi," Father of the Turkmens, and has established a personality cult surpassing that of Stalin. Now Sheikmuradov is rebelling, having fled to exile in Moscow late last year from his assignment as ambassador to China. In January he set up the Turkmenistan Popular Democratic Movement and has been touring Europe and the United States to drum up international support for his aim to topple Niyazov. One year ago, Sheikmuradov's efforts might have gone unnoticed. But September 11 brought the five former Soviet republics of Central Asia onto the global stage. The U.S. now has air bases in the region, sends aircraft through its airspace, transports arms and humanitarian aid through some of its countries and trains some of their military officers. This increased cooperation has put the region's five presidents under increasing scrutiny. All five have been in power since the break-up of the Soviet Union in 1991 and are determined to remain in power. When the U.S. rushed into Central Asia to establish military bases for its campaign in Afghanistan, many in the region hoped that the international attention and pressure would force the five leaders to carry out long-needed political and economic reforms. Instead, the U.S. has focused on Afghanistan, while the Central Asian regimes have felt confident enough to use the threat of Islamic fundamentalism and the Al Qaeda terrorist network to continue in their old ways. The result: a staggering increase in repression and only mild criticism from Washington. While Washington reaps the short-term benefits, it may well be storing up trouble for later. The increase in repression also energizes extremists, who are certain to destabilize their host countries, sow strife in the region and possibly target the U.S. just as Al Qaeda has done. But the growing power of Central Asian leaders is also inspiring revolt among some in the top level of former communist bureaucrats who inherited the newly independent Central Asian states in 1991. Many are fed up with their leaders' lack of vision and unwillingness to carry out desperately needed reforms. In Kirgyzstan, which was once the most free of the Central Asian states, there have been mass protests, while the main opposition leader is serving a lengthy jail sentence. In Kazakhstan, which over the years has attracted the largest foreign investment because of its oil wealth, the regime's unwillingness to carry out reforms and the concentration of wealth and influence within the first family have pushed businessmen and politicians to form a new opposition party, the Democratic Choice of Kazakhstan. In Turkmenistan, in the past three months, Sheikmuradov has been joined in exile by other prominent members of the bureaucratic elite--the Turkmen ambassadors to Turkey and the United Arab Emirates, a former deputy prime minister and a senior diplomat from the Turkmenistan embassy in Washington. In March, Niyazov sacked 20 top officials from the security, intelligence and defence services, for allegedly plotting a coup against him. "There has been stagnation in Central Asia for 10 years and now the elites are resisting because all the presidents are trying to extend their political life and the terms of their presidency," Sheikmuradov told the Review from Vienna. "The more opposition we have the better, but we are all in exile because there is no legal environment to operate in. That's true for all of Central Asia." Niyazov has accused Sheikmuradov of corruption and selling arms abroad, charges he says are completely groundless. According to Martha Brill Olcott of the Carnegie Endowment in Washington, "Turkmenbashi was literally choking out any fresh air among the elite. Everything had to be his way and the situation was becoming intolerable. The country was becoming more isolated." But isolation has become less of a worry to the region's leaders now that the U.S. military has arrived. All five countries are either hosting U.S. troops, getting American military training or at least allowing U.S. aircraft into their airspace. In varying degrees all the regimes have used their new alliances with the U.S. to further repress democratic opposition, Islamic groups and the media. "Twelve years have passed but the undemocratic, human-rights-abusing, one-party states have not changed and neither has Western support for them," Mohammed Solih, leader of Uzbekistan's banned Freedom Party, or Erk, wrote in The New York Times on March 11. Solih, who has been in exile in Norway since 1992, says Uzbek President Islam Karimov "shows it is possible to gain prestige and money and extend your rule on a whim--and still gain American support in the post- terrorism world." The U.S. military presence is a turning point in the history of Central Asia. It is the first arrival of Western armies since Alexander the Great conquered the region in 334 B.C. So far Russia and China have gone along with Washington's aims, but as the war in Afghanistan winds down, hardliners in both countries are expressing resentment and apprehension about a long-term U.S. military presence in a region they consider as their backyard. And it's not all about geo-politics. The key to the region's future is who gets to dominate the oil and gas reserves of Central Asia and the Caspian region and build pipelines to new markets. But designs on lucrative pipelines could remain pipe dreams unless there is stability in Central Asia, and that looks increasingly uncertain. In the absence of reforms, all the Central Asian economies have experienced massive downturns. Health and education services are disintegrating and unemployment is growing--reaching 80% in some areas, including the volatile Ferghana Valley, which straddles Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kirgyzstan. The United Nations estimates that 70%-80% of the populations of Tajikistan and Kirgyzstan are living below the poverty level. Such conditions offer extremist Islamic groups such as the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) and Hizb-ut-Tahrir ripe ground for recruitment. The U.S. war has hit the IMU hard, as it maintained bases in Afghanistan and received aid from alleged terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden, but its underground network in Central Asia remains intact. Hizb-ut-Tahrir, a pan-Islamic movement which has growing underground popularity in four of the five countries, has issued anti-American leaflets in Kirgyzstan criticizing the U.S. troops' presence. The growth of fundamentalism is a direct result of the suppression of secular democratic political parties, tight state control over local media and multiple corruption scandals in the leadership. Nobody is expecting an Islamic takeover in the near future. Instead, what has angered sections of the former communist establishment, including politicians, bureaucrats and members of the military and intelligence services, is their leaders' incompetence and unwillingness to reform. "All the regimes have escalating political problems. We don't know if it will take one year or three years to see major changes," says Anthony Richter, director of the Central Eurasia Project at the Soros Foundation in New York. The key question is whether the U.S. is going to use its presence to push the regimes into carrying out reforms or merely take advantage of their strategic assets. U.S. Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs Beth Jones told a press briefing in February: "Because we have so much more contact, we have an easier time of discussing each of these issues with the governments of the region, particularly Uzbekistan and particularly Kirgyzstan." But there are few signs that this might go beyond discussion. Washington has given Uzbekistan and Tajikistan $160 million and $125 million respectively in aid for this year, but has attached no conditions with regard to economic and political reforms. Instead it has sought verbal assurances from the regimes regarding reforms. The World Bank plans to lend $1.5 billion to the region over the next 10 years, and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development has pledged $300 million this year alone. RHETORIC, NOT REFORM Some officials are already cocky about their new strategic importance and how they can exploit it. "Foreign investors don't care where they are investing money, be it in a dictatorship or democracy," Ermukhamet Ertysbaeve, a senior adviser to Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev, told a conference in Almaty on April 9. Uzbekistan's Karimov signed a "Strategic Partnership" treaty with the U.S. when he met with President George W. Bush on March 13. The treaty urged Karimov "to intensify the democratic transformation of its society politically and economically." Karimov also pledged to "promote democratic development." Uzbeks have heard such rhetorical flourishes in the past, but they have brought no reforms. "The Americans make statements that don't tie them down to anything and which are ignored by the Central Asian regimes," Emil Aliev, leader of Kirgyzstan's opposition Ar-Namys party, said in February. Others are more optimistic. "One of the unintended consequences of the U.S. presence is that it is providing a sort of security umbrella and allowing opposition to get more active and people to speak up for the first time," says Richter. So, should Washington tie its future strategy to largely discredited leaders or push for reform and support democratization? The dilemma is made more acute by the fact that many of the new opposition leaders served time in the regimes they now criticize and are themselves engulfed in corruption scandals. In the meantime, the regimes push on with repression. In Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, there has been little problem with political unrest, simply because no democratic political parties are allowed to operate there. But the defections of top Turkmen officials and growing disquiet in Karimov's own entourage point to future problems. "We are now involved in a practical movement, and are organizing people inside the country," says Sheikmuradov. "Something very serious is going to develop in coming months." So far neither Russia nor the U.S. is openly supporting the Turkmen opposition, fearing that unrest or a coup may trigger off a domino effect in other Central Asian states just when Washington wants stability. The future of the U.S.-Central Asia relationship will partly be shaped by what happens in Afghanistan. "If the situation deteriorates, then straight security concerns will dominate. If Afghanistan stabilizes then the U.S. will press for more reform," says Olcott. But Washington appears to lack a strategic vision for the region, such as one that would unite major powers in a bid to push the regimes to reform. In the meantime, as China and Russia gear up to oppose a long-term U.S. presence in Central Asia and extremist movements gain strength, Washington will have to watch its back. The Far East Economic Review: http://www.feer.com/articles/2002/0205_09/p014region.html From adurrani at yorku.ca Tue May 7 23:29:59 2002 From: adurrani at yorku.ca (adurrani@yorku.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Anti-terrorist policies hit 60,000 US Muslims - Dawn Message-ID: <1020835799.3cd8b7d7e8298@mymail.yorku.ca> Anti-terrorist policies hit 60,000 US Muslims By Our Correspondent SAN FRANCISCO, May 7: Almost 60,000 American Muslims have been negatively impacted by the US government's policies since the terrorist attacks of Sept 11, says a report, prepared by a leading American Islamic group. Anti-Muslims in the United States increased three-fold over the previous year. The Council on American-Islamic Relations' (CAIR) seventh annual study, entitled "Stereotypes and Civil Liberties", says those affected include some 1,200 Muslims, who were detained nationwide, mostly on immigration charges, but who were treated as if they were terrorists. As many as 5,000 legal visa-holders, who were asked to submit to "voluntary" interrogations and an estimated 50,000 individuals, who donated to American Muslim relief agencies, shut down by the government. The study also outlines 1,516 reports of denial religious accommodation, harassment, discrimination, bias, threat, assault and even several murders. http://www.dawn.com/2002/05/08/top14.htm CAIR's report covers the period from March 2001, to March 2002. It is available online at http://www.cair-net.org/civilrights2002/ From adurrani at yorku.ca Tue May 7 23:30:51 2002 From: adurrani at yorku.ca (adurrani@yorku.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Nine French among 11 killed in Pakistan suicide bombing Message-ID: <1020835851.3cd8b80bd5007@mymail.yorku.ca> Nine French among 11 killed in Pakistan suicide bombing By Ha'aretz Service and agencies A suspected suicide bomber killed nine French nationals and two Pakistanis on Wednesday outside a tourist hotel in Pakistan's volatile southern city of Karachi, police and hospital officials said. The bomb exploded at around 8 a.m. )0200 GMT( alongside a navy bus which was parked near the Sheraton Hotel, where the French nationals were staying while working on a submarine project for the Pakistani government. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast in the city where slain U.S. reporter Daniel Pearl was kidnapped earlier this year while investigating a story linked to the U.S.-led war on terrorism. Officials said members of the touring New Zealand cricket team, who were staying at the adjacent Pearl Continental Hotel, were safe. New Zealand cricket authorities in Wellington immediately called off the tour. "It was apparently a suicide bombing," city police chief Asad Jehangir told Reuters. A doctor at the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre put the death toll at 11. "We have received 11 dead bodies so far and 17 injured people," he said. "Those who are injured are in critical condition." A grenade attack in March killed five people, including the wife and daughter of an American diplomat, in a church mainly used by foreign nationals in the capital Islamabad. The port city of 14 million people, Pakistan's business capital, also has a history of religious and ethnic rivalry between Shi'ite and Sunni Muslims. Pakistan's president, Pervez Musharraf, threw his weight behind the U.S.-led war on terrorism and the fight against al Qaida and the Taliban in neighboring Afghanistan, a decision that angered some Muslim groups in the country. New Zealand sports commentator Brian Waddle told Radio Sport the mangled frame of a bus could be seen in the street and a security check was being made for a second device. "Once the place has been cleared to see if there's any secondary devices, then we're going to be allowed to go back to what is left of our rooms." New Zealand Press Association reporter Mark Geenty, in Karachi with the team, said all the hotel windows were blown out. "It's complete mayhem at the moment," NZPA reported Geenty saying. http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml? itemNo=161126&contrassID=1&subContrassID=0&sbSubContrassID=0 From adurrani at yorku.ca Tue May 7 23:28:21 2002 From: adurrani at yorku.ca (adurrani@yorku.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] 'Greed, fraud, apologies: Arianna Huffington Message-ID: <1020835701.3cd8b7756d62a@mymail.yorku.ca> 'Greed, fraud, apologies: Corporate America's bottom line' -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- By Arianna Huffington, Arianna Online Every day the morning paper brings a fresh example of the flotsam bubbling to the surface following the collision of corporate greed and post-Enron reality: golden boy executives forced to walk the plank, formerly high-flying companies ?restating? fraudulently inflated earnings, internal emails exposing the depths to which Wall Street firms have sunk to boost their bottom lines. Yet the word emanating from on high -- from the well-appointed congressional committee rooms of Washington to the elegant dining rooms of L.A. -- is that the worst is behind us. Yes, they say, Enron was a bit of a wake-up call, but let?s not overreact. We?ve learned our lesson, so please pass the truffle sauce and let?s move on. And, more than likely, that?s exactly what we?d be doing were it not for Eliot Spitzer, the crusading attorney general of New York, whose investigation into conflicts of interest in the investment banking world is ruffling feathers from Wall Street to Capitol Hill. His probe has so far uncovered shocking evidence that analysts at Merrill Lynch gave investors misleading stock recommendations in order to help promote companies their firm?s investment bankers were doing business with. It has also forced the sheep-in-wolf?s-clothing Securities and Exchange Commission to actually begin to do its job and launch its own inquiry into the matter. The result? Well, surprise, surprise, Spitzer is now being told to back off and leave the matter to the big boys in Washington. While being careful not to cross jurisdictional swords, SEC chairman Harvey Pitt gently reminded Spitzer that ?only the federal government can set nationwide standards.? And Rep. Richard Baker, whose Capital Markets subcommittee held hearings on conflicts of interest on Wall Street, cautioned Spitzer: ?It is essential that the SEC now lead the concluding phase of this inquiry.? Concluding phase? Baker thinks the inquiry is wrapping up while Spitzer, who is after fundamental reform, knows it has barely begun. So now he?s having to both take on the bad guys -- and the guys who are supposed to protect the public from the bad guys. If Congress and the SEC had done their jobs, there would be no need for Spitzer. The good news is that he is a man on a mission and won?t be easily deterred. ?Nobody can force me to pull back,? he told me, ?and I have no intention of doing so.? As for the urgings of Messrs. Pitt and Baker, Spitzer doesn?t pull any punches: ?The hearings conducted by Mr. Baker were pointless. They didn?t ask the right questions and they didn?t produce the kind of evidence necessary to bring about real reform. As for the SEC, it clearly didn?t step up and prevent these abuses from occurring.? Spitzer is savvy enough to realize that he won?t be able to overhaul the way Wall Street does business without the support of the public -- and its outrage. That?s why he released those damning Merrill Lynch emails, in which the firm?s analysts privately trashed companies as ? a piece of crap? (and other, less publishable, synonyms) while publicly urging investors to buy shares in the same companies. The emails also show that the highly touted ?Chinese Wall? between Merrill Lynch?s stock researching analysts and its stock promoting investment bankers was more of a wide-open gate. ?The whole idea that we are independent from banking,? wrote one analyst ?is a big lie.? Spitzer?s gambit has paid immediate dividends, shaming Merrill Lynch?s CEO, David Komansky, into offering a mea culpa -- albeit a mealymouthed one. ?Anything that happens on my watch,? said Komansky, ?I?m responsible for. Those emails were embarrassing to me and I truly regret that they ever happened.? Notice that he doesn?t regret the out-and-out fraud the emails reveal; he regrets the emails. How much do you bet that the newest Merrill Lynch employee training session is something on the lines of ?Making the Delete key your new best friend?? Komansky?s carefully calibrated contrition was the very model of the latest in PR-approved damage control: apologize quickly, accept responsibility, and put the past behind you. Only you don?t really apologize, and you don?t really accept responsibility. It also doesn?t hurt to hire high-profile power players to help guide you through the crisis. To that effect, Merrill Lynch has retained Rudy Giuliani as an advisor. Maybe he can give Merrill Mike Milken?s number. But all the apologies and damage control in the world won?t make this problem go away. Too many people were lied to and financially devastated along the way. Since the Merrill Lynch emails were made public, lawyers across the country have been inundated with calls from angry investors looking for restitution. ?Merrill Lynch used to be the gold standard for how an investment banker should do business,? Philip Aidikoff, president of the Public Investors Arbitration Bar Association, told me. ?Now, at my firm alone, we?re getting 40 to 45 calls a day from Merrill customers who feel they?ve been duped.? So Merrill Lynch has gone from gold standard to ?crap? pusher. And it?s not alone. To pull our corporate culture out of the muck, it?s going to take more than public contrition and non-stop mea culpas on CNBC, which, given the current volume, may have to turn itself into the Self-Flagellation Channel. It will take some CEOs paying a real price for fraud, and securities regulations with real bite. Stay tuned, this one is far from over. Reprinted from Arianna Online: http://www.ariannaonline.com/columns/files/050602.html From adurrani at yorku.ca Tue May 7 23:25:35 2002 From: adurrani at yorku.ca (adurrani@yorku.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] 'Coup-operation, the American way' - Doreen Miller Message-ID: <1020835535.3cd8b6cf47933@mymail.yorku.ca> 'Coup-operation, the American way' -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- By Doreen Miller, YellowTimes.org (YellowTimes.org) ? "You're either with us or against us," as uttered by U.S. President Bush, when viewed in light of the CIA's extensive "Coups 'R Us" history of governmental overthrows, belies its singular reference to his war on terrorism and unwittingly reveals a deeper, prevailing U.S. attitude towards other nations in general, and towards democratically elected leaders of foreign countries in particular. It seems the only form of government the U.S. recognizes and is willing to support is that which unequivocally bows to the supremacy of U.S. economic and political interests. How else does one rationally explain the apparent hypocrisy between the U.S. "pro-democracy" rhetoric and its covertly sanctioned, CIA-directed attempt to oust Venezuela's democratically elected President Hugo Chavez? How does the United States, with a straight face, justify backing repressive, military dictatorships such as that of Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf, or, in the not-so-distant past, rebel leaders such as Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein who then permutate into dangerous renegades and dictators by their own "USA- made-possible" might? >From its inception in 1947, the CIA has had to answer to nobody but the president under the terms of the National Security Act, leaving the door wide open for many questionable and terribly undemocratic, clandestine operations. Throughout its 55-year history, the CIA has been responsible for political meddling, disinformation campaigns, the assassinations of democratically elected leaders, and military coups in more than three dozen countries, leaving a trail of dirty, blood-tinged fingerprints in, but not limited to: Haiti, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Brazil, Indonesia, Greece, Congo (Zaire), Bolivia, Uruguay, Australia, Angola, Nicaragua, Afghanistan, the Honduras, El Salvador, and Colombia. The U.S. Congress passed laws in 1974, 1975, and again in 1986 after the disclosure of CIA involvement in the Iran/Contra scandal, for the purpose of assuring greater accountability of this governmental arm. However, these reforms have proven themselves to be but superficial, ineffective window dressing against a powerful backdrop of CIA cunning, control, deception and stealth. The initial years of the CIA proved to be busy ones, indeed, as it participated in corrupting the democratic election process in Italy by buying up votes, broadcasting propaganda, lies and half-truths, and beating up opposition leaders in order to successfully keep the communists from winning. Another of its very first missions involved securing U.S. interests in Greece against the threat of the "dreaded" Communist Party. That was accomplished by backing and placing into power notorious, anti-communist Greek leaders who were known for their own shocking baggage of deplorable human rights abuses. Contrary to what one might expect, the high and mighty United States, model of democracy, fares no better than its more ignominious counterparts when it comes to upholding human rights around the world. In fact, it has a long, and not-so- proud history of using violence, extortion, and murder to install any kind of regime, including brutal dictatorships, if it serves to protect its economic and corporate interests, most especially its inalienable right to pursue the exploration and extraction of oil and gas worldwide. The United States thinks nothing of being involved in the overthrow of legitimate, democratically elected leaders that fail to toe the arbitrarily drawn, U.S.-defined line. In 1953, the CIA toppled, in its first military coup, the democratically elected Mohammed Mossadegh of Iran after he had defiantly threatened to nationalize British oil. He was summarily replaced with a dictator whose secret police is said to have rivaled the brutality of the Nazi Gestapo. If the democratically elected Guatemalan President Jacob Arbenz had been paying close attention to the lesson of Iran, he never would have made the foolhardy attempt in 1954 to nationalize the Rockefeller-owned United Fruit Company, in which the CIA director, Allen Dulles, personally owned stock. Arbenz, too, suffered the same fate as Mossadegh, and was replaced, in a CIA-led military coup, by a series of blood-thirsty dictators who would kill more than 100,000 Guatemalans over the course of the next 40 years. Have you ever wondered how the United States convinced Cambodia to join its efforts in the Vietnam War? Quite simply, the CIA dethroned Prince Sihanouk, who was highly popular for keeping his country out of the war, and replaced him with their personal marionette, Lon Nol, who immediately complied with U.S. interests by throwing Cambodian troops into battle. This created a chain reaction within opposition groups in Cambodia, resulting in a bloody chaos that opened the path to the rise in power of the Khmer Rouge, a ruthless faction that would claim the lives of millions of innocent people. The 1973 CIA-led military coup and subsequent assassination of the democratically elected socialist leader Salvador Allende in Chile was triggered when Allende nationalized American-owned firms in the hopes of providing better conditions for his own people. He was replaced by General Augusto Pinochet who tortured and murdered thousands of his countrymen and women in a crackdown on labor leaders, unions and the political left. Once again, much blood was shed and countless lives lost for the ultimate purpose of preserving U.S. corporate interests and sovereignty. Within the past few weeks, sophomoric attempts by the Bush Administration to ward off accusations of its involvement in Venezuela's failed military coup d'?tat pale in comparison to the plethora of implicative fingerprints left at and all along the trails leading up to and away from the scene of the crime. Those who lived through the Chilean coup of 1973 can corroborate key elements and tactics used by the CIA that were replayed in Venezuela: the use of civilians to create an atmosphere of chaos, a false picture of an elected leader turned "dictator," the complicity of media controlled by the wealthy, self-serving elite, and the use of the military to incite a coup. Prior to this bungled coup, the situation in Venezuela was akin to leaving an open bottle of wine in the same room with a known alcoholic (the CIA) and expecting him to resist the irresistible. Chavez, elected by an overwhelming majority in the last election, had been openly critical of the U.S. war in Afghanistan. He not only set about trying to correct the incredible maldistribution of wealth in his country where 80 percent live in poverty, but aggressively criticized the "poisonous" IMF policies of "plunder and exploitation" in Third World countries. To bolster the sagging Venezuelan economy, Chavez levied taxes on the rich, redistributed idle land of the wealthy to the landless, and cut the production of and imposed tariffs on oil to raise its price, much to the dismay of the insatiable, "we have a right to cheap oil" United States. What actually sealed his temporary fate was his attempt to break free of U.S. domination by resisting privatization of publicly owned enterprises, or as Colin Powell put it, "distorting the democratic free-market advocated by the U.S." Hitting the nail directly on the head, Larry Birns, Director of the Council on Hemispheric Affairs, might as well be talking about the U.S. relationship to the rest of the world when he explains the role of Latin America as being a subservient one whose function it is to "provide raw materials, cheap labor and markets to the 'colossus of the North.' " In other words, autonomous, independent development within foreign countries is simply not tolerated by the U.S. As the weeks progress, more information will undoubtedly continue to be brought to light revealing the extent of U.S. involvement in this abominable assault on freedom and democracy. To date, ties have been made between coup leaders and Otto Reich, who was directly involved in the Iran/Contra scandal; Elliot Abrams, known for his role in the 1973 coup in Chile as well as his sponsorship of death squads in Argentina, El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala; and John Negroponte, who was duly informed at the beginning of this year of the impending action against Chavez. British news reporters are currently investigating leads of alleged coup- operative and logistical support from U.S. Naval ships in the area at that time. Financial backing is being traced to the National Endowment for Democracy, an arm of the CIA used for covert operations abroad, which within this past year suspiciously quadrupled its assistance for various Venezuelan groups, including $154,377 given directly to Venezuelan labor union leader Carlos Ortega who worked closely with "King-for-a-Day," Pedro Carmona. The fact that several coup leaders and their families have found safe asylum in the welcoming arms of the United States flies in the face of U.S.-agreed-to commitments set forth by the Inter-American Democratic Charter whose provisions mandate its members defend democracy against this very type of military overthrow. The United States also dishonored this agreement not only by its immediate endorsement (within hours!) of the illegitimate and highly undemocratic military regime of Carmona, but also by its attempts to stifle criticisms of this new order by other members of the Organization of the American States. So as not to waste a moment in conveying legitimacy on the new government, U.S. Ambassador Charles Shapiro was seen welcoming and congratulating Carmona the very next day, all "smiles and embraces in an obvious state of satisfaction," as reported by Venezuelan newspapers. What the coup leaders hadn't counted on was the sheer determination of the Venezuelan people to rise up and defend their democracy against a dangerous, fascist attitude - covertly and unscrupulously played out by the United States over the years in numerous countries around the world - that ignores and would contemptuously trample on the will of the majority for the benefit of big business and the wealthy few. Chavez's ultimate crime was that of being an independent thinker whose, some might argue "misguided," measures undertaken in trying to revise flawed, inequitable domestic policies had somehow become "unacceptable" to Washington. Translated that means, he dared to place the interests of his own impoverished people over and above the corporate, money-making interests of the United States. There is much to be said of the truth in the words of Christian Perenti, a professor at the New College of California, when he describes Venezuela as "the truest democracy in the world today" as it struggles "to reform capitalism into a more egalitarian, healthier system." It seems to me that the United States has a lesson to learn from its failed coup in Venezuela about the true meaning and practice of democracy in respecting and upholding the rights and will of the people. Doreen Miller encourages your comments: dmiller@YellowTimes.org YellowTimes.org: http://www.yellowtimes.org/article.php?sid=253&mode=thread&order=0 From adurrani at yorku.ca Tue May 7 23:24:06 2002 From: adurrani at yorku.ca (adurrani@yorku.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] 'Did U.S. play a role in coup in Venezuela? - SF Examiner Message-ID: <1020835446.3cd8b6769ed4c@mymail.yorku.ca> 'Did U.S. play a role in coup in Venezuela?' -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- By Conn Hallinan, San Francisco Examiner What did the Bush administration know, and when did it know it? How deeply involved were U.S. intelligence and military personnel in the recent Venezuelan coup? Has our Latin American policy been hijacked by the same cabal of anti- Cuban fanatics who got this country in deep trouble during the 1980s? Those are some of the questions Congress needs answers to if this nation is to maintain even a shred of credibility in its "war on terrorism." Congress should begin with the White House's point man on the region, Otto Reich, assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere Affairs. Reich, a Cuban refugee, met several times with coup leaders and advised civilian coup leader Pedro Carmona during the abortive uprising. Reich denies having anything to do with the overthrow of President Hugo Chavez and says he knew nothing about the events of April 11 because of an "informational blackout." However, according to former National Security Agency officers Wayne Madison and Richard M. Bennett, U.S. Army units in Florida, Puerto Rico and Texas "assisted in providing communications intelligence to U.S. military and national command authorities on the progress of the coup." Is Reich lying? His track record suggests he is. When Reich was secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs under President Reagan, he engaged in "prohibited covert propaganda," according to the General Accounting Office. Reich furnished newspapers with phony stories and opinion pieces supporting the Nicaraguan Contras. He also helped spring Orlando Bosch from a Venezuelan prison in 1987. Bosch, another Cuban refugee, was jailed in 1976 for bombing a Cuban airliner and killing 73 people. Congressional committees also need to probe Pentagon official Rogelio Pardo- Maurer, another Cuban refugee, who met with military coup leader Gen. Lucas Romero Rincon in the weeks before the coup. Pardo-Mauer and the Pentagon deny there was any discussion of a coup. But Madsen and Bennett charge that CIA and civilians contracted by the U.S. military at Marandua airfield in eastern Colombia "stood by to provide logistics support for the leading members of the coup." They further charge that Navy patrol aircraft and at least five surface ships were involved in intercepting communications, and that Special Operations Psychological Warfare units jammed radio frequencies and cellphones in Caracas and other major cities. Pardo-Mauer was the former chief of staff of the Nicaraguan Contras, ground zero for the Iran-Contra scandal, which deeply scarred U.S. credibility in Latin America during the 1980s. Other troubling ties Congress should certainly investigate the U.S. Army School of the Americas (now renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Operations) in Fort Benning, Ga. that trained two of the key coup leaders, Army Commander in Chief Efrain Vasquez and General Ramirez Poveda. The "school" is infamous for producing 11 dictators in Panama, Ecuador, Peru, Argentina, Bolivia, Honduras and Guatemala. According to STRATFOR, a private intelligence provider, the CIA had close ties with the most reactionary wing of the operation, including the extreme right- wing Catholic organization, Opus Dei, and General Ruben Rohas (ret.). It was this group that put Carmona into power, who then dissolved the Legislature, dismissed the Supreme Court, the attorney general and the National Election Commission, fired provincial governors and suspended the constitution. Following meetings between the Bush administration and coup leaders, an anonymous e-mail was sent to the Financial Times detailing what would eventually became the coup's blueprint: a strike at Petroleos de Venezuela, leading to gas shortages, which would create chaos. The chaos would spark demonstrations that would force Chavez to resign under military pressure. According to STRATFOR, the CIA, through the Special Operations Command in Fort Bragg, N.C., has worked on organizing oil union leaders and military commanders since the summer of 2001. The congressionally funded National Endowment for Democracy also funneled almost $900,000 to Chavez foes. Doubt greets U.S. denials Did the United States actively try to undermine the Venezuelan economy in order to create a crisis that would trigger a coup? The stakes here are high, and routine disavowals or in-house investigations of U.S. involvement won't do. "Latin Americans don't give much weight to U.S. denials, because Washington has never admitted its participation in any coup -- not in Chile or anywhere else," says former Chilean ambassador to the U.S., John Biehl. Certainly the coup has sent a collective chill through countries from Colombia to Argentina, many of which endured U.S.-supported military dictatorships in the '60s and '70s. While Americans tend to have short memories about things like the 1973 U.S.-backed coup in Chile, no one else in Latin American can afford such amnesia. The images of the "disappeared" opponents, arbitrary arrests, and plundered economies ushered in by those coups are sharply etched in the collective memories of people from Buenos Aires to Caracas. "There is anxiety in Brazil and the rest of Latin America," says former Brazilian foreign minister Luis Felipe Lampreia," because the U.S. no longer seems so committed to democratic principles." That sentiment alone should be enough to trigger a congressional inquiry. Examiner columnist Conn Hallinan is a journalism lecturer and provost at the University of California, Santa Cruz. His column appears every other Friday. The San Francisco Examiner: http://www.examiner.com/opinion/default.jsp?story=OPhallinan050302w From adurrani at yorku.ca Tue May 7 23:27:09 2002 From: adurrani at yorku.ca (adurrani@yorku.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] 'U.S. promises to Afghan women unfulfilled'- New York Newsday Message-ID: <1020835629.3cd8b72d19da5@mymail.yorku.ca> 'U.S. promises to Afghan women unfulfilled' -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- By Marie Cocco, New York Newsday If you had been forced into invisibility, you would value a talisman that proves you exist. So as Afghanistan's women emerge from years of repression by the Taliban, they list among their many needs a simple one: identity cards. They do not have them. For now, they can participate without them in the nation's loya jirga, the preliminary voting for a representative council. But, says Noeleen Heyzer, executive director of the United Nations' development fund for women, without identity cards the women might be kept from voting for a permanent government in future elections. "There is a fear they will be pushed out," said Heyzer, who has just returned from a 10-day trip to assess the status of Afghan women. "They know how easy it is to make any excuse to be pushed back to the margins." They were pinup girls in the public-relations fight against terror. A few months ago, they were invited to the White House, to Capitol Hill, to Washington cocktail parties - even seated, at the president's request, in one of those made-for-TV chairs at the State of the Union address. We used the Afghan women, with their history of brutalization under the Taliban, to show there was a purpose to the war in Afghanistan that went beyond uprooting people at war with America. Now the women emerge to lives of greater dignity, but undiminished need. Identity cards are among the plainest provisions they require. In Kabul, skilled women have returned to work as teachers and health-care workers. Outside the capital, bleakness is more prevalent than promise. Some communities have been reduced to collections of mud huts and tents, Heyzer said in an interview. Finding care for a sick child requires a two-hour walk to a clinic. Many widows - there are thousands, after two decades of war - are beggars. "There are all these widows and female-headed households that have no means of support whatsoever," said Heyzer, who took her findings to the U.S. State Department yesterday. The women's marginal existence is made more precarious because they are just not safe. Security outside Kabul is a shambles. Rival warlords continue their ancient battles for regional triumph, fighting even to prevent authorities from Afghanistan's interim government from taking their posts. Men returning from refugee camps linger all day without access to work, but with easy access to ubiquitous arms. The much-ballyhooed foreign-aid package agreed on in Tokyo last January is not yet delivered. Only a fraction of $1.8 billion pledged for Afghan reconstruction this year has materialized. Donor nations have concerns, and hold back. The interim government so far lacks a banking infrastructure to track the funds. There is also worry the corrupt warlords will pocket the money. In the United States, where there were many pronouncements that we would help rebuild this nation we now consider vital, the anticipated aid levels are laughable. Of $240 million requested most recently by the two main U.S. government agencies that provide foreign assistance for Afghanistan, the White House budget office agreed to ask Congress for $40 million. President George W. Bush last month pledged a "Marshall Plan" for Afghanistan, but it is more promise than plan. "A sandwich with nothing in the middle," said Jim Bishop of InterAction, a council of 160 private groups that deliver foreign assistance. There is, everywhere but in Washington, a growing certainty that without a bigger peacekeeping force to patrol Afghanistan's regions, the nation will again descend into chaos. The Bush administration has so far rejected an expanded force. But until there is security, there cannot even be effective aid. Without aid, there cannot be the type of projects Heyzer envisions - vocational centers, for instance, for widows who need skills and jobs. Sima Samar, minister for women in the interim government - and guest of the president at the State of the Union address - told the UN Security Council last month that without an expanded peacekeeping force, she fears "the last real chance" for a more stable nation will be squandered. This is not what we promised these women when we put their faces on our propaganda poster last fall. Email: cocco@newsday.com New York Newsday: http://www.newsday.com/news/columnists/ny-vpcoc072697093may07.column? coll=ny%2Dnews%2Dcolumnists From caissa at mobile.rogers.com Wed May 8 01:51:47 2002 From: caissa at mobile.rogers.com (caissa) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] 'Greed, fraud, apologies: Arianna Huffington Message-ID: Aren't these guys your former employer?~ -----Original Message----- From: adurrani@yorku.ca Date: Wed, 8 May 2002 01:28:21 To: rad-green@lists.econ.utah.edu Subject: [R-G] 'Greed, fraud, apologies: Arianna Huffington 'Greed, fraud, apologies: Corporate America's bottom line' -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- By Arianna Huffington, Arianna Online Every day the morning paper brings a fresh example of the flotsam bubbling to the surface following the collision of corporate greed and post-Enron reality: golden boy executives forced to walk the plank, formerly high-flying companies ?restating? fraudulently inflated earnings, internal emails exposing the depths to which Wall Street firms have sunk to boost their bottom lines. Yet the word emanating from on high -- from the well-appointed congressional committee rooms of Washington to the elegant dining rooms of L.A. -- is that the worst is behind us. Yes, they say, Enron was a bit of a wake-up call, but let?s not overreact. We?ve learned our lesson, so please pass the truffle sauce and let?s move on. And, more than likely, that?s exactly what we?d be doing were it not for Eliot Spitzer, the crusading attorney general of New York, whose investigation into conflicts of interest in the investment banking world is ruffling feathers from Wall Street to Capitol Hill. His probe has so far uncovered shocking evidence that analysts at Merrill Lynch gave investors misleading stock recommendations in order to help promote companies their firm?s investment bankers were doing business with. It has also forced the sheep-in-wolf?s-clothing Securities and Exchange Commission to actually begin to do its job and launch its own inquiry into the matter. The result? Well, surprise, surprise, Spitzer is now being told to back off and leave the matter to the big boys in Washington. While being careful not to cross jurisdictional swords, SEC chairman Harvey Pitt gently reminded Spitzer that ?only the federal government can set nationwide standards.? And Rep. Richard Baker, whose Capital Markets subcommittee held hearings on conflicts of interest on Wall Street, cautioned Spitzer: ?It is essential that the SEC now lead the concluding phase of this inquiry.? Concluding phase? Baker thinks the inquiry is wrapping up while Spitzer, who is after fundamental reform, knows it has barely begun. So now he?s having to both take on the bad guys -- and the guys who are supposed to protect the public from the bad guys. If Congress and the SEC had done their jobs, there would be no need for Spitzer. The good news is that he is a man on a mission and won?t be easily deterred. ?Nobody can force me to pull back,? he told me, ?and I have no intention of doing so.? As for the urgings of Messrs. Pitt and Baker, Spitzer doesn?t pull any punches: ?The hearings conducted by Mr. Baker were pointless. They didn?t ask the right questions and they didn?t produce the kind of evidence necessary to bring about real reform. As for the SEC, it clearly didn?t step up and prevent these abuses from occurring.? Spitzer is savvy enough to realize that he won?t be able to overhaul the way Wall Street does business without the support of the public -- and its outrage. That?s why he released those damning Merrill Lynch emails, in which the firm?s analysts privately trashed companies as ? a piece of crap? (and other, less publishable, synonyms) while publicly urging investors to buy shares in the same companies. The emails also show that the highly touted ?Chinese Wall? between Merrill Lynch?s stock researching analysts and its stock promoting investment bankers was more of a wide-open gate. ?The whole idea that we are independent from banking,? wrote one analyst ?is a big lie.? Spitzer?s gambit has paid immediate dividends, shaming Merrill Lynch?s CEO, David Komansky, into offering a mea culpa -- albeit a mealymouthed one. ?Anything that happens on my watch,? said Komansky, ?I?m responsible for. Those emails were embarrassing to me and I truly regret that they ever happened.? Notice that he doesn?t regret the out-and-out fraud the emails reveal; he regrets the emails. How much do you bet that the newest Merrill Lynch employee training session is something on the lines of ?Making the Delete key your new best friend?? Komansky?s carefully calibrated contrition was the very model of the latest in PR-approved damage control: apologize quickly, accept responsibility, and put the past behind you. Only you don?t really apologize, and you don?t really accept responsibility. It also doesn?t hurt to hire high-profile power players to help guide you through the crisis. To that effect, Merrill Lynch has retained Rudy Giuliani as an advisor. Maybe he can give Merrill Mike Milken?s number. But all the apologies and damage control in the world won?t make this problem go away. Too many people were lied to and financially devastated along the way. Since the Merrill Lynch emails were made public, lawyers across the country have been inundated with calls from angry investors looking for restitution. ?Merrill Lynch used to be the gold standard for how an investment banker should do business,? Philip Aidikoff, president of the Public Investors Arbitration Bar Association, told me. ?Now, at my firm alone, we?re getting 40 to 45 calls a day from Merrill customers who feel they?ve been duped.? So Merrill Lynch has gone from gold standard to ?crap? pusher. And it?s not alone. To pull our corporate culture out of the muck, it?s going to take more than public contrition and non-stop mea culpas on CNBC, which, given the current volume, may have to turn itself into the Self-Flagellation Channel. It will take some CEOs paying a real price for fraud, and securities regulations with real bite. Stay tuned, this one is far from over. Reprinted from Arianna Online: http://www.ariannaonline.com/columns/files/050602.html _______________________________________________ Rad-Green mailing list Rad-Green@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green From caissa at mobile.rogers.com Wed May 8 01:54:45 2002 From: caissa at mobile.rogers.com (caissa) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] 'Greed, fraud, apologies: Arianna Huffington Message-ID: Oops. I just mistakenly sent that note to the list rather than a friend who recently worked for Merrill Lynch. Sorry about that. jon From Johannes.Schneider at gmx.net Wed May 8 03:15:27 2002 From: Johannes.Schneider at gmx.net (Johannes Schneider) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] The Economist on Anti-Semitism in Europe Message-ID: <00c801c1f670$e5aa5540$4a1e050a@fgl.atitech.com> Anti-Semitism in Europe Growing hostility to Israel, and Islamic attacks on Jewish targets in Europe, do not mean that old-style anti-Semitism is back Full text at: http://www.economist.com/agenda/displayStory.cfm?story_id=1118386 A quite well researched article. From citizen at comcast.net Wed May 8 08:54:22 2002 From: citizen at comcast.net (Bob Anderson) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] Grassroots resistance not supported by Democracy Now Message-ID: IMO Democracy Now is biased toward big names and is not helpful, maybe harmful, to the building of a militant domestic grassroots resistance. I am sure DN is under a lot of pressure to cover a lot of news but when the Israeli attacks on Palestine were growing DN producers told me they could not find time to report on the many actions taking place around the US even though groups such as the Texaco 7 were arrested and face severe criminal charges for raising the demands like: No Blood for Oil, Free Palestine; Stop Israeli State Terror and exposed the false terrorism line to American communities. Apparently many others were making similar bold actions around the country and none of it was carried on DN. The reason I say this is because it is important for grassroots activists in the resistance movement here in the belly of the beast to hear of each other and know of their struggles because the main stream media works hard block out this growing force. Unless I missed it, and I listen a lot, I never heard a word of the crucial domestic grassroots actions on DN but I heard a lot of big names scholars and activists and correspondence from overseas, which I do appreciate, in some perspective. So I was flabbergasted to just hear DN devote almost an hour to a NYC satirist give her personal bedroom type reactions to 9-11, events of last fall while the ethnic cleansing continues in Palestine and our grassroots is struggling for a strategy and to overcome the war abroad and developing fascism at home. The lesson is we still have much work to do in building a communications network and alternative media for the revolution in the US and we should not rely on DN to help us other than for journalism slightly different from the mainstream. Sincerely, Bob Anderson Box 4591 Albuquerque, NM 87196 505-858-0882 citizen@comcast.net From furuhashi.1 at osu.edu Wed May 8 10:52:52 2002 From: furuhashi.1 at osu.edu (Yoshie Furuhashi) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:20 2006 Subject: [R-G] U.S. Arms Transfers and Security Assistance to Israel Message-ID: William D. Hartung and Frida Berrigan, "U.S. Arms Transfers and Security Assistance to Israel," . -- Yoshie * Calendar of Events in Columbus: * Anti-War Activist Resources: * Student International Forum: * Committee for Justice in Palestine: From pieinsky at igc.org Wed May 8 11:55:51 2002 From: pieinsky at igc.org (Jay Moore) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:21 2006 Subject: [R-G] Fw: two press releases Message-ID: <000e01c1f6b9$c24a0ca0$a2211e40@bypass.com> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Muhammad Abu Nasr" To: Sent: Wednesday, May 08, 2002 9:46 AM Subject: two press releases > Dear Jay, > > Here are translations of two more PFLP press releases > that appeared in Arabic a few hours ago. > > Best, > > Muhammad > ------------ > Press Release > > Bethlehem: The Popular Front for the Liberation of > Palestine has warned against implementing the > agreement on expulsion to Italy that was signed by the > Palestinian leadership and the Sharon government > concerning the matter of the people besieged in the > Church of the Nativity. > > A responsible source in the Popular Front denounced > this agreement, considering that it accepts and grants > official Palestinian political status to the > philosophy of expulsion and exile that the Zionist > movement and Israeli governments have followed against > the Palestinian people for decades. > > The Popular Front said that the Palestine Authority's > acceptance of the Israeli legal and security measures > in this agreement amounts to an extension of the > agreement whereby the Palestine Authority opened an > international prison in Jericho and continued to > imprison the General Secretary of the Popular Front, > Ahmad Saadat, and his comrades. It must also be > considered a consecration of the situation where the > Palestinians are living in disbursal abroad, and it > contradicts the principle of the sacred right of > return of the Palestinian people. > > The Front added that the negotiations that have taken > place on this matter in recent days concerning the > issue of breaking the siege of the Church of the > Nativity and the hand over of the complete list of the > names of those besieged have whetted the appetite of > the occupation forces and thrown open the door to more > raids and arrests in various parts of the province in > search of wanted persons. > > The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine > 7 May 2002. > > ------------------------------------------------------- > Statement to the masses > > Issued by members of the Popular Front for the > Liberation of Palestine imprisoned by the Zionist > occupation. > > To the masses of our resisting people, > > We extend to you the greeting of steadfastness and > resistance that you are inscribing and carving into > the pages of history with blood, light, and bullets > that explode in the breasts of the Zionist enemy. > > We extend to you the greeting of esteem and honor for > the immense sacrifices that you have offered so > readily on the altar of freedom and independence. > > Heroic masses, the most important achievement attained > by our people's glorious intifada until now is that it > has forged and solidified unity in the ranks of the > Palestinians of various political hues from the > farthest right to the farthest left for the defense of > the gains and achievements of our national struggle > over the course of more than three decades. > > The heroic intifada has broken down all the walls and > all the demarcation lines between the various > patriotic and Islamic action organizations. To > encroach upon this unity is forbidden. It is the > responsibility of everyone, of each individual and of > each responsible organization, to protect this > achievement from any encroachment, regardless of the > cost. > > What has taken place in recent days, by the acceptance > of the leadership of the Palestine Authority, must be > considered a brazen encroachment upon this unity that > has been consecrated by blood and sacrifices. It > distances us from attaining our just and legitimate > national goals. This encroachment was represented, > first, by the trial put on by the Palestine Authority > of our four heroic comrades who taught the enemy a > dear lesson when they eliminated the Nazi snake head, > the minister Rehebam Ze'evi. More harmful and more > bitter was the fact that this shameful sham trial came > as our comrades and others were besieged and suffering > together with what was left of the Palestine Authority > leadership, in the first place Brother Abu Ammar > (Yasir Arafat), confronting the same enemy and the > same fate, sharing their privation and their bread > together. How can the prisoner be turned into judge > and jailer at one moment? And against whom? Against > the noblest fighters. Yet this humiliating trial was > not enough, it was followed by the Palestine > Authority's agreement to transport our comrades and > the General Secretary, Ahmad Saadat, and Brother > al-Shawbaki to the Authority's prisons in Jericho > under American and British guard. This was the price > for lifting the siege of the headquarters of the > President, the price paid to gain the pleasure of Bush > the son in America. How dear a price this was! > > We understand that President Abu Ammar faced enormous > pressure put upon him from American, European, and > even Arab quarters to accept these humiliating > conditions that must be considered a betrayal of the > achievements that the intifada has won as it defined > itself in the single blood that flowed in all the > towns, refugee camps, and villages of the occupied > homeland. > > Proud masses of our people, to the extent that we > highly respected and esteemed the stance of the > President before and after the recent invasion of > Ramallah and the siege of his headquarters, and his > supreme preparedness for confrontation and > steadfastness, even if the price were his martyrdom in > rejecting all the American, European, and Arab > pressures - and in this we saw the real beginning of a > true return to arousing the project of steadfastness > and national resistance, to reconstructing the > strategy of national action so as to conform with and > be dedicated to attaining all the goals of our > national consensus: for a state, for the return, and > for self-determination - to that same extent we feel > today disappointment over the acceptance of the > humiliating conditions, in the first place the > political re-arrest of our militants and holy > warriors. On this basis we affirm the following: > > 1. We consider the Palestine Authority's audacious > trial of our comrades and its compliance with the > Zionist American conditions to confine them together > with the General Secretary Ahmad Saadat and Brother > al-Shawbaki under Anglo-American guard and executive > authority a dangerous pointer left in the depths of > the national strategy of action that has been > consecrated by blood and sacrifices. It arouses the > legitimate fear that it will be the beginning of a > chain leading to the frustration and halt of the > intifada and resistance action. > > 2. The decisions of the sham trial that issued its > rulings with respect to our four comrades must be > canceled. > > 3. Acceptance of the transfer of our besieged > comrades, together with the Comrade General Secretary > Ahmad Saadat and Brother al-Shawbaki, to political > imprisonment must be refused. > > 4. The provision for political arrest must be > eliminated from the codes and files of the Palestine > Authority, and this black chapter of the history of > the Authority must not be returned to. > > 5. We call for the preservation of national unity, > politically and in the field, that unity which has > been consecrated by immense sacrifices and > encroachment upon which is forbidden, regardless of > the price. > > 6. We believe that the effort to rebuild and > reconstruct the infrastructure is a comprehensive > all-encompassing activity that must take into > consideration the rebuilding of the destroyed > infrastructure in addition to reconstructing the basis > for the project of the general national rising. > > May the torch of the intifada continue, may the > steadfastness and struggle of our people continue > until we attain our legitimate national aims, in the > first place the establishment of an independent > Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital, the > right of self determination for our people and the > return of all the refugees to their homes. > > No, a thousand times No to political arrest! > Yes to immediate release of the political prisoners in > the Palestine Authority's prisons! > Long live our great people! > Long live the glorious intifada! > We will surely win! > > Comrades of the Popular Front > In the Prisons of the Zionist Occupation > 2 May 2002. > > > __________________________________________________ > Do You Yahoo!? > Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness > http://health.yahoo.com From hunterbadbear at earthlink.net Wed May 8 13:20:18 2002 From: hunterbadbear at earthlink.net (Hunter Gray) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:21 2006 Subject: [R-G] Lost Adams Diggings, Native Americans, and Dreams and Legends Message-ID: <003201c1f6c5$6eb60f60$3f70fa43@ibm22761429477> Note by Hunterbear: This is a story about something that's very, very real: Gold. Gold Found, Gold Lost, and Gold That's Still There. And, since Gold never exists in a void by itself, this involves Natives and Anglos and Values. And Dreams and Legends. You can't grow up in the Real Southwest without hearing much about this particular situation -- from the very Four Directions. There is, as I mentioned the other day, a bona fide lost and massive lode of gold in either Eastern Arizona or Western New Mexico: "The Lost Adams Diggings." I know much about many things -- and little or nothing about many more -- but I do know much indeed about Native Americans and the Rugged West. I have a curious mind -- and I've always wondered just where, specifically, the Adams gold might be. I've done a great deal of research -- and even more listening. And I've done more than my share of looking. But I make no claims. It was "found" by Anglos in 1864 who started from some point in what is now Southern Arizona. They were led by Adams, originally of Rochester, N.Y., and guided by a Mexican Indian, a former captive of the Apaches who was later killed by the Apaches for his treachery. It lies in a very deep trough-like box canyon, through which a small creek flows or at least once did. There are some other landmarks of significance -- but most of these are not especially unique to any one locale in this vast sweep of still-wilderness turf. Once down in the deep, steep canyon the gold-hunters immediately spotted good-sized pure gold nuggets in and around the creek -- obviously washed down from a "home lode" further up the canyon. And, no sooner had the gold hunters arrived and begun to accumulate, than they had very interesting -- and interested -- visitors. A large band of Apaches led by the extremely shrewd and intrepid Nana arrived within a day. Nana was a man of the direct statement and came immediately to the point: The down-in-the-canyon gold hunters were told to take what they wanted, gold-wise from the creek -- and make absolutely no effort to find the basic gold deposits further up the canyon. And leave soon. And never return. The Apache leader explained patiently that the canyon was Sno-Tah-Hay -- a very special religious place for his people. [Like all Native Americans, the Apaches had no special interest at all in the gold itself.] A man of many great gifts, Nana was well versed in a number of languages and had no problem clearly conveying all of this, including his reasonable ultimatum -- and its implications. There was no misunderstanding his position. One and all, the Anglos agreed with his conditions. Some weeks after this, with Adams and the main body of gold-hunters remaining in the canyon, a smaller group of Anglos left, with nuggets -- some as big as wild turkey eggs -- to buy supplies at the very far away [Old] Fort Wingate, then at the present site of San Rafael, N.M. [at Grants]. The trip took many days -- precisely how many is speculative. They purchased those supplies from the post trader, paying with the huge gold nuggets -- something carefully recorded by the storekeeper. One man in Adams' party, a German, worried about the Apaches, had taken his gold out and left with the supply train -- and then returned to Germany where, years later, he verified in detail the existence of the gold. Meanwhile, Back at the Canyon, the astute and unseen Nana et al., watched the gold operations continuing and expanding via the building of a cabin and observed the surreptitious night-time Anglo trips up-canyon to the basic and super-rich source of the gold. The Christian doctrine of Original Sin is not in the theology of the Apaches [or any other Native cultures, as far as that goes] but Nana and his men certainly recognized the existence and the great endurance of on-going, burgeoning avarice. With the exception of one man -- Brewer -- who escaped, the Apaches wiped out the entire supply group as they approached the canyon from their purchasing trip -- and then killed everyone in the canyon save two who were a short distance from the main Anglo encampment. One of these was Adams himself. [A significant and extremely unfortunate personal shortcoming of his, as it turned out over the decades to come, was his almost total lack of any dependable sense-of-direction.] No survivor -- including Adams who sought it for the rest of his life -- could ever again find the canyon full of gold. Asked years later about Sno-Tah-Hay, the normally friendly Nana would immediately grow cold and withdrawn. In the chaos and unpredictability of the Southwestern Native world in the latter 19th Century [Geronimo did not "surrender" until 1886 and Indian resistance continued for years afterward], the Old Apaches obviously did not pass the location of Sno-Tah-Hay on to any of the younger people. In any event, many have sought The Wonder -- and continue to do so. And no one has found. A reasonable question to me might be, "What's your guess?" And I say, first, that "If the Adams Gold isn't where it's supposed to be, than it has to be somewhere else." And, Yes Indeed -- I have an idea where it might well be: A very remote and obscure and geographically wonderful area where everything, with one moderate directional exception, fits the information provided by Adams and the other two survivors -- especially the very carefully compiled account by the extremely astute Brewer. I've been on and into the interesting edges of that very, very rugged sprawl. And it took me a very good while to get even there. I had access to some rare, special insights -- given decades ago. And, in an interesting situation later, I was once able to be flown quite near the setting -- the special significance unknown to anyone else, even the pilot -- and it all looks very possible indeed. But there are, all over the Golden Southwest, many places which certainly seem to fit the Lost Adams Diggings. Many. Again, I make no claims. I suspect that Its gold reality, while truly stupendous, falls somewhat short of Its still-growing-nicely Tree of Legend. But It's still -- judging from the survivors and the "nuggets as big as wild turkey eggs" -- a very, very rich deposit. Personally, I have great cultural inhibitions about digging for gold -- in such a beautiful area as the one I suspect houses it -- or even seeing the gold. And I also profoundly respect Nana's concerns. I do know, definitely, the very specific location of moderately rich gold-laden rose quartz from the lower half of the very remote and vasty Sycamore Canyon Wilderness Area southwest of my home town of Flagstaff, Arizona. I found that quite by accident and brought out ore samples in 1955. Although I've been back there a number of times, almost half a century has passed and, at no point, have I had any interest whatsoever in pursuing that. I should add that, every single person -- bar none -- who has spent any time thinking about the Lost Adams Diggings has his or her pet theories, and even special information -- with locations that stretch from not far north of the Mexican border clear up to the Utah and Colorado lines. Some even have extraordinarily detailed maps whose origins are unknown. So I'm really not that unusual. Not a bit. Lots of theories and all -- for the last almost 150 years. But, wherever It is, It's real -- Sno-Tah-Hay, the Lost Adams Diggings -- very real indeed. For my part, I hope It slumbers -- forever unfound -- in the shadowy mists of legendry where It will always continue to grow and glitter. We need Dreams. All of us. And we need many kinds of Dreams. Good Dreams. One of the great human beings of the Southwest who certainly understood this was the late Texas-born [old ranching family] writer and historian, J. Frank Dobie -- who wrote extensively about Western New Mexico and Eastern Arizona and the Sierra Madre Occidental of Mexico. He deeply appreciated all of the people and their respective cultures -- Native and Anglo and Mexican and Whoever -- and the wildlife and the geography. And all of them and all the land itself certainly appreciated Frank Dobie. He was also, I should add, a very strong supporter of civil rights and civil liberties and union labor throughout his entire and very long life. Frank Dobie fought a number of significant academic freedom battles at the University of Texas, strongly supported the Southern Conference for Human Welfare [predecessor of the Southern Conference Educational Fund], and I have an extremely strong pro-union address "Divided We Stand" -- that he made in the very early 1940s which was published and widely circulated by UAW-CIO. Furthermore, Frank Dobie knew how to write -- lucidly, and with grand simplicity -- in such a way that your soul is gripped and your mind can't let it go. I strongly recommend one of his several very great Southwestern classics which covers the Adams gold in considerable detail, and much more stuff as well: great sagas from the American Southwest and Old Mexico. It is Apache Gold and Yaqui Silver [Boston, Little Brown and Company, 1950.] [That's the date for my personal edition. However, Apache Gold initially appeared in 1928 and it's been coming out in various other printings ever since.] Nana and the Old Indians were very wise indeed. So was my Native father who told me emphatically, many times: "Go after bears, leave gold alone." Yours, Hunterbear Hunter Gray [ Hunterbear ] www.hunterbear.org ( social justice ) Protected by Na?shdo?i?ba?i? From furuhashi.1 at osu.edu Wed May 8 13:48:35 2002 From: furuhashi.1 at osu.edu (Yoshie Furuhashi) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:21 2006 Subject: [R-G] Sharon's Best Weapon: The Left Must Confront Anti-Semitism Head-on Message-ID: April 26, 2002 SHARON'S BEST WEAPON The left must confront anti-Semitism head-on. By Naomi Klein Something new went on in Washington in the middle of April. A demonstration against the World Bank and International Monetary Fund was joined by an anti-war march, as well as a demonstration against the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory. In the end, all the marches joined together in what organizers described as the largest Palestinian solidarity demonstration in U.S. history, 75,000 people by some estimates. On Sunday night, I turned on my television in the hopes of catching a glimpse of this historic protest. I saw something else instead: triumphant Jean-Marie Le Pen celebrating his new found status as the second most popular political leader in France. Ever since, I've been wondering whether the new alliance displayed on the streets of Washington can also deal with this latest threat. The convergence that took place in Washington last weekend was long overdue. Despite easy labels like "anti-globalization," the trade-related protests of the past three years have all been about self-determination: the right of people everywhere to decide how best to organize their societies and economies, whether that means introducing land reform in Brazil, or producing generic AIDS drugs in India, or resisting an occupying force in Palestine. When hundreds of globalization activists began flocking to Ramallah to act as "human shields" between Israeli tanks and Palestinians, the theory that has been developing on the streets outside trade summits was put into concrete action. Bringing that courageous spirit back to Washington, where so much Middle Eastern policy is made, was the next logical step. But when I saw Le Pen beaming on TV, arms raised in triumph, some of my enthusiasm drained away. There is no connection whatsoever between French fascism and the "free Palestine" marchers in Washington (indeed the only people Le Pen's supporters seem to dislike more than Jews are Arabs). And yet I couldn't help thinking about all the recent events I've been to where anti-Muslim violence was rightly condemned, but no mention was made of attacks on Jewish synagogues, cemeteries and community centers. Or about the fact that every time I log onto activist news sites like indymedia.org, which practice "open publishing," I'm confronted with a string of Jewish conspiracy theories about September 11 and excerpts from The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. The globalization movement isn't anti-Semitic, it just hasn't fully confronted the implications of diving into the Middle East conflict. Most people on the left are simply choosing sides. In the Middle East, where one side is under occupation and the other has the U.S. military behind it, the choice seems clear. But it is possible to criticize Israel while forcefully condemning the rise of anti-Semitism. And it is equally possible to be pro-Palestinian independence without adopting a simplistic "pro-Palestinian/anti-Israel" dichotomy, a mirror image of the good-versus-evil equations so beloved by President George W. Bush. Why bother with such subtleties while bodies are still being pulled out of the rubble in Jenin? Because anyone interested in fighting Le Pen-style fascism or Sharon-style brutality has to deal with the reality of anti-Semitism head-on. The hatred of Jews is a potent political tool in the hands of both the right in Europe and in Israel. For Le Pen, anti-Semitism is a windfall, helping spike his support from 10 percent to 17 percent in a week. For Ariel Sharon, it is the fear of anti-Semitism, both real and imagined, that is the weapon. Sharon likes to say that he stands up to terrorists to show he is not afraid. In fact, his policies are driven by fear. His great talent is that he fully understands the depths of Jewish fear of another Holocaust. He knows how to draw parallels between Jewish anxieties about anti-Semitism and American fears of terrorism. And he is an expert at harnessing all of it for his political ends. The primary, and familiar, fear that Sharon draws on, the one that allows him to claim all aggressive actions as defensive ones, is the fear that Israel's neighbors want to drive the Jews into the sea. The secondary fear Sharon manipulates is the fear among Jews in the Diaspora that they will eventually be driven to seek safe haven in Israel. This fear leads millions of Jews around the world, many of them sickened by Israeli aggression, to shut up and send their checks, a down payment on future sanctuary. The equation is simple: The more fearful Jews are, the more powerful Sharon is. Elected on a platform of "peace through security," Sharon's administration could barely hide its delight at Le Pen's ascendancy, immediately calling on French Jews to pack their bags and come to the promised land. For Sharon, Jewish fear is a guarantee that his power will go unchecked, granting him the impunity needed to do the unthinkable: send troops into the Palestinian Authority's education ministry to steal and destroy records; bury children alive in their homes; block ambulances from getting to the dying. Jews outside Israel now find themselves in a tightening vice: The actions of the country that was supposed to ensure their future safety are making them less safe right now. Sharon is deliberately erasing distinctions between the terms "Jew" and "Israeli," claiming he is fighting not for Israeli territory, but for the survival of the Jewish people. And when anti-Semitism rises at least partly as a result of his actions, it is Sharon who is positioned once again to collect the political dividends. And it works. Most Jews are so frightened that they are now willing to do anything to defend Israeli policies. So at my neighborhood synagogue, where the humble facade was just badly scarred by a suspicious fire, the sign on the door doesn't say, "Thanks for nothing, Sharon." It says, "Support Israel -- now more than ever." There is a way out. Nothing is going to erase anti-Semitism, but Jews outside and inside Israel might be a little safer if there was a campaign to distinguish between diverse Jewish positions and the actions of the Israeli state. This is where an international movement can play a crucial role. Already, alliances are being made between globalization activists and Israeli "refuseniks," soldiers who refuse to serve their mandatory duty in the occupied territories. And the most powerful images from Saturday's protests were rabbis walking alongside Palestinians. But more needs to be done. It's easy for social justice activists to tell themselves that since Jews already have such powerful defenders in Washington and Jerusalem, anti-Semitism is one battle they don't need to fight. This is a deadly error. It is precisely because anti-Semitism is used by the likes of Sharon that the fight against it must be reclaimed. When anti-Semitism is no longer treated as Jewish business, to be taken care of by Israel and the Zionist lobby, Sharon will be robbed of his most effective weapon in the indefensible and increasingly brutal occupation. And as an extra bonus, whenever hatred of Jews diminishes, the likes of Jean-Marie Le Pen shrink right down with it. -- Yoshie * Calendar of Events in Columbus: * Anti-War Activist Resources: * Student International Forum: * Committee for Justice in Palestine: From shniad at sfu.ca Wed May 8 17:18:19 2002 From: shniad at sfu.ca (shniad@sfu.ca) Date: Sat Aug 5 04:32:21 2006 Subject: [R-G] Inquiry of intelligence failures hits obstacles - LAT Message-ID: <200205082318.g48NIKTf007046@rm-rstar.sfu.ca> http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-000031609may04.story The Los Angeles Times May 4, 2002 Inquiry of intelligence failures hits obstacles Sept. 11: The lawmakers leading the investigation voice concerns that the CIA and Justice Department are undermining efforts. By Greg Miller Washington -- Lawmakers l