Oh, the contradictions of the right. Damn big government and their socialist agenda, but hands off my Medicare. Damn those liberal activist judges … except when it's our activist judge and he rules against a crucial plank of healthcare reform that was lawfully passed by Congress. Requiring every American to have health insurance is no more socialist than requiring every American to have car insurance, and certainly no more socialist than the federal government bailing out Wall Street's Gordon Gekkos using taxpayer money.
Recently, though, perhaps the most unconscionable act was the blatant obstructionism Republican Senators engaged in recently: they threatened to deny healthcare to 9/11 first responders who are now suffering illnesses resulting from toxic exposures at Ground Zero. Reflecting the party's flawed moral character, every single Senate Republican followed through on their threat to block the bill until Democrats agreed to extend Bush-era tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans.
Partisanship venom at its finest. Our nation's bravest souls, who ran into burning buildings to save innocents, were almost deprived healthcare because our politicians wanted to cut rich Americans a tax break. The Zadroga bill, named after the first NYPD officer whose death is attributed to the noxious fumes at Ground Zero, initially passed in the House, but fell three votes short of the 60 needed to break the Senate filibuster. It wasn't until late last week that the bill also passed in the Senate, but not without Democrats' begging, and with only minimal public outcry.
The hypocrisy is astounding, nauseating almost. For the past nine years, the Republican rallying chorus has consistently harkened to the heroism of 9/11, whether it was relevant or not. Remember 9/11: we shall never forget. The astronomic sales of NYPD T-shirts speaks volumes. Rhetoric is cheap, but when it comes to actually providing for our first responders, the Republican party failed, and failed miserably. The disturbing display of callousness towards 9/11 first responders was indicative of the vindictive partisan divide we are destined to see next year.
According to the WTC Health Registry annual report, of approximately 70,000 registered enrollees, 10% reported developing asthma in the first 16 months after 9/11. In the year following the attacks, firefighters developed the lung disease sarcoidosis at five times the normal rate. Public health experts fear the widespread development of malignant mesothelioma, a type of lung cancer attributable to asbestos. Add that approximately 40% of the World Trade Centre workers monitored by a Mount Sinai Hospital study lack health insurance and it qualifies as a public health crisis.
So, who could possibly have the temerity, the unmitigated audacity, to argue against our moral obligation to take care of the heroic men and women who are now suffering after inhaling 9/11's noxious fumes? Instead of professing false patriotism and rah-rahing, "USA! USA! USA", how about we just give those brave men and women the chance to see a doctor so they can breathe easier?
The most peculiar part of the sordid mess is the relative dearth of media coverage it initially received. It mysteriously slipped under most major networks' radar. In fact, the issue was largely ignored until Jon Stewart informed the public that al-Jazeera had run a 22-minute story focusing on the disgraceful Senate rancour, which set off a flurry of media coverage.
Still, there was more fiery indignation about TSA feeling up America's nether regions than there was about 9/11 first responders getting shafted by the government. Wherever did we Americans lose our outrage? Maybe, we used it all up in the WikiUproar.
Let's see now … We had it for the 9/11 mosque hysteria, as is usually the case for anything 9/11-related. It was only too easy to incite a seething populace into faux patriotism then. Talk of the mosque was even able to ignite jingoism to epic proportions. Oh, the disgrace, the indignity. Hell, we get high blood pressure when Facebook uses Helvetica instead of the Times New Roman font. We could have used some of that emotional reaction, and that rallying cry, to remember 9/11 emergency personnel last week.
Curiously, though, depriving Ground Zero workers medical care – because of the ignominious bravado of the Republican party, no less – did not seem to detonate the public, not even mildly. The absurd temper about anything remotely pertaining to 9/11 remained sedate. Why? Because it was about Republicans guaranteeing tax breaks to privileged American suburbia-ville first. They failed at their opportunity to step up to the plate and put their money where their NYPD and FDNY bumper stickers are.
The men and women who selflessly rushed into the blazing Twin Towers to save lives did not hesitate. They did not waiver; nor did they bargain or negotiate before they lunged towards their death and towards future illnesses. But when it came to rewarding them – and not with the pseudo-patriotism of flagwaving and groupthink chants – but with tangible, compassionate medical care for their ailments, our politicians to the right of the aisle did.
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Monday, November 22, 2010
Das Racist - Chicken And Meat
i know this is not my usual subject matter...i am just really digging these guys lately...check it out =)
scary :Bankrolling book tour, Murdoch emerges as Palin’s top 2012 supporter
As she embarks on her 16-stop book tour promoting "America by Heart," former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin has one person to be enormously grateful to: media baron Rupert Murdoch.
Palin's publisher, HarperCollins Publishers, is part of the News Corp. media empire, and they're bankrolling her tour. It's not coincidence that her stops focus inordinately on swing-states, either.
That, combined with her employment by the Fox News Channel and her show "Sarah Palin's Alaska" on TLC, means she could be a real GOP heavyweight in 2012, even as senior party officials seem to loathe her.
As New York Times columnist Frank Rich noted over the weekend, it's none other than Murdoch who seems to be emerging as Palin's top 2012 supporter.
"But logic doesn’t apply to Palin," he wrote. "What might bring down other politicians only seems to make her stronger: the malapropisms and gaffes, the cut-and-run half-term governorship, family scandals, shameless lying and rapacious self-merchandising. In an angry time when America’s experts and elites all seem to have failed, her amateurism and liabilities are badges of honor. She has turned fallibility into a formula for success."
Amid the flurry of fighting to differentiate herself from the other GOP 2012 likelies -- nearly all of whom are employed by Fox News -- Palin seems to have succeeded at least in ensuring that her media personality is sustainable through 2012.
Fox News has already dedicated over $40 million-worth in airtime to Republicans seen as likely 2012 candidates. Network anchor Chris Wallace also recently admitted that the station was planning to run the primaries as "a production of Fox News." He compared their plans to the hit Fox networks show "American Idol," which, ironically, Palin criticizes in her new book as fueling "the cult of self-esteem."
But if Murdoch is picking sides, or even just appears to be, that could ultimately fan the flames of a GOP civil war: a topic which has gained increasing traction since the mid-term elections.
rupertmurdochsmiles Bankrolling book tour, Murdoch emerges as Palins top 2012 supporterAnd it's not as though Palin's celeb status has gone unnoticed. Her recent appearance on the Fox network's Dancing with the Stars was flagged by all the hallmarks of a talk show introducing a celebrity guest. Fellow Republican former governors Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee don't get that kind of welcome wherever they go.
"The editorial page of Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal is also on board, recently praising Palin for her transparently ghost-written critique of the Federal Reserve’s use of quantitative easing," Rich noted. "'Mrs. Palin is way ahead of her potential presidential competitors on this policy point,' The Journal wrote, and 'shows a talent for putting a technical subject in language that average Americans can understand.'
"With Murdoch, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity on her side, Palin hardly needs the grandees of the so-called Republican establishment."
With that kind of reception from one of the largest media empires in America, it'd be hard to avoid the same conclusion as Palin, who said recently that if she runs for president -- which Palin almost certainly will -- she will only talk to Fox News.
With Palin's poll numbers topping 80 percent among Republicans according to recent Gallup figures, her candidacy for the GOP nomination in 2012 is entirely viable. However, with 52 percent of overall poll respondents saying they have an unfavorable view of the half-term governor, her viability against Obama is entirely in question.
"I have no doubt that she is a formidable force in the Republican Party and very well could be the most formidable force in the Republican Party," White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs opined in Sept.
The White House had previously said that no matter who wins the GOP nomination, plans are in place to essentially run against the prior Republican administration, calling the 2012 elections a decision between moving forward or going back.
Palin's publisher, HarperCollins Publishers, is part of the News Corp. media empire, and they're bankrolling her tour. It's not coincidence that her stops focus inordinately on swing-states, either.
That, combined with her employment by the Fox News Channel and her show "Sarah Palin's Alaska" on TLC, means she could be a real GOP heavyweight in 2012, even as senior party officials seem to loathe her.
As New York Times columnist Frank Rich noted over the weekend, it's none other than Murdoch who seems to be emerging as Palin's top 2012 supporter.
"But logic doesn’t apply to Palin," he wrote. "What might bring down other politicians only seems to make her stronger: the malapropisms and gaffes, the cut-and-run half-term governorship, family scandals, shameless lying and rapacious self-merchandising. In an angry time when America’s experts and elites all seem to have failed, her amateurism and liabilities are badges of honor. She has turned fallibility into a formula for success."
Amid the flurry of fighting to differentiate herself from the other GOP 2012 likelies -- nearly all of whom are employed by Fox News -- Palin seems to have succeeded at least in ensuring that her media personality is sustainable through 2012.
Fox News has already dedicated over $40 million-worth in airtime to Republicans seen as likely 2012 candidates. Network anchor Chris Wallace also recently admitted that the station was planning to run the primaries as "a production of Fox News." He compared their plans to the hit Fox networks show "American Idol," which, ironically, Palin criticizes in her new book as fueling "the cult of self-esteem."
But if Murdoch is picking sides, or even just appears to be, that could ultimately fan the flames of a GOP civil war: a topic which has gained increasing traction since the mid-term elections.
rupertmurdochsmiles Bankrolling book tour, Murdoch emerges as Palins top 2012 supporterAnd it's not as though Palin's celeb status has gone unnoticed. Her recent appearance on the Fox network's Dancing with the Stars was flagged by all the hallmarks of a talk show introducing a celebrity guest. Fellow Republican former governors Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee don't get that kind of welcome wherever they go.
"The editorial page of Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal is also on board, recently praising Palin for her transparently ghost-written critique of the Federal Reserve’s use of quantitative easing," Rich noted. "'Mrs. Palin is way ahead of her potential presidential competitors on this policy point,' The Journal wrote, and 'shows a talent for putting a technical subject in language that average Americans can understand.'
"With Murdoch, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity on her side, Palin hardly needs the grandees of the so-called Republican establishment."
With that kind of reception from one of the largest media empires in America, it'd be hard to avoid the same conclusion as Palin, who said recently that if she runs for president -- which Palin almost certainly will -- she will only talk to Fox News.
With Palin's poll numbers topping 80 percent among Republicans according to recent Gallup figures, her candidacy for the GOP nomination in 2012 is entirely viable. However, with 52 percent of overall poll respondents saying they have an unfavorable view of the half-term governor, her viability against Obama is entirely in question.
"I have no doubt that she is a formidable force in the Republican Party and very well could be the most formidable force in the Republican Party," White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs opined in Sept.
The White House had previously said that no matter who wins the GOP nomination, plans are in place to essentially run against the prior Republican administration, calling the 2012 elections a decision between moving forward or going back.
9/11 Was NOT A Muslim Crime
Jon Gold
10/24/2010
"Muslims did kill us on 9/11, and there is a Muslim problem in the world. If you want to walk away from that truth, I can't stop you. But a better strategy would be for all of us to acknowledge the danger coming out of the Muslim world and work together to mitigate it." - Bill O'Reilly
I have written on this topic a couple of times.
My basic belief, is that 9/11 was not an act of war, and instead, a crime. Not a Muslim, Zionist, American, Israeli, Saudi Arabian, Pakistani, Episcopalian crime. A crime.
If people who happened to be Muslim participated in the crime of 9/11, that doesn't mean you blame everyone who is a Muslim. Just as you don't blame everyone who is a Christian after a Christian decides to blow up an abortion clinic. You blame the individuals responsible, and not everyone from their religion, nationality, or ideology.
9/11 is being treated as a "Muslim crime" by some, and as a result, 1000's of Muslims that had nothing to do with the attacks have been slaughtered. Treating 9/11 as a crime, without the religious, national, and ideological undertones, prevents more people from being blamed and slaughtered for a crime they didn't commit. It's as simple as that.
We have been told repeatedly by people like Bill O'Reilly that "Muslims killed us on 9/11." The 9/11 Report dedicates many pages to Muslims and Islam. The hijackers' religious beliefs are mentioned as well. Hani Hanjour is described as a "rigorously observant Muslim." Mohammad Atta as "religious, but not fanatically so. This would change..." Ramzi Binalshibh thought, "the highest duty of every Muslim was to pursue jihad, and that the highest honor was to die during the jihad." Marwan al Shehhi had an "evolution toward Islamic fundamentalism." Ziad Jarrah, "started living more strictly according to the Koran. He read brochures in Arabic about jihad, held forth to friends on the subject of holy war, and professed disaffection with his previous life and a desire not to leave the world "in a natural way."
As it turns out, there is reason to believe that the individuals we are told were the hijackers, were not strict Muslims at all.
The following are some entries from www.historycommons.org that suggest this:
(1998): Two Saudi 9/11 Hijackers Nonreligious and Drink Alcohol
According to the 9/11 Commission, two of the alleged Saudi 9/11 hijackers, Satam Al Suqami and Salem Alhazmi, appear "unconcerned with religion and, contrary to Islamic law, [are] known to drink alcohol." In addition, they both have minor criminal offence records. However, Salem Alhazmi’s father will later remember that Salem "stopped drinking and started attending mosque regularly three months before he disappeared." [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 232-3, 524]
July-December 2000: Some at Flight School Find Ziad Jarrah an Unlikely Terrorist, Though Accounts Conflict
According to some accounts, while he is taking lessons at Florida Flight Training Center (FFTC) in Venice, alleged 9/11 hijacker Ziad Jarrah appears an unlikely terrorist. Arne Kruithof, the school’s owner, later says Jarrah is "not just nice, but he had qualities you look for in a dear friend, someone you trust." [Longman, 2002, pp. 92] He will tell the 9/11 Commission that Jarrah is "polite and easy to deal with," and does not show "any hostility to the United States or to the West." [9/11 Commission, 4/12/2004] Kruithof says Jarrah "would even offer to put out the trash cans at night, which no one else did," and later remembers him "bringing me a six-pack of beer at home when I hurt my knee one time and sitting for hours on my sofa chatting." Unlike other Middle Eastern students, Jarrah never seems uncomfortable or disapproving of the school’s receptionists, who wear skimpy skirts and tiny t-shirts. [Corbin, 2003, pp. 155] Furthermore, Jarrah drinks alcohol, having one or two beers, "but not three." According to Kruithof, who later insists Jarrah’s demeanor was "not faked," the school’s "entire staff does not believe that he had bad intentions," and Jarrah "was a friend to all of us." However, fellow flight student Thorsten Biermann, who rooms with Jarrah for six weeks, describes him as "introverted, a loner, he kept his distance." Biermann will describe one occasion flying with Jarrah on a round-trip to Fort Lauderdale where, on the return, Jarrah insisted on both flying and manning the radio, and twice ignored Biermann’s pleas to refuel when the weather worsened. Biermann says: "I decided I did not want to fly with him anymore, and everyone I knew who flew with him felt the same way. It was as if he needed control." Biermann will also say that Jarrah avoids pork and, contrary to what Kruithof claims, does not drink alcohol, even when they go to bars together. [New York Times, 9/23/2001; Los Angeles Times, 10/23/2001; Longman, 2002, pp. 91-92]
(Mid-July - December 2000): Atta and Alshehhi Frequent Venice Bars and Drink Alcohol
While attending flight school in Venice, Florida (see July 6-December 19, 2000), Mohamed Atta and Marwan Alshehhi regularly visit a couple of local bars. Most nights, after flying classes, they drink beer at the Outlook. They are observed there as being well dressed and well spoken. Atta comes across as cold and unfriendly, and is disapproving of the presence of women servers behind the bar. Bartender Lizsa Lehman will later say that, after the 9/11 attacks, "I remember thinking that [Atta] was capable of everything they had said was done." In contrast, Alshehhi is "friendly and jovial and… always eager to interact with bartenders and patrons." Lehman later says, "I, to this day, have trouble seeing [Alshehhi] doing it [i.e., participating in 9/11]." [Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/10/2006; Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/10/2006] Atta and several friends are also regulars at the 44th Aero Squadron bar. The group drinks Bud Light, talks quietly, and stays sober. The bar’s owner, Ken Schortzmann, says Atta has "a fanny pack with a big roll of cash in it," and comments, "I never had any problems with them.… They… didn’t drink heavily or flirt with the waitresses, like some of the other flight students." While he regularly goes to these bars during this period, Atta never visits any of the three mosques in Southwest Florida, and avoids contact with local Muslims. [Newsweek, 9/24/2001; Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/28/2001] Interestingly, other witnesses later describe Atta as possibly doing drugs as well. The owner of a unit of apartments where Atta reportedly lived with some other Middle Eastern men in late 2000 (see (Mid-July 2000 - Early January 2001)) says these men smoked a strange tobacco, which smelled like marijuana. [Charlotte Sun, 9/14/2001] Atta may also be a heavy smoker, as he is reported to spend his time "chain smoking," when later living in Coral Springs. [Sunday Times (London), 2/3/2002]
February 22-25, 2001: Atta Spends Weekend in Key West on a ‘Continuous Party,’ then Bails Girlfriend out of Jail?
Some reports later suggest that around this time Mohamed Atta has an American girlfriend called Amanda Keller (see (February-April 2001)). According to Tony and Vonnie LaConca, a couple that meet Keller and her boyfriend (who they know only as "Mohamed"), the pair and another woman go on a short trip to Key West, Florida. Tony LaConca later recalls, "They were gone for three days. They didn’t sleep—it was a continuous party." The three indulge in drugs and alcohol, all paid for by "Mohamed," even though he does not have a job. After returning from the trip, on February 25 "Mohamed" has to bail Keller out of South County Jail, after police take her in because of an outstanding warrant over a "worthless check charge." [Charlotte Sun, 9/14/2001; Charlotte Sun, 9/11/2003] The Sarasota Herald-Tribune claims that Keller’s companion is not Mohamed Atta, but another man of Middle Eastern descent named Mohammed. [Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/23/2001] In 2002, Keller will say that her boyfriend was indeed Mohamed Atta, but in 2006 she retracts this claim. [Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/10/2006] Interestingly, other witnesses later describe Atta as frequently drinking alcohol, smoking, and possibly doing drugs (see (Mid-July - December 2000)).
May 24-August 14, 2001: 9/11 Hijackers Make Several Unexplained Trips to Vegas
Several of the 9/11 hijackers make trips to Las Vegas and the west coast over the summer:
* May 24-27: Marwan Alshehhi flies to Vegas (see May 24-27, 2001);
* June 7-10: Ziad Jarrah takes a trip to Vegas (see June 7-10, 2001);
* June 28-July 1: Mohamed Atta takes his first trip to Vegas, flying from Fort Lauderdale to Boston and then, the next day, to Las Vegas via San Francisco with United Airlines. He stays there three nights, then returns to Boston via Denver, and flies to New York the next day;
* July 31-August 1: Waleed Alshehri flies from Fort Lauderdale to Boston and then takes American Airlines flight 195 to San Francisco the next day. After spending a night at the La Quinta Inn, he returns to Miami via Las Vegas; [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006, pp. 1-2, 16, 18 pdf file; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006, pp. 55-7 pdf file]
* August 1: Actor James Woods sees four people he will later suspect are hijackers, including individuals he believes to be Khalid Almihdhar and Hamza Alghamdi, on a transcontinental flight (see August 1, 2001). Abdulaziz Alomari is reported to try to get into the cockpit on a different flight from Vegas on the same day (see August 1, 2001);
* August 13-14: Atta, Hani Hanjour, and Nawaf Alhazmi all fly to Vegas, possibly meeting some other hijackers there (see August 13-14, 2001).
Nawaf Alhazmi and Khalid Almihdhar also made frequent car trips to Las Vegas from San Diego, where they lived in 2000. [Los Angeles Times, 9/1/2002; McDermott, 2005, pp. 192] The reason for these trips is never definitively determined, although there will be speculation the hijackers are casing aircraft similar to those they will hijack on 9/11. The 9/11 Commission will comment, "Beyond Las Vegas’s reputation for welcoming tourists, we have seen no credible evidence explaining why… the operatives flew to or met in Law Vegas." [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 242, 248] After 9/11, it will be reported that the hijackers may use these cross-country flights to take pictures of airline cockpits and check out security at boarding gates. During the flights, the hijackers apparently take notes, watch the crews, and even videotape them. There are some reports that two, or perhaps more, of the hijackers sit in "jumpseats" in the pilot’s cabin, a courtesy extended by airlines to other pilots, during the surveillance flights (see Summer 2001) and on the day of 9/11 itself (see November 23, 2001). [Boston Globe, 11/23/2001; Associated Press, 5/29/2002] There are reports that the hijackers drink alcohol, gamble, and frequent strip clubs while they are in Las Vegas. For example, according to a dancer named "Samantha," Marwan Alshehhi stares up at her blankly while she "undulate[s] her hips inches from his face" and only gives her $20, although he is a "light drinker." [San Francisco Chronicle, 10/4/2001; Newsweek, 10/15/2001]
September 7, 2001: Story of Hijackers Drinking Alcohol Changes Over Time
One of the first and most frequently told stories about the hijackers is their visit to Shuckums, a sports bar in Hollywood, Florida, on this day. What is particularly interesting about this story is how it has changed over time. In the original story, first reported on September 12 [Associated Press, 9/12/2001] , Mohamed Atta, Marwan Alshehhi, and an unidentified man come into the restaurant already drunk. "They were wasted," says bartender Patricia Idrissi, who directs them to a nearby Chinese restaurant. [St. Petersburg Times, 9/13/2001] Later they return and drink—Atta orders five vodka and orange juices, while Alshehhi orders five rum and Cokes. [Time, 9/24/2001] According to manager Tony Amos, "The guy Mohamed was drunk, his voice was slurred and he had a thick accent." Idrissi says they argue about the bill, and when she asks if there was a problem, "Mohamed said he worked for American Airlines and he could pay his bill." [Associated Press, 9/12/2001] This story was widely reported through much of September. [New York Times, 9/13/2001; South Florida Sun-Sentinel, 9/15/2001; Sunday Herald (Glasgow), 9/16/2001; Miami Herald, 9/22/2001; Newsweek, 9/24/2001; Time, 9/24/2001] However, beginning on September 15, a second story appears. [Toronto Star, 9/15/2001] This story is similar to the first, except that here, Atta is playing video games and drinking cranberry juice instead of vodka, and Alshehhi is the one who argues over the bill and pays. After some coexistence, the second story seems to have become predominant in later September. [Washington Post, 9/16/2001; Washington Post, 9/22/2001; Los Angeles Times, 9/27/2001; St. Petersburg Times, 9/27/2001; Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 11/12/2001; Sunday Times (London), 2/3/2002]
Before September 11, 2001: Hijackers Drink Alcohol and Watch Strip Shows, Especially towards Eve of Attacks
A number of the hijackers apparently drink alcohol heavily in bars, sleep with prostitutes, and watch strip shows in the US in the months and especially the days leading up to 9/11.
* In late February 2001, hijacker Ziad Jarrah frequents a strip club in Jacksonville, Florida (see February 25-March 4, 2001).
bullet In July 2001, hijackers Hamza Alghamdi and Marwan Alshehhi make two purchases of "pornographic video and sex toys" from a Florida store (see July 4-27, 2001).
* Some hijackers, including possibly Satam Al Suqami and Waleed and Wail Alshehri, sleep with prostitutes in the days before 9/11 (see September 7-11, 2001).
* On September 10, three hijacker associates spend $200 to $300 apiece on lap dances and drinks in the Pink Pony, a Daytona Beach, Florida strip club. While the hijackers had left Florida by this time, Mohamed Atta is reported to have visited the same strip club, and these men appear to have had foreknowledge of the 9/11 attacks (see September 10, 2001). [Boston Herald, 10/10/2001]
* Marwan Alshehhi and Mohamed Atta are seen entering the Hollywood, Florida, sports bar Shuckums already drunk. They proceed to drink even more hard alcohol there (see September 7, 2001).
* Atta and Alshehhi are seen at Sunrise 251, a bar in Palm Beach, Florida. They spend $1,000 in 45 minutes on Krug and Perrier-Jouet champagne. Atta is with a tall busty brunette in her late twenties; Alshehhi is with a shortish blonde. Both women are known locally as regular companions of high-rollers. [Daily Mail, 9/16/2001]
* A stripper at the Olympic Garden Topless Cabaret in Las Vegas, Nevada, later recalls Marwan Alshehhi being "cheap," paying only $20 for a lap dance. [Cox News Service, 10/16/2001]
* Several hijackers reportedly patronize the Nardone’s Go-Go Bar in Elizabeth, New Jersey. They are even seen there on the weekend before 9/11. [Boston Herald, 10/10/2001; Wall Street Journal, 10/16/2001]
* Majed Moqed visits a porn shop on three occasions and rents a porn video. The mayor of Paterson, New Jersey, later says of the six hijackers who stayed there, "Nobody ever saw them at mosques, but they liked the go-go clubs." [Newsday, 9/23/2001; Newsweek, 10/15/2001]
* Nawaf Alhazmi and Khalid Almihdhar often frequent Cheetah’s, a nude bar in San Diego. [Los Angeles Times, 9/1/2002]
* Marwan Alshehhi is possibly seen in the Cheetah nightclub in Pompado Beach, Florida, on July 1, 2001. Six dancers who work there later claim to have seen him. [Federal Bureau of Investigation, 10/2001, pp. 173 pdf file]
bullet Hamza Alghamdi watches a porn video on September 10. [Wall Street Journal, 10/16/2001]
Temple University in Philadelphia professor Mahmoud Mustafa Ayoub will later comment: "It is incomprehensible that a person could drink and go to a strip bar one night, then kill themselves the next day in the name of Islam.… People who would kill themselves for their faith would come from very strict Islamic ideology. Something here does not add up." [South Florida Sun-Sentinel, 9/16/2001]
So, it seems that the hijackers who may have been Muslim, weren't as Muslim as we have been led to believe. It doesn't matter though, because 9/11 wasn't a Muslim crime. It was a crime.
10/24/2010
"Muslims did kill us on 9/11, and there is a Muslim problem in the world. If you want to walk away from that truth, I can't stop you. But a better strategy would be for all of us to acknowledge the danger coming out of the Muslim world and work together to mitigate it." - Bill O'Reilly
I have written on this topic a couple of times.
My basic belief, is that 9/11 was not an act of war, and instead, a crime. Not a Muslim, Zionist, American, Israeli, Saudi Arabian, Pakistani, Episcopalian crime. A crime.
If people who happened to be Muslim participated in the crime of 9/11, that doesn't mean you blame everyone who is a Muslim. Just as you don't blame everyone who is a Christian after a Christian decides to blow up an abortion clinic. You blame the individuals responsible, and not everyone from their religion, nationality, or ideology.
9/11 is being treated as a "Muslim crime" by some, and as a result, 1000's of Muslims that had nothing to do with the attacks have been slaughtered. Treating 9/11 as a crime, without the religious, national, and ideological undertones, prevents more people from being blamed and slaughtered for a crime they didn't commit. It's as simple as that.
We have been told repeatedly by people like Bill O'Reilly that "Muslims killed us on 9/11." The 9/11 Report dedicates many pages to Muslims and Islam. The hijackers' religious beliefs are mentioned as well. Hani Hanjour is described as a "rigorously observant Muslim." Mohammad Atta as "religious, but not fanatically so. This would change..." Ramzi Binalshibh thought, "the highest duty of every Muslim was to pursue jihad, and that the highest honor was to die during the jihad." Marwan al Shehhi had an "evolution toward Islamic fundamentalism." Ziad Jarrah, "started living more strictly according to the Koran. He read brochures in Arabic about jihad, held forth to friends on the subject of holy war, and professed disaffection with his previous life and a desire not to leave the world "in a natural way."
As it turns out, there is reason to believe that the individuals we are told were the hijackers, were not strict Muslims at all.
The following are some entries from www.historycommons.org that suggest this:
(1998): Two Saudi 9/11 Hijackers Nonreligious and Drink Alcohol
According to the 9/11 Commission, two of the alleged Saudi 9/11 hijackers, Satam Al Suqami and Salem Alhazmi, appear "unconcerned with religion and, contrary to Islamic law, [are] known to drink alcohol." In addition, they both have minor criminal offence records. However, Salem Alhazmi’s father will later remember that Salem "stopped drinking and started attending mosque regularly three months before he disappeared." [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 232-3, 524]
July-December 2000: Some at Flight School Find Ziad Jarrah an Unlikely Terrorist, Though Accounts Conflict
According to some accounts, while he is taking lessons at Florida Flight Training Center (FFTC) in Venice, alleged 9/11 hijacker Ziad Jarrah appears an unlikely terrorist. Arne Kruithof, the school’s owner, later says Jarrah is "not just nice, but he had qualities you look for in a dear friend, someone you trust." [Longman, 2002, pp. 92] He will tell the 9/11 Commission that Jarrah is "polite and easy to deal with," and does not show "any hostility to the United States or to the West." [9/11 Commission, 4/12/2004] Kruithof says Jarrah "would even offer to put out the trash cans at night, which no one else did," and later remembers him "bringing me a six-pack of beer at home when I hurt my knee one time and sitting for hours on my sofa chatting." Unlike other Middle Eastern students, Jarrah never seems uncomfortable or disapproving of the school’s receptionists, who wear skimpy skirts and tiny t-shirts. [Corbin, 2003, pp. 155] Furthermore, Jarrah drinks alcohol, having one or two beers, "but not three." According to Kruithof, who later insists Jarrah’s demeanor was "not faked," the school’s "entire staff does not believe that he had bad intentions," and Jarrah "was a friend to all of us." However, fellow flight student Thorsten Biermann, who rooms with Jarrah for six weeks, describes him as "introverted, a loner, he kept his distance." Biermann will describe one occasion flying with Jarrah on a round-trip to Fort Lauderdale where, on the return, Jarrah insisted on both flying and manning the radio, and twice ignored Biermann’s pleas to refuel when the weather worsened. Biermann says: "I decided I did not want to fly with him anymore, and everyone I knew who flew with him felt the same way. It was as if he needed control." Biermann will also say that Jarrah avoids pork and, contrary to what Kruithof claims, does not drink alcohol, even when they go to bars together. [New York Times, 9/23/2001; Los Angeles Times, 10/23/2001; Longman, 2002, pp. 91-92]
(Mid-July - December 2000): Atta and Alshehhi Frequent Venice Bars and Drink Alcohol
While attending flight school in Venice, Florida (see July 6-December 19, 2000), Mohamed Atta and Marwan Alshehhi regularly visit a couple of local bars. Most nights, after flying classes, they drink beer at the Outlook. They are observed there as being well dressed and well spoken. Atta comes across as cold and unfriendly, and is disapproving of the presence of women servers behind the bar. Bartender Lizsa Lehman will later say that, after the 9/11 attacks, "I remember thinking that [Atta] was capable of everything they had said was done." In contrast, Alshehhi is "friendly and jovial and… always eager to interact with bartenders and patrons." Lehman later says, "I, to this day, have trouble seeing [Alshehhi] doing it [i.e., participating in 9/11]." [Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/10/2006; Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/10/2006] Atta and several friends are also regulars at the 44th Aero Squadron bar. The group drinks Bud Light, talks quietly, and stays sober. The bar’s owner, Ken Schortzmann, says Atta has "a fanny pack with a big roll of cash in it," and comments, "I never had any problems with them.… They… didn’t drink heavily or flirt with the waitresses, like some of the other flight students." While he regularly goes to these bars during this period, Atta never visits any of the three mosques in Southwest Florida, and avoids contact with local Muslims. [Newsweek, 9/24/2001; Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/28/2001] Interestingly, other witnesses later describe Atta as possibly doing drugs as well. The owner of a unit of apartments where Atta reportedly lived with some other Middle Eastern men in late 2000 (see (Mid-July 2000 - Early January 2001)) says these men smoked a strange tobacco, which smelled like marijuana. [Charlotte Sun, 9/14/2001] Atta may also be a heavy smoker, as he is reported to spend his time "chain smoking," when later living in Coral Springs. [Sunday Times (London), 2/3/2002]
February 22-25, 2001: Atta Spends Weekend in Key West on a ‘Continuous Party,’ then Bails Girlfriend out of Jail?
Some reports later suggest that around this time Mohamed Atta has an American girlfriend called Amanda Keller (see (February-April 2001)). According to Tony and Vonnie LaConca, a couple that meet Keller and her boyfriend (who they know only as "Mohamed"), the pair and another woman go on a short trip to Key West, Florida. Tony LaConca later recalls, "They were gone for three days. They didn’t sleep—it was a continuous party." The three indulge in drugs and alcohol, all paid for by "Mohamed," even though he does not have a job. After returning from the trip, on February 25 "Mohamed" has to bail Keller out of South County Jail, after police take her in because of an outstanding warrant over a "worthless check charge." [Charlotte Sun, 9/14/2001; Charlotte Sun, 9/11/2003] The Sarasota Herald-Tribune claims that Keller’s companion is not Mohamed Atta, but another man of Middle Eastern descent named Mohammed. [Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/23/2001] In 2002, Keller will say that her boyfriend was indeed Mohamed Atta, but in 2006 she retracts this claim. [Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/10/2006] Interestingly, other witnesses later describe Atta as frequently drinking alcohol, smoking, and possibly doing drugs (see (Mid-July - December 2000)).
May 24-August 14, 2001: 9/11 Hijackers Make Several Unexplained Trips to Vegas
Several of the 9/11 hijackers make trips to Las Vegas and the west coast over the summer:
* May 24-27: Marwan Alshehhi flies to Vegas (see May 24-27, 2001);
* June 7-10: Ziad Jarrah takes a trip to Vegas (see June 7-10, 2001);
* June 28-July 1: Mohamed Atta takes his first trip to Vegas, flying from Fort Lauderdale to Boston and then, the next day, to Las Vegas via San Francisco with United Airlines. He stays there three nights, then returns to Boston via Denver, and flies to New York the next day;
* July 31-August 1: Waleed Alshehri flies from Fort Lauderdale to Boston and then takes American Airlines flight 195 to San Francisco the next day. After spending a night at the La Quinta Inn, he returns to Miami via Las Vegas; [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006, pp. 1-2, 16, 18 pdf file; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006, pp. 55-7 pdf file]
* August 1: Actor James Woods sees four people he will later suspect are hijackers, including individuals he believes to be Khalid Almihdhar and Hamza Alghamdi, on a transcontinental flight (see August 1, 2001). Abdulaziz Alomari is reported to try to get into the cockpit on a different flight from Vegas on the same day (see August 1, 2001);
* August 13-14: Atta, Hani Hanjour, and Nawaf Alhazmi all fly to Vegas, possibly meeting some other hijackers there (see August 13-14, 2001).
Nawaf Alhazmi and Khalid Almihdhar also made frequent car trips to Las Vegas from San Diego, where they lived in 2000. [Los Angeles Times, 9/1/2002; McDermott, 2005, pp. 192] The reason for these trips is never definitively determined, although there will be speculation the hijackers are casing aircraft similar to those they will hijack on 9/11. The 9/11 Commission will comment, "Beyond Las Vegas’s reputation for welcoming tourists, we have seen no credible evidence explaining why… the operatives flew to or met in Law Vegas." [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 242, 248] After 9/11, it will be reported that the hijackers may use these cross-country flights to take pictures of airline cockpits and check out security at boarding gates. During the flights, the hijackers apparently take notes, watch the crews, and even videotape them. There are some reports that two, or perhaps more, of the hijackers sit in "jumpseats" in the pilot’s cabin, a courtesy extended by airlines to other pilots, during the surveillance flights (see Summer 2001) and on the day of 9/11 itself (see November 23, 2001). [Boston Globe, 11/23/2001; Associated Press, 5/29/2002] There are reports that the hijackers drink alcohol, gamble, and frequent strip clubs while they are in Las Vegas. For example, according to a dancer named "Samantha," Marwan Alshehhi stares up at her blankly while she "undulate[s] her hips inches from his face" and only gives her $20, although he is a "light drinker." [San Francisco Chronicle, 10/4/2001; Newsweek, 10/15/2001]
September 7, 2001: Story of Hijackers Drinking Alcohol Changes Over Time
One of the first and most frequently told stories about the hijackers is their visit to Shuckums, a sports bar in Hollywood, Florida, on this day. What is particularly interesting about this story is how it has changed over time. In the original story, first reported on September 12 [Associated Press, 9/12/2001] , Mohamed Atta, Marwan Alshehhi, and an unidentified man come into the restaurant already drunk. "They were wasted," says bartender Patricia Idrissi, who directs them to a nearby Chinese restaurant. [St. Petersburg Times, 9/13/2001] Later they return and drink—Atta orders five vodka and orange juices, while Alshehhi orders five rum and Cokes. [Time, 9/24/2001] According to manager Tony Amos, "The guy Mohamed was drunk, his voice was slurred and he had a thick accent." Idrissi says they argue about the bill, and when she asks if there was a problem, "Mohamed said he worked for American Airlines and he could pay his bill." [Associated Press, 9/12/2001] This story was widely reported through much of September. [New York Times, 9/13/2001; South Florida Sun-Sentinel, 9/15/2001; Sunday Herald (Glasgow), 9/16/2001; Miami Herald, 9/22/2001; Newsweek, 9/24/2001; Time, 9/24/2001] However, beginning on September 15, a second story appears. [Toronto Star, 9/15/2001] This story is similar to the first, except that here, Atta is playing video games and drinking cranberry juice instead of vodka, and Alshehhi is the one who argues over the bill and pays. After some coexistence, the second story seems to have become predominant in later September. [Washington Post, 9/16/2001; Washington Post, 9/22/2001; Los Angeles Times, 9/27/2001; St. Petersburg Times, 9/27/2001; Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 11/12/2001; Sunday Times (London), 2/3/2002]
Before September 11, 2001: Hijackers Drink Alcohol and Watch Strip Shows, Especially towards Eve of Attacks
A number of the hijackers apparently drink alcohol heavily in bars, sleep with prostitutes, and watch strip shows in the US in the months and especially the days leading up to 9/11.
* In late February 2001, hijacker Ziad Jarrah frequents a strip club in Jacksonville, Florida (see February 25-March 4, 2001).
bullet In July 2001, hijackers Hamza Alghamdi and Marwan Alshehhi make two purchases of "pornographic video and sex toys" from a Florida store (see July 4-27, 2001).
* Some hijackers, including possibly Satam Al Suqami and Waleed and Wail Alshehri, sleep with prostitutes in the days before 9/11 (see September 7-11, 2001).
* On September 10, three hijacker associates spend $200 to $300 apiece on lap dances and drinks in the Pink Pony, a Daytona Beach, Florida strip club. While the hijackers had left Florida by this time, Mohamed Atta is reported to have visited the same strip club, and these men appear to have had foreknowledge of the 9/11 attacks (see September 10, 2001). [Boston Herald, 10/10/2001]
* Marwan Alshehhi and Mohamed Atta are seen entering the Hollywood, Florida, sports bar Shuckums already drunk. They proceed to drink even more hard alcohol there (see September 7, 2001).
* Atta and Alshehhi are seen at Sunrise 251, a bar in Palm Beach, Florida. They spend $1,000 in 45 minutes on Krug and Perrier-Jouet champagne. Atta is with a tall busty brunette in her late twenties; Alshehhi is with a shortish blonde. Both women are known locally as regular companions of high-rollers. [Daily Mail, 9/16/2001]
* A stripper at the Olympic Garden Topless Cabaret in Las Vegas, Nevada, later recalls Marwan Alshehhi being "cheap," paying only $20 for a lap dance. [Cox News Service, 10/16/2001]
* Several hijackers reportedly patronize the Nardone’s Go-Go Bar in Elizabeth, New Jersey. They are even seen there on the weekend before 9/11. [Boston Herald, 10/10/2001; Wall Street Journal, 10/16/2001]
* Majed Moqed visits a porn shop on three occasions and rents a porn video. The mayor of Paterson, New Jersey, later says of the six hijackers who stayed there, "Nobody ever saw them at mosques, but they liked the go-go clubs." [Newsday, 9/23/2001; Newsweek, 10/15/2001]
* Nawaf Alhazmi and Khalid Almihdhar often frequent Cheetah’s, a nude bar in San Diego. [Los Angeles Times, 9/1/2002]
* Marwan Alshehhi is possibly seen in the Cheetah nightclub in Pompado Beach, Florida, on July 1, 2001. Six dancers who work there later claim to have seen him. [Federal Bureau of Investigation, 10/2001, pp. 173 pdf file]
bullet Hamza Alghamdi watches a porn video on September 10. [Wall Street Journal, 10/16/2001]
Temple University in Philadelphia professor Mahmoud Mustafa Ayoub will later comment: "It is incomprehensible that a person could drink and go to a strip bar one night, then kill themselves the next day in the name of Islam.… People who would kill themselves for their faith would come from very strict Islamic ideology. Something here does not add up." [South Florida Sun-Sentinel, 9/16/2001]
So, it seems that the hijackers who may have been Muslim, weren't as Muslim as we have been led to believe. It doesn't matter though, because 9/11 wasn't a Muslim crime. It was a crime.
Sunday, November 14, 2010
Will Internet censorship bill be pushed through lame-duck Congress?
A bill giving the government the power to shut down Web sites that host materials that infringe copyright is making its way quietly through the lame-duck session of Congress, raising the ire of free-speech groups and prompting a group of academics to lobby against the effort.
The Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act (COICA) was introduced in Congress this fall by Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT). It would grant the federal government the power to block access to any Web domain that is found to host copyrighted material without permission.
Critics say the bill is both a giveaway to the movie and recording industries and a step towards widespread and unaccountable censorship of the Internet.
Opponents note that the powers given the government under the bill are very broad. Because the bill targets domain names and not specific materials, an entire Web site can be shut down. So for example, if the US determines that there are copyright-infringing materials on YouTube, it could theoretically block access to all of YouTube, whether or not particular material being accessed infringes copyright.
Activist group DemandProgress, which is running a petition against the bill, argues the powers in the bill could be used for political purposes. If the whistleblower Web site WikiLeaks is found to be hosting copyrighted material, for instance, access to WikiLeaks could be blocked for all US Internet users.
Though the bill was delayed in September after an outcry from activist groups, it now appears to be back and potentially poised for quick passage in the lame-duck session of Congress, reports DemandProgress.
A group of academics, led by Temple University law professor David Post, have signed a petition opposing COICA.
"The Act, if enacted into law, would fundamentally alter U.S. policy towards Internet speech, and would set a dangerous precedent with potentially serious consequences for free expression and global Internet freedom," Post wrote in the petition letter (PDF).
The bill is "awful on many fronts," he wrote at Volokh Conspiracy. "It would allow a court to effectively shut down a site operated out of Brazil, or France, without any adversary hearing ... or any reasoned determination that the site actually is engaged in unlawful activity."
"Even more significant and more troubling, the Act represents a retreat from the United States’ historical position as a bulwark and beacon against censorship and other threats to freedom of expression, freedom of thought, and the free exchange of information and ideas around the globe."
The Electronic Frontier Foundation has published a list of Web sites it believes are at highest risk of being shut down under the proposed law. Included in the list are file-hosting services such as Rapidshare and Mediafire, music mash-up sites like SoundCloud and MashupTown, as well as "sites that discuss and advocate for P2P technology or for piracy," such as pirate-party.us and P2PNet.
A TOOL FOR POLITICAL CENSORSHIP?
Free speech advocates argue that Internet censorship laws are inevitably used for purposes other than the ones claimed by lawmakers.
For instance, Australia in recent years set up a "firewall" around its Internet, with the intention of blacklisting child pornography Web sites. But a list of the blocked sites, leaked to Wikileaks, showed that the Australian government was censoring more than porn: The blacklist contained religious and political Web sites.
According to the Melbourne Age:
But about half of the sites on the list are not related to child porn and include a slew of online poker sites, YouTube links, regular gay and straight porn sites, Wikipedia entries, euthanasia sites, websites of fringe religions such as satanic sites, fetish sites, Christian sites, the website of a tour operator and even a Queensland dentist.
"It seems to me as if just about anything can potentially get on the list," [University of Sydney associate professor Bjorn] Landfelt said.
As predicted by some critics, the "great Aussie firewall" ended up blocking access to parts of WikiLeaks.
The Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act (COICA) was introduced in Congress this fall by Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT). It would grant the federal government the power to block access to any Web domain that is found to host copyrighted material without permission.
Critics say the bill is both a giveaway to the movie and recording industries and a step towards widespread and unaccountable censorship of the Internet.
Opponents note that the powers given the government under the bill are very broad. Because the bill targets domain names and not specific materials, an entire Web site can be shut down. So for example, if the US determines that there are copyright-infringing materials on YouTube, it could theoretically block access to all of YouTube, whether or not particular material being accessed infringes copyright.
Activist group DemandProgress, which is running a petition against the bill, argues the powers in the bill could be used for political purposes. If the whistleblower Web site WikiLeaks is found to be hosting copyrighted material, for instance, access to WikiLeaks could be blocked for all US Internet users.
Though the bill was delayed in September after an outcry from activist groups, it now appears to be back and potentially poised for quick passage in the lame-duck session of Congress, reports DemandProgress.
A group of academics, led by Temple University law professor David Post, have signed a petition opposing COICA.
"The Act, if enacted into law, would fundamentally alter U.S. policy towards Internet speech, and would set a dangerous precedent with potentially serious consequences for free expression and global Internet freedom," Post wrote in the petition letter (PDF).
The bill is "awful on many fronts," he wrote at Volokh Conspiracy. "It would allow a court to effectively shut down a site operated out of Brazil, or France, without any adversary hearing ... or any reasoned determination that the site actually is engaged in unlawful activity."
"Even more significant and more troubling, the Act represents a retreat from the United States’ historical position as a bulwark and beacon against censorship and other threats to freedom of expression, freedom of thought, and the free exchange of information and ideas around the globe."
The Electronic Frontier Foundation has published a list of Web sites it believes are at highest risk of being shut down under the proposed law. Included in the list are file-hosting services such as Rapidshare and Mediafire, music mash-up sites like SoundCloud and MashupTown, as well as "sites that discuss and advocate for P2P technology or for piracy," such as pirate-party.us and P2PNet.
A TOOL FOR POLITICAL CENSORSHIP?
Free speech advocates argue that Internet censorship laws are inevitably used for purposes other than the ones claimed by lawmakers.
For instance, Australia in recent years set up a "firewall" around its Internet, with the intention of blacklisting child pornography Web sites. But a list of the blocked sites, leaked to Wikileaks, showed that the Australian government was censoring more than porn: The blacklist contained religious and political Web sites.
According to the Melbourne Age:
But about half of the sites on the list are not related to child porn and include a slew of online poker sites, YouTube links, regular gay and straight porn sites, Wikipedia entries, euthanasia sites, websites of fringe religions such as satanic sites, fetish sites, Christian sites, the website of a tour operator and even a Queensland dentist.
"It seems to me as if just about anything can potentially get on the list," [University of Sydney associate professor Bjorn] Landfelt said.
As predicted by some critics, the "great Aussie firewall" ended up blocking access to parts of WikiLeaks.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Friday, April 9, 2010
Amnesty: US guilty of Katrina-related abuses
Amnesty: US guilty of Katrina-related abuses
By CAIN BURDEAU (AP) – 9 hours ago
NEW ORLEANS — The U.S. government and Gulf Coast states have consistently violated the human rights of hurricane victims since Hurricane Katrina killed about 1,800 people and caused widespread devastation after striking in August 2005, Amnesty International said Friday.
The report, entitled "Un-Natural Disaster," said the treatment of hurricane victims and government actions in housing, health care and policing have prevented poor minority communities from rebuilding and returning to their homes on the Gulf Coast.
In sum, government actions have amounted to human rights violations and "as a result, the demographics of the region are being permanently altered," the report said.
Amnesty took particular aim at New Orleans, where public housing was bulldozed, hospitals have been slow to reopen and the criminal justice system has been plagued by police brutality, lengthy pretrial detentions and an underfunded indigent defense system.
"You have the demolition of most of the public housing units in New Orleans without a one-for-one replacement as well as a lack of rebuilding affordable rental housing," said Justin Mazzola, an Amnesty researcher. "Orleans Parish Prison is now the largest mental health psych facility in the city of New Orleans."
Moira Mack, a White House spokeswoman, said the Obama administration had cut through the red tape that delayed assistance and improved coordination among agencies that often failed to collaborate in the years after the storms. She said the administration's actions freed $2.4 billion in rebuilding money that had stalled for years.
Christina Stephens, a spokeswoman for Gov. Bobby Jindal's Louisiana Recovery Authority, said Louisiana had worked "diligently since the hurricanes to rebuild housing, restore critical infrastructure — including schools and health care facilities — and protect our citizens from future harm."
New Orleans' former public housing was being replaced with new mixed-income communities, she said. She said $1.2 billion has been set aside for rental housing.
Staff for New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin did not return a message seeking comment.
The human rights group also said that in Mississippi, public housing and affordable housing was lacking and that the state rebuilding program did an injustice by not paying for wind damage, leaving many homes in poor shape.
The group also criticized a plan by Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour to use $600 million in federal recovery money for a port in Gulfport. The governor says the money can be used for the port, but Democrats in Congress have said the money was meant to rebuild housing.
"I think Amnesty International has missed some details here," said Dan Turner, a spokesman for Barbour. "Or shaded them to their advantage."
For example, he said there was more public housing on the Gulf Coast than before Katrina. He added that Mississippi decided to help those who had their homes destroyed by storm surge on the coast rather than homes damaged by wind far inland.
Civil rights advocates, though, saw Amnesty's report as accurate.
"A good part of the beginning of the human rights violations took place on TV screens," said Monique Harden, co-director of the New Orleans-based Advocates for Environmental Human Rights. "It's no longer on TV, but those human rights violations have moved into other areas around housing and racial equality, and our government has been called out."
Amnesty urged Congress to amend the nation's main disaster response legislation, the Stafford Act, to guarantee the humane and fair treatment of all disaster victims, as stipulated by the United Nation's Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement. The U.S. has endorsed the principles.
The agreement calls for the humanitarian treatment of people uprooted because of war or a natural disaster. The principles say governments need to allow victims to "return voluntarily, in safety and with dignity, to their homes" or "resettle voluntarily in another part of the country."
It says governments have the duty to help victims recover their property and possessions they left behind or which were taken from them. Also, governments should make sure victims are compensated for property or possessions they have lost, the principles say.
The agreement also says uprooted people should be allowed full participation in the planning and management of their return or resettlement.
Stephens, the spokeswoman for the Louisiana Recovery Authority, said Louisiana officials have lobbied Congress to make the Stafford Act "less bureaucratic and problematic" and make it easier for disaster victims to return home.
"Right now, under the (U.S.) law, nobody has the right to recover," Harden said.
By CAIN BURDEAU (AP) – 9 hours ago
NEW ORLEANS — The U.S. government and Gulf Coast states have consistently violated the human rights of hurricane victims since Hurricane Katrina killed about 1,800 people and caused widespread devastation after striking in August 2005, Amnesty International said Friday.
The report, entitled "Un-Natural Disaster," said the treatment of hurricane victims and government actions in housing, health care and policing have prevented poor minority communities from rebuilding and returning to their homes on the Gulf Coast.
In sum, government actions have amounted to human rights violations and "as a result, the demographics of the region are being permanently altered," the report said.
Amnesty took particular aim at New Orleans, where public housing was bulldozed, hospitals have been slow to reopen and the criminal justice system has been plagued by police brutality, lengthy pretrial detentions and an underfunded indigent defense system.
"You have the demolition of most of the public housing units in New Orleans without a one-for-one replacement as well as a lack of rebuilding affordable rental housing," said Justin Mazzola, an Amnesty researcher. "Orleans Parish Prison is now the largest mental health psych facility in the city of New Orleans."
Moira Mack, a White House spokeswoman, said the Obama administration had cut through the red tape that delayed assistance and improved coordination among agencies that often failed to collaborate in the years after the storms. She said the administration's actions freed $2.4 billion in rebuilding money that had stalled for years.
Christina Stephens, a spokeswoman for Gov. Bobby Jindal's Louisiana Recovery Authority, said Louisiana had worked "diligently since the hurricanes to rebuild housing, restore critical infrastructure — including schools and health care facilities — and protect our citizens from future harm."
New Orleans' former public housing was being replaced with new mixed-income communities, she said. She said $1.2 billion has been set aside for rental housing.
Staff for New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin did not return a message seeking comment.
The human rights group also said that in Mississippi, public housing and affordable housing was lacking and that the state rebuilding program did an injustice by not paying for wind damage, leaving many homes in poor shape.
The group also criticized a plan by Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour to use $600 million in federal recovery money for a port in Gulfport. The governor says the money can be used for the port, but Democrats in Congress have said the money was meant to rebuild housing.
"I think Amnesty International has missed some details here," said Dan Turner, a spokesman for Barbour. "Or shaded them to their advantage."
For example, he said there was more public housing on the Gulf Coast than before Katrina. He added that Mississippi decided to help those who had their homes destroyed by storm surge on the coast rather than homes damaged by wind far inland.
Civil rights advocates, though, saw Amnesty's report as accurate.
"A good part of the beginning of the human rights violations took place on TV screens," said Monique Harden, co-director of the New Orleans-based Advocates for Environmental Human Rights. "It's no longer on TV, but those human rights violations have moved into other areas around housing and racial equality, and our government has been called out."
Amnesty urged Congress to amend the nation's main disaster response legislation, the Stafford Act, to guarantee the humane and fair treatment of all disaster victims, as stipulated by the United Nation's Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement. The U.S. has endorsed the principles.
The agreement calls for the humanitarian treatment of people uprooted because of war or a natural disaster. The principles say governments need to allow victims to "return voluntarily, in safety and with dignity, to their homes" or "resettle voluntarily in another part of the country."
It says governments have the duty to help victims recover their property and possessions they left behind or which were taken from them. Also, governments should make sure victims are compensated for property or possessions they have lost, the principles say.
The agreement also says uprooted people should be allowed full participation in the planning and management of their return or resettlement.
Stephens, the spokeswoman for the Louisiana Recovery Authority, said Louisiana officials have lobbied Congress to make the Stafford Act "less bureaucratic and problematic" and make it easier for disaster victims to return home.
"Right now, under the (U.S.) law, nobody has the right to recover," Harden said.
Who watches WikiLeaks?
(I am very pro wikileaks for the record. Just thought this was a good article)
BY:Chris McGreal
This week a classified video of a US air crew killing unarmed Iraqis was seen by millions on the internet. But for some, the whistleblowing website itself needs closer scrutiny
It has proclaimed itself the "intelligence service of the people", and plans to have more agents than the CIA. They will be you and me.
WikiLeaks is a long way from that goal, but this week it staked its claim to be the dead drop of choice for whistleblowers after releasing video the Pentagon claimed to have lost of US helicopter crews excitedly killing Iraqis on a Baghdad street in 2007. The dead included two Reuters news agency staff. The release of the shocking footage prompted an unusual degree of hand-wringing in a country weary of the Iraq war, and garnered WikiLeaks more than $150,000 in donations to keep its cash-starved operation on the road.
It also drew fresh attention to a largely anonymous group that has outpaced the competition in just a few short years by releasing to the world more than a million confidential documents from highly classified military secrets to Sarah Palin's hacked emails. WikiLeaks has posted the controversial correspondence between researchers at East Anglia University's Climatic Research Unit and text messages of those killed in the 9/11 attacks.
WikiLeaks has promised to change the world by abolishing official secrecy. In Britain it is helping to erode the use of the courts to suppress information. Its softly spoken Australian director, Julian Assange, was recently in Iceland, offering advice to legislators on new laws to protect whistleblowers.
Assange, who describes what he does as a mix of hi-tech investigative journalism and advocacy, foresees a day when any confidential document, from secret orders that allow our own governments to spy on us down to the bossy letters from your children's school, will be posted on WikiLeaks for the whole world to see. And that, Assange believes, will change everything.
But there are those who fear that WikiLeaks is more like an intelligence service than it would care to admit – a shadowy, unaccountable organisation that tramples on individual privacy and other rights. And like so many others who have claimed to be acting in the name of the people, there are those who fear it risks oppressing them.
Assange has a shock of white hair and an air of conspiracy about him. He doesn't discuss his age or background, although it is known that he was raised in Melbourne and convicted as a teenager of hacking in to official and corporate websites. He appears to be perpetually on the move but when he stops for any length of time it is in Kenya. Almost nothing is said about anyone else involved with the project.
WikiLeaks was born in late 2006. Its founders, who WikiLeaks says comprised mostly Chinese dissidents, hackers, computer programmers and journalists, laid out their ambitions in emails inviting an array of figures with experience dealing with secret documents to join WikiLeak's board of advisers. Among those approached was the inspiration for the project, Daniel Ellsberg, the US military analyst who leaked the Pentagon papers about the Vietnam war to the New York Times four decades ago.
"We believe that injustice is answered by good governance and for there to be good governance there must be open governance," the email said. "New technology and cryptographic ideas permit us to not only encourage document leaking, but to facilitate it directly on a mass scale. We intend to place a new star in the political firmament of man." The email appealed to Ellsberg to be part of the "political-legal defences" the organisers recognised they would need once they started to get under the skin of governments, militaries and corporations: "We'd like … you to form part of our political armour. The more armour we have, particularly in the form of men and women sanctified by age, history and class, the more we can act like brazen young men and get away with it."
Others were approached with a similar message. WikiLeaks organisers suggested that it "may become the most powerful intelligence agency on earth". Its primary targets would be "highly oppressive regimes in China, Russia and central Eurasia, but we also expect to be of assistance to those in the west who wish to reveal illegal or immoral behaviour in their own governments and corporations."
But the group ran in to problems even before WikiLeaks was launched. The organisers approached John Young, who ran another website that posted leaked documents, Cryptome, and asked him to register the WikiLeaks website in his name. Young obliged and was initially an enthusiastic supporter but when the organisers announced their intention to try and raise $5m he questioned their motives, saying that kind of money could only come from the CIA or George Soros. Then he walked away.
"WikiLeaks is a fraud," he wrote in an email when he quit. "Fuck your cute hustle and disinformation campaign against legitimate dissent. Same old shit, working for the enemy." Young then leaked all of his email correspondence with WikiLeak's founders, including the messages to Ellsberg.
Despite this sticky start, WikiLeaks soon began making a name for itself with a swathe of documents and establishments started kicking back.
Two years ago, a Swiss bank persuaded a US judge to temporarily shut down the WikiLeaks site after it published documents implicating the Julius Bare bank in money laundering and tax evasion. That revealed WikiLeaks' vulnerability to legal action and it sought to put itself beyond the reach of any government and court by moving its primary server to Sweden which has strong laws to protect whistleblowers. Since then the Australian government has tried to go after WikiLeaks after it posted a secret list of websites the authorities planned to ban, and members of the US Congress demanded to know what legal action could be taken after the site revealed US airport security manuals. Both discovered there was nothing they could do. It's been the same for everyone from the Chinese government to the Scientologists.
Yet WikiLeaks worries more than just those with an instinctive desire for secrecy. Steven Aftergood, who has published thousands of leaked documents on the Secrecy News blog he runs for the Federation of American Scientists, turned down an invitation to join WikiLeaks board of advisers.
"They have acquired and published documents of extraordinary significance. I would say also that WikiLeaks is a response to a genuine problem, namely the over control of information of public policy significance," he says. Yet he also regards WikiLeaks as a threat to individual liberties. "Their response to indiscriminate secrecy has been to adopt a policy of indiscriminate disclosure. They tend to disregard considerations of personal privacy, intellectual property as well as security," he says.
"One of the things I find offensive about their operations is their willingness to disclose confidential records of religious and social organisations. If you are a Mormon or a Mason or a college girl who is a member of a sorority with a secret initiation ritual then WikiLeaks is not your friend. They will violate your privacy and your freedom of association without a second thought. That has nothing to do with whistleblowing or accountability. It's simply disclosure for disclosure's sake." Aftergood's criticism has angered WikiLeaks. The site's legal advisor, Jay Lim, wrote to Aftergood two years ago warning him to stop. "Who's side are you on here Stephen? It is time this constant harping stopped," Lim said. "We are very disappointed in your lack of support and suggest you cool it. If you don't, we will, with great reluctance, be forced to respond."
WikiLeaks has also infuriated the author, Michela Wrong, who was horrified to discover her book exposing the depths of official corruption in Kenya, It's Our Turn To Eat, was pirated and posted on WikiLeaks in its entirety on the grounds that Nairobi booksellers were reluctant to sell it for fear of being sued under Kenya's draconian libel laws.
Wrong was angry because, while she supports what WikiLeaks is about, the book is not a government document and is freely available across the rest of the world. From email distribution lists she could see that the pirated version was being emailed among Kenyans at home and abroad. "I was beside myself because I thought my entire African market is vanishing," says Wrong. "I wrote to WikiLeaks and said, please, you're going to damage your own cause because if people like me can't make any money from royalties then publishers are not going to commission people writing about corruption in Africa." She is not sure who she was communicating with because the WikiLeaks emails carried no identification but she assumes it was Assange because of the depth of knowledge about Kenya in the replies.
"He was enormously pompous, saying that in the interests of raising public awareness of the issues involved I had a duty to allow it to be pirated. He said: 'This book may have been your baby, but it is now Kenya's son.' That really stuck in my mind because it was so arrogant," she says. "On the whole I approve of WikiLeaks but these guys are infuriatingly self-righteous." WikiLeaks does apparently expect others to respect its claims to ownership. It has placed a copyright symbol at the beginning of its film about the Iraq shootings.
Assange has countered criticism over some of the material on the site by saying that WikiLeak's central philosophy is "no censorship". He argues that the organisation has to be opaque to protect it from legal attack or something more sinister. But that has also meant that awkward questions – such as a revelation in Mother Jones that some of those it claims to have recruited, including a former representative of the Dalai Lama, and Noam Chomsky, deny any relationship with WikiLeaks – are sidestepped.
Despite repeated requests for a response to the issues raised by Aftergood, Wrong and others, WikiLeaks' only response was an email suggesting to call a number that went to a recording saying it was not in service.
BY:Chris McGreal
This week a classified video of a US air crew killing unarmed Iraqis was seen by millions on the internet. But for some, the whistleblowing website itself needs closer scrutiny
It has proclaimed itself the "intelligence service of the people", and plans to have more agents than the CIA. They will be you and me.
WikiLeaks is a long way from that goal, but this week it staked its claim to be the dead drop of choice for whistleblowers after releasing video the Pentagon claimed to have lost of US helicopter crews excitedly killing Iraqis on a Baghdad street in 2007. The dead included two Reuters news agency staff. The release of the shocking footage prompted an unusual degree of hand-wringing in a country weary of the Iraq war, and garnered WikiLeaks more than $150,000 in donations to keep its cash-starved operation on the road.
It also drew fresh attention to a largely anonymous group that has outpaced the competition in just a few short years by releasing to the world more than a million confidential documents from highly classified military secrets to Sarah Palin's hacked emails. WikiLeaks has posted the controversial correspondence between researchers at East Anglia University's Climatic Research Unit and text messages of those killed in the 9/11 attacks.
WikiLeaks has promised to change the world by abolishing official secrecy. In Britain it is helping to erode the use of the courts to suppress information. Its softly spoken Australian director, Julian Assange, was recently in Iceland, offering advice to legislators on new laws to protect whistleblowers.
Assange, who describes what he does as a mix of hi-tech investigative journalism and advocacy, foresees a day when any confidential document, from secret orders that allow our own governments to spy on us down to the bossy letters from your children's school, will be posted on WikiLeaks for the whole world to see. And that, Assange believes, will change everything.
But there are those who fear that WikiLeaks is more like an intelligence service than it would care to admit – a shadowy, unaccountable organisation that tramples on individual privacy and other rights. And like so many others who have claimed to be acting in the name of the people, there are those who fear it risks oppressing them.
Assange has a shock of white hair and an air of conspiracy about him. He doesn't discuss his age or background, although it is known that he was raised in Melbourne and convicted as a teenager of hacking in to official and corporate websites. He appears to be perpetually on the move but when he stops for any length of time it is in Kenya. Almost nothing is said about anyone else involved with the project.
WikiLeaks was born in late 2006. Its founders, who WikiLeaks says comprised mostly Chinese dissidents, hackers, computer programmers and journalists, laid out their ambitions in emails inviting an array of figures with experience dealing with secret documents to join WikiLeak's board of advisers. Among those approached was the inspiration for the project, Daniel Ellsberg, the US military analyst who leaked the Pentagon papers about the Vietnam war to the New York Times four decades ago.
"We believe that injustice is answered by good governance and for there to be good governance there must be open governance," the email said. "New technology and cryptographic ideas permit us to not only encourage document leaking, but to facilitate it directly on a mass scale. We intend to place a new star in the political firmament of man." The email appealed to Ellsberg to be part of the "political-legal defences" the organisers recognised they would need once they started to get under the skin of governments, militaries and corporations: "We'd like … you to form part of our political armour. The more armour we have, particularly in the form of men and women sanctified by age, history and class, the more we can act like brazen young men and get away with it."
Others were approached with a similar message. WikiLeaks organisers suggested that it "may become the most powerful intelligence agency on earth". Its primary targets would be "highly oppressive regimes in China, Russia and central Eurasia, but we also expect to be of assistance to those in the west who wish to reveal illegal or immoral behaviour in their own governments and corporations."
But the group ran in to problems even before WikiLeaks was launched. The organisers approached John Young, who ran another website that posted leaked documents, Cryptome, and asked him to register the WikiLeaks website in his name. Young obliged and was initially an enthusiastic supporter but when the organisers announced their intention to try and raise $5m he questioned their motives, saying that kind of money could only come from the CIA or George Soros. Then he walked away.
"WikiLeaks is a fraud," he wrote in an email when he quit. "Fuck your cute hustle and disinformation campaign against legitimate dissent. Same old shit, working for the enemy." Young then leaked all of his email correspondence with WikiLeak's founders, including the messages to Ellsberg.
Despite this sticky start, WikiLeaks soon began making a name for itself with a swathe of documents and establishments started kicking back.
Two years ago, a Swiss bank persuaded a US judge to temporarily shut down the WikiLeaks site after it published documents implicating the Julius Bare bank in money laundering and tax evasion. That revealed WikiLeaks' vulnerability to legal action and it sought to put itself beyond the reach of any government and court by moving its primary server to Sweden which has strong laws to protect whistleblowers. Since then the Australian government has tried to go after WikiLeaks after it posted a secret list of websites the authorities planned to ban, and members of the US Congress demanded to know what legal action could be taken after the site revealed US airport security manuals. Both discovered there was nothing they could do. It's been the same for everyone from the Chinese government to the Scientologists.
Yet WikiLeaks worries more than just those with an instinctive desire for secrecy. Steven Aftergood, who has published thousands of leaked documents on the Secrecy News blog he runs for the Federation of American Scientists, turned down an invitation to join WikiLeaks board of advisers.
"They have acquired and published documents of extraordinary significance. I would say also that WikiLeaks is a response to a genuine problem, namely the over control of information of public policy significance," he says. Yet he also regards WikiLeaks as a threat to individual liberties. "Their response to indiscriminate secrecy has been to adopt a policy of indiscriminate disclosure. They tend to disregard considerations of personal privacy, intellectual property as well as security," he says.
"One of the things I find offensive about their operations is their willingness to disclose confidential records of religious and social organisations. If you are a Mormon or a Mason or a college girl who is a member of a sorority with a secret initiation ritual then WikiLeaks is not your friend. They will violate your privacy and your freedom of association without a second thought. That has nothing to do with whistleblowing or accountability. It's simply disclosure for disclosure's sake." Aftergood's criticism has angered WikiLeaks. The site's legal advisor, Jay Lim, wrote to Aftergood two years ago warning him to stop. "Who's side are you on here Stephen? It is time this constant harping stopped," Lim said. "We are very disappointed in your lack of support and suggest you cool it. If you don't, we will, with great reluctance, be forced to respond."
WikiLeaks has also infuriated the author, Michela Wrong, who was horrified to discover her book exposing the depths of official corruption in Kenya, It's Our Turn To Eat, was pirated and posted on WikiLeaks in its entirety on the grounds that Nairobi booksellers were reluctant to sell it for fear of being sued under Kenya's draconian libel laws.
Wrong was angry because, while she supports what WikiLeaks is about, the book is not a government document and is freely available across the rest of the world. From email distribution lists she could see that the pirated version was being emailed among Kenyans at home and abroad. "I was beside myself because I thought my entire African market is vanishing," says Wrong. "I wrote to WikiLeaks and said, please, you're going to damage your own cause because if people like me can't make any money from royalties then publishers are not going to commission people writing about corruption in Africa." She is not sure who she was communicating with because the WikiLeaks emails carried no identification but she assumes it was Assange because of the depth of knowledge about Kenya in the replies.
"He was enormously pompous, saying that in the interests of raising public awareness of the issues involved I had a duty to allow it to be pirated. He said: 'This book may have been your baby, but it is now Kenya's son.' That really stuck in my mind because it was so arrogant," she says. "On the whole I approve of WikiLeaks but these guys are infuriatingly self-righteous." WikiLeaks does apparently expect others to respect its claims to ownership. It has placed a copyright symbol at the beginning of its film about the Iraq shootings.
Assange has countered criticism over some of the material on the site by saying that WikiLeak's central philosophy is "no censorship". He argues that the organisation has to be opaque to protect it from legal attack or something more sinister. But that has also meant that awkward questions – such as a revelation in Mother Jones that some of those it claims to have recruited, including a former representative of the Dalai Lama, and Noam Chomsky, deny any relationship with WikiLeaks – are sidestepped.
Despite repeated requests for a response to the issues raised by Aftergood, Wrong and others, WikiLeaks' only response was an email suggesting to call a number that went to a recording saying it was not in service.
Bush ‘knew Guantanamo prisoners were innocent’
By Agence France-Presse
Friday, April 9th, 2010 -- 6:48 am
Former US president George W. Bush and his top aides were accused Friday of covering up that many Guantanamo Bay detainees were innocent, amid fears releasing them could harm the 'war on terror'.
The allegations were made in a document by Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, once chief of staff to Bush's first secretary of state, Colin Powell, in a lawsuit filed by a former Guantanamo inmate and published by The Times in London.
Wilkerson alleged Bush's vice president, Dick Cheney, and defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld knew that most detainees held at the US detention camp in 2002 were innocent but believed it was "politically impossible to release them".
They were also keen to avoid revealing the "incredibly confused" detention operation, Wilkerson said, claiming prisoners were often rounded up by Afghan and Pakistani forces in return for cash, with little or no evidence as to why.
He alleged Cheney "had absolutely no concern that the vast majority of Guantanamo detainees were innocent... If hundreds of innocent individuals had to suffer in order to detain a handful of hardcore terrorists, so be it".
Wilkerson, who according to The Times has been a long-time critic of the Bush administration's approach to counter-terrorism, said he discussed the issue with Powell, who left his job in 2005.
"I learnt that it was his view that it was not just vice president Cheney and secretary Rumsfeld, but also president Bush who was involved in all of the Guantanamo decision-making," the newspaper reported him as saying.
Wilkerson's statement was filed in support of Adel Hassan Hamad, a Sudanese man held at Guantanamo Bay from March 2003 until December 2007. He claims he was tortured by US agents and filed a damages action Thursday, The Times said.
Some 183 detainees remain at the US military prison at Guantanamo Bay on Cuba, including dozens already cleared for release. Most have been held without charge or trial.
Friday, April 9th, 2010 -- 6:48 am
Former US president George W. Bush and his top aides were accused Friday of covering up that many Guantanamo Bay detainees were innocent, amid fears releasing them could harm the 'war on terror'.
The allegations were made in a document by Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, once chief of staff to Bush's first secretary of state, Colin Powell, in a lawsuit filed by a former Guantanamo inmate and published by The Times in London.
Wilkerson alleged Bush's vice president, Dick Cheney, and defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld knew that most detainees held at the US detention camp in 2002 were innocent but believed it was "politically impossible to release them".
They were also keen to avoid revealing the "incredibly confused" detention operation, Wilkerson said, claiming prisoners were often rounded up by Afghan and Pakistani forces in return for cash, with little or no evidence as to why.
He alleged Cheney "had absolutely no concern that the vast majority of Guantanamo detainees were innocent... If hundreds of innocent individuals had to suffer in order to detain a handful of hardcore terrorists, so be it".
Wilkerson, who according to The Times has been a long-time critic of the Bush administration's approach to counter-terrorism, said he discussed the issue with Powell, who left his job in 2005.
"I learnt that it was his view that it was not just vice president Cheney and secretary Rumsfeld, but also president Bush who was involved in all of the Guantanamo decision-making," the newspaper reported him as saying.
Wilkerson's statement was filed in support of Adel Hassan Hamad, a Sudanese man held at Guantanamo Bay from March 2003 until December 2007. He claims he was tortured by US agents and filed a damages action Thursday, The Times said.
Some 183 detainees remain at the US military prison at Guantanamo Bay on Cuba, including dozens already cleared for release. Most have been held without charge or trial.
Monday, April 5, 2010
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Cern LHC sees high-energy success
Europe's Large Hadron Collider (LHC) has produced record-breaking high-energy particle collisions.
Scientists working on the European machine have smashed beams of protons together at energies that are 3.5 times higher than previously achieved.
Tuesday's milestone marks the beginning of work that could lead to the discovery of fundamental new physics.
There was cheering and applause in the LHC control room as the first collisions were confirmed.
These seven-trillion-electronvolt (TeV) collisions have initiated 18-24 months of intensive investigations at the LHC.
Scientists hope the studies will bring novel insights into the nature of the cosmos and how it came into being.
Many of them have described Tuesday's event as the beginning of a "new era in science".
But researchers caution that the data gathered from the sub-atomic impacts will take time to evaluate, and the public should not expect immediate results.
"Major discoveries will happen only when we are able to collect billions of events and identify among them the very rare events that could present a new state of matter or new particles," said Guido Tonelli, a spokesman for the CMS detector at the LHC.
"This is not going to happen tomorrow. It will require months and years of patient work," he told BBC News.
The LHC is one of the biggest scientific endeavours ever undertaken.
Housed at Cern (the European Organization for Nuclear research) in a 27km-long tunnel under the Franco-Swiss border near Geneva, the LHC successfully collided particle beams travelling at close to the speed of light.
The expectation is that previously unseen phenomena will reveal themselves in the resulting debris, with a key objective being the search for the much talked-about Higgs boson particle.
This is thought to have a profound role in the structure of the Universe, and would enable scientists to explain why matter has mass - something which, at a fundamental level, they have difficulty doing at present.
Cern's director general Rolf Heuer said: "It's a great day to be a particle physicist.
"The LHC has a real chance over the next two years of... possibly giving insights into the composition of about a quarter of the Universe."
Take two
The LHC broke down shortly after its opening in 2008 but, since coming back online late last year, has gradually been ramping up operations.
Two proton particle beams have been circling in opposite directions in the magnet-lined tunnels at 3.5 TeV since 19 March.
Having established their stability, these beams were allowed to cross paths and collide.
This 7 TeV event, which took place on Tuesday at 1200 BST, was the highest energy yet achieved in a particle accelerator.
The LHC's four major experiments - its giant detectors Alice, Atlas, CMS and LHCb - have now begun to gather their first physics data from the collisions, a development that Cern described as an "historic moment".
"This is new territory," said Professor Tonelli.
"If you want to discover new particles, you have to produce them; and these new particles are massive. To produce them, you need higher energies. For the first time [on Tuesday], we will be producing particles that have energy 3.5 times higher than the maximum energy achieved so far.
"This is why we can start the long journey to make major discoveries in identifying a new massive state of matter."
At the end of the 7 TeV (3.5 TeV per beam) experimental period, the LHC will be shut down for maintenance for up to a year. When it re-opens, it will attempt to create 14 TeV events.
Scientists working on the European machine have smashed beams of protons together at energies that are 3.5 times higher than previously achieved.
Tuesday's milestone marks the beginning of work that could lead to the discovery of fundamental new physics.
There was cheering and applause in the LHC control room as the first collisions were confirmed.
These seven-trillion-electronvolt (TeV) collisions have initiated 18-24 months of intensive investigations at the LHC.
Scientists hope the studies will bring novel insights into the nature of the cosmos and how it came into being.
Many of them have described Tuesday's event as the beginning of a "new era in science".
But researchers caution that the data gathered from the sub-atomic impacts will take time to evaluate, and the public should not expect immediate results.
"Major discoveries will happen only when we are able to collect billions of events and identify among them the very rare events that could present a new state of matter or new particles," said Guido Tonelli, a spokesman for the CMS detector at the LHC.
"This is not going to happen tomorrow. It will require months and years of patient work," he told BBC News.
The LHC is one of the biggest scientific endeavours ever undertaken.
Housed at Cern (the European Organization for Nuclear research) in a 27km-long tunnel under the Franco-Swiss border near Geneva, the LHC successfully collided particle beams travelling at close to the speed of light.
The expectation is that previously unseen phenomena will reveal themselves in the resulting debris, with a key objective being the search for the much talked-about Higgs boson particle.
This is thought to have a profound role in the structure of the Universe, and would enable scientists to explain why matter has mass - something which, at a fundamental level, they have difficulty doing at present.
Cern's director general Rolf Heuer said: "It's a great day to be a particle physicist.
"The LHC has a real chance over the next two years of... possibly giving insights into the composition of about a quarter of the Universe."
Take two
The LHC broke down shortly after its opening in 2008 but, since coming back online late last year, has gradually been ramping up operations.
Two proton particle beams have been circling in opposite directions in the magnet-lined tunnels at 3.5 TeV since 19 March.
Having established their stability, these beams were allowed to cross paths and collide.
This 7 TeV event, which took place on Tuesday at 1200 BST, was the highest energy yet achieved in a particle accelerator.
The LHC's four major experiments - its giant detectors Alice, Atlas, CMS and LHCb - have now begun to gather their first physics data from the collisions, a development that Cern described as an "historic moment".
"This is new territory," said Professor Tonelli.
"If you want to discover new particles, you have to produce them; and these new particles are massive. To produce them, you need higher energies. For the first time [on Tuesday], we will be producing particles that have energy 3.5 times higher than the maximum energy achieved so far.
"This is why we can start the long journey to make major discoveries in identifying a new massive state of matter."
At the end of the 7 TeV (3.5 TeV per beam) experimental period, the LHC will be shut down for maintenance for up to a year. When it re-opens, it will attempt to create 14 TeV events.
Subway riders question NYPD’s ‘ridiculous’ show of force
Some people in New York are wondering whether the presence of police officers toting machine guns through the city's subway tunnels is really a necessary response to the subway bombings in Moscow on Monday.
"I think it's ridiculous," Torey Deprisest, a tourist from Ohio, told the New York Post. "The attack happened in a different country and had nothing to do with Americans. I'd be nervous seeing cops with machine guns on the train. It makes people afraid when they don't need to be."
Queens resident Holly Celentang described the police response as excessive.
"It's Easter this week, and you have families with young kids on the subway, and I'm sure cops with machine guns would scare them," she said. "I feel there should have been a bit more of a thought process before they did this."
"By the time most people awoke to news of yesterday's twin terror blasts that killed dozens, the NYPD had flooded city subways with extra cops," the New York Daily News reports. "Officers with bomb-sniffing dogs swept train cars, and cops set up tables near turnstiles to do random bag checks."
Bleary-eyed New Yorkers began their work weeks with a morning rush hour that featured city cops in full military gear, including helmets, goggles, body armor, sidearms and M16 assault rifles.
The underground arsenal startled sleepy straphangers, many of whom wondered whether the extra security was overkill.
NYPD Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne told the Daily News that the measures are "simply a precaution," and said there was "no indication that the Moscow bombings were related to anything planned against the New York City subway system."
Russian authorities are preliminarily pinning the blame for the twin suicide bombings in Moscow -- which at last count took the lives of 39 people on Monday morning -- on the "Black Widows," a militant group composed of the wives, daughters and sisters of Chechens who were killed at the hands of Russian forces during Chechnya's long-running war of secession.
Some New Yorkers say they support the added security measures, even if they are a response to something unrelated to New York.
"Better overkill than under-response," Joe Kerick of New Jersey told the Post. "If the terrorists see an under-response, they may think we are vulnerable."
Sunday, March 28, 2010
A Dog For Three Days
A Dog For Three Days
Jon Gold
3/24/2010
On Saturday March 20th, a huge anti-war rally and march was held at Lafayette Park in Washington D.C. It was sponsored by A.N.S.W.E.R. Speakers included Cindy Sheehan, Ann Wright, Ralph Nader, Matthis Chiroux, Mike Ferner, and many others.
The march ended in front of the White House. Some of the protesters placed faux coffins representing different countries we have harmed during these illegal wars against the fence in front of the White House. The Park Police set up a perimeter around these coffins using the "POLICE DO NOT CROSS" tape. My guess would be it was around 50ft x 50ft on the front sidewalk of the White House. People like Matthis Chiroux laid down in front of the coffins to protest. If you entered this zone, you were arrested. I refer to it as an arbitrary "arrest zone."
Cindy Sheehan, myself, and others walked through the crowd until we reached the barrier closest to those laying down on the sidewalk. As you can see in this video, the barrier failed, and Cindy Sheehan walked across. As soon as she entered the "arrest zone," the Park Police immediately grabbed her, and handcuffed her. They were literally manhandling her.
This made me angry, and I yelled at the Park Police to "let her go!" Before I knew it, the barrier was back up. I tried to push through the barrier, but the Park Police pushed back. I managed to push two Park Policeman back until one of them grabbed for something on their side to use against me. It was probably mace, but it could have been anything. I stopped pushing. I walked around to the side where the police tape was, that failed, and I found myself within the "arrest zone." I decided that I was going to allow myself to be arrested in order to keep an eye on Cindy. One of the Park Police grabbed me by my arm, and placed me next to Matthis and the others.
When I sat down next to Matthis, he said to me, "you're on the right side of the line," and I said, "I know." One of the Park Police walked over to me, and said to another officer, "he crossed the line, arrest him." That Park Policeman lifted me up, and put me in regular metal cuffs. As I stood up, I screamed as loud as I could, "THIS ARREST IS DEDICATED TO 9/11 VICTIM FAMILY MEMBER ROBERT MCILVAINE JR.!!!" and part of the crowd cheered. As they walked me away I could see Ann Wright waving her fist at me with a big smile on her face as if to say, "RIGHT ON!"
Before I was placed in the van, they changed the metal cuffs to the plasticuffs. They put them on WAY too tight. I told them I have a bad shoulder, but it didn't matter. They were not too concerned with our comfort. As a result of the plasticuffs, my left thumb is numb. Joshua Smith took this video of me being taken to the van.
This arrest was completely unplanned. The action Camp OUT NOW did plan was to take place about 45min - 1hr later (around 4pm) when the Democratic Caucus arrived to discuss the new health bill. The plan was to sit in front of the entrance ways to the White House to block them from getting in. We never had the opportunity.
Personally, I think it's a shame that more people didn't cross the line. That is a public sidewalk paid for by the people of this country, and we have a right to peaceably assemble. This arbitrary "arrest zone," is unconstitutional as far as I'm concerned.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. - The First Amendment to the United States Constitution
A song had been going through my head all week. Power To The People by John Lennon. I started singing it in the van, and everyone else joined in. It was really quite amazing to see.
When we arrived at the Park Police station, they took us out of the van, and brought us in to get our information, and to strip of us of everything we were carrying. Including our shoelaces. I told the officers that my shoulder was hurting, and that the plasticuffs were on too tight. They clipped them off, and Matthis described the way my arms shot forward like a "spring board." My wrists had these huge purple gashes in them where the plasticuffs were. They took my information, and placed me in a cell by myself with a window, a small metal bench, and a metal sink with a toilet. The air conditioning was on, so that was good for me, but a lot of the other arrestees were freezing.
We spent several hours in those cells only to come out to get fingerprinted, and photographed. Two of the people that were arrested with us eventually were allowed to leave, but six of us were not. Other people found out that we would most likely not be getting out until Monday, but I didn't hear anything from within my cell.
Cindy writes:
The two that were released were from DC and those of us held were out-of-towners. Immediately, we knew this explanation was total b.s. because I have been arrested in DC about 13 times now and I have always been from “out-of-town,” and have never even been held overnight, let alone two nights.
Was it a coincidence that Camp OUT NOW had two major actions over the weekend to try and hold our campsite that I missed due to being jailed? I don’t think so.
I asked officer Walker if we would be getting out that night, and he said he had to talk to his supervisor. Eventually officer Walker opened my cell door, and placed a tag on my wrist with my info and mugshot, and said "put your hands behind your back." This time they didn't put the plasticuffs on me so tightly. One of the officers TIGHTENTED Cindy's plasticuffs after another officer put them on less tighter than before. Elaine had cuts on her wrists.
From there, we were placed into a truck that had a VERY cramped sitting area. I am somewhat claustrophobic so it was hard for me to get in. I did. On the way to the jail, we were talking about how we should have been let go, among other things.
After we arrived at the jail, they took off our plasticuffs, and they frisked us. Then we were placed into what can only be described as a human kennel. The cells were SMALL, and comprised of steel walls, steel beds, steel sinks, and steel toilets. The bars were made up of big bars, and a steel mesh that kind of looked like this from Star Trek TNG. It was easily 85-90 degrees in there, with one big fan blowing. There was very little air circulation. My shirt became my pillow, and I put my socks in the water, and wrapped them around my head Rambo style in order to cool off.
As I said, I'm somewhat claustrophobic, and I started to get a panic attack. I asked to be taken to the hospital in order to get something to calm me down. They did, and as I was there, I was watched by two different shifts of officers from the Metropolitan Police Department. Most of them were nice. We talked about politics, and other things. Every single one of them laughed at me when I told them why I was in jail. They told me I should have gotten a $25-$100 fine, and been released after a few hours.
When I was returned to the kennel, they put me in a bigger cell by myself. In there, I sat for 30 some odd hours. Oddly enough, the fact that I didn't have cigarettes really didn't bother me. The cockroaches kept all of us company. They were ALL OVER the place. One of them crawled into bed with me.
The one commodity in jail is the time of day. There were no clocks on the wall so you had no idea what time it was. The only way you could get the time was to ask a guard as they passed by. Some of them gave us the correct time, and others lied to us about it. They fed us bologna and cheese sandwiches every 12 hours, along with bug juice and lemonade.
It is very hard to sleep in jail. Someone told me the guilty sleep well, and the innocent do not. I could only sleep an hour here, and an hour there. It didn't help that some of my cellmates were talking, or that my neighbor sang and banged on the wall for all hours of the day.
This was my very first arrest, and the charge is "crossing a police line." I expected a phone call, and to have my rights read to me, but the big joke of the weekend was, "that's only on TV."
On Monday morning, we were eventually taken out of our cells to be taken to the court house. They plasticuffed us together. Three or four people per grouping, and placed us into the vans with the VERY cramped sitting area. We arrived at the court house, and they walked us into an area to put leg shackles on us. We saw Cindy and Elaine for the first time in this area. Obviously men and women are separate in jail. From there, they took us to a holding cell for traffic court offenders. It was run by the U.S. Marshal service.
Attorney Ann Wilcox came walking through one of the doors, and we finally got to hear a little bit about what was happening with Camp OUT NOW, and with our arrests. A BIG thank you to Ann for doing everything you did for us.
When it was time to go to court, they put handcuffs on our wrists that attached to a chain around our bellies. Then we were taken to a cell that is meant to hold four people, but they managed to shove 14 in. Cindy, Elaine, and other ladies were in the neighboring cell.
Never before have I wished for my name to be called. We waited for at least 2 hours in that cell before we finally were able to see the judge. We all plead not guilty, and have a trial sometime in June, but one of the more interesting things to happen was a request from the White House to create a "stay away" area around the White House that if we were to enter, we would get an automatic sixth months in prison.
When I finally entered the court room, I was THRILLED to see some of our friends from Camp OUT NOW waiting there for us. It made me feel really good inside.
Finally, the shackles and everything were taken off, and I was able to have a cigarette outside (thanks Josh). PressTV was there to interview us, and they took pictures of the purple abrasions on my ankles from the leg shackles.
The one thought that I had all weekend was that anything that I and the others experienced PALED in comparison to what those people in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan have had to endure. Cindy said they couldn't do anything worse to her than taking the life of her child.
I was often asked if I would do it again. My answer is without hesitation.
PEACE OF THE ACTION!!!
Jon Gold
3/24/2010
On Saturday March 20th, a huge anti-war rally and march was held at Lafayette Park in Washington D.C. It was sponsored by A.N.S.W.E.R. Speakers included Cindy Sheehan, Ann Wright, Ralph Nader, Matthis Chiroux, Mike Ferner, and many others.
The march ended in front of the White House. Some of the protesters placed faux coffins representing different countries we have harmed during these illegal wars against the fence in front of the White House. The Park Police set up a perimeter around these coffins using the "POLICE DO NOT CROSS" tape. My guess would be it was around 50ft x 50ft on the front sidewalk of the White House. People like Matthis Chiroux laid down in front of the coffins to protest. If you entered this zone, you were arrested. I refer to it as an arbitrary "arrest zone."
Cindy Sheehan, myself, and others walked through the crowd until we reached the barrier closest to those laying down on the sidewalk. As you can see in this video, the barrier failed, and Cindy Sheehan walked across. As soon as she entered the "arrest zone," the Park Police immediately grabbed her, and handcuffed her. They were literally manhandling her.
This made me angry, and I yelled at the Park Police to "let her go!" Before I knew it, the barrier was back up. I tried to push through the barrier, but the Park Police pushed back. I managed to push two Park Policeman back until one of them grabbed for something on their side to use against me. It was probably mace, but it could have been anything. I stopped pushing. I walked around to the side where the police tape was, that failed, and I found myself within the "arrest zone." I decided that I was going to allow myself to be arrested in order to keep an eye on Cindy. One of the Park Police grabbed me by my arm, and placed me next to Matthis and the others.
When I sat down next to Matthis, he said to me, "you're on the right side of the line," and I said, "I know." One of the Park Police walked over to me, and said to another officer, "he crossed the line, arrest him." That Park Policeman lifted me up, and put me in regular metal cuffs. As I stood up, I screamed as loud as I could, "THIS ARREST IS DEDICATED TO 9/11 VICTIM FAMILY MEMBER ROBERT MCILVAINE JR.!!!" and part of the crowd cheered. As they walked me away I could see Ann Wright waving her fist at me with a big smile on her face as if to say, "RIGHT ON!"
Before I was placed in the van, they changed the metal cuffs to the plasticuffs. They put them on WAY too tight. I told them I have a bad shoulder, but it didn't matter. They were not too concerned with our comfort. As a result of the plasticuffs, my left thumb is numb. Joshua Smith took this video of me being taken to the van.
This arrest was completely unplanned. The action Camp OUT NOW did plan was to take place about 45min - 1hr later (around 4pm) when the Democratic Caucus arrived to discuss the new health bill. The plan was to sit in front of the entrance ways to the White House to block them from getting in. We never had the opportunity.
Personally, I think it's a shame that more people didn't cross the line. That is a public sidewalk paid for by the people of this country, and we have a right to peaceably assemble. This arbitrary "arrest zone," is unconstitutional as far as I'm concerned.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. - The First Amendment to the United States Constitution
A song had been going through my head all week. Power To The People by John Lennon. I started singing it in the van, and everyone else joined in. It was really quite amazing to see.
When we arrived at the Park Police station, they took us out of the van, and brought us in to get our information, and to strip of us of everything we were carrying. Including our shoelaces. I told the officers that my shoulder was hurting, and that the plasticuffs were on too tight. They clipped them off, and Matthis described the way my arms shot forward like a "spring board." My wrists had these huge purple gashes in them where the plasticuffs were. They took my information, and placed me in a cell by myself with a window, a small metal bench, and a metal sink with a toilet. The air conditioning was on, so that was good for me, but a lot of the other arrestees were freezing.
We spent several hours in those cells only to come out to get fingerprinted, and photographed. Two of the people that were arrested with us eventually were allowed to leave, but six of us were not. Other people found out that we would most likely not be getting out until Monday, but I didn't hear anything from within my cell.
Cindy writes:
The two that were released were from DC and those of us held were out-of-towners. Immediately, we knew this explanation was total b.s. because I have been arrested in DC about 13 times now and I have always been from “out-of-town,” and have never even been held overnight, let alone two nights.
Was it a coincidence that Camp OUT NOW had two major actions over the weekend to try and hold our campsite that I missed due to being jailed? I don’t think so.
I asked officer Walker if we would be getting out that night, and he said he had to talk to his supervisor. Eventually officer Walker opened my cell door, and placed a tag on my wrist with my info and mugshot, and said "put your hands behind your back." This time they didn't put the plasticuffs on me so tightly. One of the officers TIGHTENTED Cindy's plasticuffs after another officer put them on less tighter than before. Elaine had cuts on her wrists.
From there, we were placed into a truck that had a VERY cramped sitting area. I am somewhat claustrophobic so it was hard for me to get in. I did. On the way to the jail, we were talking about how we should have been let go, among other things.
After we arrived at the jail, they took off our plasticuffs, and they frisked us. Then we were placed into what can only be described as a human kennel. The cells were SMALL, and comprised of steel walls, steel beds, steel sinks, and steel toilets. The bars were made up of big bars, and a steel mesh that kind of looked like this from Star Trek TNG. It was easily 85-90 degrees in there, with one big fan blowing. There was very little air circulation. My shirt became my pillow, and I put my socks in the water, and wrapped them around my head Rambo style in order to cool off.
As I said, I'm somewhat claustrophobic, and I started to get a panic attack. I asked to be taken to the hospital in order to get something to calm me down. They did, and as I was there, I was watched by two different shifts of officers from the Metropolitan Police Department. Most of them were nice. We talked about politics, and other things. Every single one of them laughed at me when I told them why I was in jail. They told me I should have gotten a $25-$100 fine, and been released after a few hours.
When I was returned to the kennel, they put me in a bigger cell by myself. In there, I sat for 30 some odd hours. Oddly enough, the fact that I didn't have cigarettes really didn't bother me. The cockroaches kept all of us company. They were ALL OVER the place. One of them crawled into bed with me.
The one commodity in jail is the time of day. There were no clocks on the wall so you had no idea what time it was. The only way you could get the time was to ask a guard as they passed by. Some of them gave us the correct time, and others lied to us about it. They fed us bologna and cheese sandwiches every 12 hours, along with bug juice and lemonade.
It is very hard to sleep in jail. Someone told me the guilty sleep well, and the innocent do not. I could only sleep an hour here, and an hour there. It didn't help that some of my cellmates were talking, or that my neighbor sang and banged on the wall for all hours of the day.
This was my very first arrest, and the charge is "crossing a police line." I expected a phone call, and to have my rights read to me, but the big joke of the weekend was, "that's only on TV."
On Monday morning, we were eventually taken out of our cells to be taken to the court house. They plasticuffed us together. Three or four people per grouping, and placed us into the vans with the VERY cramped sitting area. We arrived at the court house, and they walked us into an area to put leg shackles on us. We saw Cindy and Elaine for the first time in this area. Obviously men and women are separate in jail. From there, they took us to a holding cell for traffic court offenders. It was run by the U.S. Marshal service.
Attorney Ann Wilcox came walking through one of the doors, and we finally got to hear a little bit about what was happening with Camp OUT NOW, and with our arrests. A BIG thank you to Ann for doing everything you did for us.
When it was time to go to court, they put handcuffs on our wrists that attached to a chain around our bellies. Then we were taken to a cell that is meant to hold four people, but they managed to shove 14 in. Cindy, Elaine, and other ladies were in the neighboring cell.
Never before have I wished for my name to be called. We waited for at least 2 hours in that cell before we finally were able to see the judge. We all plead not guilty, and have a trial sometime in June, but one of the more interesting things to happen was a request from the White House to create a "stay away" area around the White House that if we were to enter, we would get an automatic sixth months in prison.
When I finally entered the court room, I was THRILLED to see some of our friends from Camp OUT NOW waiting there for us. It made me feel really good inside.
Finally, the shackles and everything were taken off, and I was able to have a cigarette outside (thanks Josh). PressTV was there to interview us, and they took pictures of the purple abrasions on my ankles from the leg shackles.
The one thought that I had all weekend was that anything that I and the others experienced PALED in comparison to what those people in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan have had to endure. Cindy said they couldn't do anything worse to her than taking the life of her child.
I was often asked if I would do it again. My answer is without hesitation.
PEACE OF THE ACTION!!!
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
McCain and Lieberman's "Enemy Belligerent" Act Could Set U.S. on Path to Military Dictatorship
http://www.alternet.org/rights/146081/mccain_and_lieberman%27s_%22enemy_belligerent%22_a ct_could_set_u.s._on_path_to_military_dictatorship
Glenn Greenwald calls the bill "probably the single most extremist, tyrannical and dangerous bill introduced in the Senate in the last several decades."
On March 4th, Senators John McCain and Joe Lieberman
introduced a bill called the "Enemy Belligerent Interrogation, Detention, and Prosecution Act of 2010" that, if passed, would set this country on a course to become a military dictatorship.
The bill is only 12 pages long, but that is plenty of room to grant the president the power to order the arrest, interrogation, and imprisonment of anyone -- including a U.S. citizen -- indefinitely, on the sole suspicion that he or she is affiliated with terrorism, and on the president's sole authority as commander in chief.
The Act begins with the following (convoluted) requirement:
Whenever within the United States, its territories, and possessions, or outside the territorial limits of the United States, an individual is captured or otherwise comes into the custody or under the effective control of the United States who is suspected of engaging in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners through an act of terrorism, or by other means in violation of the laws of war, or of purposely and materially supporting such hostilities, and who may be an unprivileged enemy belligerent, the individual shall be placed in military custody for purposes of initial interrogation and determination of status in accordance with the provisions of this Act.
In other words, if at any point, anywhere in the world, a person is caught who might have done something to suggest that he or she is a terrorist or somehow supporting a terrorist organization against the U.S. or its allies, that person must be imprisoned by the military.
For how long?
As long as U.S. officials want. A subsequent section, titled "Detention Without Trial of Unprivileged Enemy Belligerents," states that suspects "may be detained without criminal charges and without trial for the duration of hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners." In a press conference introducing the bill earlier this month, Sen. Joe Lieberman said, "I know that will be -- that may be -- a long time, but that's the nature of this war."
As constitutional expert Glenn Greenwald has pointed out, "It's basically a bill designed to formally authorize what the Bush administration did to American citizen Jose Padilla -- arrest him on U.S. soil and imprison him for years in military custody with no charges." What happened to Padilla, a notorious perversion of justice in a country that claims to be a democratic standard-bearer, would thus go from being an exception to the rule itself.
As "war on terror"-era legislation goes, Greenwald calls the Enemy Belligerent Interrogation, Detention, and Prosecution Act "probably the single most extremist, tyrannical and dangerous bill introduced in the Senate in the last several decades, far beyond the horrific, habeas-abolishing Military Commissions Act." This is a sobering statement, especially given the intense controversy the MCA generated at the time of its passage, in the heady weeks preceding the 2006 midterm elections. Then-Senator Obama was one of only 34 senators who voted against it, calling it "sloppy," and expressing his wish that "cooler heads … prevail after the silly season of politics is over."
Now, however, as president, Obama has helped pave the way for such radical legislative efforts as the one introduced by McCain and Lieberman, by embracing -- and re-branding -- the military commissions he once opposed.
"Belligerents" are the new "Combatants"
Three years after Obama eloquently opposed the Military Commissions Act, the now-president signed a Military Commissions Act of his own, as part of the 2010 Defense Authorization Bill. The law, which sought to overhaul the discredited Bush-era military commissions for "alien enemy combatants," introduced what is apparently turning out to be an important new term to the counterterror lexicon: Unprivileged Enemy Belligerent, defined as "an individual who: 1) has engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners; or 2) has purposefully and materially supported hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners."
Months before, in March of 2009, the Obama administration announced that it was phasing out the term "alien enemy combatant," even as it held on to the authority to hold terror suspects indefinitely. "Unprivileged Enemy Belligerent," then, was its replacement.
As Human Rights Watch attorney Joanne Mariner wrote last fall, "this is a cosmetic change, not a real improvement, which mirrors the administration's decision to drop the enemy combatant formula in habeas litigation at Guantanamo Bay."
Glenn Greenwald calls the bill "probably the single most extremist, tyrannical and dangerous bill introduced in the Senate in the last several decades."
On March 4th, Senators John McCain and Joe Lieberman
introduced a bill called the "Enemy Belligerent Interrogation, Detention, and Prosecution Act of 2010" that, if passed, would set this country on a course to become a military dictatorship.
The bill is only 12 pages long, but that is plenty of room to grant the president the power to order the arrest, interrogation, and imprisonment of anyone -- including a U.S. citizen -- indefinitely, on the sole suspicion that he or she is affiliated with terrorism, and on the president's sole authority as commander in chief.
The Act begins with the following (convoluted) requirement:
Whenever within the United States, its territories, and possessions, or outside the territorial limits of the United States, an individual is captured or otherwise comes into the custody or under the effective control of the United States who is suspected of engaging in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners through an act of terrorism, or by other means in violation of the laws of war, or of purposely and materially supporting such hostilities, and who may be an unprivileged enemy belligerent, the individual shall be placed in military custody for purposes of initial interrogation and determination of status in accordance with the provisions of this Act.
In other words, if at any point, anywhere in the world, a person is caught who might have done something to suggest that he or she is a terrorist or somehow supporting a terrorist organization against the U.S. or its allies, that person must be imprisoned by the military.
For how long?
As long as U.S. officials want. A subsequent section, titled "Detention Without Trial of Unprivileged Enemy Belligerents," states that suspects "may be detained without criminal charges and without trial for the duration of hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners." In a press conference introducing the bill earlier this month, Sen. Joe Lieberman said, "I know that will be -- that may be -- a long time, but that's the nature of this war."
As constitutional expert Glenn Greenwald has pointed out, "It's basically a bill designed to formally authorize what the Bush administration did to American citizen Jose Padilla -- arrest him on U.S. soil and imprison him for years in military custody with no charges." What happened to Padilla, a notorious perversion of justice in a country that claims to be a democratic standard-bearer, would thus go from being an exception to the rule itself.
As "war on terror"-era legislation goes, Greenwald calls the Enemy Belligerent Interrogation, Detention, and Prosecution Act "probably the single most extremist, tyrannical and dangerous bill introduced in the Senate in the last several decades, far beyond the horrific, habeas-abolishing Military Commissions Act." This is a sobering statement, especially given the intense controversy the MCA generated at the time of its passage, in the heady weeks preceding the 2006 midterm elections. Then-Senator Obama was one of only 34 senators who voted against it, calling it "sloppy," and expressing his wish that "cooler heads … prevail after the silly season of politics is over."
Now, however, as president, Obama has helped pave the way for such radical legislative efforts as the one introduced by McCain and Lieberman, by embracing -- and re-branding -- the military commissions he once opposed.
"Belligerents" are the new "Combatants"
Three years after Obama eloquently opposed the Military Commissions Act, the now-president signed a Military Commissions Act of his own, as part of the 2010 Defense Authorization Bill. The law, which sought to overhaul the discredited Bush-era military commissions for "alien enemy combatants," introduced what is apparently turning out to be an important new term to the counterterror lexicon: Unprivileged Enemy Belligerent, defined as "an individual who: 1) has engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners; or 2) has purposefully and materially supported hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners."
Months before, in March of 2009, the Obama administration announced that it was phasing out the term "alien enemy combatant," even as it held on to the authority to hold terror suspects indefinitely. "Unprivileged Enemy Belligerent," then, was its replacement.
As Human Rights Watch attorney Joanne Mariner wrote last fall, "this is a cosmetic change, not a real improvement, which mirrors the administration's decision to drop the enemy combatant formula in habeas litigation at Guantanamo Bay."
Monday, March 22, 2010
Ron Paul: IRS Will Steal More Money To Fund Health Care
by.Paul Joseph Watson
Texas Congressman Ron Paul warns that last night’s passage of the health care reform bill will prompt the government to hire thousands of new IRS agents who will be used to steal money from taxpaying Americans to fund the new program.
Paul also told Fox News that the passage of Obamacare will only be repealed once the United States enters bankruptcy as a result of its exploding national deficit and runaway spending.
“Any time a government tries to give you a service or something of substance, they have to steal it from somebody else, so the whole process is immoral because it’s based on government theft, that’s why they’re hiring 16,000 more new IRS agents, because they have to steal more money,” stated the Congressman, referring to an analysis by the Joint Economic Committee and the House Ways & Means Committee that found “Up to 16,500 new IRS personnel will be needed to collect, examine and audit new tax information mandated on families and small businesses,” under the health care bill.
Paul said that the passage of Obamacare will precipitate a deepening of the economic crisis that will be “defined by the destruction of the dollar,” meaning government won’t be able to pay for
“You cannot spend this kind of money, borrow this money and create new credit to finance this debt….medical care will get worse and this country will go into bankruptcy,” added Paul.
“This idea of an executive order amending the bill just is such an outrage,” said the Congressman, slamming Obama’s intention to bar federal funding for abortion after the vote as both misplaced and completely unconstitutional.
“To think that we’ve gotten to a point where we allow our presidents just to write an executive order as the law of he land, there’s nothing conceivable about that being Constitutional,” said Paul.
Throughout his campaign, Obama promised not to use executive powers and signing statements to change laws, a principle he has completely abandoned in pursuit of his big government agenda.
Congressman Paul warned that apparent efforts to prevent health care money being used to fund abortions were utterly ineffectual, saying that hospitals and clinics are just going to shift money around to fudge evidence of where the funds are being used.
On the wider argument behind government providing health care, Paul stated, “Central economic planning, if anything the 20th century proves, central economic planning fails, every country in the world today is on the verge of bankruptcy….and we’re marching on to a worldwide economic catastrophe if we’re not careful.”
Texas Congressman Ron Paul warns that last night’s passage of the health care reform bill will prompt the government to hire thousands of new IRS agents who will be used to steal money from taxpaying Americans to fund the new program.
Paul also told Fox News that the passage of Obamacare will only be repealed once the United States enters bankruptcy as a result of its exploding national deficit and runaway spending.
“Any time a government tries to give you a service or something of substance, they have to steal it from somebody else, so the whole process is immoral because it’s based on government theft, that’s why they’re hiring 16,000 more new IRS agents, because they have to steal more money,” stated the Congressman, referring to an analysis by the Joint Economic Committee and the House Ways & Means Committee that found “Up to 16,500 new IRS personnel will be needed to collect, examine and audit new tax information mandated on families and small businesses,” under the health care bill.
Paul said that the passage of Obamacare will precipitate a deepening of the economic crisis that will be “defined by the destruction of the dollar,” meaning government won’t be able to pay for
“You cannot spend this kind of money, borrow this money and create new credit to finance this debt….medical care will get worse and this country will go into bankruptcy,” added Paul.
“This idea of an executive order amending the bill just is such an outrage,” said the Congressman, slamming Obama’s intention to bar federal funding for abortion after the vote as both misplaced and completely unconstitutional.
“To think that we’ve gotten to a point where we allow our presidents just to write an executive order as the law of he land, there’s nothing conceivable about that being Constitutional,” said Paul.
Throughout his campaign, Obama promised not to use executive powers and signing statements to change laws, a principle he has completely abandoned in pursuit of his big government agenda.
Congressman Paul warned that apparent efforts to prevent health care money being used to fund abortions were utterly ineffectual, saying that hospitals and clinics are just going to shift money around to fudge evidence of where the funds are being used.
On the wider argument behind government providing health care, Paul stated, “Central economic planning, if anything the 20th century proves, central economic planning fails, every country in the world today is on the verge of bankruptcy….and we’re marching on to a worldwide economic catastrophe if we’re not careful.”
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Obama gives Patriot Act another year with no privacy protections
If the Patriot Act hadn't been approved for another year, Sunday would have looked much different.
Sunday could have meant the government was no longer given permission to wiretap the phones of Americans and seize their records and property.
But since the bill was approved by Congressional Democrats earlier this week and signed into law by President Obama on Saturday, this Sunday is just another Sunday for Americans living with the Patriot Act.
To be fair, many Democrats asked for additional protections for the privacy rights of American citizens.
But Republicans said that would detract from the ability of the country's intelligence agencies to track down terrorists. Lacking a 60-vote supermajority in the Senate to pass the bill with the extra provisions, Democrats left them out.
Democratic Rep. Jane Harman opposed the House's approval of the extension, citing abuses during the administration of President George W. Bush.
"While I strongly support using the most robust tools possible to go after terrorists, Congress must revise and narrow -- not extend -- Bush era policies," Harman said.
Glenn Greenwald of Salon.com had the following to say of the overwhelming support of the law's extension:
One of the strangest prongs of conventional Beltway wisdom is the lament that there is not enough bipartisanship. The opposite is true: many of the most damaging acts inflicted on the country by Washington are enacted on a fully bipartisan basis -- the most destructive political act of this generation, the invasion of Iraq, was fully bipartisan, as were most of the post-9/11 civil liberties abuses and other Bush-era initiatives-- and, at least in certain areas, the harmonious joining together of Republicans and Democrats continues unabated.
Most publications and politicians expected Obama to sign the Patriot Act.
Sunday could have meant the government was no longer given permission to wiretap the phones of Americans and seize their records and property.
But since the bill was approved by Congressional Democrats earlier this week and signed into law by President Obama on Saturday, this Sunday is just another Sunday for Americans living with the Patriot Act.
To be fair, many Democrats asked for additional protections for the privacy rights of American citizens.
But Republicans said that would detract from the ability of the country's intelligence agencies to track down terrorists. Lacking a 60-vote supermajority in the Senate to pass the bill with the extra provisions, Democrats left them out.
Democratic Rep. Jane Harman opposed the House's approval of the extension, citing abuses during the administration of President George W. Bush.
"While I strongly support using the most robust tools possible to go after terrorists, Congress must revise and narrow -- not extend -- Bush era policies," Harman said.
Glenn Greenwald of Salon.com had the following to say of the overwhelming support of the law's extension:
One of the strangest prongs of conventional Beltway wisdom is the lament that there is not enough bipartisanship. The opposite is true: many of the most damaging acts inflicted on the country by Washington are enacted on a fully bipartisan basis -- the most destructive political act of this generation, the invasion of Iraq, was fully bipartisan, as were most of the post-9/11 civil liberties abuses and other Bush-era initiatives-- and, at least in certain areas, the harmonious joining together of Republicans and Democrats continues unabated.
Most publications and politicians expected Obama to sign the Patriot Act.
Tsunami waves reach Japan’s coast
The first tsunami from Chile's earthquake has hit Japan's outlying islands, but the initial waves are small," the Associated Press reports.
The article continues, "Japan's Meteorological Agency said the first tsunami to reach Japan after the magnitude 8.8 quake off Chile was recorded in the Ogasawara islands early Sunday afternoon. It was just 10 centimeters high. There were no reports of damage."
Japan and Russia went on alert Sunday, clearing tens of thousands of people out of vulnerable coastal areas as a tsunami triggered by Chile's massive killer quake powered across the Pacific.
Tsunami warnings were lifted in other nations across the Pacific Basin's "Ring of Fire" as fears of destructive waves eased, but Tokyo and Moscow were taking no chances after one of the biggest earthquakes on record.
Waves pummelled Chile and rolled through into Hawaii, French Polynesia and the South Pacific as the tsunami moved at jet-speed across the vast ocean after Saturday's 8.8-magnitude quake, which left at least 300 people dead. Related article: Chile quake kills over 300
Warning sirens wailed as about 50 countries and territories along an arc stretching from New Zealand to Japan were put on alert, five years after the Indian Ocean tsunami disaster that killed more than 220,000 people.
Five people were killed on the remote Robinson Crusoe archipelago far off the coast of Chile, the first reported tsunami casualties, but elsewhere no significant damage was reported and surges of water were smaller than expected.
The Hawaii-based Pacific Tsunami Warning Center lifted its tsunami warning for everywhere except Japan and Russia, but the Philippines was also bracing for outsized waves.
Japan warned that waves of up to three metres (10 feet) could hit its northern Pacific coastline, ordering more than 50,000 people living near the shore to leave and closing ports.
The Chilean disaster revived raw memories for Japan, where 140 lives were lost in 1960 when a 9.5-magnitude earthquake in the South American nation -- the largest on record -- sent a tsunami roaring across the Pacific.
"Last time, waves that hit after the first one became even more powerful," said Japan Meteorological Agency official Yasuo Sekita.
"We believe it will be the case this time, too," he said, as Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama set up an emergency task force. "The agency will keep the tsunami alert for quite a long time."
Russia issued a similar warning and launched an evacuation in its Pacific peninsula of Kamchatka.
"We are expecting waves of up to two metres, which is a dangerous height, and so people are asked to evacuate from dangerous zones," Sakhalin island's tsunami centre chief, Tatyana Ivelskaya, said.
Thousands of families in the Philippines also fled coastal areas.
"The most important thing is that for people not to panic. We have prepared all our local government units since last night," said Albay provincial official Joey Salceda.
The Hawaii center, set up by Pacific governments after the 1960 tsunami, had warned of possible "widespread damage" from waves as high as three metres.
In Hawaii itself, the tsunami led to the evacuation of thousands of people and triggered panic buying of food, water and fuel. But there was little damage in the event.
US President Barack Obama, who was born in Hawaii, had warned that the US western seaboard may see dangerous waves and currents throughout the day.
"In the hours ahead, we'll continue to take every step possible to prepare our shores and protect our citizens," he said.
One tsunami measuring nearly 2.5 metres slammed into Talcahuano, one of about 11 coastal towns in Chile pounded by the surge. Trawlers were sent shooting inland to the town square where they lay oddly marooned next to abandoned cars.
Chilean President Michelle Bachelet announced a partial evacuation of Easter Island, but the island of about 4,000 people, known for its monolithic stone statues, received a relatively small onrush of water.
In the island paradise of French Polynesia, schools were closed, the port in Papeete was evacuated and thousands in Tahiti's hillside areas were taken to safer areas as the waves hit.
Waves up to 1.5 metres rammed New Zealand's eastern Chatham Islands, while in Australia, the size of the surge dropped to around 40 centimetres although strong currents rolled up the east coast.
In Tonga and the Cook Islands, residents made their way to higher ground, still jittery after a tsunami trashed entire villages in the South Pacific in September, killing more than 180.
Japan and Russia are on the outer edge of the "Ring of Fire", a belt of seismic fury responsible for most of the world's tremors and volcanoes.
The article continues, "Japan's Meteorological Agency said the first tsunami to reach Japan after the magnitude 8.8 quake off Chile was recorded in the Ogasawara islands early Sunday afternoon. It was just 10 centimeters high. There were no reports of damage."
Japan and Russia went on alert Sunday, clearing tens of thousands of people out of vulnerable coastal areas as a tsunami triggered by Chile's massive killer quake powered across the Pacific.
Tsunami warnings were lifted in other nations across the Pacific Basin's "Ring of Fire" as fears of destructive waves eased, but Tokyo and Moscow were taking no chances after one of the biggest earthquakes on record.
Waves pummelled Chile and rolled through into Hawaii, French Polynesia and the South Pacific as the tsunami moved at jet-speed across the vast ocean after Saturday's 8.8-magnitude quake, which left at least 300 people dead. Related article: Chile quake kills over 300
Warning sirens wailed as about 50 countries and territories along an arc stretching from New Zealand to Japan were put on alert, five years after the Indian Ocean tsunami disaster that killed more than 220,000 people.
Five people were killed on the remote Robinson Crusoe archipelago far off the coast of Chile, the first reported tsunami casualties, but elsewhere no significant damage was reported and surges of water were smaller than expected.
The Hawaii-based Pacific Tsunami Warning Center lifted its tsunami warning for everywhere except Japan and Russia, but the Philippines was also bracing for outsized waves.
Japan warned that waves of up to three metres (10 feet) could hit its northern Pacific coastline, ordering more than 50,000 people living near the shore to leave and closing ports.
The Chilean disaster revived raw memories for Japan, where 140 lives were lost in 1960 when a 9.5-magnitude earthquake in the South American nation -- the largest on record -- sent a tsunami roaring across the Pacific.
"Last time, waves that hit after the first one became even more powerful," said Japan Meteorological Agency official Yasuo Sekita.
"We believe it will be the case this time, too," he said, as Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama set up an emergency task force. "The agency will keep the tsunami alert for quite a long time."
Russia issued a similar warning and launched an evacuation in its Pacific peninsula of Kamchatka.
"We are expecting waves of up to two metres, which is a dangerous height, and so people are asked to evacuate from dangerous zones," Sakhalin island's tsunami centre chief, Tatyana Ivelskaya, said.
Thousands of families in the Philippines also fled coastal areas.
"The most important thing is that for people not to panic. We have prepared all our local government units since last night," said Albay provincial official Joey Salceda.
The Hawaii center, set up by Pacific governments after the 1960 tsunami, had warned of possible "widespread damage" from waves as high as three metres.
In Hawaii itself, the tsunami led to the evacuation of thousands of people and triggered panic buying of food, water and fuel. But there was little damage in the event.
US President Barack Obama, who was born in Hawaii, had warned that the US western seaboard may see dangerous waves and currents throughout the day.
"In the hours ahead, we'll continue to take every step possible to prepare our shores and protect our citizens," he said.
One tsunami measuring nearly 2.5 metres slammed into Talcahuano, one of about 11 coastal towns in Chile pounded by the surge. Trawlers were sent shooting inland to the town square where they lay oddly marooned next to abandoned cars.
Chilean President Michelle Bachelet announced a partial evacuation of Easter Island, but the island of about 4,000 people, known for its monolithic stone statues, received a relatively small onrush of water.
In the island paradise of French Polynesia, schools were closed, the port in Papeete was evacuated and thousands in Tahiti's hillside areas were taken to safer areas as the waves hit.
Waves up to 1.5 metres rammed New Zealand's eastern Chatham Islands, while in Australia, the size of the surge dropped to around 40 centimetres although strong currents rolled up the east coast.
In Tonga and the Cook Islands, residents made their way to higher ground, still jittery after a tsunami trashed entire villages in the South Pacific in September, killing more than 180.
Japan and Russia are on the outer edge of the "Ring of Fire", a belt of seismic fury responsible for most of the world's tremors and volcanoes.
Gates Calls European Mood a Danger to Peace
Gates Calls European Mood a Danger to Peace
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/24/w...ope/24nato.html
(Gold9472: Wanting peace is bad for peace.)
By BRIAN KNOWLTON
Published: February 23, 2010
WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, who has long called European contributions to NATO inadequate, said Tuesday that public and political opposition to the military had grown so great in Europe that it was directly affecting operations in Afghanistan and impeding the alliance’s broader security goals.
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates spoke at the National Defense University at in Washington on Tuesday.
Notes from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq and other areas of conflict in the post-9/11 era. Go to the Blog »
Recent developments on the war in Afghanistan with background, analysis, timelines and earlier events from NYTimes.com and Google.
“The demilitarization of Europe — where large swaths of the general public and political class are averse to military force and the risks that go with it — has gone from a blessing in the 20th century to an impediment to achieving real security and lasting peace in the 21st,” he told NATO officers and officials in a speech at the National Defense University, the Defense Department-financed graduate school for military officers and diplomats.
A perception of European weakness, he warned, could provide a “temptation to miscalculation and aggression” by hostile powers.
The meeting was a prelude to the alliance’s review this year of its basic mission plan for the first time since 1999. “Right now,” Mr. Gates said, “the alliance faces very serious, long-term, systemic problems.”
Mr. Gates’s blunt comments came just three days after the coalition government of the Netherlands collapsed in a dispute over keeping Dutch troops in Afghanistan. It now appears almost certain that most of the 2,000 Dutch troops there will be withdrawn this year. And polls show that the Afghanistan war has grown increasingly unpopular in nearly every European country.
The defense secretary, putting a sharper point on his past criticisms, outlined how NATO shortfalls were exacting a material toll in Afghanistan. The alliance’s failure to finance needed helicopters and cargo aircraft, for example, was “directly impacting operations,” he said.
Mr. Gates said that NATO also needed more aerial refueling tankers and intelligence-gathering equipment “for immediate use on the battlefield.”
Yet alliance members, he noted, were far from reaching their spending commitments, with only 5 of 28 having reached the established target: 2 percent of gross domestic product for defense. By comparison, the United States spends more than 4 percent of its G.D.P. on its military.
Dana Allin, a senior fellow with the International Institute of Strategic Studies in London, called Mr. Gates’s remarks “very striking.”
“Whether this is a conscious statement to sound a real sharp warning, there’s no question that the frustration among the American military establishment is palpable regarding coalition operations in Afghanistan,” he said.
Mr. Gates did soften his message a bit, noting that, not counting United States forces, NATO troops in Afghanistan were to increase to 50,000 this year, from 30,000 last year.
“By any measure,” he said, “that is an extraordinary feat.”
More sobering, he said, was that just two months into the year, NATO was facing shortfalls of hundreds of millions of euros — “a natural consequence of having underinvested in collective defense for over a decade.”
NATO’s problems — greatly magnified by the expansion of its mandate beyond European borders, following 9/11 — called for “serious, far-reaching and immediate reforms,” Mr. Gates said.
Indeed, the secretary general of NATO, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, last month turned to an unlikely source — Russia — to request helicopters for use in Afghanistan, arguing that this would help reduce the terrorism threat and drug trade on a border of the former Soviet Union.
Mr. Rasmussen, speaking at the same meeting as Mr. Gates, said that NATO’s members needed to better coordinate their weapons purchases. The European Union and NATO should collaborate on developing capabilities like heavy-lift helicopters, he said, and avoid “spending double money.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/24/w...ope/24nato.html
(Gold9472: Wanting peace is bad for peace.)
By BRIAN KNOWLTON
Published: February 23, 2010
WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, who has long called European contributions to NATO inadequate, said Tuesday that public and political opposition to the military had grown so great in Europe that it was directly affecting operations in Afghanistan and impeding the alliance’s broader security goals.
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates spoke at the National Defense University at in Washington on Tuesday.
Notes from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq and other areas of conflict in the post-9/11 era. Go to the Blog »
Recent developments on the war in Afghanistan with background, analysis, timelines and earlier events from NYTimes.com and Google.
“The demilitarization of Europe — where large swaths of the general public and political class are averse to military force and the risks that go with it — has gone from a blessing in the 20th century to an impediment to achieving real security and lasting peace in the 21st,” he told NATO officers and officials in a speech at the National Defense University, the Defense Department-financed graduate school for military officers and diplomats.
A perception of European weakness, he warned, could provide a “temptation to miscalculation and aggression” by hostile powers.
The meeting was a prelude to the alliance’s review this year of its basic mission plan for the first time since 1999. “Right now,” Mr. Gates said, “the alliance faces very serious, long-term, systemic problems.”
Mr. Gates’s blunt comments came just three days after the coalition government of the Netherlands collapsed in a dispute over keeping Dutch troops in Afghanistan. It now appears almost certain that most of the 2,000 Dutch troops there will be withdrawn this year. And polls show that the Afghanistan war has grown increasingly unpopular in nearly every European country.
The defense secretary, putting a sharper point on his past criticisms, outlined how NATO shortfalls were exacting a material toll in Afghanistan. The alliance’s failure to finance needed helicopters and cargo aircraft, for example, was “directly impacting operations,” he said.
Mr. Gates said that NATO also needed more aerial refueling tankers and intelligence-gathering equipment “for immediate use on the battlefield.”
Yet alliance members, he noted, were far from reaching their spending commitments, with only 5 of 28 having reached the established target: 2 percent of gross domestic product for defense. By comparison, the United States spends more than 4 percent of its G.D.P. on its military.
Dana Allin, a senior fellow with the International Institute of Strategic Studies in London, called Mr. Gates’s remarks “very striking.”
“Whether this is a conscious statement to sound a real sharp warning, there’s no question that the frustration among the American military establishment is palpable regarding coalition operations in Afghanistan,” he said.
Mr. Gates did soften his message a bit, noting that, not counting United States forces, NATO troops in Afghanistan were to increase to 50,000 this year, from 30,000 last year.
“By any measure,” he said, “that is an extraordinary feat.”
More sobering, he said, was that just two months into the year, NATO was facing shortfalls of hundreds of millions of euros — “a natural consequence of having underinvested in collective defense for over a decade.”
NATO’s problems — greatly magnified by the expansion of its mandate beyond European borders, following 9/11 — called for “serious, far-reaching and immediate reforms,” Mr. Gates said.
Indeed, the secretary general of NATO, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, last month turned to an unlikely source — Russia — to request helicopters for use in Afghanistan, arguing that this would help reduce the terrorism threat and drug trade on a border of the former Soviet Union.
Mr. Rasmussen, speaking at the same meeting as Mr. Gates, said that NATO’s members needed to better coordinate their weapons purchases. The European Union and NATO should collaborate on developing capabilities like heavy-lift helicopters, he said, and avoid “spending double money.”
1.5 Million Displaced After Chile Quake
RIO DE JANEIRO — A strong aftershock struck Chile on Sunday, a day after a destructive 8.8-magnitude earthquake left hundreds of people dead and a long swath of the country in smoky rubble.
The death toll was expected to rise, particularly around Concepción, Chile's second-largest metropolitan area, which is roughly 70 miles from the quake's center. The aftershock was reported around 8:30 local time Sunday morning from the capital of Santiago, where it shook buildings, according to Reuters.
More than 1.5 million people have displaced by the quake, according to local news services that quoted the director of Chile's emergency management office. In Concepción, which appeared to be especially hard hit, the mayor said Sunday morning that 100 people were trapped under the rubble of a building that had collapsed, according to Reuters.
Elsewhere in Concepción, cars lay mangled and upended on streets littered with telephone wires and power cables. A new 14-story apartment building fell, while an older, biochemical lab at the University of Concepción caught fire.
In the nearby port of Talcahuano, a giant wave flooded the main square before receding and leaving behind a large fishing boat on the city streets.
“It was terrible, terrible,” said Adela Galaz, a 59-year-old cosmetologist who said glasses and paintings fell to the floor of her 22nd-floor apartment in Santiago, 200 miles from the quake’s center. “We are grateful to be alive.”
President Michelle Bachelet, speaking at a news conference on Saturday night, called the quake “one of the worst tragedies in the last 50 years” and declared a “state of catastrophe.”
While this earthquake was far stronger than the 7.0-magnitude one that ravaged Haiti six weeks ago, the damage and death toll in Chile are likely to be far less extensive, in part because of strict building codes put in place after devastating earthquakes.
The quake Saturday, tied for the fifth largest in the world since 1900, set off tsunami waves that swamped some nearby islands before moving across the Pacific. Hawaii began evacuations before dawn, but by early afternoon there — more than 15 hours after the earthquake first struck 6,500 miles away — the fears of a destructive wave had passed. Countries including Japan and the Philippines were on alert and ordered limited evacuations in anticipation of waves hitting Sunday.
Chileans were only just beginning to grapple with the devastation before them, even as more than two dozen significant aftershocks struck the country.
In Santiago, the capital, residents reported having been terrified as the city shook for about 90 seconds.
Some people ran screaming from their downtown apartments, while car alarms and sirens wailed during the middle of the night. At least one apartment building collapsed, according to local media, and one highway buckled, flipping cars.
“We are in panic because it has been trembling all day,” said Cecilia Vial, 65, an interior decorator in Santiago, who dashed out of her apartment only to return at night because she had nowhere else to go.
“We cannot go against nature,” she said. “This is something that nature did.”
Paul E. Simons, the United States ambassador to Chile, said in a telephone interview from Santiago that people he spoke with at the embassy said those 90 seconds “felt like five minutes.” He added: “It was definitely an emotional experience.”
Mr. Simons said that although the United States had offered aid, Chile’s government had not yet requested assistance. All international relief groups were on standby, and the International Federation of Red Crosses and Red Crescents said the Chilean Red Cross indicated that it did not need external assistance at this point.
Although there were long lines at supermarkets and gas stations, and damaged buildings and roads, the capital city, according to residents there, was mostly calm by the late afternoon Saturday. But the scene was grimmer in Concepción and surrounding areas to the south.
In Talca, 167 miles south of Santiago, almost every home in the center of the city was severely damaged, and on Saturday night, people slept on the streets in the balmy night air near fires built with wood from destroyed homes. All but two of the local hospital’s 13 wings were in ruins, said Claudio Martínez, a doctor at the hospital. “We’re only keeping the people in danger of dying,” he said.
Dr. Martínez said the hospital staff had tried to take some people to Santiago for treatment in the morning, but the roads were blocked at the time.
Eduardo Martínez, 57, a local resident, said many people on his street had died and that he and his five brothers all lost their homes.
In Chillán, 69 miles from Concepción, a crumbling wall allowed 300 prisoners to escape and incite a riot, according to La Tercera, the nation’s largest newspaper. The police captured 60 inmates, but more than 200 were still at large, the newspaper reported on its Web site. With major highways and bridges destroyed, and slabs of concrete jabbing diagonally into the air, transportation slowed or was halted altogether.
Major seaports and airports, including the main airport in Santiago, were out of operation across the central region, Chilean officials said. TV Chile reported that part of the ceiling at the airport had collapsed, but that runways appeared intact. Cellphone and Internet service was sporadic throughout the country, considered one of the most wired in Latin America, complicating rescue efforts.
On Robinson Crusoe, one of the coastal islands hit by early waves, authorities said at least four people had been killed.
President Obama spoke briefly outside the White House on Saturday afternoon, expressing concern for the country and saying the United States would offer aid in rescue and recovery efforts.
“Early indications are that hundreds of lives have been lost in Chile and the damage has been severe,” Mr. Obama said.
He told Mrs. Bachelet that the United States was ready to help if needed. “We will be there for her should the Chilean people need assistance,” he said
State Department officials said that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who had been planning a trip to South America beginning on Monday, was also contacting Mrs. Bachelet, with whom she has long had warm personal relations.
Ban Ki-moon, the United Nations secretary general, also offered his condolences, as well as longer-term aid should Chilean officials signal the need for it.
The earthquake struck at 3:34 a.m. in central Chile, centered roughly 200 miles southwest of Santiago at a depth of 22 miles, the United States Geological Survey reported.
The Geological Survey said that another earthquake on Saturday, a 6.3-magnitude quake in northern Argentina, was unrelated. In Salta, Argentina, an 8-year-old boy was killed and two of his friends were injured when a wall collapsed, The Associated Press reported.
The most powerful earthquake ever recorded was also in Chile: a 9.5-magnitude quake struck in the spring of 1960 that struck near Concepción and set off a series of deadly tsunamis that killed people as far away as Hawaii and Japan.
But that earthquake, which killed nearly 2,000 people and left more than two million homeless at the time, prepared officials and residents in the region for future devastating effects.
Shortly after a 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck in Valparaíso in 1985, the country established strict building codes, according to Andre Filiatrault, the director of the Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering Research at the University at Buffalo.
“There is a lot of reinforced concrete in Chile, which is normal in Latin America,” Professor Filiatrault said. “The only issue in this, like any earthquakes, are the older buildings and residential construction that might not have been designed according to these codes.”
This was in direct contrast to Haiti, which was unprepared for the Jan. 12 earthquake, Professor Filiatrault added.
“If you are considering this magnitude is 8.8, I would be very surprised if the death tolls come close,” Professor Filiatrault said.
The death toll was expected to rise, particularly around Concepción, Chile's second-largest metropolitan area, which is roughly 70 miles from the quake's center. The aftershock was reported around 8:30 local time Sunday morning from the capital of Santiago, where it shook buildings, according to Reuters.
More than 1.5 million people have displaced by the quake, according to local news services that quoted the director of Chile's emergency management office. In Concepción, which appeared to be especially hard hit, the mayor said Sunday morning that 100 people were trapped under the rubble of a building that had collapsed, according to Reuters.
Elsewhere in Concepción, cars lay mangled and upended on streets littered with telephone wires and power cables. A new 14-story apartment building fell, while an older, biochemical lab at the University of Concepción caught fire.
In the nearby port of Talcahuano, a giant wave flooded the main square before receding and leaving behind a large fishing boat on the city streets.
“It was terrible, terrible,” said Adela Galaz, a 59-year-old cosmetologist who said glasses and paintings fell to the floor of her 22nd-floor apartment in Santiago, 200 miles from the quake’s center. “We are grateful to be alive.”
President Michelle Bachelet, speaking at a news conference on Saturday night, called the quake “one of the worst tragedies in the last 50 years” and declared a “state of catastrophe.”
While this earthquake was far stronger than the 7.0-magnitude one that ravaged Haiti six weeks ago, the damage and death toll in Chile are likely to be far less extensive, in part because of strict building codes put in place after devastating earthquakes.
The quake Saturday, tied for the fifth largest in the world since 1900, set off tsunami waves that swamped some nearby islands before moving across the Pacific. Hawaii began evacuations before dawn, but by early afternoon there — more than 15 hours after the earthquake first struck 6,500 miles away — the fears of a destructive wave had passed. Countries including Japan and the Philippines were on alert and ordered limited evacuations in anticipation of waves hitting Sunday.
Chileans were only just beginning to grapple with the devastation before them, even as more than two dozen significant aftershocks struck the country.
In Santiago, the capital, residents reported having been terrified as the city shook for about 90 seconds.
Some people ran screaming from their downtown apartments, while car alarms and sirens wailed during the middle of the night. At least one apartment building collapsed, according to local media, and one highway buckled, flipping cars.
“We are in panic because it has been trembling all day,” said Cecilia Vial, 65, an interior decorator in Santiago, who dashed out of her apartment only to return at night because she had nowhere else to go.
“We cannot go against nature,” she said. “This is something that nature did.”
Paul E. Simons, the United States ambassador to Chile, said in a telephone interview from Santiago that people he spoke with at the embassy said those 90 seconds “felt like five minutes.” He added: “It was definitely an emotional experience.”
Mr. Simons said that although the United States had offered aid, Chile’s government had not yet requested assistance. All international relief groups were on standby, and the International Federation of Red Crosses and Red Crescents said the Chilean Red Cross indicated that it did not need external assistance at this point.
Although there were long lines at supermarkets and gas stations, and damaged buildings and roads, the capital city, according to residents there, was mostly calm by the late afternoon Saturday. But the scene was grimmer in Concepción and surrounding areas to the south.
In Talca, 167 miles south of Santiago, almost every home in the center of the city was severely damaged, and on Saturday night, people slept on the streets in the balmy night air near fires built with wood from destroyed homes. All but two of the local hospital’s 13 wings were in ruins, said Claudio Martínez, a doctor at the hospital. “We’re only keeping the people in danger of dying,” he said.
Dr. Martínez said the hospital staff had tried to take some people to Santiago for treatment in the morning, but the roads were blocked at the time.
Eduardo Martínez, 57, a local resident, said many people on his street had died and that he and his five brothers all lost their homes.
In Chillán, 69 miles from Concepción, a crumbling wall allowed 300 prisoners to escape and incite a riot, according to La Tercera, the nation’s largest newspaper. The police captured 60 inmates, but more than 200 were still at large, the newspaper reported on its Web site. With major highways and bridges destroyed, and slabs of concrete jabbing diagonally into the air, transportation slowed or was halted altogether.
Major seaports and airports, including the main airport in Santiago, were out of operation across the central region, Chilean officials said. TV Chile reported that part of the ceiling at the airport had collapsed, but that runways appeared intact. Cellphone and Internet service was sporadic throughout the country, considered one of the most wired in Latin America, complicating rescue efforts.
On Robinson Crusoe, one of the coastal islands hit by early waves, authorities said at least four people had been killed.
President Obama spoke briefly outside the White House on Saturday afternoon, expressing concern for the country and saying the United States would offer aid in rescue and recovery efforts.
“Early indications are that hundreds of lives have been lost in Chile and the damage has been severe,” Mr. Obama said.
He told Mrs. Bachelet that the United States was ready to help if needed. “We will be there for her should the Chilean people need assistance,” he said
State Department officials said that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who had been planning a trip to South America beginning on Monday, was also contacting Mrs. Bachelet, with whom she has long had warm personal relations.
Ban Ki-moon, the United Nations secretary general, also offered his condolences, as well as longer-term aid should Chilean officials signal the need for it.
The earthquake struck at 3:34 a.m. in central Chile, centered roughly 200 miles southwest of Santiago at a depth of 22 miles, the United States Geological Survey reported.
The Geological Survey said that another earthquake on Saturday, a 6.3-magnitude quake in northern Argentina, was unrelated. In Salta, Argentina, an 8-year-old boy was killed and two of his friends were injured when a wall collapsed, The Associated Press reported.
The most powerful earthquake ever recorded was also in Chile: a 9.5-magnitude quake struck in the spring of 1960 that struck near Concepción and set off a series of deadly tsunamis that killed people as far away as Hawaii and Japan.
But that earthquake, which killed nearly 2,000 people and left more than two million homeless at the time, prepared officials and residents in the region for future devastating effects.
Shortly after a 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck in Valparaíso in 1985, the country established strict building codes, according to Andre Filiatrault, the director of the Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering Research at the University at Buffalo.
“There is a lot of reinforced concrete in Chile, which is normal in Latin America,” Professor Filiatrault said. “The only issue in this, like any earthquakes, are the older buildings and residential construction that might not have been designed according to these codes.”
This was in direct contrast to Haiti, which was unprepared for the Jan. 12 earthquake, Professor Filiatrault added.
“If you are considering this magnitude is 8.8, I would be very surprised if the death tolls come close,” Professor Filiatrault said.
PEACE CAMP DEMANDS THAT PRESIDENT OBAMA MEET WITH A PEACE COUNCIL
PEACE CAMP DEMANDS THAT PRESIDENT OBAMA MEET WITH A PEACE COUNCIL
http://peaceoftheaction.org/2010/02...-peace-council/
( Please spread this as far and as wide as you possibly can. Thank you.)
February 23, 2010
Dear President Obama,
A contingent of Peace Groups and Activists will be setting up a Peace Camp across the street from your house on the lawn of the Washington Monument called, Camp OUT NOW.
After over one year of your presidency, it’s become crystal clear to even many of those who supported you, that your foreign policy is as much of a disaster as was George Bush’s.
On Sunday, 33 civilians were killed in a bombing raid on a caravan in Afghanistan, and no matter how many times you or your generals say, “Sorry,” innocent civilians will always be killed in these insane wars of profit and occupation. Since, by your regime’s own admission, civilian slaughter “can’t be avoided,” these wars must come to an immediate end.
It’s also quite tragic that your war in Afghanistan has victimized more of our troops than when Bush was president, and more of our returning vets are committing suicide with most of their needs still going unmet.
For all intents and purposes, Mr. Obama, you have had a blank-check from the U.S. anti-war movement since you were elected. Certainly being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize gave these wars some international legitimacy, but those days of your free pass to carry out and magnify the Bush regime’s crimes against humanity are over.
Even though there have been those of us in the anti-war movement who never dropped the ball, or passed it to the Democratic Party, many of the ones who supported you are also starting to awaken to the harsh reality that you are only keeping your campaign promises and they don’t like that.
Mr. Obama, your anti-war base is an awakening giant that you will have to deal with in this election year. People are fleeing your party with the same regularity that they fled the other party when Bush was president. This waking giant is also realizing that with a Democratic majority everywhere, your failure in proceeding with a progressive agenda is abysmal.
Every time you are “contemplating” sending more troops to Afghanistan, you have countless meetings with what you have called your “War Council.” The very name implies a foregone conclusion that you will send more troops and that other, more rational, more humane, and more peaceful solutions are never even considered.
In 2005, I asked for a meeting with President Bush that was never granted, and as you know, Camp Casey in Crawford became the spark that lit a prairie fire of anti-war sentiment that swept you and your cohorts in the Democratic Party back into power and now we are coming to collect the spoils of that victory–which is not more war–but more Peace. You Democrats owe much to your anti-war base–and we will not be quiet nor be ignored as we were in the previous administration. It’s time for you to pay the Peace-piper, Mr. Obama.
Our demands are profound, yet simple for you to perform: troops out of Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan (where three soldiers were just killed); no more drone bombings anywhere; close the permanent bases and torture prisons; and bring the mercenary soldiers home, too. We will not be closing up Camp, or the movement, until positive progress in the direction of Peace is noted.
The first week of Camp (March 13-20), we are asking for a meeting with you to discuss setting up a Peace Council that you will regularly meet with that will have a seat at the table when decisions that will kill, maim, displace, or harm our troops or civilians in any way are being discussed. We also demand that this Peace Council be comprised of grassroots members of the Peace Movement and not rubber-stamp status quo worshippers, or other “Peace” Prize laureates like Henry Kissinger, who already, reportedly, has your ear.
If you do not meet with representatives from Camp OUT NOW, we will be a thorn in the side of the War Machine, and we will not go away without a struggle. If you do meet with us and agree to a Peace Council, we will pack up our tents, but we will still be a thorn in the side of the War Machine until Peace is finally achieved–the only difference is that we won’t be camped across the street from your home.
During your campaign, you often quoted Roosevelt as saying that if the voters wanted him to do the right thing, they would have to “make him.” Well, Mr. Obama, we are the bosses of you–not your corporate masters–and we will be in DC to “make you” do the right thing.
I can be reached at anytime through my email:
Cindy@PeaceoftheAction.org
In struggle until there is finally Peace,
Cindy Sheehan
Mother of Spc. Casey Sheehan who was murdered on 04 April, 2004, by the U.S. War Machine.
And the Peace of the Action Coalition
www.PeaceoftheAction.org
http://peaceoftheaction.org/2010/02...-peace-council/
( Please spread this as far and as wide as you possibly can. Thank you.)
February 23, 2010
Dear President Obama,
A contingent of Peace Groups and Activists will be setting up a Peace Camp across the street from your house on the lawn of the Washington Monument called, Camp OUT NOW.
After over one year of your presidency, it’s become crystal clear to even many of those who supported you, that your foreign policy is as much of a disaster as was George Bush’s.
On Sunday, 33 civilians were killed in a bombing raid on a caravan in Afghanistan, and no matter how many times you or your generals say, “Sorry,” innocent civilians will always be killed in these insane wars of profit and occupation. Since, by your regime’s own admission, civilian slaughter “can’t be avoided,” these wars must come to an immediate end.
It’s also quite tragic that your war in Afghanistan has victimized more of our troops than when Bush was president, and more of our returning vets are committing suicide with most of their needs still going unmet.
For all intents and purposes, Mr. Obama, you have had a blank-check from the U.S. anti-war movement since you were elected. Certainly being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize gave these wars some international legitimacy, but those days of your free pass to carry out and magnify the Bush regime’s crimes against humanity are over.
Even though there have been those of us in the anti-war movement who never dropped the ball, or passed it to the Democratic Party, many of the ones who supported you are also starting to awaken to the harsh reality that you are only keeping your campaign promises and they don’t like that.
Mr. Obama, your anti-war base is an awakening giant that you will have to deal with in this election year. People are fleeing your party with the same regularity that they fled the other party when Bush was president. This waking giant is also realizing that with a Democratic majority everywhere, your failure in proceeding with a progressive agenda is abysmal.
Every time you are “contemplating” sending more troops to Afghanistan, you have countless meetings with what you have called your “War Council.” The very name implies a foregone conclusion that you will send more troops and that other, more rational, more humane, and more peaceful solutions are never even considered.
In 2005, I asked for a meeting with President Bush that was never granted, and as you know, Camp Casey in Crawford became the spark that lit a prairie fire of anti-war sentiment that swept you and your cohorts in the Democratic Party back into power and now we are coming to collect the spoils of that victory–which is not more war–but more Peace. You Democrats owe much to your anti-war base–and we will not be quiet nor be ignored as we were in the previous administration. It’s time for you to pay the Peace-piper, Mr. Obama.
Our demands are profound, yet simple for you to perform: troops out of Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan (where three soldiers were just killed); no more drone bombings anywhere; close the permanent bases and torture prisons; and bring the mercenary soldiers home, too. We will not be closing up Camp, or the movement, until positive progress in the direction of Peace is noted.
The first week of Camp (March 13-20), we are asking for a meeting with you to discuss setting up a Peace Council that you will regularly meet with that will have a seat at the table when decisions that will kill, maim, displace, or harm our troops or civilians in any way are being discussed. We also demand that this Peace Council be comprised of grassroots members of the Peace Movement and not rubber-stamp status quo worshippers, or other “Peace” Prize laureates like Henry Kissinger, who already, reportedly, has your ear.
If you do not meet with representatives from Camp OUT NOW, we will be a thorn in the side of the War Machine, and we will not go away without a struggle. If you do meet with us and agree to a Peace Council, we will pack up our tents, but we will still be a thorn in the side of the War Machine until Peace is finally achieved–the only difference is that we won’t be camped across the street from your home.
During your campaign, you often quoted Roosevelt as saying that if the voters wanted him to do the right thing, they would have to “make him.” Well, Mr. Obama, we are the bosses of you–not your corporate masters–and we will be in DC to “make you” do the right thing.
I can be reached at anytime through my email:
Cindy@PeaceoftheAction.org
In struggle until there is finally Peace,
Cindy Sheehan
Mother of Spc. Casey Sheehan who was murdered on 04 April, 2004, by the U.S. War Machine.
And the Peace of the Action Coalition
www.PeaceoftheAction.org
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