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."
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
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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