US President, George W. Bush's dysfunctional relationship with the truth seems to be shaped by two complementary factors, a personal compulsion to say whatever makes him look good at that moment and a permissive environment that rarely holds him accountable for his lies. Robert Parry, the writer of the book "Secrecy and Privilege" has more on the subject of Bush's lie game in policy as follows:

How else would Bush explain his endless attempts to rewrite history and reshape his own statements, a pattern on display again in his New Year's Day comments to reporters in San Antonio of Texas? In that session, as Bush denied misleading the public, he twice again misled the public.

By denying that he lied when he told a crowd in Buffalo of New York in 2004, Bush launched into a defense of his honesty and said: "any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires a court order."

Two years earlier, Bush had approved rules that freed the National Security Agency to use warrantless wiretaps on communications originating in the United States without a court order. But Bush still told the Buffalo audience: "Nothing has changed. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so."

On New Year's Day 2006, the US President sought to explain those misleading comments by contending that he had been talking about wandering wiretaps, and he believed being involved in the Patriot Act. As a justification he said: "This is different from the NSA program".

The context of Bush's 2004 statement was clear. He broke away from a discussion of the USA Patriot Act to note that "any time" a wiretap is needed a court order must be obtained. He was not confining his remarks to "wandering wiretaps" under the Patriot Act.

In his New Year's Day remarks, Bush further misled the public, by insisting that his warrantless wiretaps only involved communications from suspicious individuals abroad who were contacting people in the United States, a policy that would be legal. Bush said the eavesdropping was "limited to calls from outside the United States to calls within the United States."

Bush's explanation was at odds with what his own administration had previously admitted to journalists. They said that the wiretaps also covered calls originating in the United States, which require warrants from a special court created by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978.

The White House soon "clarified" Bush's remarks to acknowledge that his warrantless wiretaps involve communications originating in the United States.

Though occasionally the news media notes these discrepancies in Bush's claims, it rarely makes much of an issue out of them and often averts its collective gaze from the deceptions altogether.

For years now, there has been a troubling pattern of Bush lying and US news media enabling his deceptive behavior, a problem especially acute around the War on Terror and the Iraq War; The war which has now claimed the lives of more than 2,200 US soldiers and tens of thousands of Iraqi citizens.

Even on the pre-war chronology, Bush has been allowed to revise the history. In one favorite fictitious account, he apparently became the victim of Saddam's intransigence, leaving Bush no choice but to invade on March 19, 2003, in search of Iraq's supposed weapons of mass destruction. Less than four months later, facing criticism because no WMD was found and US soldiers were dying, Bush began to claim that the former Iraqi dictator had barred United Nations weapons inspectors from Iraq and blocked a non-violent search for WMD.

On July 14, 2003 the US President claimed that they have given Saddam Hussein a chance to allow the inspectors in, but he wouldn't let them in. And, therefore, after a reasonable request, the Bush camp decided to remove Saddam from power.

However, the reality was that the UN inspectors were allowed to examine any site of their choosing. And it was Bush, not Saddam Hussein, who forced the UN inspectors to pull out in March 2003, so the invasion could proceed.

When Presidents Lie

These remarks are expressed by, Geov Parrish a Columnist and Reporter for Seattle Weekly, In These Times and Eat the State!

One by one, President Bush's lies are unraveling -- the lies that were used to justify talk of mushroom clouds over America, the lies that led a majority of the country to believe Saddam Hussein had something to do with 9-11. The yellowcake uranium in Niger. The weapons of mass destruction stories. The aluminum tubes for processing uranium. All these are now known to be lies.

Lies, all of it. Once stripped away, there remains not one shred of evidence that in 2002-03 Saddam Hussein's Iraq posed any threat whatsoever to the security of the United States. Much less an imminent threat -- the only rationale, under both American and international law, which makes permissible the short-circuiting of the diplomatic process and the launching of an unprovoked invasion. American citizens now know all this, too late for over 2,000 American soldiers and untold scores of thousands of Iraqis.

Why are Americans surprised? In modern times, this is what American Presidents, Democrats as well as Republicans, do. The bigger the stakes, the bigger the lies, and there are no bigger stakes than war. They lie to the U.S. Congress, they lie to the American public, they lie to the world.

In 1990, even with the world mortified over Saddam's invasion of Kuwait, the Bush and White House overcame fierce public and congressional resistance to war with a wholly concocted story about Iraqi soldiers pulling the plugs on the incubators of Kuwaiti babies.

In 2002 to 2003, it was -- well, everything.

In each case, American Congress, as well as the public, were kept in the dark. The fundamental checks and balances of the Constitution, which allow only Congress to declare war, were subverted.

Geov Parris continues: There are tremendous institutional incentives for chief executives to call the military into action. Eisenhower knew what he was talking about when he warned of the dangers of the permanent military-industrial complex. A lot of American people make a lot of money from war, and a lot of other people, that is people that don't matter to the leaders, suffer. Power is seductive, and the people who crave power enough to want the most powerful job in the world are invariably never satisfied. They always want more. It's a story as old as humankind.

After the fall of Saigon, something called the "Vietnam Syndrome" set in, a very healthy response in which citizens and leaders were wary of committing troops to another foreign war. Then Ronald Reagan came along, and invaded Grenada, and waged covert wars in Central America, and people forgot.

Perhaps, given how catastrophic the invasion of Iraq has been -- for Iraqis, for the American military, for the federal budget, and for America's moral standing in the world -- there will come to be a similar "Iraq Syndrome." But Americans are not there yet. Irresponsible Powerful people, particularly in and around the Bush White House, continue to peddle war as the answer of first resort for a variety of diplomatic conflicts, from Syria to North Korea to Venezuela and even to China.

The anger of American people over the recent revelations of the lies of George W. Bush and the White House Iraq Group is completely justified. There is no greater betrayal to the U.S. nation than the misuse of its military, and no greater moral sin than ordering up a policy which effectively ensures the murder of thousands.

History and common sense told Americans at the time that there was a high probability the White House was lying. American people have to question and investigate White House claims far more closely than they did. The lies of George W. Bush's White House are, an impeachable crime.

But if there is no "Iraq Syndrome" -- if American people seize upon these misdeeds but then continue to call for the casual projection of American military power anywhere and everywhere in the world -- then the lives lost in Iraq really will have been in vain.

These are remarks are by Cindy Sheehan, an American Mom protester whose son is killed at Iraq war.

This immoral invasion and occupation of Iraq has cost the world so much. George W.Bush and his reckless war of choice have cost the American taxpayers billions of dollars that could be better spent at home. Iraq has cost the U.S much of its security. It has cost the U.S any good standing America enjoyed in the world community. It cost America the post 9/11 attacks good will from almost the entire world. American people are the laughing stock of the world community. Not only is their callous and careless leadership disdained, but they are scorned because they "re"-elected George for a 2nd term and not only that, they are allowing him to continue to mislead America into ruin.

The price many of Americans are paying is so much costlier than the mere monetary expense or loss of reputation. Over 2000 American families have paid the price of Americans dear loved ones to the insanity and over 15,000 of the U.S young people are wounded with over 400 of those being amputees.

Cindy Sheehan continues: The U.S government liars and lies that led America to invade Iraq are legion and well documented. The lies to maintain the occupation are the same. The liars are now starting to beat the war drum for invading Syria.

American people who have made the "ultimate sacrifice" know the true cost of war. American families will soon know how much pain the Bush administration's lies will cause them and how much peace, sleep, and joy these same lies cost.

For everyone else, this is the true cost of war:

American Moms and Dads having their hearts and souls violently ripped out. Overwhelming guilt is felt in relentless and pounding waves.

American Husbands and wives sorrowfully and prematurely burying their life partners. Days and nights ahead filled with loneliness and pain.

American Brothers and sisters having integral parts of their history seized so cruelly from them. Holidays, birthdays, and other celebrations that will never be the same.

American sons and daughters unjustly denied the basic human right to grow up with both of their parents.

Other American family members and friends mourning and missing someone too young to be killed in an illegal occupation.

A sovereign nation which was no threat to the United States of America lies in ruins and tens of thousands of its innocent citizens have been slaughtered just for the U.S leaders imperial ambitions.

How much and how many more are Americans going to allow the serial liars to rob from them.

Torture: It's the New American Way

The repressive Soviet state collapsed under the weight of its own cruelties and lies. With recent blockbuster report of secret CIA detention facilities in Eastern Europe, cynics may be pardoned for wondering who really won the Cold War. Rosa Brooks, the Los Angeles Times staff writer has expressed more on the issue as follows:

According to Dana Priest, the Washington Post investigative reporter who broke the story, it all started on September 17, 2001, when President Bush signed a secret executive order authorizing the CIA to kill, capture or detain Al-Qaeda operatives.

There was only one problem: The CIA didn't know where to put the people it detained. Those detainees thought to be of "high value" needed to be kept somewhere special. Somewhere secure, like Alcatraz. And somewhere secret, far from the hunting eyes of reporters or Red Cross officials. Because these high-value and so-called ghost detainees, were going to be subjected to "enhanced interrogation techniques (EIT)."

EIT is synonymous for what's known in English as torture. The list of enhanced techniques is classified but reportedly includes such old favorites as "waterboarding" and artificial suffocation. Authorized techniques also may have included the "Palestinian hanging," a "stress position" in which a detainee is suspended from the ceiling or wall by his wrists, which are handcuffed behind his back.

According to government investigative reports, it was this enhancement that preceded the death of Manadel Jamadi, an Iraqi who died in CIA custody at Abu Ghraib in November 2003. According to Tony Diaz, an American MP who witnessed Jamadie’s torture, when Jamadi was lowered to the ground, blood gushed from his mouth as if "a faucet had turned on". Later, other guards posed with Jamadi's battered corpse, and the leaked photos shocked the world.

That's not the kind of publicity a so-called freedom-loving democracy needs, so the CIA reportedly opted for secret "black sites." It's not as easy as you might think to find a spot where you can torture people in peace. Abu Ghraib is full of camera-clicking reservists, and the Marquis de Sade's castle in Paris lies in ruins. The Tower of London's dungeons still boast an excellent range of enhanced interrogation equipment, but they attract too many giggling children.

CIA operatives apparently considered uninhabited islands near Zambia's Lake Kariba, but interrogators didn't much like the idea of catching one of those nasty local diseases so prevalent in Central Africa.

According to Rosa Brooks, the Los Angeles Times staff writer Thailand worked for a while, but the Thai government got cold feet when press reports revealed the existence of a local CIA site. And Guantanamo's CIA interrogation facility had to be closed when the Supreme Court pointed out that Guantanamo is not a law-free zone.

Remember the flap last spring when Amnesty International called Guantanamo an American "gulag"? Maybe that's what gave the CIA the idea of locating some black sites in Eastern Europe. "Hmm, gulag, gulag that reminds me of something. Hey! Maybe there are some leftover Soviet-era detention facilities we can use for our enhanced interrogations!"

At the request of "senior U.S. officials," the Washington Post declined to identify the locations of the Eastern European black sites. But Marc Garlasco, a military Analyst at Human Rights Watch, says that host countries may include Poland and Romania.

Human Rights Watch examined flight records showing that on September 22, 2003, for instance, around the same time several high-value Al Qaeda detainees were transferred out of CIA facilities in Afghanistan, a CIA-linked Boeing 737 with the tail number N313P flew from Kabul to Szymany Airport in Poland. The next day, it landed at Mihail Kogalniceanu military airfield in Romania. Released Guantanamo detainees have corroborated the use of this plane as a prisoner transport, and rights groups and journalists say witnesses also have reported seeing hooded prisoners being loaded and unloaded from the same plane at various other locations.

During the Cold War, the US thought she knew what distinguished her from the Soviet bloc enemies. The US did not have a gulag; the US did not imprison and torture her enemies. But the war on terror has distorted US national values. US has used and still uses some of the same tactics she once decried. The Soviet Union's legacy of terror lives on and its tactics embraced by some American leaders. This is while US Vice President, Dick Cheney continues to insist that the McCain amendment, which prohibits U.S. personnel from cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment of prisoners, should not be applicable to the CIA.

Somewhere in Moscow's Novodevichyi cemetery, Khrushchev is probably laughing inside his grave.

Dick Cheney's Covert Action

The following article is by Larry Johnson, a Veteran who has worked as a CIA intelligence Analyst.

The Bush administration organized and executed a classic “covert action” program against the citizens of the United States.

Covert action refers to behind-the-scenes efforts by U.S. intelligence agencies to plant stories, manipulate information and shape American public opinion. In other words, one writes stories that reporters will publish as their own, one creates media events that tout a particular theme. Traditionally, this activity was directed against foreign governments. For example, the U.S. used covert action extensively in Greece in the 1960s to help fend off what it called thecommunist threat.

Revelations during the past month about the Plame affair make it clear that the Bush administration used covert action against its own citizens. Consider, for example, the charge that Iraq was trying to buy uranium from Niger. The key event in this disinformation campaign was the intelligence manufactured by the Italians.

American citizens learned last May that in the summer of 2002, the Bush administration told its. British allies that they would "fix the facts" around the intelligence. In other words, the United States sought to manufacture a case that Iraq was trying to build a nuclear capability. Note, not only did bogus intelligence reports and fabricated documents surface, but senior officials such as Condoleezza Rice as senior administration officials and Vice President Dick Cheney—went to great lengths to try to convince Americans that the United States would soon face the wrath of Iraqi attacks. Remember the smoking mushroom cloud?

Despite repeated attempts by the Italian intelligence service to help cook the books, the senior CIA intelligence analysts resisted the administration’s effort to sell the bogus notion that Iraq was trying to buy uranium in Niger. Even in the much-maligned October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate, the entire intelligence community remained split on the reliability of the Iraq/Niger claim. During briefings subsequent to the publication of the NIE, senior CIA officials repeatedly debunked the claim that Iraq was trying to buy uranium. They also dismissed as unreliable reports from Britain, which also were derived from the faulty Italian intelligence reports.

Two weeks before President Bush spoke the infamous 16 words in the January 2003 State of the Union speech, the U.S. Department of Defense was fanning the flames about Iraq’s alleged Nigerian uranium shopping trip. Starting in late 2001, senior Department of Defense officials, including Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz and Doug Feith, provided favored military minded heads with and briefings to reinforce messages the administration wanted the public to hear.

One of those who frequently attended these affairs, Robert Maginnis, a former Army officer and now a Commentator for Fox News and the Washington Times , published on January 15, 2003, for United Press International, subsequent to one of the briefings. In writing about the case for attacking Iraq, Robert Maginnis affirmed that, “ Saddam failed to explain why Iraq manufactures fuels suited only for a class of missile that it does not admit to having and why it sought to procure uranium from the African nation of Niger.”

While CIA did make mistakes, and while some key members of the U.S. National Intelligence Council were willing to drink the neocon Kool-Aid and go along with the White House, when it came to questions of whether Iraq was buying uranium in Niger or if Saddam was working with bin Laden, CIA analysts consistently got it right and told the administration what they did not want to hear. It was policymakers, such as Vice President Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, who ignored what the analysts were saying and writing.

The evidence of the White House effort to manipulate and shape U.S. public opinion is now overwhelming. American people know that the Bush administration had an organized campaign to manipulate the U.S. media to get its message out. Unfortunately, the corporate media played along.

Americans have died because of the Bush deceit. The unmasking of Valerie Plame was not an odd occurrence. It was part of a pattern of deliberate manipulation and disinformation. At the end of the day, American men and women have died because of this lie. It is up to the American people to hold the Bush administration accountable for these actions.

Inequality in America

The United States is now the third most unequal industrialized society. In 2004, after three years of economic recovery, the U.S. Census reports that poverty in America continues to grow, while the real median income for fulltime workers has declined. Just since 2001, when US economy hit bottom, the ranks of the nation’s poor have grown by 4 million, and the number of people without health insurance has swelled by 10 percent to over 45 million.

Income inequality in the US is now near all-time highs, with over 50 percent of 2004 total income going to the top fifth of households, and the biggest gains going to the top 5 percent and 1 percent.

At the pinnacle of U.S. wealth, 2004 saw a dramatic increase in the number of billionaires. According to “Forbes” magazine, there are now 374 of them. This growth in billionaires took a dramatic leap since the early 1980s, when the average net worth of the individuals on the Forbes 400 list was 400 million dollars. Today, the average net worth is 2.8 billion dollars. Wal-Mart’s Walton family now has 771,287 times more than the middle U.S. household.

Does inequality matter in the United States? One problem is that concentrations of wealth and power pose a danger to a supposed to be democratic system. The corruption of politics by big money might explain why for the last five years President Bush and the Congress have been more interested in repealing the federal estate tax, paid only by multi-millionaires, than in reinforcing levees along the Gulf Coast.

Now, to pay for hurricane reconstruction and the war in Iraq, US Congress is considering cuts in programs that help poor people, such as Medicaid and Food Stamps. They have not yet considered fairer ways of reducing the deficit like reversing special tax breaks for the rich, such as the recent cuts in capital gains and dividend taxes.

And inequality is non-partisan. The pace of inequality has grown steadily over three decades, under both Republican and Democratic administrations and Congresses. The Gini index, the global measure of inequality, grew as quickly under President Bill Clinton as it has under President George W. Bush. Widening disparities in the United States are the result of three decades of bipartisan public policies that have tilted the rules of the economy to the benefit of major corporations and large asset owners at the expense of people whose security comes largely from a paycheck.

Public policies in trade, taxes, wages and social spending can make a difference in justifying national and global trends toward prolonged inequality. But the US government priorities are moving the nation in the wrong direction.

For example, the failure to raise the minimum wage from its 1997 level of 5.15 dollars an hour guarantees continued income stagnation for the working poor for years to come. The president and Congress’ focus on tax cuts for the wealthy and their disinterest in government spending to expand equal opportunity sets the stage for Inequality Version 3.

The American people shouldn’t tolerate this drift toward an economic apartheid society.

9/11 Aircraft Parts as a Clue to Their Identity

The following article is by George Nelson, Former American Air Force Official that appeared in the opinion column of Tehran Times on Wednesday, September 21, concerning the highly suspicious aircraft that plowed into New York’s Twin-tower, 110-storey high World Trade Center and in the Pentagon in Washington, making analysts doubt the official White House version of the story and convincing many that it was the work of insiders connected to the US Administration itself. Excerpt of this article is as follows:

The precautionary principle is based on the fact that the failure to prove a proposition completely does not disprove the proposition. If the proposition warns of an ongoing or oncoming disaster, for example global warming, it is wise to take precautions. The proposition arrived at here is this: the supposed 9/11 hijackings and damage to buildings were not the work of the alleged Arab terrorists, but appear to have been part of a black operation carried out with the cooperation of elements in the US government. In July 1965, I had just been commissioned as a second lieutenant in the US Air Force after taking a solemn oath that I would protect and defend the American Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and that I would bear true faith and allegiance to the same. I took that oath very seriously. It was my constant companion throughout a thirty-year military career in the field of aircraft maintenance. As an additional duty, aircraft maintenance officers are occasionally tasked as members of aircraft accident investigation boards and my personal experience was no exception. In 1989, I graduated from the Aircraft Mishap Investigation Course at the Institute of Safety and Systems Management at the University of Southern California. In addition to my direct participation as an aircraft accident investigator, I reviewed countless aircraft accident investigation reports for thoroughness and comprehensive conclusions for the Inspector General, HQ Pacific Air Forces during the height of the Vietnam conflict. In all my years of direct and indirect participation, I never witnessed nor even heard of an aircraft loss, where the wreckage was accessible, that prevented investigators from finding enough hard evidence to positively identify the make, model, and specific registration number of the aircraft -- and in most cases the precise cause of the accident. This is because every military and civilian passenger-carrying aircraft has many parts that are identified for safety of flight. That is, if any of the parts were to fail at any time during a flight, the failure would likely result in the catastrophic loss of aircraft and passengers. Consequently, these parts are individually controlled by a distinctive serial number and tracked by a records section of the maintenance operation and by another section called plans and scheduling.

Following a certain number of flying hours or, in the case of landing gears, a certain number of takeoff-and-landing cycles, these critical parts are required to be changed, overhauled or inspected by specialist mechanics. When these parts are installed, their serial numbers are married to the aircraft registration numbers in the aircraft records and the plans and scheduling section will notify maintenance specialists when the parts must be replaced. If the parts are not replaced within specified time or cycle limits, the airplane will normally be grounded until the maintenance action is completed. Most of these time-change parts, whether hydraulic flight surface actuators, pumps, landing gears, engines or engine components, are virtually indestructible. It would be impossible for an ordinary fire resulting from an airplane crash to destroy or obliterate all of those critical time-change parts or their serial numbers. I repeat, impossible.

Considering the catastrophic incidents of September 11, 2001, certain troubling but irrefutable conclusions must be drawn from the known facts. I get no personal pleasure or satisfaction from reporting my own assessment of these facts.

United Airlines Flight 93: This flight was reported by the federal government to be a Boeing 757 aircraft, registration number N591UA, carrying 45 persons, including four supposedly Arab hijackers who had allegedly taken control of the aircraft, crashing the plane in a Pennsylvania farm field. Aerial photos of the alleged crash site were made available to the general public. They show a significant hole in the ground, but private investigators were not allowed to come anywhere near the crash site. If an aircraft crash caused the hole in the ground, there would have been literally hundreds of serially controlled time-change parts within the hole that would have proved beyond any shadow of doubt the precise tail-number or identity of the aircraft. However, the US government has not produced any hard evidence that would prove beyond a doubt that the specifically alleged aircraft crashed at that site. On the contrary, it has been reported that the aircraft, registry number N591UA, is still in operation.

American Airlines Flight 11: This flight was reported by the US government to be a Boeing 767, registration number N334AA, carrying 92 people, including five Arabs who had allegedly hijacked the plane. This plane was reported to have crashed into the north tower of the WTC complex of buildings. Again, the US government would have no trouble proving its case if only a few of the hundreds of serially controlled parts had been collected to positively identify the aircraft. A Boeing 767 landing gear or just one engine would have been easy to find and identify.

United Airlines Flight 175: This flight was reported to be a Boeing 767, registration number N612UA, carrying 65 people, including the crew and five hijackers. It reportedly flew into the south tower of the WTC. Once more, the government has yet to produce one serially controlled part from the crash site that would have dispelled any questions as to the identity of the specific airplane.

American Airlines Flight 77: This was reported to be a Boeing 757, registration number N644AA, carrying 64 people, including the flight crew and five hijackers. This aircraft, with a 125-foot wingspan, was reported to have crashed into the Pentagon, leaving an entry hole no more than 65 feet wide.

Following cool-down of the resulting fire, it would have been very easy to collect enough time-change equipment at this crash site within 15 minutes to positively identify the aircraft registry. There was apparently some aerospace type of equipment found at the site but no attempt was made to produce aerial numbers or to identify the specific parts found. Some of the equipment removed from the building was actually hidden from public view.

Conclusion: The US government alleges that four wide-body airliners crashed on the morning of September 11, 2001, resulting in the deaths of about 3,000 human beings, yet not one piece of hard aircraft evidence has been produced in an attempt to positively identify any of the four aircraft. On the contrary, it seems only that all potential evidence was deliberately kept hidden from public view. The hard evidence would have included hundreds of critical time-change aircraft items, plus security videotapes that were confiscated by the FBI immediately following each tragic episode. With all the evidence readily available at the Pentagon crash site, any unbiased rational investigator could only conclude that a Boeing 757 did not fly into the Pentagon as alleged. Similarly, with all the evidence available at the Pennsylvania crash site, it was most doubtful that a passenger airliner caused the obvious hole in the ground and certainly not the Boeing 757 as alleged. Regarding the planes that allegedly flew into the WTC towers, it is only just possible that heavy aircraft were involved in each incident, but no evidence has been produced that would add credence to the government's theoretical version of what actually caused the total destruction of the buildings, let alone proving the identity of the aircraft. That is the problem with the US government's 9/11 story. It is time to apply the precautionary principle. As painful and heartbreaking as was the loss of innocent lives and the lingering health problems of thousands more, a most troublesome and nightmarish probability remains that so many Americans appear to be involved in the most heinous conspiracy in their own country's history.

Bush Helps Disaster Profiteers

The following article is by Peter Dreier, a distinguished Professor of Politics and Director of the Urban & Environmental Policy Institute at Occidental College. And coauthor of “ The Next Los Angeles: The Struggle for a Livable City and Place Matters”.

US President, George W. Bush has been justly criticized for his mishandling of the Katrina disaster, for his failure of leadership and for his indecisiveness. Involving post-hurricane reconstruction, Bush has been exceedingly decisive! He suspended federal rules to allow FEMA and the Army Corps of Engineers to extend no-bid contracts to corporations engaged in the rebuilding. In doing so, he also allowed companies with close political ties to get to the front of the line.

Bush also sweetened these contracts even more by suspending the federal Davis-Bacon Act, the Depression-era law that requires contractors with federal funds to pay local "prevailing wages" on construction projects. Through these actions, Bush revealed that despite all the rhetoric about compassion toward the victims of Katrina, the administration's capitalism and corporate agenda is never far below the surface.

Katrina is a disaster for the people of the gulf region and for the nation's economy. According to the Congressional Budget Office about 400,000 Americans will lose their jobs. But for some companies, especially those with political connections, Katrina, like the war in Iraq, is a bonanza.

US Congress has already appropriated 62 billion dollars for post-Katrina relief and repair, and the figure is expected to exceed 100 billion dollars. The reconstruction of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, like the rebuilding of Iraq, has unleashed a feeding frenzy of government contracts to companies. Federal Emergency Management Agency or FEMA and the Army Corps of Engineers quickly suspended rules in order to allow no-bid contracts and speed up reconstruction. Politically connected firms like Haliburton, Fluor Corporation, and Bechtel have already scooped up hundreds of millions of dollars for post-Katrina reconstruction.

Haliburton, formerly run by Vice President Dick Cheney, is facing questions for allegedly overcharging on work done in Iraq. The US Department of Defense has been criticized for awarding Iraq reconstruction contracts to Haliburton and Bechtel without competition. Since the storm hit, Haliburton's shares have risen by more than 10 percent to 65 dollars.

The crony capitalism, rampant during the Bush Administration, is bad enough. But President Bush added insult to injury by suspending the Davis-Bacon law for Katrina-damaged areas of Alabama, Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi. The Davis-Bacon law, enacted in 1931, sets a minimum pay scale for workers on federal contracts by requiring contractors to pay the prevailing or average pay in the region. The prevailing wage in New Orleans is 9 dollars per hour for construction work, far below that of most other parts of the country. The Executive Order came a day after a group of 35 Republican members of Congress asked Bush to suspend the law for recovery effort. The Bush administration, Congressional Republicans and their corporate allies have long opposed the Davis-Bacon law, just as they've opposed raising the federal minimum wage from the current below-poverty level of 5.15 dollars.

During the 2004 election cycle, the construction industry donated 71 million dollars to candidates for the White House and Congress. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan watchdog group, seventy-two percent of those contributions went to Republicans. Now it's pay-back time.

President Bush's behavior is consistent. In the wake of the 9/11 tragedy, Bush used concerns over national security as a pretext for undermining workers' rights. His legislation sought to strip 170,000 federal employees being transferred to the new Department of Homeland Security of various workplace protections, including civil service regulations and collective bargaining rights. Similarly, the legislation federalizing about 56,000 airport screeners exempted them from union protections. Soon after 9/11, Bush also established a quota requiring government agencies to outsource at least 425,000, later upped to 850,000, federal jobs to private contractors many of which, had contributed to his campaign.

Indeed, suspending Davis-Bacon is exactly the wrong move at this time. What the devastated areas need is people with jobs that pay decent wages so they can contribute to stimulating the local economy. Federal funds should be used to help get families back on their feet, not to exacerbate their suffering.

As the reconstruction proceeds, the federal government will not only be rebuilding levees, dams and roads, but also subsidizing the rebuilding of the region's low-wage tourism economy, including its hotels.

The mentioned firms will soon have their hands out to receive federal largesse to rebuild their enterprises. If major hotel chains, as well as big construction firms, are going to get billions of dollars in taxpayer funds and government-backed insurance, shouldn't there be some quid-pro-quos - like requiring them to pay a living wage; that guarantee fairness for the real victims of the Bush administration's failure of leadership in protecting people from Katrina? The Bush administration obviously doesn't think so. Even amidst the tragedy of Katrina, Bush's conservatism trumps his compassion.

Hurricane Katrina Viewed From Different Angles

The furious Hurricane Katrina calmed down after destroying parts of southeastern United States including the states of Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi. However the different dimensions of this incident are still the topic of discussion of political, economic and scientific circles. Hurricane Katrina began on Aug. 25 and reached New Orleans 4 days later. A few days later, after the hurricane subsided, the dimensions of the catastrophe were gradually revealed. Based on estimates, up to now more than 10 thousands people have been killed, half a million have become homeless and 200 billions of dollars of material losses have been inflicted, as a result of the biggest hurricane in the past century in the US.

There have been different analyses regarding hurricane Katrina and its consequences, especially about the US government’s performance that was unable to help the victims on time and reduce the losses and damages by adopting the necessary measures. This big weakness led to the disruption of Washington’s big claims like leading the western world, and trying to dominate the world, for a country that has many facilities, and cannot lead the damages resulting from natural disasters to a minimum, is making empty and baseless claims.

Former US President Bill Clinton says about the country’s weakness in the face of Katrina. The system ruling the US has shown to the world that it is faced with serious problems to create the minimum security and welfare for its own society. On the other hand, Katrina also created a hurricane in the White House. The weak performance of the George W. Bush administration to send relief to the people southeast of this country was faced with wide scale criticism, for the US government was aware that the hurricane was inevitable. The report published by the Federal Agency for Emergency Administration FEMA indicates that this organization was even aware of the coming of this hurricane and its effects in 2004. But the US government did not carry out the necessary measures to help the people and only sufficed to announce that there was danger. Until 4 days after the hurricane inflicted all these damages on the people, houses and installations, government aid had not yet reached the survivors. This was while 80% of the city of New Orleans with a population of 1.5 million was beneath water and some of these regions were damaged up to 90%. Late and weak relief to the victims of Hurricane Katrina strongly reduced Bush’s popularity among the American people. Based on an opinion poll, 65% of Americans voiced their hatred toward the way bush had administered the case and considered him incompetent. Many politicians including some Democrats and many renowned US artists criticized the US governments’ incompetence in managing the catastrophe. Dr Stephen Zunes, a Professor of political science in the US regarding one of the reasons for the lack of aid to the victims says, Bush has not appointed the head of FEMA due to his experience and record in this task, rather he was appointed because he supported Bush in the elections.

The US government’s incapability in managing a natural disaster comes while Washington has on many occasions accused other governments of negligence in such cases. This is while experts believe that the majority of governments have acted better than the US government in confronting natural disasters. Early this summer a strong hurricane hit Cuba. But the Cuban government with a quick organization evacuated 1.7 million people in the threatened regions on time. But the US government with all its facilities was unable to carry out a similar task. However, what has intensified criticism toward the White House’s inability in sending relief to the crisis stricken area, is the huge amount of military forces with huge costs that have been sent to Iraq, for the people now feel that Bush and the other white house war mongers instead of spending the country’s budget on the development and welfare sectors, are spending this money on the military sector and on attacking other countries. Bush in order to provide the costs for the Iraq war reduced the necessary budget for confronting unpredictable disasters. He strongly reduced the budget for repairing the levees of New Orleans. The US has spent 300 billion dollars on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and now according to research by the US center for political research and US foreign policy, it is paying 5.4 billion dollars a month for continuing to occupy Iraq.

After the hurricane televised reports showed angry and suffering people chanting: Leave Iraq and help your own country’s people. The Daily Mile newspaper wrote, the US is the same superpower that toppled a dictator in Iraq but is has become so entangled in the consequences of the war in Iraq that it is not able to confront the problems of tens of thousands of its own people that have been afflicted with a natural disaster. On the other hand, many experts believe that the racial discrimination in the US is also seen in the Katrina incident. The majority of the residents of the crisis-hit city of New Orleans are African Americans and these experts believe that one of the reasons for the delay in relief for the victims was that they were black. Relief forces and police also had rude and violent behavior toward the hurricane victims. One of the phenomena that took place after the Katrina hurricane was the looting of houses, shops and even hospitals by armed individuals. One of the commanders of the coast guard in New Orleans says in this regard, today an armed house war has begun in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama between the police and the people and the situation in the city of New Orleans is chaotic. Sociologists believe that this behavior by a group of people reveals the inner layers of the US society .

Today due to the extension of modern technological life and extension of violence and interest -seeking the people do not have the necessary feelings and solidarity toward each other. This was seen in the form of looting and confronting relief workers during the Katrina hurricane. The point that has not remained hidden to experts is that the US government has an indirect role in the emergence of such incidents, for phenomena such as hurricane Katrina are the results of changes in the earth’s atmosphere one of the reasons of which is the increase of greenhouse gases and the widening of the hole in the ozone layer. A few years ago industrial countries by signing the Kyoto Environmental Protocol promised to reduce the production of greenhouse gases but the US that produces 25% of such gases in the world refrained from signing the protocol on the pretext that its economy would be damaged. At any rate although incidents like Katrina, might be very detrimental, they are warnings and they teach us that the world with all its beauties is not eternal. Thus, one must not get too proud about his power and facilities, and no one is immune from the harms of the world. US President George W. Bush also admitted to his shortcomings, and said we became ashamed in the face of natural forces.

Winds of Change

The following article has appeared on the editorial of the Daily Camera newspaper.

As the devastating, tragic consequences of Hurricane Katrina continue to spread out along the Mexico Gulf Coast, the magnitude of America's misplaced priorities becomes ever more apparent. It would hardly be unwarranted to turn this disaster into a matter of partisan politics. Certainly, the party in power will have plenty to answer for even after toxic waters are pumped away and images of a Third World America slip off the front pages. But all of Americans in this supposed democracy bear some responsibility for the misguided policies that have left perhaps thousands dead, a historic city in chaos and ruins, and American people exposed as a place where poverty, racial inequality and dangerous environmental destruction are allowed to grow.

When American leaders decided that massive tax cuts for the wealthy took priority over their collective responsibility to the poor, they stretched the canvas for the scenes of heartrending desperation in drowned New Orleans. For the most part, those who stayed behind had no other option, no car, no place to go.

When the U.S. leaders launched an optional war 8,000 miles away from American shores, draining billions of dollars from domestic needs, they said "come here" to disasters like Katrina.

When thousands of the U.S. National Guard members, whose primary responsibility is to protect citizens within the borders, were sent to Iraq to an illegal war, American governors have left Americans vulnerable right here.

When the U.S. leaders cut federal funds for disaster preparation, including money to shore up levees in New Orleans that experts told American citizens would fail in a big hurricane, they signed on the dotted line for suffering.

Allowing politics and greed, destroy wetlands for development has left the Mississippi Delta more exposed to hurricane.

American people in accordance with their democracy, have elected political leaders of the U.S who set their priorities. But now, Americans must take responsibility for changing their leaders or their priorities.

The next disaster will not look precisely like Sept. 11 attacks or Hurricane Katrina; American people need to muster the will to pay for a flexible, responsive and more humane system for the future. Americans can no longer neglect the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which the Bush administration pushed into Homeland Security and ignored. American Federal, state and local governments must have the resources to devise effective emergency plans for every emergency. Even the U.S. president has grimly acknowledged that the government's response to Katrina has been fatally slow and inadequate.

Keep the National Guard at home, where it belongs. If American armed forces are overstretched, the most obvious solution is to stop shipping them off to extended, illegal and unnecessary wars. If American people can't manage that, then let's expand them. And if Americans can't find enough volunteers, then it's time for a draft, with no exceptions for the privileged.

American vision of "homeland security" cannot be dominated by 20th-century military "solutions" to what as viewed by the U.S. leaders as terrorism.

How to pay for all this? Protest Bush administration. Abolish the destructive Bush tax cuts and stop running America like a country club for the neo-con wealthy.

Will any of this happen? Americans dare not hope. On the other hand, Katrina just might begin to correct the political myopia that has now exposed Americans to the world as anything but enlightened, sympathetic or compassionate.

Katrina's Assault on Washington

New York Times

Do not be misled by the U.S. Congress's approval of 10.5 billion dollars in relief for the Hurricane Katrina victims. That's prompted by the graphic shock of the news coverage from New Orleans and the region, where the devastation catapults daily, in heartbreaking contrast with the U.S. reports of government.

There are dozens of questions Americans will demand to have answered once this emergency has passed. If the U.S. Homeland Security Department was so ill prepared for a natural disaster that everyone knew was coming, how is it equipped to handle other kinds of crises? Has the war in Iraq drained the nation of resources that it needs for things like flood prevention? Is the National Guard ready to handle a disaster that might be even worse?

One thing is certain: if President Bush and his Republican Congressional leaders want to deal responsibly with a historic disaster of this scale, they must finally try the path of honestly shared national sacrifice. If they respond by passing a few emergency measures and then falling back on their plans to enact more tax cuts, America will have to confront the fact that it is stuck with leaders who neither know, nor care, how to lead.

The pre-Katrina plan for American Congressional season was to enact more upper-bracket tax cuts for the least needy, while cutting into the safety-net programs for sick and impoverished Americans. Will Congress dare to go forward with these unjust plans in the face of the suffering from Katrina? Its woeful track record suggests that, shockingly, the answer may be yes.

American political leaders are set to mandate billions in Medicaid and antipoverty cuts this month, while the U.S. Senate is poised to try again to repeal the estate tax, a monumental folly that will deprive the deficit-ridden government of an estimated 750 billion dollars in vital revenue in the first decade. The theory is that over the long run, the missing money will "starve the beast" and force Washington to make huge cuts in federal programs. The public has never bought this, but as long as the economy held up, it was willing to ignore the long-term implications. That can't be the case now, when those implications are sitting in filthy refugee centers, when the streets of New Orleans are under water and when the nation must take care of hundreds of thousands of homeless people. Yet President Bush has still managed to repeat his no-taxes song.

Senator Mary Landrieu, the Louisiana Democrat, is now fighting for every available dollar to restore her state. Republicans had been wooing Ms. Landrieu as a possible supporter of the estate tax repeal.

Washington's inspiration must now be the individual rescuers in New Orleans, who have labored so bravely and selflessly, as well as the charitable deeds of local and state governments.

American Congress and the U.S. president had better get the message: an extraordinary time is upon the American nation. The destruction in New Orleans is an undeniable sign that the national tax-cut party is over. So is the idea that American voters cannot be required to accept sacrifice or trouble, no matter how great the crisis. A

ns

Sept. 11 An Inside Job

A former chief economist in the Labor Department during President George W. Bush's first term now believes the official story about the collapse of the 110-storey twin towers of the World Trade Centre in New York on September 11, 2001 is 'bogus', saying it is more likely that a controlled demolition destroyed the Twin Towers and adjacent Building No. 7. According to Morgan Reynolds, Ph.D., a former member of the Bush team who also served as director of the Criminal Justice Center at the National Center for Policy Analysis headquartered in Dallas, TX: "If demolition destroyed three steel skyscrapers at the World Trade Center on 9/11, then the case for an 'inside job' and a government attack on America would be compelling." Reynolds who is now a professor at Texas A&M University, also believes it's 'next to impossible' that the supposed 19 Arab terrorists outfoxed the mighty U.S. military. He added that the scientific conclusions about the WTC collapse may hold the key to the entire mysterious plot behind 9/11.

"It is hard to exaggerate the importance of a scientific debate over the cause(s) of the collapse of the twin towers and building 7," Reynolds raised the question asking: "If the official wisdom on the collapses is wrong, as I believe it is, then policy based on such erroneous engineering analysis is not likely to be correct either. The US government's collapse theory is highly vulnerable on its own terms. Only professional demolition appears to account for the full range of facts associated with the collapse of the three buildings.

"More importantly, momentous political and social consequences would follow if impartial observers concluded that professionals imploded the World Trade Cenre.

Morgan Reynolds further states: "Getting it right in today's security state" remains challenging because American explosives and structural experts have been intimidated in their analyses of the collapses of 9/11. From the beginning, the Bush administration claimed that burning jet fuel caused the collapse of the towers. Although many independent investigators have disagreed, they have been hard-pressed to disprove the government theory since most of the evidence was removed by FEMA prior to independent investigation. Critics say the Bush administration has tried to cover up the evidence and the recent 9/11 Commission has failed to address the major evidence contradicting the official version of 9/11. Some facts demonstrating the flaws in the government jet fuel theory include:

-- Photos showing people walking around in the hole in the North Tower where 10,000 gallons of jet fuel supposedly was burning.

-- When the South Tower was hit, most of the North Tower's flames had already vanished, burning for only 16 minutes, making it relatively easy to contain and control without a total collapse.

-- The fire did not grow over time, probably because it quickly ran out of fuel and was suffocating, indicating without added explosive devices the fires could have been easily controlled.

-- New York fire fighters still remain under a tight government gag order to not discuss the explosions they heard, felt and saw. -- Even the flawed 9/11 Commission Report acknowledges that "none of the fire chiefs present believed that a total collapse of either tower was possible."

-- Fire had never before caused steel-frame buildings to collapse except for the three buildings on 9/11, nor has fire collapsed any steel high rise since 9/11.

-- The fires, especially in the South Tower and WTC-7, were relatively small.

-- WTC-7 was unharmed by an airplane and had only minor fires on the seventh and twelfth floors of this 47-story steel building yet it collapsed in less than 10 seconds.

-- WTC-5 and WTC-6 had raging fires but did not collapse despite much thinner steel beams.

-- In a PBS documentary, Larry Silverstein, the WTC leaseholder, told the fire department commander on 9/11 about WTC-7 that "maybe the smartest thing to do is pull it", slang for demolish it.

-- It's difficult if not impossible for hydrocarbon fires like those fed by jet fuel (kerosene) to raise the temperature of steel close to melting.

Despite the numerous holes in the government story, the Bush administration has basically ignored any and all critics. Mainstream experts, speaking for the administration, offer a theory essentially arguing that an airplane impact weakened each structure and an intense fire thermally weakened structural components, causing buckling failures while allowing the upper floors to pancake onto the floors below. There is no hard evidence to fully substantiate the official theory since the structural steel was quickly removed before it could be analyzed. Even though the criminal code requires that crime scene evidence be kept for forensic analysis, the government had it destroyed or shipped overseas before a serious investigation could take place. And even more doubt is cast over why the Bush Administration acted so swiftly, since coincidentally officials had arrived the day before the 9/11 attacks at New York's Pier 29 to conduct a war game exercise, named "Tripod II". Besides the quick removal of the debris, authorities considered the steel quite valuable as New York City officials had every debris truck tracked on GPS and even fired one truck driver who took an unauthorized lunch break.

In a detailed analysis just released supporting the controlled demolition theory, Reynolds presents a compelling case. He points out that “first, no steel-framed skyscraper, even engulfed in flames hour after hour, had ever collapsed before. Suddenly, three stunning collapses occur within a few city blocks on the same day, two allegedly hit by aircraft, the third not. These extraordinary collapses after short-duration minor fires made it all the more important to preserve the evidence, mostly steel girders, to study what had happened. After considering both sides of the 9/11 debate and after thoroughly sifting through all the available material, Reynolds concludes the government story regarding all four plane crashes on 9/11 remains highly suspect. "In fact, the government has failed to produce significant wreckage from any of the four alleged airliners that fateful day. The familiar photo of the Flight 93 crash site in Pennsylvania shows no fuselage, engine or anything recognizable as a plane, just a smoking hole in the ground," said Reynolds.

"Photographers reportedly were not allowed near the hole. Neither the FBI nor the National Transportation Safety Board have investigated or produced any report on the alleged airliner crashes."

The Questions a Shocked America Is Asking Its President

Recent phenamonenal catastrophe in New Orleans has popped up some questions to the minds of American people. Rupert Cornwell, Washington Correspondent of the British daily “Independent” Washington correspondent has published the questions with brief answers following.

The first question is: Why has it taken US President, George W. Bush, five days to get to New Orleans?

Because, President Bush was on holiday in Texas when Katrina struck. He then spent Monday on a pre-arranged political fundraising tour of California and Arizona, which he did not cancel or curtail. He surveyed the hurricane damage, but only from the flight deck of Air Force One, prompting criticism that he was too detached from the suffering on the ground. He didn't give a speech until 36 hours after the storm first hit, and he didn't embark on a proper tour of the region until then. Key advisers of Bush have come under fire for similar levels of detachment. As the full magnitude of the disaster unfolded, the US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, was seen buying shoes in New York, and Dick Cheney remained on holiday.

The second question is: How could the so-called world's superpower be so slow in rescuing its own people?

The answer is: It will probably take months, even years, to answer that question. But there are a few factors to consider such as: first, the federal government's disaster relief agency, FEMA, has lost considerable clout because it was submitted to the Department of Homeland Security that its priority has been international counter-terrorism; although it was not so much successful on that. The second reason in slowing the rescue operation is that the US Homeland Security Director, Michael Chertoff, has no experience in disaster relief; and the third factor is because of FEMA's low profile, almost no contingency measures were taken before Katrina struck; another factor is: the under-resourced local Army Corps of Engineers appeared completely unprepared to conduct emergency operations after the levees were breached; and finally, nobody appears to have considered the communications problems inherent in loss of phone and cell-phone service.

Another question asked by Americans is: Why did George W. Bush cut funding for flood control and emergency management?

This is another question likely to be the subject of official investigations. Local and former federal officials are in little doubt that the budgetary priorities of Iraq, tax cuts and the so-called "war on terror" are to blame. Disaster prevention experts have been studying New Orleans for years and urging upgrades to its levees and other preventive measures. The US Army Corps of Engineers was supposed to carry out some of this work last year, but its funding was cut. It seems that the Bush administration considered the risk of malicious human attack and the risk of the ravages of nature, and found itself incapable of holding both ideas in its head.

And, Why did it take so long to send adequate National Guard forces to keep law and order?

The simple answer is: The National Guard is under pressure in every US state because of the strains of deployment in Iraq. More than one-third of Louisiana's 10,000 guardsmen are either in Iraq or Afghanistan.No mass deployment of guardsmen from other states is being contemplated because they are all needed in Iraq too. At first, only 3,000 guardsmen were sent to New Orleans, but that was increased to about 10,000 as looting and gun violence became widespread.

Another question regarding the lack of preparedness by the Bush government to tackle the Katrina is: How can the US take Iraq, a country of 25 million people, in three weeks but fail to rescue 25,000 of its own citizens from a sports arena in a big American city?

Simply the probable answer could be: America's obsession with maintaining its pre-eminent position as the world's largest superpower means it is incapable of responding swiftly and effectively to a humanitarian crisis. While it has the firepower for fighting wars, it does not have the leadership and skills to combat natural disaster.

Hurricane Katrina and the War in Iraq

Much of the criticism against the Bush Administration thus far has focused on the failure of authorities to evacuate the tens of thousands of low-income residents in New Orleans who lacked the means to leave for higher ground inland and the slowness and inefficiency of the federal response following the burst of the levees protecting the city, much of which lies below sea level.

Some have noted the growing evidence that the increase in recent years in the frequency of such mega-hurricanes as Katrina is a result of global warming. The Bush administration has aggressively undermined international efforts to forcefully address such potentially catastrophic changes in the world's climate. These changes are due to carbon dioxide emissions in the United States and other industrialized nations.

It also appears that the Bush administration's decision to undercut the authority of the Federal Emergency Management Agency or FEMA, a once-independent unit of government, by subsuming it into the Department of Homeland Security limited FEMA's ability to better prepare for the long-predicted scenario. The Department of Homeland Security has over-emphasized on the threat from international terrorism, as a result of which it neglected disastrous flooding resulting from a major hurricane striking New Orleans.

The decision by the Bush administration has most directly contributed to the Iraq war. It has cost the federal government more than 200 billion dollars thus far, resulting in cutbacks in a number of emergency preparedness projects. It appeared to have lessened the ability of Louisiana authorities to cope with the hurricane, including providing charter busses to complete the evacuation of the city before the storm struck.

Furthermore, Walter Maestri, the Emergency Management Chief for Jefferson Parish, which includes New Orleans' western suburbs, noted in June of last year that anticipated funding to strengthen the levees had been diverted to pay for the war. Indeed, federal assistance to the Southeast Louisiana Flood Control Project dropped disastrously following the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Also contributing to the violent killing is the fact that at least 35 percent of the Louisiana National Guard, long serving as the front line in hurricane relief efforts, have been unable to respond to the crisis because they are far away in Iraq. The numbers that could have been on the ground participating in relief operations have been reduced further as a result of the dramatic drop in recruitment over the past two years. Hundreds of men and women who would have otherwise enlisted or re-enlisted in the National Guard have failed to do so due to the prospect of being sent to fight in Iraq.

Perhaps even more significant reason behind the government in efficieany to tackle the problem, has been the absence of equipment critical for emergency responses. WGNO-TV, the ABC affiliate in New Orleans, reported on August 1 that "Dozens of high water vehicles, humvees, refuelers and generators are now abroad." It warned that "in the event of a major natural disaster, that could be a problem." They interviewed Lieutenant Colonel Pete Schneider of the Louisiana National Guard, who observed that "The National Guard needs that equipment back home."

As a result of the absence of these high water vehicles and other equipment which could have been used in the aftermath of the flooding, it appears that many hundreds of people died while waiting to be rescued. Even Thomas Donnelly of the Neo-Conservative “American Enterprise Institute” observed that "This is what happens when you take Guardsmen and put them on the conveyor belt into Iraq."

In neighboring Mississippi, which took the brunt of the hurricane's 145-mile per hour winds and twenty-foot storm surge, 4000 members of the state's National Guard, a full 40 percent of its total troop strength, are currently in Iraq. “The Washington Post” daily quoted Lieutenant Andy Thaggard, a Mississippi National Guard Spokesman, as saying, "Missing personnel is the big thing in this particular event; we need our people."

Louisiana's 256th Infantry Brigade and Mississippi's 155th Armored Brigade, both of which are currently in Iraq, include engineering and support battalions specializing in disaster relief.

US President, George W. Bush's priorities were apparent the day after the hurricane struck the Gulf coast. Rather than immediately returning to Washington to coordinate the federal response, he flew out to San Diego to give a major speech where he avoided mentioning the unfolding tragedy. He, instead, focused upon rationalizing for his war in Iraq, comparing it to the struggle against the Axis powers in World War II.

American public disillusioned by the failure of its elected leadership, are themselves providing shelter for those fleeing the devastated areas, and making financial contributions to relief efforts and other measures. However, this laudable energy must also be focused on holding accountable the politicians of both parties, who out of their eagerness to invade an oil-rich country on the other side of the globe, allowed so many of their fellow Americans to suffer and die needlessly.

Washington to be Sued Over Global Warming

A lawsuit charging US federal agencies of funding multibillion-dollar projects for oil and gas development overseas without regard for their impact on global warming has the green light from a federal judge in San Francisco who rejected the Bush administration's attempt to derail it. Bob Egelko, the Sanfancisco Chronicle Staff Writer and legal correspondent has reported on the case. Excerpt of this report is as folloews:

An attorney for the plaintiffs, who include two environmental groups and the city of Oakland, said that the ruling was the first in the nation to allow private citizens to sue over the harm caused by industrial projects that contribute to climate change.

The Lawyer, Ronald Shems said: The goal of the suit is to get the federal agencies, the Overseas Private Investment Corp. and the Export-Import Bank, whose directors are appointed by the US president, to fund "more alternative energy projects, more conservation measures, as opposed to fossil fuel.''

The suit, filed in 2002, seeks to require the Overseas Private Investment Corp. and the Export-Import Bank to conduct environmental studies of the fossil-fuel projects they bankroll. Under federal law, such studies must include any available measures to reduce environmental damage.

The two agencies and the US Justice Department, which represented them in court, declined to comment on the ruling.

The lawsuit says: "Financing for oil and gas development, including power plants, oilfields and pipelines, totaled 32 billion dollars in the 10-year period ending in 2002. It said those projects were responsible for more than 2.1 billion tons of carbon dioxide and methane emissions each year, nearly 8 percent of the world total, and one-third of the U.S. domestic total.

Leading scientists agree that these so-called greenhouse gases are the chief contributors to global warming that endangers the environment and human health; this is while US President, George W. Bush has opposed regulation, saying more study is needed.

The suit was filed by the cities of Oakland, Arcata Humboldt County, Santa Monica and Boulder, Colo., along with Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth. The suit outlines the threats that global warming poses to the four city plaintiffs and to private citizens like the members of the environmental groups. In Oakland's case, the suit said, increased temperatures would endanger the water supply, harm air quality, worsen fire risk and flood low- lying areas, including Oakland International Airport.

The agencies, the Overseas Private Investment Corp. and the Export-Import Bank, denied in court filings that their projects had a significant effect on the environment. In seeking to dismiss the suit, they argued that the plaintiffs could not show they were likely to be harmed by any decision either agency made.

But U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White ruled that, if the plaintiffs could prove their claims, they were likely to show that the overseas energy projects were having such an effect on the climate that private citizens in the United States would suffer harm.

District Judge, Jeffrey White, who is a Bush appointee said: The evidence "is sufficient to demonstrate it is reasonably probable that emissions from projects supported by the two agencies will threaten plaintiffs' concrete interests.'' He also ruled that the agencies were covered by the federal law that requires an agency to prepare a formal study, with public input, of any project it approves that is likely to have a significant effect on the environment.

Ronald Shems, the plaintiffs' attorney, says: The ruling allowed his clients to try to prove that climate change was a reasonable concern for the agencies in considering overseas projects.

Referring to the plaintiffs, Kert Davies research Director of Greenpeace, said that the case illustrated the fact that global warming pollution should not recognize political borders. Meantime, Oakland Mayor Jerry Brown, who supported the lawsuit, said in a statement that the federal government's violation of environmental law "injures the citizens of Oakland, and every person in this country.'' The Overseas Private Investment Corp. did not immediately return calls seeking comment.

Brown, a former California Governor, said: "Bush is only going to be around for a couple more years, and the evidence of global warming has grown; these agencies should act on their own. This issue is recognized by scientists and world leaders."

Carbon dioxide gas from fossil fuel use has warmed the atmosphere, causing storms, droughts, floods, rising sea levels and other environmental mayhem, environmentalists argued in court paperwork. This is while, the US President, a former oilman, has expressed scepticism about global warming and refused to sign the Kyoto Accord on climate change endorsed by the European Union.

The Incredibly Shrinking President

Summer, especially August, has not been good to the U.S. commander-in-chief. While on a 35-day vacation in Crawford he was unable to find time to meet with Cindy Sheehan, the mother of Casey Sheehan, a soldier killed in Iraq. His refusal to meet Ms. Sheehan diminished him, showing weakness and insecurity on his part. This has raised a host of questions. Is the U.S. commander- in chief unable to defend his Iraq occupation policy to the family members of the deceased families? Is he unable to hear the perspective of a mother who lost her child to his war? Kevin Zeese, of “Democracy Rising, US”, has put the issue in plain words.

Public opinion is turning dramatically against the U.S President; casualties are rising rapidly, and President Bush is facing divisions in his own administration. Republican members of Congress are meeting behind closed doors to discuss how to get out of Iraq and anti-war Democrats are becoming more outspoken and more organized. In Iraq, polling shows that a majority of Iraqis want the U.S. to leave and even members of Iraq's National Assembly have called for the U.S. to depart.

Leadership in the U.S. Department of Defense struck a discordant note with the President when General George Casey, the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq hinted at “substantial reductions” in U.S. troops next year. At the same time the media reported on a “detailed plan” produced by the Pentagon to cut U.S. troops by two-thirds by the end of 2006. As a result of this discord, the U.S. President, who has consistently claimed that the generals will determine the level of troops in Iraq, had to step in and rebuke General Casey that there were no plans for withdrawal.

The Bush Administration showed confusion within the White House when ‘The Washington Post’ reported that: According to U.S. officials in Washington and Baghdad the Administration was “significantly lowering expectations of what can be achieved in Iraq, recognizing that the United States will have to settle for far less progress than originally envisioned.” Thus, the claim of bringing democracy to Iraq may dissipate just as the search for weapons of mass destruction disappeared.

An official report acknowledged that Iraq is worse off after the U.S. invasion, with the oil industry ruining, electricity black-outs for days at a time, very high levels of unemployment, shortage of filtered water, fears of kidnappings and humiliations and some other problematic issues concerning the civilians. As a result, some in the Bush Administration seem to be beginning to face a reality, that is: the failure of the U.S. occupation of Iraq.

Politics at home, in the U.S, seem to be playing a role in the confusion. Republican support for the President is starting to show significant cracks. Not reported in the media, is that a cadre of Republican legislators in the House of Representatives has been meeting regularly to discuss how to get out of Iraq. No doubt through back channels the Bush Administration is hearing from these Republicans. If this group decides to go public, momentum against the war could escalate significantly.

Even in the US Senate, three leading Republican Senators, John McCain, John Warner and Lindsay Graham, are reportedly upsetting the White House with legislation that would prohibit cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment of detainees in US custody. Vice President, Dick Cheney has tried to convince the senators that the amendment undermines the President’s ability to fight what he views as terrorism. The Republican Senator, Lindsay Graham released internal memoranda from the Department of Defense lawyers concluding that “extreme interrogation techniques, on their face, amount to violations of domestic criminal law as well as military law.” Another Republican Senator, John McCain has released statements of retired officers, including prisoners of war, that claim the interrogation techniques put U.S. soldiers at risk. Elsewhere, on the Senate floor, when challenged Senator Jeff Sessions claimed that “they are terrorists”, Senator John McCain responded that: “This is not about who they are. It's about who we are.”

With similar types of divides among Republicans more than a year away from the 2006 elections, the Administration must be concerned about where its support will be as the election draws near. The Newsweek findings shows that: The US President’s approval rating is dropping in a way that only a quarter of Americans support his handling of the war. Members of Congress facing re-election will be uncomfortable standing by an unpopular, lame duck President.

As the Nation Magazine reports: “About 70 percent of Americans want US troops brought home within the next year.” The Washington Post quoting the bereaved families said: their comments were not just those of grieving parents. They were based on anger, not grief. Anger was an honest emotion when someone's family had been broken.

Iraq war parents have good reasons to feel that the honour of their families have been “violated” by the Bush administration. It has become more and more evident that President Bush misled the nation and the Congress in order to invade Iraq and remake the US failing economy to the liking of U.S. corporate interests.

George W. Bush’s leadership after this deception shows failure as commander-in-chief. The torture scandals, killing of civilians and corruption of huge funds earmarked for alleged “reconstruction” in Iraq are glaring evidences in this regard. Even the basic needs of soldiers are not being met; the U.S. is still struggling to get soldier’s armor that will protect them from deadly attacks. This month, The New York Times reported that the US Department of Defense acknowledged that it would take “several more months or longer to complete” the supplying of soldiers with body armor. This is not good news for American soldiers facing up to 70 attacks each day.

Reports of incompetent leadership come at the same time as deaths in Iraq are spiking, with 60 deaths of US soldiers in the first 16 days of August. The National Guard and Reserve suffered more combat deaths in the first 16 days of August than in any month, at least 38. This death toll is showing itself in news reporting and increasing the voice of the anti-war movement. According to the editors and publishers of newspapers around the country, with the U.S. death toll in Iraq again soaring, coverage of the antiwar sentiments of family members of the deceased during is increasing.

Perhaps it is time for the American President to honestly consider the question Cindy Sheehan is asking: “How many more of our loved ones need to die in this senseless war?”

Destroyer of Worlds

After the first test of an atomic bomb in July 1945 at the Trinity Site in New Mexico, Manhattan Project Director Robert Oppenheimer described the event by quoting from the Hindu religious book Bhaghavad-Gita, saying, “I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.” This is something to reflect upon, especially today, since it is the sixtieth anniversary of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki. Where is humanity 60 years into the Nuclear Age? Paradoxically, many people both fear nuclear war and believe their countries’ must possess nuclear weapons to defend themselves. In the 2005 Hiroshima Peace Declaration, delivered, the 60^th anniversary of the atomic bombing of that city, Hiroshima Mayor Tadatoshi Akiba criticized nuclear weapons states for opposing calls for complete nuclear disarmament and encouraging trust in the bomb, saying, “Based on the dogma ‘Might is right’, these countries have formed their own ‘nuclear club’, the admission requirement being possession of nuclear weapons. Through the media, they have long repeated the incantation, ‘Nuclear weapons protect you.’” The hibakusha or atomic attack survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and their allies around the world are calling for total nuclear disarmament as mentioned in the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Article 6 of the NPT states: “Each of the Parties to the Treaty undertakes to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament, and on a treaty on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control.” Elsewhere in the Peace Declaration, the mayor of Hiroshima said that a consensus and harmony on the abolition of nuclear weapons and the realization of genuine world peace was taking hold all over the world, adding, “The keynote of this harmony is the hibakusha warning, ‘No one else should ever suffer as we did’, along with the cornerstone of all religions and bodies of law: Thou shalt not kill. Our sacred duty to future generations is to establish this axiom, especially its corollary, ‘Thou shalt not kill children’, as the highest priority for the human race across all nations and religions.”

There are seven declared nuclear weapons states, the US, Russia, Britain, France, China, India, and Pakistan. The Zionist entity called Israel, which has never declared its nuclear status, is the eighth member of the nuclear weapons club. North Korea has also declared that it possesses nuclear weapons, but its claim has not been conclusively confirmed. The US, Russia, Britain, France and China are also veto-wielding permanent members of the UN Security Council and official nuclear weapons states according to the NPT. This means that they do not have to commit themselves to immediate nuclear disarmament and can set the tone of the non-proliferation debate. The US and Russia both possess ICBM MIRVE, which in plain English means they have Inter-Continental Ballistic Missiles with Multiple Independently Targetable Reentry Vehicles Armed with Nuclear Weapons that can hit anywhere on Earth in about 25 minutes.

According to many scientists, the detonation of 7000 nuclear weapons would spread so much radioactive fallout throughout the world that it would kill every human being on Earth and would perhaps kill almost all life on the planet. In the 1970s, the US and the Soviet Union each possessed about 25,000 nuclear weapons. This means that their combined nuclear arsenals could have destroyed the world seven times. They have reportedly reduced their nuclear arsenals. Today, the US has approximately 10,600 nuclear warheads and Russia has about 20,000, so now they can only destroy the world about four times.

Some scientists say the detonation of 400 nuclear weapons would trigger a nuclear winter. In the nuclear winter scenario, hundreds of nuclear explosions would set off firestorms in targeted cities and adjacent forests, sending several hundred million tons of smoke, soot, and dust into the atmosphere that would form clouds that would screen out most sunlight for several weeks. This would in turn cause a sudden drop in temperature and interrupt plant photosynthesis, which would destroy crops and cause food shortages and starvation. Surface temperatures would plunge for a few weeks, perhaps by as much as 11° to 22° C. The study set a threshold of 1000 nuclear explosions for nuclear winter to occur. Other scientists have said that a limited nuclear exchange would only cause a nuclear autumn, but that would also damage crops and cause food shortages. In addition, studies in the 1970s showed that the ozone layer that shields living things from much of the sun's harmful ultraviolet radiation could be depleted by the large amounts of nitrogen oxides produced by hundreds of nuclear explosions. Depleted uranium weapons have been used by the US military in Iraq, Afghanistan, Bosnia, Kosovo, and Serbia. These weapons cause genetic damage, birth defects, cancer, immune system damage, and other serious health problems and are probably the cause of the Persian Gulf War syndrome. In Iraq physicians have documented a 3-fold increase in childhood cancers and a fivefold increase in birth defects since 1990. The US military used depleted uranium weapons in that country for the first time in 1991. US forces used these weapons in Iraq again in 2003 and are probably still using them. There were reports of the use these weapons during the assault on Fallujah.

After the Chernobyl nuclear accident in 1986 in what is now Ukraine, over 116,000 people were permanently evacuated from the area. Zones of Exclusion were set up, including the towns of Pripyat and Chernobyl, which were declared unfit for human habitation due to the high levels of radioactivity. It is believed that the area is so contaminated that it will not be safe for people to live there for at least 100,000 years. In a violation of the letter and spirit of the NPT, the US government is currently making plans to develop a new generation of smaller tactical nuclear weapons, dubbed mini-nukes. In addition, US officials have recently begun using expressions like ‘full spectrum dominance’ and the US Space Command is talking about putting nuclear weapons in space. Obviously, China and Russia are becoming extremely concerned. Due to this irresponsible nuclear brinkmanship, there is now the possibility of an arms race in space. The nuclear waste generated by both civilian and military nuclear programs is also a major problem. The US is planning to establish a permanent nuclear waste dump that will be radioactive for hundreds of thousands of years. So, where is humanity 60 years into the Nuclear Age, and where are we going?

Americans Are Finally Waking Up to the Failure of U.S. Policy in Iraq

The following remarks expressed by Ivan Eland a Senior Fellow at The Independent Institute’s Center for Peace & Liberty.

Although the American people slept through the superficial national debate about whether the Bush administration should invade Iraq and the post-invasion storage of justifications for doing so, the public is finally waking up to the nightmare of U.S. policy in Iraq.

A recent New York Times poll shows how low support for the Bush administration’s adventure in Iraq has sunk. Sixty percent of the American public thinks that the U.S. claim to bring stability to Iraq is going badly, fifty-nine percent disapprove of the way President George Bush is handling the situation, and 51 percent now believe that the United States should have stayed out of Iraq in the first place. All of these measures of support for the war effort have gradually deteriorated over time and can be expected to decline further as the carnage continues

This erosion of support has emboldened some thinking members of the U.S. Congress to propose a resolution calling for president Bush to begin withdrawing U.S. forces from Iraq by October 1, 2006. The sponsors of the resolution come from across the political spectrum, including a liberal, a moderate, a conservative, and a libertarian. Although the resolution does not specify a date for the completion of the draw down, it is a long overdue exercise of Congress’s underused constitutional role of determining whether, when, and where U.S. forces are in harm’s way around the world. The last time Congress flexed its muscles and ended an unnecessary Executive Branch–initiated quagmire was the termination of funding for the Vietnam War. Since then, a cowed Congress has blindly gone along with many ill-advised presidential wars.

Nancy Pelosi, the House Minority Leader, unsuccessfully attempted to introduce a measure that would require the Bush administration to give Congress criteria for determining when U.S. troops could be pulled out of Iraq. More and stronger congressional actions to end the war will arise as popular support for the war continues to erode.

Initially, in any military action, the public usually gives the president the benefit of the doubt and members of Congress, even if they think the foreign intervention is unneeded or harebrained, are scared of being labeled “unpatriotic” if they oppose war. But if the United States begins to lose the conflict or is perceived to be doing so, takes too long to win, or experiences too many casualties, the war can quickly become unpopular, as it has in Iraq. Democracies that fight wars that are not critical to their security are always at a disadvantage. Guerrilla movements only need to keep an army in the field and wait until public opinion in the invading country turns against the war. In other words, if the guerrillas don’t lose, they have a good chance of winning.

The Iraqis have ample evidence that the American pubic will eventually react to escalated casualties and illusory victory. In the last three or so decades, the United States not only withdrew from Vietnam, but also left Somalia and Lebanon because of public disapproval of excessive casualties in faraway wars.

The Bush administration is fastening all its hopes in Iraq on the quick establishment of competent Iraqi security forces.

The American people and their congressional representatives are unlikely to wait that long. The administration should at least be honest with itself, if not the people, and realize that the war has been lost. It should follow the proposal of the aforementioned bipartisan congressional group, setting a schedule for withdrawal, and begin negotiations with all Iraqi groups for a comprehensive peace settlement.

Learning Lesson of Vietnam All Over Again

The following remarks expressed by Joseph L. Galloway the Senior Military Correspondent for Knight Ridder Newspapers and Co-Author of the national best seller "We Were Soldiers Once and Young."

After a rousing July 4th holiday weekend, complete with flag-waving, fireworks, assorted burned meat products and a wealth of patriotic speeches, it is time to come back to the harsh realities of this earth and the U.S role in these realities in the fifth year of this new century and new millennium. Anyone who writes critically of the conduct of the war in Iraq is asked, over and over, why American journalists focus on the bad news and never write the good news about that country, its people and American soldiers who are caught in the middle of a very bloody birth of a representative government.

That would be because there is a dearth of good news in Iraq. There are indeed occasional bright spots, like the January election, but soon enough they are pushed to the background by the steady tide of bad news.

The truth is that every time commentators sit down to analyze what is going on in Iraq the results are seriously depressing. Every day American soldiers are killed and wounded trying to install peace in a country where peace has been a scarce commodity for as long as it has existed. Every day even more Iraqis are killed and horribly wounded by the car-bombers, assassins and terrorists who take over towns and regions where there is little or no security.

America is two and a half years into this war in Iraq. When it first began, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and his neo-conservative civilian deputies and advisers were rightly confident in a fast, conventional military victory over Saddam and his army. But they gave no advance thought to the insurgency that they got instead of the liberator's welcome they'd anticipated.

Donald Rumsfeld and his people expected a fast victory, a brief occupation and a withdrawal of American forces beginning three months after the fall of Baghdad. They said it would be cheap and paid for out of Iraq's oil earnings.

The American taxpayers instead have paid a hefty price for this journey into pre-emptive warfare - well in excess of 200 billion dollars to date and increasing at the rate of 5 billion dollars a month - for this nonsense war.

At least Rumsfeld now knows how deep a swamp Iraq has become and recently acknowledged that this struggle, and the American military combat role, could drag on for many years.

American people are better off believing Rumsfeld's analysis of where they are and where they are going and that it could take many years. Still it begs the question whether the U.S secretary of defense really believes that the next president or the American people will continue to provide blank checks for someone else's mistake.

The High Cost of a Rush to Security

US Transportation Security Administration lost control of over 300 million dollars spent by contractor to hire Airport Screeners after 9/11. The details of the money spent in the name of improving security at the nation's airports are contained in a US federal audit that calls into question 303 million dollars of the 741 million dollars spent to assess and hire airport passenger screeners for the newly created Transportation Security Administration after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. The audit, along with interviews with people involved in the passenger-screener contract, paints a rare and detailed portrait of how officials at the Transportation Security Administration or TSA lost control of the spending in the recklessly rush to hire 60,000 screeners to meet a one-year congressional deadline. Washington Post Staff Writers Scott Higham and Robert O'Harrow getting help of researchers Alice Crites and Madonna Lebling’s contribution have prepared the following report on the issue.

The audit, performed by the US Defense Contract Audit Agency at the TSA's request, spotlights scores of expenses such as 20 dollars-an-hour temporary workers billed to the government at 48 dollars per hour, subcontractors who signed out 5,000 dollars in cash at a time with no supporting documents. Among other expenses, the audit referred to 377,273 dollars in unconfirmed long-distance phone calls, 514,201 dollars to rent tents that flooded in a rainstorm, and finally 4.4 million dollars in “no show” fees for job candidates who did not appear for tests.

The audit said that NCS Pearson Incorporation failed to properly justify costs and improperly awarded subcontracts without competitive bidding. The audit also said the company demonstrated a “lack of management or oversight of subcontractors.”

One of The audit, performed by the US Defense Contract Audit Agency’s key revelations is that: a decision to move the hiring process from Pearson's 925 US private assessment centers to 150 hotels and other meeting facilities added at least 343 million dollars to the cost of the contract.

Patrick Cowan, of Denver, who supervised hiring efforts for Pearson at 43 sites in the central part of the country, said: “The hiring of 60,000 screeners was a waste of US taxpayer's money, there was abuse of the taxpayers' trust.”

While the US government officials in the past have hinted at problems with the contract, which rose to 741 million dollars in April 2003 from 104 million dollars in February 2002, the extent of the questionable spending has never been disclosed. Only a few details have emerged in brief congressional testimony and scattered news reports. Government officials have repeatedly denied media requests for access to the audit, which was completed last year and labeled as “For Official Use Only.”

By the way, a copy was obtained independently by The Washington Post Daily.

The audit, performed by the US Defense Contract Audit Agency, refers to internal Pearson reports that sharply criticized the behavior of some of the 168 subcontractors hired to help complete the contract. One Pearson official, referring to a security company hired to provide services, wrote that: “there appeared to be serious fraud occurring.”

Government managers and Pearson executives have long claimed that they performed a “major and historical accomplishment” by replacing an inefficient patchwork of private passenger screeners with a more professional federal workforce. They said they did the best they could under difficult circumstances and spent taxpayer money wisely. But, Did they really do?

Exactly, how the decision to provide private passenger screeners at airports was made, is in dispute. Pearson officials maintain they were given no choice and did not make the decision themselves. To book the hotels, Pearson turned to a company called HelmsBriscoe Incorporation, a travel-and-event coordination firm. Even though Pearson never had a formal contract with the company, HelmsBriscoe became the hotel agent for the passenger-screening hiring effort, taking 10 percent off the top of every room it booked. Of course, the hotels were experiencing low occupancy rates after the September 11, 2001 attacks.

At the Marriott and Millennium hotels, the government was billed 129,621 dollars for long-distance phone calls without any supporting documentation. In addition, the audits found numerous calls that were 25 to 100 dollars per call, which most of them were made in the late hours of the evening to residential numbers after normal work hours that was after 10:00 p.m. This is while only 388.37 dollars of the 3,403 dollars had been in international calls.

Elsewhere, at a Hilton Hotel in Boston, a company called Atent For Rent Incorporation was hired to construct a large tent with cathedral windows in the hotel parking lot, along with two smaller tents. The cost was 514,201 dollars. By the way, the audit said: “when it began to rain, the tents flooded. Workers scrambled to buy sandbags at Home Depot. The work was directed by hotel employees rather than Pearson or its subcontractors. The tent costs at the Hilton Boston Logan Airport and Pearson's payment of them highlights a lack of management oversight by Pearson in controlling costs.”

One of Pearson's security subcontractors was Ambassador Protection Services Incorporation of New York. The company rented six magnetometers at a cost of 475 dollars a day for a total of 125,400 dollars. While, auditors said similar magnetometers could have been purchased for between 2,500 and 6,000 dollars apiece.

Despite months of requests by The Washington Post Daily, including Freedom of Information Act filings, TSA officials continue to withhold the audits. And the auditors concluded that they could not get to the bottom of it.

Why War is all the Rage

The following remarks expressed by Christine Ahn, Director of the U.S. Peace and International Solidarity at the Women of Color Resource Center.

The stories of the 1,640 young U.S. soldiers who have died in Iraq since 2003 are heart wrenching. They came from all over the U.S. They were white, black, Asian and Latino. Some were immigrants, farmers, students and athletes. They shared a dream for their future and their families, as well as a belief that they were serving their country. Along with these U.S. military personnel, almost 100,000 Iraqi civilians are estimated to have died in the Iraq war. American people have spent more than 250 billion, in tax dollars on the fighting and reconstruction. Shameful actions by U.S. soldiers at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo have fueled enormous rage against America.

How did we get here? How did the White House convince so many Americans that military force was its only viable option? By way of explaining, it is worth noting how militarism has crept and permeated into American culture.

Militarism also infiltrates America's high schools and colleges. The No Child Left Behind Act requires high schools to give the names and phone numbers of juniors and seniors to military recruiters, unless parents object in writing. The U.S. military discovers vulnerable recruits through culturally tailored advertisements featuring blacks or Spanish-language sport fields with Latin music. The recruiters prey on students who feel they have no other options: immigrant students trying to get citizenship, seniors lacking credits to graduate and anyone who they can persuade that the Army will train them for the real world.

Militarism seeps into Americans everyday life through fashion as well. The "military look" has influenced civilian clothing for centuries. The problem isn't just that war cloths and war toys are popular for American young people. The problem is that as the symbols of the military filter into daily life, war becomes palatable and natural. American people are deceived to forget that this is the fabric of battlefield uniforms, of bombing, torture, violence and death. They are desensitized to the horror of war, and more inclined to support an aggressive foreign policy. Militarism becomes normalized as everyday life becomes more militarized.

Clark University professor Cynthia Enloe writes, "Militarization is a sneaky sort of transformative process. Sometimes it is only in the pursuit of de- militarization that American people become aware of just how far down the road of complete militarization they have gone. In fact, since the attacks of Sept. 11, publicly criticizing militarization has been widely viewed as an act of disloyalty."

The militarization of U.S. society has grave implications.

Many voters and elected representatives hardly bat an eye over the fact that half the federal discretionary budget funds the military. This will be 438 billion dollars in 2006 -- excluding the costs of action in Iraq and Afghanistan. It is vital that American citizens open their eyes to these realities. They are engaged in a senseless, dreadful war. Far too many American and Iraqi lives have been lost. They must urge their elected officials to replace the war budget with a people's budget that invests in making this nation healthier, better educated and genuinely secure. Americans must believe in and contribute to a global community based on international law, diplomacy and human rights.

US Attempts to Control Caspian Sea Oil

Recently, the Republic of Azerbaijan connected its oil wells in the landlocked Caspian Sea to Turkey’s Black Sea port of Jeyhan via an American blessed oil pipeline that transits some rough terrain in the neighbouring republics, thereby putting an end to Russia’s domination of the Caucasus’ oil exports. The economically unfeasible pipeline actually shifts the loyalties of the Republic of Azerbaijan from Moscow to Washington, although for the moment Azeri President, Elham Aliev, while inaugurating the 1768 km long pipeline, remarked: “Our wishes have come true.” Observers, however, feel there is nothing to celebrate for the Republic of Azerbaijan. The pipeline that originates in Baku on the Caspian Sea passes through the Georgian capital Tbilisi on its way to the Turkish Black Sea port of Ceyhan, and is expected to bring around 50 billion dollars to Azerbaijan in the next 30 years if all goes well, and if the Americans, who are notorious for recycling whatever they spend on oil back to their banks, keep their promise of paltry payments to the Azeris.

The project was launched by an international consortium supervised by the US. The project actually formed a new block made up of Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey in the oil market and all these countries have good relations with Washington.

There have been many oil pipelines passing through Iran and Russia to transfer the Caspian Sea oil, but the Baku-Tbilisi, Ceyhan pipeline is the costliest and longest of all these routes. The project cost about 4 billion dollars and the pipeline goes through the Caucasus’s mountains, which includes commercial hubs such as the Armenian inhabited parts of Azerbaijan and Georgia as well as the Kurdish areas of Turkey.

However, for the main financial supporter of the plan that is the US the project was worth the cost, for the new Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan pipeline has nothing to do with Russia and other key Middle East countries and thus justifies the United States’ presence in this strategic and oil-rich region.

So far most of the Caspian Sea oil was exported through Russia’s Novorossiysk Port to other countries. Now this new pipeline can directly transfer Azerbaijan’s oil to the US and Europe via the Mediterranean Sea.

Head of the Russian Duma’s Foreign Affairs Commission, Konstantin Kossatchiov says: “No doubt, this is a political rather than economic plan. The only objective behind this project was preventing the transfer of the Caspian Sea oil to West via Russia or Iran.”

The Russian official adds: “This pipeline has been laid in very insecure regions and thus provides the US with an excuse to continue its military presence in the region.”

Given the fact that Russia will be a loser in this project, Moscow preferred to focus on the Siberian oil which can be extracted much easier so that it can preserve its Caspian Sea oil reserves for the future generations.

However, the Kremlin expressed its wrath by avoiding sending a representative to the inauguration ceremony.

The only relief for Moscow is the low financial profit of the plan in the coming years. A Russian financial expert, Valerie Nestrov believes: “The Azerbaijan Republic has not such rich oil resources to export 50 million barrels of oil per year in the next 20 years through this new pipeline so as to economically justify this costly project.”

To increase the financial efficiency of the plan, Kazakhstan which enjoys richer oil resources has to increase its share of exports through the Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan pipeline. But this is only possible if Kazakhstan is linked to Baku through another pipeline.

Kazakh President Nour Sultan Nazarbayev in the inaugural ceremony of the Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan pipeline said that his country will make use of the new oil pipeline but reminded the participants that there are other ways for Kazakhstan to export its oil through such countries as Iran and China.

This is Just a Redneck Administration

“If the US government continues to shirk its responsibility, Amnesty International calls on foreign governments to uphold their obligations under international law by investigating all senior US officials involved in the torture scandal.”
These are the words of Doctor William F. Schulz, Executive Director of Amnesty International in the USA regarding investigation of US abuses against detaainees in Iraq and elswhere. A political analyst who writes on international affairs for Inter Press Service, Oneworld.net, and Foreign Policy in Focus.

If the administration of US President, George W. Bush fails to conduct a truly independent investigation of US abuses against detainees in Iraq and elsewhere, foreign governments should investigate and prosecute those senior officials who bear responsibility for them.

Speaking at the release of Amnesty's annual report, the head of the US chapter of Amnesty International William Schulz charged that Washington has become “a leading source and practitioner” of torture and ill-treatment and that its senior officials should face prosecution by other governments for violations of the Geneva Conventions and the U.N. Convention Against Torture.

Among those officials, Mr. Schulz names President Bush, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Douglas Feith, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, former Central Intelligence Agency or CIA director George Tenet, and senior officers at the US detention facilities in Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, and Abu Ghraib Prison in Iraq.

The head of the US Chapter of Amnesty International William Schulz says “If the US government continues to evade its responsibility, Amnesty International calls on foreign governments to uphold their obligations under international law by investigating all senior US officials involved in the torture scandal.” Violations of the torture convention, which has been ratified by the United States and some 138 other countries, can be prosecuted in any jurisdiction.

William Schultz continues: went on saying: “ If those investigations support prosecution, the governments should arrest any official who enters their territory and begin legal proceedings against them; the apparent high-level architects of torture should think twice before planning their next vacation to places like Acapulco or the French Riviera because they may find themselves under arrest as former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet famously did in London in 1998.”

Schulz also calls on state bar associations to investigate administration lawyers who helped prepare legal opinions that sought to justify or defend the use of abusive interrogation methods for breach of their professional and ethical responsibilities.

Schulz cited, in particular, US Vice President Dick Cheney's general counsel, David Addington; Pentagon General Counsel William Haynes; and top officials in the Justice Department's Office of General Counsel, one of whom, Jay Bybee, has since been confirmed as a federal appeals court judge.

According to Doctor William Schulz a wall of secrecy is protecting those who masterminded and developed the US torture policy; and unless those who drew the blueprint for torture, approved it, and ordered its implementation are held accountable, the United States' human rights will remain in tatters.

The appeal by the head of the US chapter of Amnesty International William Schulz's for foreign governments to take the initiative coincided with the launch of a bipartisan drive endorsed by some 350 attorneys and legal scholars urging the administration to establish an independent commission to address the allegations of abuse and torture, including an assessment of the responsibility of senior US administration officials and military officers.

Supporting the supposed to-be-prosecutions Whitehead, who served as deputy secretary of state in the Ronald Reagan administration says: “By establishing an independent bipartisan commission to fully investigate the issue of abuse of the so-called terrorist suspects, the US Congress and the president have a unique opportunity to send a message to the rest of the world that the United States is committed to respecting the worth and dignity of all human beings, whether they are US citizens or prisoners of war.”

John Whitehead adds that a high-level, independent investigation is necessary because the Pentagon's ongoing or recently completed investigations were too narrowly focused and not designed to produce recommendations to prevent future abuses.

Among the signatories to the initiative, which was sponsored by the bipartisan Constitution Project at Georgetown University, were prominent right-wing activists including David Keene, Chairman of the American Conservative Union, two former Republican congressmen, as well as former US ambassador to the United Nations Thomas Pickering, and former Federal Bureau of Investigation or FBI Director William Sessions. The National Institute of Military Justice also endorsed the statement, as did more than a dozen military law specialists and retired high-ranking military officers.

Since the abuses first came to light with the publication of photographs of prisoners at Abu Ghraib 13 months ago, the Pentagon has carried out dozens of reviews, courts-martial, and disciplinary proceedings. But virtually all of them have dealt only with the responsibility of the soldiers who carried out the abuses or their immediate superiors.

The failure to address the responsibility of officials and officers at the top of the command chain has provoked repeated demands by human rights groups to appoint an independent commission to conduct a thorough examination. Last summer, the 400,000-lawyer American Bar Association joined Amnesty, Human rights Watch, Human Rights First, and the American Civil Liberties Union in those demands.

But the Bush administration has rejected them, arguing that the Pentagon's own efforts to investigate and prosecute abuses were adequate. The Republican leadership in Congress has also paralyzed efforts by Democratic and some Republican lawmakers to create a commission.

The head of the US Chapter of Amnesty International William Schulz said that the refusal to investigate translates into effective “tolerance” for torture and mistreatment, resulting not only in the spread of such practices but also in the destruction of US credibility when it assails other countries, such as Syria or Egypt, for human rights violations.

William Schultz believes that, “It is the height of hypocrisy for the US government itself to use the very torture techniques that it routinely condemns in other countries,” “When the US government then calls upon foreign leaders to bring to justice those who commit or authorize human rights violations in their own countries, why should those foreign leaders listen?”

The American Civil Liberties Union or ACLU released new documents it had obtained from the FBI that disclosed that prisoners held at Guantanamo complained that US guards there had repeatedly desecrated Muslim holy book, Koran. In one 2002 summary, an FBI interrogator noted a prisoner's allegation that guards had flushed a Koran down a toilet.

Other documents released by the ACLU provided accounts of beatings, planned suicide attempts, hunger strikes to protest mistreatment and sexual assaults.

The American Civil Liberties Union director Anthony Romero said that the United States government continues to turn a blind eye to mounting evidence of widespread abuse of detainees held in its custody, and that if we are to truly repair America's standing in the world, the Bush administration must hold accountable high-ranking officials who allow the continuing abuse and torture of detainees.

The Newsweek Retraction

The following article is by Matthew Rothschild, an American Journalist in defending freedom of speach in the U.S.

Newsweek's retraction of its story about insult to the Holy Koran at Guantanamo by the American armymen raises serious questions about the state of journalism in America.

The threshold question is whether the initial story was true.It's quite conceivable that Newsweek had the story right in the first place. After all, previous stories have come out about prisoners stating that U.S. interrogators were ridiculing their faith and abusing the Koran. In a sworn statement by Ameen Saíeed Al-Sheikh, which appears in Mark Danner's story titled "Torture and Truth," the prisoner tells of how he was tortured at Abu Ghraib. He said: "They handcuffed me and hung me to the bed. They ordered me to curse Islam and because they started to hit my broken leg, I cursed my religion. They ordered me to thank Jesus that I'm alive. And I did what they ordered me. This is against my belief."

In the ACLU's law suit against Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, two of the plaintiffs namely Arkan Mohammed Ali and Thahe Mohammed Sabbar, claim that U.S. interrogators repeatedly desecrated the Koran.

Last year, three Britons detained in Afghanistan in December 2001 and later taken to Guantanamo released a long statement documenting their torture and mistreatment.

Rhuhel Ahmed, another detainee, gives this account and says: "I saw a guard walk into a detainee's cell, search through the Koran, and drop it on the floor. . . . The guard looked at the Koran on the floor and said "this" and then kicked it."

Iqbal and the third detainee, Shafiq Rasul, also told of how a military police officer ordered another detainee to uncover himself while he prayed, and when he refused, the officer "punched him violently in the face, knocking him to the ground and then kicked him."

The Center for Constitutional Rights says that the U.S. military at Guantanamo engages in a "systemic use of religious humiliation. . . . Religious intimidation and humiliation are a central, and intolerable, part of the Guantanamo interrogation strategy."

According to Gulf News, another British detainee released from Guantanamo, Tarek Dergoul, told Amnesty International that his interrogator "grabbed the Koran with his feet" and "made jokes about the Holy Koran."

That same article mentions a Newsmax report about Mohammad Al-Musawi, a detainee at Camp Delta, who says, "Late at night, drunken female soldiers used to come and trample on the Koran."

And a Moroccan detainee named, Abdallah Tabarak, told the Moroccan newspaper al-Tajdid on December 28, 2004, that when he was at the U.S. base at Kandahar, "the American soldiers used to tear up copies of the Koran."

Thus given this context, the Newsweek story is not altogether hard to believe.

Newsweek may have bowed to enormous pressure from the rightwing media and the Bush Administration and from its own horrified sense of responsibility for the riots that killed 17 people in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Whitaker on the NewsHour said: "We certainly accept some responsibility, and we feel awful about it," Newsweek's investigative reporter, Michael Isikoff, echoed that sentiment. It was his anonymous high government source, which he relied on in the original piece, and Whitaker said that source had proven reliable in the past.

Isikoff, one of the authors of the piece, said: "Neither Newsweek nor the Pentagon foresaw that a reference to the desecration of the Koran was going to create the kind of response that it did."

But it is not the responsibility of Newsweek to bow to the Pentagon if Rumsfeld feared a bad response in the Muslim world.

Nor is it the responsibility of Newsweek to worry on its own about the repercussions and spike a story as a consequence.

Let's be clear: To avoid rioting in the Muslim world, the answer is not for the press in the United States to censor itself. The answer is for the United States to stop torturing Muslims.

Newsweek's obligation is to publish the truth.

Stranger Than Fiction

The following article is by Bob Herbert an American Columnist and Bush administration political critic.

When Bob Woodward asked President Bush if he had consulted with his father about the decision to go to war in Iraq, the president famously replied, "There is a higher father that I appeal to."

It might have been better if Mr. Bush had stayed in closer touch with his earthly father. From the very beginning the war in Iraq has been an exercise in extreme madness, an absurd venture that would have been rich in comic possibilities except for the fact that many thousands of men, women and children have died, and tens of thousands have been crippled, burned or otherwise maimed. The world now knows that the weapons of mass destruction were a convenient fiction. Less well known is that bumbling administration officials eagerly embraced the ravings of a foreign intelligence source known, believe it or not, as "Curveball." He helped promote the fantasy that Iraq had mobile laboratories for the manufacture of biological weapons.

The C.I.A. was warned that Curveball was as crazy as a Peter Sellers character, but the administration wanted this war in the way that a small child wants candy. Curveball's information was swallowed whole. Amateurs and incompetents have run the war from the start, and fantasy has trumped reality at every turn. If a movie were to be made of the war, the appropriate director would be Mel Brooks. Even as the administration was listening to the likes of Curveball, it was showing the door to the Army's Chief of Staff, General Eric Shinseki, who made the mistake of speaking the plain truth to officials fluent only in self-serving nonsense.

General Shinseki said it would take hundreds of thousands of troops to calm Iraq. That was the end of his career.

As for training and preparedness, the scandal at Abu Ghuraib is instructive. The problems there went far beyond the photos of Lynndie England and others humiliating the Iraqis under their control. American people learned last week that Janis Karpinski, the Brigadier General whose reserve military police unit was in charge of the prison, had been arrested for shoplifting at a military base in Florida in 2002. The same army that's scouring Iraq for insurgents and terrorists was apparently unaware of the arrest record of the woman assigned to such a sensitive position at Abu Ghuraib.

Abu Ghuraib was not a deviation but an indication.

This is a war in which the people in charge have had no idea what they were doing. One of the recommendations of Major General Antonio Taguba, who investigated the scandal at Abu Ghuraib, was that a team be sent to Iraq to teach some of the soldiers how to run prisons. How's that for an innovative step?!

The United States is now stuck with a war it should never have started. The violence continues to rage out of control. The latest fantasy out of Washington is that somehow, miraculously, Iraqi troops will be able to take over and win the war that America couldn't. The American public is becoming fed up and with good reason. Support for the war is declining and the reputation of the military is in danger. The Army has been unable to meet its enlisted goals and the search for new soldiers is becoming desperate.

Last week, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Richard Myers, told the U.S Congress that the war in Iraq was taking a toll on the military and would make combat operations elsewhere in the world more difficult. That was hardly a comforting thought as the administration was ramping up its rhetoric about North Korea.

If President Bush had consulted with his father before launching this foolish, disastrous war, he might have gotten some advice that would have pointed him in a different direction and release America and American families of the many thousands dead and a lot of sadness.

Bolton the Eavesdropper

As Undersecretary of State for Arms Control, John Bolton didn't like what he heard from U.S. intelligence officials. Not happy with the information provided by the State Department and CIA, Bolton started listening to phone conversations taped by the National Security Administration as his own source of intelligence about countries targeted by the Bush administration for "regime change."

Gov. Bill Richardson, who served as U.N. ambassador during the Clinton administration, is concerned that Bolton, who is the Bush administration's controversial nominee for the U.N. post, might have been listening to his phone conversations.

During the Senate confirmation hearings last week, Bolton admitted he requested NSA recordings "on a couple of occasions, maybe a few more." Later the State Department said Bolton made ten such requests.

Despite rising pressure from Senate Democrats and the media, the administration has refused to release any more information. Administration stonewalling raised speculation that any disclosure of the number of requests and the names involved - possibly including Richardson's - might further tarnish Bolton's reputation and sink the nomination.

Even after the CIA and State Department officials told Bolton that Syria didn't have a nuclear weapons program and that Cuba didn't have a bioweapons program, Bolton publicly targeted the two nations for "regime change" because of alleged banned weapons.

Instead of being reprimanded for spreading false intelligence, President Bush has vigorously defended Bolton. That's no surprise, given that the White House invaded Iraq based upon cooked-up, politicized intelligence about Iraq's banned weapons - which were never found.

Bolton's confrontational posture - combined with the administration's quickening plans to attack Iraq - led North Korea to pull out of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, announce that it would resume developing nuclear weapons and demand that U.N. inspectors leave the country.

Given that the Bush administration had targeted it as part of the "axis of evil", North Korea decided that creating a nuclear deterrence was its best defense against a "preventive war" waged by the Bush administration.

Before they precipitate more unnecessary wars, it's time that ideologues like Bolton listen to what wiser voices are saying. But rather than listening in on private conversations of prominent Americans, such as Richardson, Bolton would do better to ask his advice.

After all, Richardson has successfully negotiated several agreements with the North Koreans when he was a New Mexico congressman and proved his mettle as U.N. ambassador in helping arrange the successful framework agreement with North Korea.

But it's not just the famous "green chile diplomacy" of Richardson that should be the model for Bolton and this administration. Surely, a policy of "constructive engagement" that encourages North Korean diplomats to come to Santa Fe to talk to nonideological figures like Richardson is better than having the two nuclear powers engage in a battle of insults.

Bolton has repeatedly called for the overthrow of the "tyrannical dictator," and North Koreans have responded saying they would never engage in talks with "such human scum" as Bolton. Having the North Korea delegation come to New Mexico and come out of Santa Fe shops wearing cowboy hats, sporting bola ties and strutting in cowboy boots, pointed to the virtues of constructive engagement.

Fortunately, senators of both parties are no longer listening passively to the hyped intelligence assessments provided by Bolton and other hard-liners. They would do better to listen to diplomats, with successful track records like Richardson, to South Korea's concerns and advice.

Former Republican Sen. Jesse Helms once called Bolton "the kind of man I would want to stand with at Armageddon."

The problem is that ideologues like Bolton look forward to Armageddon as a test of U.S. military power and purpose, and in the belief that Armageddon is a battle that can be won - supposedly like Iraq - in "cake walk."

Anti-U.S. Protests in Afghanistan

Tuesday 17 May 2005

Afghan students burned an American flag and shouted slogans against the U.S. military on Thursday, as protests at reported abuse of Islam's holy book at the U.S. jail in Guantanamo Bay spread to the capital and into Pakistan.
Protesters also attacked a government outpost and the offices of two international relief organizations to the south of Kabul, injuring one aid worker and leaving a trail of destruction. The unrest came a day after riots in an eastern city left four people dead in the worst anti-American protests in Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

Most of the protesters appeared to be students who opposed the country's occupation by the U.S. soldiers.

Paul Barker, Director of CARE International, one of the largest international relief groups in Afghanistan said that: It's the symbols of this change in Afghanistan that have been singled out.

Barker said a group of high school students assailed the CARE office in Mohammed Agha district of Logar province on Thursday morning, beating one staff member and destroying equipment. The office of another foreign relief group next door was set on fire.

Logar Governer, Amanullah Hamimi said that Afghan anti-US protesters also broke the windows of the local government office and that unidentified men had destroyed a nearby mobile phone mast with rockets during the night, to show their wrath towards the US presence in Afghanistan and because of desecration of the holy book of Muslims by Americans.

In Kabul, more than 200 young men marched from a dormitory block near the university chanting “Death to America!” and carrying banners including one stating: “Those who insult the Quran should be brought to justice.”

At the entrance to the university, one of the protesters read a resolution calling on US President, George W. Bush to apologize and opposing long-term U.S. military bases in Afghanistan.

About hundreds of students clambered onto the roof of a nearby building and burned an American flag to applause and cries of “God is great!” from the crowd below.

Dozens of police looked on.

Ahmad Shah, an Afghan political sciences undergraduate, said the students had decided to protest after hearing of the deaths on Wednesday.

He said that America was their enemy and they don't want them in Afghanistan, when they insulted Muslim’s holy book they have also insulted Afghans.

Afghan Police said that more than two hundred students staged a similar demonstration at another high school in the city but reported no violence.

Hundreds of opponents of US presence in Afghanistan rallied in northwestern Pakistan over the same issue Thursday, some chanting “Death to America!” Many who rallied in the town of Peshawar were students from an Islamic school and supporters of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam party. They demanded that the United States offer an apology.

Abdul Jalil Jan, a Leader of the rally said: This insulting of the Quran is a shameful act. It has torn to bits America's claims of being an enlightened country.

On Wednesday, police and government troops opened fire in the eastern city of Jalalabad after a protest by more than 2,000 people turned into a riot. Four people were reported killed and 71 wounded, including six police officers.

Government buildings and the offices of several relief organizations were burned as a reaction to this sacrilege. The city was quiet on Thursday.

Another demonstrations have been reported in at least four other Afghan provinces.

The source of anger was a brief report in the May 9 edition of Newsweek Magazine that interrogators at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, placed Qurans on toilets in order to rattle suspects, and in at least one case “flushed a holy book down the toilet.”

Islamic parties in neighboring Pakistan had called for protests on Friday. The Pakistani government said over the weekend it was “deeply dismayed” over the report, which Pentagon and White House officials said would be investigated.

Many of the 520 inmates in Guantanamo are Pakistanis and Afghans imprisoned without trials by the US soldiers after the September 11 attacks.

The Bush - DeLay Axis

Thursday 5 May 2005

This is an article by Saul Landau. He teaches at Cal Poly Pomona University, where he is the director of Digital Media Programs and International Outreach, and is a fellow of the Institute for Policy Studies. He is also the co-author of "Assassination on Embassy Row.” Parts of his recent article entitled: “ The Bush-DeLay Axis of Naked Power” is as follows:

US President George W. Bush and Tom DeLay, his political enforcer in the House of Representatives, have changed long established rules of U.S. political culture as "bipartisanship" has become winner take all; debate and deliberation has devolved into Party line dictates; civility has turned into hostility.

This partnership for naked power involves the quenching of executive and legislative power as they still haven't taken the whole judicial branch with liquefied Christian rhetoric. Concerned citizens and even some Congressional Democrats have finally gotten the idea, but have not yet formulated a strong political answer to the audacious Bush-DeLay axis.

In the Senate, liberal Democrats like Ted Kennedy and Dick Durban watch in disgust and horror as Bush re-nominates for federal judgeships the same incompetent people that the Senate has already rejected. For Circuit Court, Bush re-named California Supreme Court Justice Janice Rogers Brown, who compared big government to slavery and referred to minimum wage laws as the triumph of America’s own socialist revolution. Senior citizens today, she claimed, cannibalize their grandchildren by getting free stuff from the political system. She weighed in heavily on the decision to end meaningful affirmative action in California. Bush also re-nominated 39-year-old Brent M. Kavanaugh for the Court of Appeals. His record of judicial achievement consists of his work with former Special Prosecutor Kenneth Starr who tried unsuccessfully to convict Bill Clinton for lying about his affairs with Monica Lewinsky. According to the website saveourcourts.org the Senate rejected Kavanaugh just over a year ago after reviewing his record and finding little but ultra right wing views and lack of legal experience to recommend him.
These candidates, like other Bush re-nominees, share extreme right wing agendas and practice judicial activism on the right to end judicial activism everywhere else.
Perhaps Bush only knows a very limited number of people, suggested comic Bill Maher, trying to generate a little optimism, and that's why he keeps sending the same names of ultra right wing cooks to the Senate.
Trying to put positive spin on the nomination of Undersecretary of State for Arms Control John Bolton for UN Ambassador, however, resembles an attempt to find the upside of heroin addiction. A Los Angeles Times editorial described Bolton as a man who appears to have a mean streak, apparent arrogant restlessness that bodes ill for this assignment. The Times might have added his addiction to bad information that led him to scream at subordinates when they contradicted him with the facts. He has said on several occasions that Cuba possessed weapons of mass destruction, despite clear warnings from intelligence experts that the information indicated the very opposite. Senate testimony by Republican officials and letters sent to the Foreign Relations Committee by a Republican woman who had scary encounters with Bolton, show him as a pathological bully aside from his apparent compulsion to repeat false information.

The Bush-Delay gang indeed behaves like people addicted to their drug of choice: power. The inner circles seem to have gotten so high on this dubious aphrodisiac that, once inhaled, forces them to say anything, push other people around and spend the nation's treasury on loony projects like wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. This addiction, enabled by the change in the basic rules by which the U.S. government has operated for many decades, has also allowed their corporate and banking supporters to grow wealthier at the expense of the rest of the nation.
The monarchical disdain Bush has shown for the informal democratic process of U.S. government extends dramatically to the behavior of House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. One dissident Member claimed that beyond personal offenses, we're watching the destruction of the House of Representatives. In place of debate, discussion, hearings and Committee meetings, DeLay has substituted naked power: his. Referring to DeLay's acceptance of huge sums of money from corporate lobbyists to support his ambitions, the Congressman said that DeLay covers his corruption with layers of Christian babble. He took a $56,500 contribution for one of his political action committee fronts from Westar Energy Inc. In return, he promised the energy company a "seat at the table" with drafters of a critical energy bill.

Lobbyists know that contributions in the hundreds of thousands of dollars can lead to legislation that means many millions in corporate profits. So, in May 2001, Enron's top lobbyists gladly contributed to DeLay's political coffers in addition to the $250,000 the company had already pledged to the Republican Party that year. DeLay used some of the funds to help finance the successful redistricting of Texas even using federal power to try to force the recalcitrant Democrats into appearing for a 2004 vote.

Using Social Conservatives for Political Reasons

Thursday 7 April 2005

Terri Schiavo's case has raised so many issues and specially the ethical ones. The US Congress and Bush were trying to intervene in the Terri Schiavo case and these efforts have put forward two political questions. First question, proposed by secular Americans and many Europeans, is the same old debate: have religious fundamentalists taken over the Republican Party? The other, raised by nervous Republicans; who were asking: is the conservative coalition beginning to break apart?

The answers to both questions are too complicated; Since they question two different ideas that affects the US Republican’s future. The Terri Schiavo case certainly confirms the power of religious conservatives. But this doesn't reveal they have taken over the Republican Party. Republicans' believe the Terri Schiavo's case shows a few worrying cracks in the conservative coalition and also the danger of alienating moderate voters; but George Bush, was so confused to manage the case.

There is little doubt that in the Terri Schiavo case decisions, Congress was responding to the concerns of leaders of the Religious Right. The religious leaders thought Bush was a man of faith; But the political reality is that if Bush and pro-life leaders had not taken extraordinary action to address this extraordinary case, it would have had serious impact on US Conservative decisions on a whole range of issues.

That was something any Republican leader in recent times couldn't safely ignore. Traditional conservatism still remains. According to John Green of the University of Akron, in 2004 Traditional Conservatives accounted for 27% of Bush's total vote, twice as much as any other groups in US. If we include traditionalist Catholics and other religious types, “traditionalist Christians” cast more than two-fifths of Bush's total vote.

What matters far more for Republican members of Congress is that religious voters are mostly influential in their local parties. A study in 2002 by a magazine, Campaigns and Elections, found that, of the 31 states Bush won in 2004, the Christian Right was strong in 15 states and it wasn't weak in none of the states. Generally, the influence of the Christian Right had grown in 15 states and had shown a decrease in only 8 states. But the influence of the Christian Right has probably grown further since the election in 2004.

For Republicans in the House of Representatives, the unfair distribution of polling stations has made this even more crucial. Republican seats are safe from Democrats, so in primary elections they see no reason to offend people who possess the power to vote against them in primary elections.

The Terry Schiavo case is only the most prominent example of religious conservatives making their voice heard in Washington, DC. They are prominent in the attempt to introduce a constitutional ban on gay marriage, in restrictions on the use of stem cells for medical research and in some ways it seems the White House is using “religious initiative” to encourage religious institutions to get more involved in social policy.

Does this represent a takeover? This week John Danforth, a Former Senator from the moderate wing of the party, argued in the New York Times that it was a demonstration of power, He wrote: “By a series of recent initiatives, Republicans have transformed our party into the political arm of conservative Christians”. But there are several reasons for thinking this is an exaggeration.

The religious power remains fragile within the US Republican party. The difference between social conservatives, such as John Ashcroft, the extremely religious former attorney-general, and more libertarian , such as Arnold Schwarzenegger, California's governor, widens . At a recent forum sponsored by the Hudson Institute, social conservatives argued that governments should aim to encourage public virtue, while others believed that government should get off people's backs. Leon Kass, the Head of the President's Bio-Ethics Council, argued that “it will be no great victory...if families decay, if the general moral vision diminishes”; While it's obvious that moral issues are fading in the US. Grover Norquist, the head of Americans for Tax Reform, which is a lobby group, replied that governments should not regulate private behavior unless it was criminal.

In the Terri Schiavo case, Social Conservatives obviously dominated the Congress and they did not face so many objections. But there were also Traditional Conservatives, such as Senator John Warner of Virginia who were concerned about exact process of law on the same cases in the US. And the Schiavo battle was not a partisan affair. Almost 50 Democrats voted for the Republicans, many of them were concerned for the rights of the disabled. This was an issue where “social conservatives” included Jesse Jackson, visited Mrs. Schiavo's parents last week.

Now it's obvious that the Religious Right, is influential. But it was not the sole influence in the Schiavo affair. And in many ways, its influence is limited to specific issues of “the culture of life”; Issues such as abortion, stem cells and the end of life. On some of the most important of these, Bush cannot follow the Religious Right's orders, even if he may want to. For example, He cannot outlaw abortion, though he can influence the Supreme Court's opinions on the matter by appointing conservative judges.

On other issues, such as his apparent acceptance of civil unions for gays, and his comment that a constitutional ban on gay marriage cannot get through the Senate, Bush is going against the Religious Right's demands. In this area, his attitude seems almost defensive, using symbolic issues as a device to deceive his Christian backers.

The religious groups do not always agree on what “the culture of life” means. One of the most striking features of the Schiavo's affair has been the close association between Conservative Catholics and evangelicals who believe in the rule of Bible. Yet their theological positions on some “life issues” differ. Catholics oppose the death penalty and on the other hand the evangelicals have no problem with contraception. This limits their co-operation.

In issues that go beyond the culture of life, relations between the White House and conservative Christian leaders sometimes seem almost cold. In January, a group of religious leaders wrote to Karl Rove, Bush's main political adviser, expressing frustration that the president was being “defeatist” on the gay-marriage ban. They argued that Bush was instead seeking to persuade voters to back Social Security reform, which some Christian leaders, such as Gary Bauer, oppose. The White House in turn is frustrated by the lack of religious support for reforming the pension system.

Lastly, Christian groups are divided on how far to expand their influence. Rich Christians argue that religious groups should seek to broaden their agenda by including things like “fighting poverty” and “protecting the environment”. Christians think meddling in such cases, would increase their impact on the US Government. While Others think this would decrease their influence, and want to maintain the focus on life issues and education.

Certainly, the power of religious groups has not yet caused a problem of day-to-day management of the Republican Party for Bush. Religious groups may be getting some of their wishes granted by Congress. The other way for the Republicans to overreach is by frightening off independent voters. Opinion polls on the Terri Schiavo case showed that large majorities of voters- including those who believed Bible should rule the case-thought Congress had overstepped the limits in intervening a personal matter. As Republicans are famous for their intolerance. Bush's autocrat character and his strong support for the war on terror has kept the Republicans away from such accusations of intolerance. This has caused moderate voters to forgive the Bush's interventions on behalf of the Christian Right, even when they themselves disagree with those decisions .We have seen this in the case of stem cells, the federal gay-marriage amendment and even the Terri Schiavo case.

Because of bush's “tricky plans” next generation of leaders seems to be working harder to win the trust of religious leaders. In doing so, future leaders of America might risk dividing their party. And also they might let the Republican movement be defined by Religious Right groups who already have huge influence on its representatives in Congress.

Screened Audiences, Fake News Promote Bush Agenda
Thursday 7 April 2005

US President George W. Bush has learned to use the bully pulpit that is the powerful prerogative of all US presidents.

But this president has tried to twist that power in ways that expand the definition of "managed news."

Let's start with his national campaign to change Social Security.

As he travels around the nation to make his pitch that Social Security is in a crisis, the president is limiting his congregation to screened, sanitized audiences. Why does he sermonize on the subject only to carefully selected audiences?

These are people who are vetted to make sure they agree with the president's views. If they pass that test, the local Republican Party or the groups sponsoring the event then issue tickets to the so-called "town meetings" or "conversations with the president."

Asked why the president speaks only to his supporters, White House press secretary Scott McClellan said Bush's intention is to "educate" the people. He probably meant "indoctrinate."

Is this the president of all the people -- or just some of the people who agree with him?

It's bizarre. He's preaching to the choir, hardly the way to "educate" the public.

Controlling his audience was a prime goal of Bush's 2004 presidential campaign, when anti-war protesters were barred from his public appearances. People who openly disagreed with him were hustled out of the hall. We're now seeing the same audience control when Bush speaks about Social Security. The Secret Service and White House aides apparently spend a lot of time trying to handpick those permitted to hear him.

Bush seems satisfied that he has made Social Security a worry to people. That's the goal of his sky-is-falling campaign. But the president is not ready to handle genuine dialogue on the subject or deal with those opposed to his plan to partially privatize the government pension program.

Every administration tries to manage the message that the news media convey to the public about presidential policies, problems and successes. But the Bush White House is pioneering new methods that steer message management into outright government propaganda.

The New York Times on March 13 published an in-depth report on how the administration is cranking up its public relations campaign to manipulate broadcast news by distributing pre-packaged videos prepared by several federal agencies, including the Pentagon.

These videos use phony reporters to advertise the administration's position on major issues. Thinly staffed TV stations are only too happy to receive the free videos, which they then pass along to viewers without any acknowledgement that the images and messages are government issue.

Spokespersons for the major TV networks say they would never disseminate government-prepared videos for their news broadcasts. But some financially strapped affiliates apparently are willing to air them without identifying the source.

The government agencies say it is up to the broadcast stations to attribute the origin of the report, if they want to do so.

The Government Accountability Office -- a congressional investigative unit -- has ruled that such government videos represent "covert propaganda." The GAO declared that agencies may not produce pre-packaged news reports "that conceal or do not clearly identify for the television viewing audience" that they were made by the government.

But the White House rejected that opinion and handed reporters a memorandum from the Justice Department and the Office of Management and Budget directing the federal agencies to ignore the GAO verdict.

The memo contended that the GAO did not distinguish between propaganda and "purely informational" news reports and claimed there was no requirement for a federal agency to label its disguised broadcasts.

This is consistent with the administration's other outrageous exercise in propaganda, which took the form of paying a few columnists and broadcasters, such as Armstrong Williams, to promote administration programs.

Williams pushed the Education Department's "No Child Left Behind" program without disclosing that he was on Uncle Sam's payroll.

The president called a halt to paying pundits, saying "there needs to be a nice independent relationship between the White House and the press."

He needs to pay more attention to other administration actions that threaten that independence.

Wolfie's Career Move from Failed Warrior to Humanitarian Banker

Chase Madar writes articles for Urban Latino, The Nation and the Times Literary Supplement. He works on the legal staff of Make the Road by Walking, Inc, a community-organizing center in Bushwick, Brooklyn. The following are exceprts of an article by him entitled: Wolfie's Career Move from Failed Warrior to Humanitarian Banker:

Around the world people are gasping at the appointment of Paul Wolfowitz to head the World Bank. And well might we gasp: how can this washed-up chicken hawk, whose crazy scheme of easily invading Iraq seems even crazier with each car bomb, be handed the top post at an organization that is apparently philanthropic? Wasn't it enough of a sick joke for the Neocons to call their Mesopotamian oil-grab as a humanitarian intervention? Here those who remember their Cold War are feeling little pangs of memory. For this is not the first time an architect of a disastrous war has gone on to land a plum position in a bigtime philanthropy. It isn't even the first time a disgraced warrior has been rewarded with the keys to the World Bank.

Comparisons of the latest Iraq War to the invasion of Vietnam are usually way overdrawn, but Wolfie's latest change of occupations is richly stinking of the career moves made by some of Kennedy's best and brightest intellectuals who planned, launched and then intensified the Vietnam War. Verily, it was Robert McNamara himself who in 1968 left his seven-year position as Secretary of Defense to head...the World Bank! No doubt there was a great deal of gulping oxygen back then about the same man who planned a war that would kill 3.4 million Vietnamese and 59,000 Americans being suddenly thrust to the leadership of a global institution intended to help the Third World.

A kind of sordid cooperation between the imperial conquest and the development industry is embodied in McGeorge Bundy, also a Prime Instigator of the Vietnam War as a National Security Advisor to Kennedy and Johnson. After jumping ship from the Johnson administration in 1966, Bundy was handed the helm of the Ford Foundation, one of the best-endowed philanthropies in the world and one of the largest disbursers of non-governmental development aid. Again we might ingenuously ask how the hard-line architect of so much destruction and slaughter could be put in charge of an ostensibly humanitarian organization. But here too experts of the Ford Foundation's history would find America’s naiveté touching, for the chronicle of the Ford Foundation's collaboration with the CIA and other Cold War agencies is long and well-documented; together Ford and the CIA funded everything from the literary magazines of liberal intellectuals to the training of Indonesian technocrats poised to take over after the anti-communist bloodbath that killed Sukarno and half a million others in 1965-66. Such was the philanthropy of the Ford Foundation.

A third and final example of the sordid nexus between philanthropy and imperial domination is Walt Whitman Rostow, who was chairman of the Policy Planning Council at the State Department under Kennedy and then Lyndon Johnson's National Security Assistant. Before leading the charge to invade South Vietnam he had been a visionary of the Marshall Plan and a star development economist at MIT where he authored a quick and easy twelve-step recipe for poor countries to get rich. For Rostow, the Vietnam War was a economic development project from start to finish, and all the bombs were just ingredients to help that unlucky nation to achieve "stability" in order to reach "take-off" phase. Unlike McNamara, Rostow never had any second thoughts about the fundamental benevolence of the carpet bombing and free-fire zones. Even until his death two years ago Rostow continued to look at the Vietnam War as a development project that "bought time" for the rest of Asia by keeping the reds at bay. The 3.4 million dead Vietnamese remained, in this humanitarian vision, a key input in the long-term economic prosperity of Asia.

These Cold War monsters demonstrate what historians of empire have long known: that large humanitarian organizations, whether development NGOs, lending institutions or the Church of England have frequently, and willingly, acted as a lubricant for imperial conquest. As for Paul Wolfowitz, truly the heir of McNamara, Bundy and Rostow, don't expect him to have any second thoughts about his humanitarian liberation of Iraq no matter how much deeper the US invasion sinks into chaos, violence and civilian death. The faith of a humanitarian can be hard to shake.

American Mental Health

Howard Goldman of the University of Maryland School of Medicine, says

“Every American generation thinks it's more stressed out and troubled than the rest.” He's true indeed. But more and more Americans are seeking help for mental problems, and most of them are much younger than what doctors expected. One study, conducted among students at a large mid-western university between 1988 and 2001, showed a dramatic increase in American mental-health problems reported by college students: the number seeking help for depression doubled, while the number with suicidal tendencies tripled. Another study found that, in 2001, 5 and a half million more Americans were taking prescription drugs for mental-health problems, or problems of substance abuse, than was the case only five years earlier.

About one in five Americans now suffers from a diagnosable mental disorder. The National Institute of Mental Health estimates that more than 13% of Americans-over 19 million people between the ages of 18 and 54-suffer from anxiety disorders, 9.5% from depressive disorders and millions of others from conditions ranging from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) to schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.

Women are more likely than men to experience the most common problems, including anxiety and depression. People with mental illness are also more likely to be divorced and jobless than the general population. Yet mental illness differs across gender, race and class, from high-class girls taking modish therapy to homeless people sleeping by the railway tracks.

Also, battle-scarred soldiers are Increasingly joining the ranks of the mentally ill. Of about 245,000 US soldiers discharged from service in Iraq and Afghanistan, more than 12,000 have sought consulting for symptoms of PTSD(post-traumatic stress disorder). The army is trying to detect symptoms early, before they become difficult to treat, but already the war in Iraq is producing the most seriously traumatized body of US soldiers since the war in Vietnam.

The impact on society, in both human and economic terms, is substantial. Four out of ten leading causes of disability in America and other developed economies are mental disorders. They lead to nothingness, lost wages and joblessness. The World Health Organization (WHO) has a précis measure to evaluate the share of the “global disease burden” via gathering information about the years of healthy life lost to premature death or disability. The organization suggests that in 2005 psychiatric and neurological conditions will rise from 10.5% in 2001 to nearly 15%-partly because the population is getting older, and partly because infectious diseases seem less large in the picture.

Some conditions, such as anxiety disorders, appear to be more common in America than in other developed countries. Ronald Kessler, of Harvard Medical School, suggests that some of this may stem from childhood trauma and some of them stem from early involvement in drugs with which young Americans take just for fun.

Laurie Garduque (Gaghdook) of the McArthur Foundation, Famous Founder of modern research in US mental health, points to three key issues that bother the mentally ill in America: first a gap between the latest research findings and actual treatment; second, a gap in access to treatment; And finally the ongoing shame of mental illness, which she says is “alive and well”.

Concerns about two-dimensional treatment are claimed by many in the field. Treatment depends largely on ability to pay; The wealthy tend to see private psychotherapists or their family doctors, while the poor are put into community health programs or simply go untreated. For those without employer health plans, it is often impossible to get independent insurance for the conditions like depression. The quality of care varies widely, too: no more than one-third of mentally ill people in treatment are believed to get minimally appropriate care.

Since insurance payments for treatment of mental illness delayed because of those who are physically ill, US doctors have few motivations to consult mentally-ill patients on the issue. Yet primary-care doctors play a vital role: at least 10% of visits to them are by patients with hidden psychological problems.

Doctors tend to get away from psychotherapy and go towards treatment with medicines. This trend worries many in the field, not least because of a debate over the potential side effects of anti-depressant pills. These pills are still available to teenagers in America, though banned in some other countries because they seem to increase the risk of suicide. The shift away from therapy toward medicines has occurred not only because drugs have become more effective, but also because they are easier to be used alone. Perhaps because of this trend, there are now too many psychotherapists in large cities. But while the people of Los Angles and Manhattan may be finding more time for golf, psychologists and psychiatrists are desperately needed in smaller communities where too many Americans are suffering mental disorder, worried or unhappy.

Guantanamo & the Concealed Tortures

The torture of prisoners is considered an inhumane act that has been banned by international laws and pacts. The western governments, the US in particular, usually by resorting to these pacts accuse third world governments not following their dictates of torturing the political prisoners. But the disclosure of torture of prisoners by US agents in different parts of the world has ripped off the mask of hypocrisy from Washington’s ugly face, and revealed the US to be the world’s worst torturer. One of the most manifest examples of torture of prisoners by the US is the case of the hapless detainees in the Cuban enclave of Guantanamo where about 600 persons of various nationalities rounded up randomly in Afghanistan are being tortured on charges of terrorism. Five days after the suspicious September 11, 2001 incidents in New York and Washington, US Vice President Dick Cheney announced that the US has the right to use any possible means for achieving its objectives. One of these means is undoubtedly torture, an inhuman treatment that the Americans had been secretly using for long time. This is the reason the US has refused to join the International War Criminals tribunal, for fear that its own sanguine crimes against humanity would be revealed. So brazed are the methods of the US torturers that they have kept the detainees rounded up randomly in Afghanistan on Guantanamo Bay in Cuba where even the US federal laws are not applicable. Thus, the prisoners have no right of appeal.

The Americans are practically trampling the international laws. US president George Bush issued orders that the detainees in Guantanamo should not be considered as war prisoners, which means the Americans in violation of the Geneva Convention are free to use any method of torture as they like without bothering to allow representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross to register them or meet them. The prisoners are thus deprived of the basic right of access to law or a lawyer. News sources and the few captives fortunate enough to be released from Guantanamo have revealed horrible and blood-curdling methods of torture by the Americans. The torture applied by the US forces is extreme physical harassment that sometimes leads to killing. In addition, the Americans use psychological and sexual torture of inmates and made them stand or hang for hours in unbearable positions without water and food. Even the facility to toilet is denied and reports speak of prisoners rotting in their own urine and excrement. Prisoners are also stripped naked and tortured, while at times they are locked in solitary cells where they could hardly lie down and sleep for months. Many other unimaginable techniques of torture in Guantanamo camp have remained confidential and secret, and has led to some prisoners committing suicide.

The British daily Sunday Times revealed sometime ago that the US government secretly takes the captives from Guantanamo to countries in which torture has not yet been banned yet for more uninhibited form of torture. This way the White House has kept secret its inhuman atrocities and tried to avoid criticism from the world public and international circles. The irony is that the ruling neo-conservative clique in the White House has tried to portray its torture of prisoners in Guantanamo and other prisons as justified. Even former American officials have expressed concern over the pain and suffering of the inmates being tortured by US soldiers. But the US officials are the least concerned and continue their crimes against humanity not only in Guantanamo but in other countries as well, especially the occupied lands of Afghanistan and Iraq where the reports of torture have shocked the civilized world. Mark Dinner in his book titled “Torture and Truth”, has exposed the American crimes at the notorious Baghdad prison of Abu Ghuraib. He writes: Guantanamo is just one jail in a widespread network of torture cells the US has built around the world. That means the shocking pictures of torture revealed from Abu Ghuraib 10 months ago are only the tip of the iceberg with the realities still hidden and unimaginable. The situation is no better in Bagram jail in Afghanistan, and also in Palestine where the Zionist regime uses equally blood-curdling methods of torture. For instance the Palestinian teacher residing in Pakistan Abdol Baqer Yousef Mostafa was arrested in May, 2002 without any charge. After exposing him to physical and sexual abuse, the Americans finally released him after two years without any charges. But Mostafa after his release realizes that the Americans have killed his elder son. The book titled “Documents of Torture: A Path to Abu Ghuraib” which has been written by two American attorneys named Greensberg and Dranel, has shed light on the inhuman methods of FBI agents. Guantanamo is thus the symbol of torture and violence, which the US government attempts to spread all over the world in order to continue with its aggression and domination.

Lies Military Recruiters Tell

Recently, most students at the University of Vermont (UVM) in Burlington received an email with the heading 'ARMY PAYS OFF STUDENT LOANS' in their university email box. The general message of the mass mailing was that if a student was nearing graduation and wondering how they were going to pay off the massive debt today's US college students incur, they should join the army. In essence, this email was a college student's version of the poverty draft that entraps so many working class and poor young people into enlisting in the service. The sender was a military recruiter working out of the US Army recruitment office in the Burlington suburb of Williston. Given that the university has a very clear policy forbidding these types of solicitations on their email servers, one wonders how the recruiting office was able to obtain the address list. The university administration has been silent when asked this question by various faculty, students, and parents. It is fair to assume, however, that the email list was released to the recruiter under the compliance sections of the so-called Solomon Amendment, which essentially forbids Department of Defense (DOD) funding of schools unless those schools provide military representatives access to their students for recruiting purposes. It is this same law that enables military recruiters to set up shop in high schools across the US and to call students at their homes attempting to entice them into joining the military.

At UVM, this email was met with anger and questions, and probably even a few inquiries. The anger is now being organized into a drive to keep military recruiters off the university campus and out of the students' private communications. There is a petition campaign underway that demands that no recruiters for the regular military or the Vermont National Guard be allowed recruit on campus. Despite this, recruiters do show up unannounced on campus. One assumes that their strategy is designed to prevent student organizers from organizing protests against the recruiters' presence. In addition, there is organizing underway to organize some kind of response to the military and Guard's presence at the University's Spring Career Day on March 8th. In Vermont, the Guard recruitment hits close to home, since the state ranks near the top in the number of deaths per capita in Iraq. The likelihood of the university denying these recruiters access is slim, especially in light of the mass email, yet the students involved continue on undaunted. If the petition campaign fails to produce the results they desire, there will likely be some kind of protest.

Other college campuses have already experienced such protests. On January 20, 2005, several hundred students at Seattle Central Community College chased army recruiters from their spot in the Student center. On February 23, campus police arrested a woman student during a strike in front of the military's recruitment table at a job fair at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. On February 22, 2005 several dozen students picketed recruiters at the University of Illinois campus in Chicago. At the USC Law School, recruiters were met with pickets and leafleters demanding that they leave, and at UC Berkeley, a couple dozen students protested the presence of a military recruiter table there. These are but a few of the dozens of protests that have taken place.

Meanwhile, in high schools across the US, more students and their parents seem to be opting out of taking the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB), a test given to high school juniors as a method of targeting potential recruits. It is an admissions and placement test for the US military. All persons enlisting in the US military are required to take the ASVAB. Although, the military does not usually start turning up the pressure to join the military until students reach their senior year, about 14,000 high schools nationwide give this test to juniors.

While this strategy is not necessarily the best political strategy possible to chase recruiters off campus, it is a legal tool counter-recruitment activists should utilize while it exists. It seems that the best political strategy is one that challenges the imperial policies of the US and calls into question not just the military's discriminatory recruitment policies, but also the role of the military itself. A strategy based on this premise would not only diminish the military's visibility, it would also challenge young people to examine for whom and what the military really fights.

The Inevitable Trend of Multi-Polarization

Following the end of the cold war era, the US turned into the sole superpower with no serious rival. After military attacks on Kosovo, Afghanistan and Iraq, a certain group in America, claimed to have established a new order based on a uni-polar system which, they say would help the US continue its efforts to dominate the world and follow its hegemony. The massive military campaign launched by the US on the pretext of fighting terrorism following the highly suspicious attacks that rocked New York and Washington on September 11, 2001, increased Washington’s efforts to achieve this hegemony. On the contrary, the US fought even more openly and used the pretext of campaign against terrorism to spread its domineering tentacles around the world. Ignoring international regulations and the basic principles of international relations, the US impudently invaded and occupied Iraq and Afghanistan and shamelessly announced that countries, which do not support the US, are terrorists.

The US, meanwhile, used the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, NPT, as a pretext to keep up with its hegemonic policies. In fact, Washington’s nuclear policy is the source of proliferation and production of nuclear arms. The United States, the world’s biggest and most dangerously armed nuclear power, overlooks the NPT Protocol and makes no effort to destroy nuclear arms. It refused to sign the CTBT and instead in a controversial move, resumed its experiments with more dangerous nuclear arms. Meanwhile, the US unilaterally withdrew from the anti-ballistic missile treaty, ABM, and is currently increasing and developing its missile defense system. While violating the NPT, which explicitly says that no country should be threatened with nuclear arms, the US has prepared a list of enemy countries and is constantly threatening to attack them with nuclear arms. The US has listed some world countries as rogue states or what it calls axis of evil and is scheming to launch pre-emptive attacks against them in a bid to change their systems of government.

As with the prevention of production and proliferation of nuclear arms, the US not only does not intend to establish a fair and global system to prepare the grounds for the destruction of nuclear arms, it has instead mainly focused on countries which it has occupied and claims are developing nuclear arms.

Realities clearly show that the US under the name of prevention of use of nuclear arms is in fact strengthening its monopoly of nuclear arms. Global developments both before and after the Iraq war proved that the US hegemony and dominance were the biggest dangers for peace, stability and global development. Hegemony is the source of war. The US relying on its materialistic power, especially its unmatched military might, is establishing a global order under its own leadership called, uni-polar world. The uni-polar world cannot bring about the peace and stability that the world is expecting. A uni-polar power does not respect any laws or regulations. History has proven that domineering states take violently unpredictable measures to save their vested interests. In the uni-polar system, the domineering force is oblivious of the reaction of other world countries. Thus, the hegemonic state would increase its illogical measures and attempt to move in the direction of destruction, threatening global peace and order.

The uni-polar system is unable to change the disorderly and chaotic international structure or uproot the causes of international disputes and rows.

After the Cold War, the world has never witnessed actual peace. As a result certain big powers, such as Russia, China, and the European Union are using their own methods to thwart the US unilateral power. Economy is the focal point of rivalry and politics is an important means to save major economic interests. Other major industrial countries are also restive. Japan too is striving to free itself from the US control and create more space for itself in the international arena. US dominance and hegemony has been challenged in international relations through globalization and the process of democratization of rules. Globalization is the process of structuring the world by unifying it in political, economic and cultural arenas. Globalization is a rather complicated and ambiguous trend related with restructuring and reshaping in social, economic and cultural fields. The present world is faced with various issues such as environmental pollution, production of nuclear arms, financial crises, terrorism, etc, which no country can face all alone.

Following the Cold War, the process of global democratization speeded up.

All world countries call for participation in international issues and creating a new international order based on justice and reason. Such rapid pace of democratization at international level would definitely put under question the uni-polar dominance. In a uni-polar system, which is an anarchist system as well, the security of world nations cannot be guaranteed and security and political disputes cannot be prevented. The current era is neither too short nor infinite; it is a transient period from bipolar mode to the uni-polar mode. In this period, the world will never witness peace because of constant changes. In view of these facts, multi-polarization is an inevitable trend and the US unilateralism cannot stop it. The multi-polarized world is a reflection of the transient time when all world people demand social progress. Since the world enjoys variety, the development patterns are various too. All big powers are developing. While supporting each other, these powers thwart each other as well, and this would create a suitable situation for control and prevention of dominance and hegemony of a single superpower and a new world war.

Globalization of economy is a real and natural trend of developing production which, deeply influences global economy, international politics, social life and other fields. Economic Globalization brings about mutual dependence. Without cooperation and participation, no country can have continued and coordinated development. Multi-polarization would not necessarily lead to confrontation of big powers. This trend is different from the situation in which big powers sought hegemony and dominance and divided their spheres of influence. However, a multi-polarized world represents expansion of democracy in international politics, and the fact that world countries need to have mutual cooperation in its various forms.

Multi-polarization not only leads to the progress of new political and economic international world order, it is also beneficial for the world’s peace and stability. More world countries are gradually accepting the concept of multi-polarization. They believe that a multi-polar world is better than a uni-polar one. Thus, these countries maintain that multi-polarization is the main condition for establishing real peace in the world. The fight against terrorism indicated that big powers could easily display cooperation and coordination among themselves. A multi-polar world is a guarantee to global security. Though countries considered as multi-polar might have different motives and understandings, generally they maintain similar stances in such cases as defending national interests, supporting international peace and rejecting US dominance.

True Face of US War

The following article is by Joseph Nevins an Assistant Professor of Geography at Vassar College and Post-Doctoral Researcher at the University of California Berkeley.

No doubt many U.S. soldiers took care in Fallujah--as elsewhere in Iraq--to respect international humanitarian law and avoid injuring civilians. But as throughout the U.S. invasion and the ongoing conflict, war crimes and civilian casualties were frequent and often systematic, rather than rare and exceptional. In breach of the Geneva Conventions, for example, U.S. troops refused to allow males of "military-age" defining them all as potential enemy combatants--to flee Fallujah. Given the heavy American bombardment of the city, one wonders how many of these men are among the estimated 1,200 to 1,600 categorized by U.S. authorities as dead insurgents.

American military commanders first stated there was no evidence of civilian casualties in Falluja. Now, the Pentagon has accepted responsibility and offered compensation for the death of a family of seven, including a three-month-old baby. Yet it still only admits to having killed a few.

Press accounts, however, described Fallujah's streets as littered with corpses. One high-level International Committee of the Red Cross official in Iraq estimated in mid-November that there were "at least 800 civilians" among the dead. More recently, the Iraqi Red Crescent estimated that more than 6,000 people may have died in the battle. Eyewitness and survivor reports make clear that U.S. forces were responsible--often deliberately--for most of the victims. At least five fatalities were patients at a Fallujah clinic bombed by U.S. forces--despite promising that they would spare the facility. A clinic doctor stated that American snipers killed many civilians, the youngest a four-year-old boy. An Associated Press photographer described U.S. helicopters shooting people trying to ford a river to safety. Among those slain was a family of five.

Similar to the free-fire zones of Vietnam, U.S. forces in Fallujah had instructions that they could shoot anyone under the assumption that those left in the city were hostile. As a teacher who witnessed two civilians shot and killed by American troops told the Independent of London, "The only way to stay alive was to stay inside and hope your house did not get hit by a shell."

Given such rules of engagement and what war does to those who wage it, it would be foolhardy to see the execution of the wounded prisoner as an isolated occurrence.

Such callousness combined with deadly firepower have led to an Iraqi death toll of horrific proportions. An October article in Britain's most respected medical journal, The Lancet, estimated 100,000 Iraqis had died due to war-related violence, mostly from aerial bombings. Over two-thirds of the fatalities have been women, children or elderly--non-combatants, in other words.

The Geneva Conventions require occupying militaries to protect civilians from violence and prohibit the use of disproportionate and indiscriminate force. As the death toll in Fallujah and throughout Iraq shows, the Pentagon has failed to comply. When such transgressions are isolated, they are war crimes. When they are systematic, they constitute crimes against humanity.

From Vietnam to Nicaragua to Washington's ongoing efforts to undermine the International Criminal Court, American political and military leaders have long insulated themselves from accountability for their illegal behavior overseas. The resulting culture of impunity permitted the Bush administration to launch its illegal invasion of Iraq and has allowed the Pentagon to commit atrocities with little fear of punishment.

Because the U.S. Congress is unwilling to hold accountable high-level officials for war-related crimes, it is the American public's political and moral responsibility to rule in Washington. By acting upon this responsibility, a mobilized citizenry can help end the Iraq disaster and lessen the likelihood that U.S. soldiers are even in a position to commit future cruelties in other countries.

Why Europe Ignores Bush

Machiavelli's advice to political leaders was that it's more important to be feared than to be loved. That's no help for President Bush on his European tour; in spite of the warm words he's exchanging with European leaders, the reality is that the Bush administration is neither loved nor feared in growing sectors of the international community, increasingly, it is simply being ignored.

New evidence of this trend, which has developed in the wake of the war in Iraq, emerges every week: Last Friday, Russia's President Vladimir Putin pooh-poohed the U.S. claim that Iran seeks nuclear weapons, and Moscow agreed to move ahead with delivering the nuclear fuel for Tehran's reactors despite Washington's opposition. And in case you missed the message, Russia has also agreed to supply advanced surface-to-air missiles to Syria, the latest focus of U.S. ire in the Middle East, again in defiance of Washington's stated wishes.

It's hard to avoid the irony in US Secretary of State, Condoleeza Rice's suggestion, in the wake of the fall of Baghdad, that the U.S. should “forgive Russia, ignore Germany and punish France” for opposing the war. On this trip, and Rice's preparatory one, it's more than clear that in fact they're trying hard to forgive France and Germany. And it's equally clear that Russia has no interest in U.S. “forgiveness”, Russia’s President, Vladimir Putin is ignoring the Bush administration.

Nor is Putin alone in shrugging off U.S. calls to abandon trade deals that threaten Washington's strategic interests. The European Union is going ahead with its plans to lift the arms embargo imposed on China after Tiananmen Square, despite urgings by the Bush administration to avoid selling weapons to Beijing.

In their efforts to put a bright face on the administration's diminishing strategic influence, the Bush administration is accentuating the positive, the Europeans have agreed, they point out, to help train Iraqi security forces. Sure, they've agreed to train 1,000 Iraqis a year at a location outside of Iraq. To put that in perspective, the current U.S. goal is to train a further 200,000 Iraqis by October 1 — in other words, the NATO contribution will amount to 0.5 percent of the total.

Iraq, of course, is where the problem began in earnest, even before the war. By pressing ahead to war two years ago without the evidence to back its case and without waiting for UN inspectors to complete their work, the Bush administration inadvertently created a rupture in the international system of alliances that has proved disastrous. It created a situation where longtime U.S. allies found themselves with no choice but to say no to Washington on a strategic priority, and then not only to face no negative consequences, but to see the U.S. struggle under the weight of its occupation mission and then return to Europe calling for fences to be mended without the Europeans having changed their position. Now when US President, George W. Bush said Monday that sweet talk about the environment and promises to make the Israeli Zionists and Palestinian peace process a top priority, the Europeans know the reason is that Washington has been humbled by events. Indeed, it may be a measure of how the strategic balance has shifted that President Bush not only tosses around bon-mots from the existentialists; he hosts a dinner for French President, Jacques Chirac, a European leader he plainly detests, and who has not given an inch in his opposition to U.S. policy in Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East. France won't even consent to U.S. pressure to make the relatively meaningless gesture of putting Hezbollah on a terrorist list.

A two-year occupation by 150,000 U.S. troops has failed to face anti-occupation Iraqi forces. And now in terms of Iran, in light of the difficulties the US has faced in Iraq, it's hard to imagine the U.S. managing to invade and occupy a country three times as large and as populous as Iraq, an unlikely to be any more welcoming of American troops than the Iraqis have been.

The Europeans certainly welcome the shift in tone from Washington, but that won't alter the fundamental strategic differences that transcend the common values President Bush tried to highlight. Look no further than Iran for a reminder that the transatlantic strategic divisions that opened over Iraq are even wider than they were two years ago. The U.S. and Europe’s ways of dealing with Iran’s nuclear technology remain poles apart. The Europeans are trying to negotiate a deal that takes account of what they believe Tehran's legitimate security concerns.

US Administration hawks may think they're cleverly lining up support for tougher action on Iran by letting diplomacy run its course and fail. If so, they could be in for a nasty surprise. The Europeans will almost certainly blame the U.S. refusal to come to the table for the failure of diplomacy. And they're trying to make up a pretext and see a nuclear-armed Iran as a reason to start yet another war in the Middle East. US President says Iran is different from Iraq, Saddam violated 16 UN resolutions, while the Iran matter hasn't even gone to the UN yet. The operative word, of course, is “yet.” US Secretary of State, Condoleeza Rice made clear that the U.S. intends to take the matter there, and has been lobbying to unseat IAEA Chief Doctor Mohammed el-Baradei to help ease the path to refer Tehran to the Security Council. El-Baradei has refused to endorse Washington's charge that Iran is covertly running a weapons program. But the Europeans are opposing Bush administration efforts to unseat him, perhaps more mindful than the Bushies are of just how much credibility the U.S. lost in international eyes by the total collapse in the face of reality of the case for war against Iraq it presented to the UN two years ago. And even if Washington did manage to get the Iran matter onto the Security Council agenda, its chances of getting the Council to pass the sort of resolution Washington wants are negligible. President Putin has signaled Russia is in Tehran's corner on this one, and China's 30 billion dollars investment in Iran's oil and natural gas fields make it a relative certainty that Beijing would veto any resolution designed to impose sanctions or otherwise isolate Tehran.

The rift between the U.S. and Europe is evident on issues as diverse as the Kyoto treaty and the treatment of prisoners at Guantanamo. But it's likely to be felt most acutely in the strategic realm, in which the Europeans plainly no longer see themselves as hitched to the U.S. on matters of global conflict and security. The Europeans will make their own policy on Iraq, building their own relationships with its new government independently of the US.

The New American Souvenir for Afgans

Members of the US Army Special Forces unit punched, slapped, kicked and beat Afghan civilians in two villages southeast of the capital of Kabul last May, prompting official complaints from two senior Army psychological operations officers who were present and said they witnessed the incidents.

Previous abuse allegations have mostly concerned U.S. military activities in Iraq in 2003; these documents detail parallel conduct in Afghanistan in 2004.

In one strikingly similar event, the Army last year found about half a dozen photographs that depict masked U.S. soldiers standing with their weapons pointed at the heads of handcuffed and hooded or blindfolded detainees at a base in southern Afghanistan and, in one case, pressing a detainee's head against the wall of a "cage" where he was brought for interrogation.

The photographs were found on a compact disc left in one of the unit's offices, and the discovery set off a lengthy search by the Army for additional copies in the cars, homes, barracks, computers and cameras of members of the unit, part of the US 22nd Infantry Regiment based in Fort Drum, N.Y.

None of the photos have been published, unlike a set of photos the news media obtained last summer depicting similar acts of abuse and humiliation in Iraq, and a US Army spokesman said that they are being withheld from release “ to protect the privacy” of the Afghan victims.

According to testimony in the Army documents the acts photographed in Afghanistan occurred without provocation between December 2003 and February 2004 and violated Army regulations. The Geneva Conventions bar inhumane treatment as well as any outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment; the convention which the Bush administration pledged to respect in Afghanistan “to the extent appropriate and consistent with military necessity,” but he didn’t.

Members of the culprit US unit in Afghanistan said that they took the pictures for sport and they destroyed some images after photos appeared in the media of similar acts at the U.S. military's Abu Ghuraib prison near Iraq’s capital city, Baghdad.

A US soldier whose name was deleted from an Army investigative report dated July 8, 2004 said: “There would be another public outrage if these photographs got out, so they were destroyed”. Another said his squad leader had directed that photos be deleted from a camera in order to not make him and his unit look bad.”

Several of the published photos of earlier abuse in Iraq depicted the corpse of Manadel Jamadi, who had been in the custody of a Navy SEAL team and CIA interrogators. Earlier, the Associated Press reported for the first time a claim by Army guards at the prison that before the man's death, he had his hands handcuffed behind him and was suspended by his wrists in an effort to coerce his cooperation.

The wire service, quoting what it described as a summary of an interview conducted by investigators with one guard, US Sergeant Jeffery Frost, said Frost had depicted Jamadi's arms as so badly stretched he was surprised they “didn't pop out of their sockets.” Eight US Navy workers have received non-judicial punishments in the case, while two others are awaiting further Navy made-up judgment.

None of those involved in the seven new cases of alleged abuse detailed in the Army documents released were charged by the Army with criminal wrongdoing, although six soldiers received unspecified administrative punishment for dereliction of duty in taking or participating in the photos. Although, investigators found probable cause to charge another soldier in the unit with assault for punching a bound detainee in the back of the head, the documents do not indicate any punishment was imposed.

The American Civil Liberties Union or ACLU said in a statement that they show military abuses were widespread. ACLU Executive Director, Anthony D. Romero said that the abuse, including photos that the ACLU said depicted “mock executions”, couldn’t be dismissed as the rogue actions of a few misguided individuals.

In the case involving alleged abuses in the Afghan villages of Gurjay and Surkhagen last May, all of the Special Forces personnel interviewed by army investigators denied impropriety. The unit's unnamed commander said that the fact was that Afghan villagers who offer resistance or even try to escape were dealt with very aggressively due to the number of detainees the US Army had to deal with.” The commander added noting that nine or fewer soldiers were responsible for controlling 50 to 90 detainees.

The US unnamed commander in Afghanistan added furiously, however: “Everyone knows that we have such a small force very far away from any other real support; the Afghan locals by beating them for no apparent reason will just make things worse for our isolated unit.”

America's War on Itself

The following article is by George Monbiot , an American Columnist and Critic.

Both Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein were groomed and armed by the United States. Until the invasion of Iraq, there were no links between the Ba'athists and al-Qaeda: now Bush's government has created the monster it claimed to be slaying. The US army developed high-grade weaponised anthrax in order, it said, to work out what would happen if someone else did the same. No one else was capable of producing it: the so-called terrorist who launched the anthrax attacks in 2001 took it from one of the U.S army's laboratories. Now US researchers are preparing genetically modified strains of smallpox on the same pretext, and with the same likely consequences. The Pentagon's space-based weapons program is being developed in response to a threat which doesn't yet exist, but is likely to conjure up. The US government is engaged in a global war with itself. It is like a robin attacking its reflection in a window.

Nowhere is this more obvious than in its assaults on the multilateral institutions and their treaties. Listening to some of the nonsense about the United Nations venting from Capitol Hill at the moment, one could be forgiven for believing that the UN was a foreign conspiracy against the United States. It was, of course, proposed by a US president, launched in San Francisco and housed in New York, where its headquarters remain. Its Universal Declaration of Human Rights, characterized by Republicans as a dangerous restraint upon American freedoms, was drafted by Franklin Roosevelt's widow. The US is now the only member of the UN Security Council whose word is law, with the result that the UN is one of the world's most effective instruments for the projection of American power.

So we could interpret the activities of Bush's government at the climate talks in Buenos Aires as another vigorous attempt to destroy its own interests. US economic growth depends on the rest of the world's prosperity. The greatest long-term threat to global prosperity is climate change, which threatens to wreck many of America's key markets in the developing world. Coastal cities in the US - including New York - are threatened by rising sea levels. Florida could be hit by stronger and more frequent hurricanes. Both farms and cities are likely to be affected by droughts. In February, a leaked report from the Pentagon revealed that it sees global warming as far more dangerous to US interests than terrorism. As a result of abrupt climate change, it claimed, "warfare may again come to define human life... As the planet's carrying capacity shrinks, an ancient pattern re-emerges: the eruption of desperate, all-man wars over food, water, and energy supplies." The nuclear powers are likely to invade each other's territories as they scramble for diminishing resources.

So how does George Bush respond to this? "Bring it on." The meeting in Buenos Aires was supposed to work out what the world should do about climate change when the Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012. Most of the world's governments want the Protocol to be replaced by a new, tougher agreement. But the Bush administration has been seeking to ensure both that the original agreement is scrapped, and that nothing is developed to replace it. The Kyoto Protocol is flawed, the Bush team says, because countries such as China and India are currently exempted from cutting their emissions. But instead of helping to design a treaty that would eventually bring them in, the US teamed up with them in Buenos Aires to try to sink all international cooperation. It even supported Saudi Arabia's demand that oil-producing countries should be compensated for any decline in the market caused by carbon cuts.

The US tried to sink the bio-safety Protocol in 1999, even though, as it hadn't signed, it wasn't bound by it. It sought to trash the 2002 Earth Summit, though Bush failed to attend. This isn't, as some people suggest, isolationism. It is a thorough and sustained engagement, whose purpose is to prevent the world's most pressing problems from being solved. And the result, of course, is that the catastrophe described by the Pentagon is now more likely to happen. The US has just spent millions of dollars in Buenos Aires undermining its own peace and prosperity. Of course, Americans know that its delegation was representing the interests of the U.S corporations, not the U.S people, and that what's bad for America is good for Exxon.

But this does not detract from the sheer, self-immolating stupidity of its position. The US has every right to beat itself up. But unfortunately, while chasing itself around the world, it tramples everyone else. Everyone knows that appealing to George Bush's intelligence isn't likely to take Americans very far, but surely there's someone in that administration who can see what a monkey he's making of America.

Bush's Inaugural Address vs. Reality

President Bush’s second inaugural address has received widespread praise for its recognition of the imperative of advancing human freedom worldwide, not just for its own sake, but for America’s own national interest.

Unfortunately, this ignores the fact that the United States has long been the number one military, diplomatic, and economic backer of the world’s most repressive regimes, a pattern that has only been strengthened under the Bush administration.

Correctly recognizing the roots of terrorism, President Bush noted that “as long as whole regions of the world simmer in resentment and tyranny prone to ideologies that feed hatred and excuse murder violence will gather, and multiply in destructive power, and cross the most defended borders, and raise a mortal threat.”

For much of the second half of his first term, he has emphasized that as a necessary means of curbing the threat of terrorism the United States must push for reform and democratization of the so – called autocratic governments of Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, and the Palestine Authority. It is important to note, however, that none of the 9/11 attacks came from those countries. Instead, they came from U.S.-backed like Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and the United Arab Emirates, which continue to receive billions of dollars worth of U.S. military equipment annually. Oman, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Uzbekistan, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, Tunisia and Morocco are also among the autocratic regimes in the Islamic world which continue to receive unconditional support from the United States. A look at the six family dictatorships of the Persian Gulf region propped up by American arms and advisors underscores the irony that the nation founded in one of the first republican revolutions against monarchial rule is now the primary supporter of the world’s few remaining absolute monarchies. It is presumably no coincidence that the only autocratic regimes toward which the Bush administration has pressed for reform have been those which have traditionally opposed American hegemonic goals in the region. In addition, while Israel serves as an exemplary democracy for its Jewish citizens, the right-wing government of Ariel Sharon has engaged in a pattern of gross and systematic human rights violations in its occupied Palestinian territories, practices made possible in large part through billions of dollars worth of unconditional military and economic assistance sent annually courtesy of the American taxpayer.

If U.S. policy is indeed so contrary to the promotion of freedom and liberty, why has this become such a focal point of the Bush administration at the start of its second term?

Perhaps it is a means of diverting attention from the administration’s disastrous policies in Iraq. Though claims that Saddam Hussein still possessed “weapons of mass destruction” and had operational links with Al-Qaeda have been proven false, no one can deny the repressive nature of his regime or the Iraqi people’s right to live freely. Unfortunately, American forces have been responsible for far more civilian deaths in the nearly two years since the U.S. occupation began than during the final two years of Saddam’s regime.

It may also be a means of silencing opposition. If, for example, the American public can actually be made to believe that the primary purpose of U.S. foreign policy under President Bush is to promote democracy, critics of Bush administration policy can therefore be depicted as not supporting democracy. Indeed, in the only reference President Bush made to critics of his policies in his inaugural address, he blithely dismissed them as those who have “questioned the global appeal of liberty.”

President Bush promised that “All who live in tyranny and hopelessness can know: the United States will not ignore their oppression, or excuse their oppressors.” If this is actually the case, President Bush must immediately make it clear to all governments that oppress their own people or those under their military occupation: that unless and until they respect human rights, including the rights of people to choose their own government, the United States will immediately cease all economic and security assistance, withdraw American advisors to their police and military, block all transfers of American armaments and other implements of repression, and encourage other countries to do the same.

Unfortunately, there are currently no signs that President Bush is prepared to do this or that either party in Congress is willing to pressure him to do so.

Unless or until that time comes, President Bush’s noble words at his inauguration can only be seen as self-serving hypocrisy of the worst kind.

Bring Our Troops Home

The follwing article is by Howard Zinn, Author of the best-selling, ‘A People's History of the United States'.

America must withdraw its military from Iraq, the sooner the better. The reason is simple: The U.S. presence there is a disaster for the American people and an even bigger disaster for the Iraqi people.

It is a strange logic to declare, as so many in Washington do, that it was wrong for the U.S. to invade Iraq but right for it to remain. A recent New York Times editorial sums up the situation accurately: ``Some 21 months after the American invasion, United States military forces remain essentially alone in battling what seems to be a growing insurgency, with no clear prospect of decisive success any time in the foreseeable future.''

And then, in an extraordinary non sequitur: ``Given the lack of other countries willing to put up their hands as volunteers, the only answer seems to be more American troops, and not just through the spring, as currently planned. . . . Forces need to be expanded through stepped-up recruitment.''

Here is the flawed logic: the U.S. is alone in the world in this invasion. The insurgency is growing. There is no visible prospect of success. Therefore, let's send more troops? The definition of fanaticism is that when one discovers that he is going in the wrong direction, he redoubles his speed.

In all of this, there is an unexamined premise: that military victory would constitute ``success.''

Conceivably, the United States, possessed of enormous weaponry, might finally crush the resistance in Iraq. The cost would be great. Already, tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands, have lost their lives and Americans must not differentiate between ''their'' casualties and '' Americans '' if it is believed that all human beings have an equal right to life. Would that be a ``success''?

In 1967, the same arguments that is hearing now were being made against withdrawal in Vietnam. The United States did not pull out its troops for six more years. During that time, the war killed at least one million more Vietnamese and perhaps 30,000 U.S. military personnel.

The U.S. must stay in Iraq, it is said again and again, so that it can bring stability and democracy to that country. Isn't it clear that after almost two years of war and occupation America has brought only chaos, violence and death to that country, and not any recognizable democracy? Can democracy be nurtured by destroying cities, by bombing, by driving people from their homes?

There is no certainty as to what would happen in the U.S. absence. But there is absolute certainty about the result of its presence -- escalating deaths on both sides.

The loss of life among Iraqi civilians is especially startling. The British medical journal Lancet reports that 100,000 civilians have died as a result of the war, many of them children. The casualty toll on the American side includes more than 1,350 deaths and thousands of maimed soldiers, some losing limbs, others blinded. And tens of thousands more are facing psychological damage in the aftermath. Has the U.S. learned nothing from the history of imperial occupations, all pretending to help the people being occupied?

The United States, the latest of the great empires, is perhaps the most self-deluded, having forgotten that history, including its own: its 50-year occupation of the Philippines, or its long occupation of Haiti or of the Dominican Republic, its military intervention in Southeast Asia and its repeated interventions in Nicaragua, El Salvador and Guatemala.

Its military presence in Iraq is making America less safe, not more so. It is inflaming people in the Middle East, and thereby magnifying the danger of terrorism. Far from fighting ''there rather than here,'' as President Bush has claimed, the occupation increases the chance that enraged infiltrators will strike the U.S. at home.

In leaving, America can improve the odds of peace and stability by encouraging an international team of negotiators, largely Arab, to mediate among the Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds and work out a federalist compromise to give some autonomy to each group. The U.S. must not underestimate the capacity of the Iraqis, once free of both Saddam Hussein and the U.S. occupying army, to forge their own future.

Bush's Jobless Economy

The January jobs report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics continues the bad news of the past four years. During President Bush's first term, the US economy had a net loss of three-quarters of a million private sector jobs. Despite three years of economic recovery, fewer Americans are employed in the private sector today than when Bush was first inaugurated four years ago.

The slight decline in the unemployment rate reported for January is not the result of new jobs; it is the result of large numbers of discouraged people, many with university degrees, dropping out of the work force. They cannot find employment and have given up looking for it.

During Bush's first term, the once fabled US economy has been unable to create jobs in export sectors or in import-competitive sectors. January's 134,000 new private sector jobs are in domestic services that cannot be outsourced: couriers and messengers, food services and drinking places, health care and social assistance, educational services, temporary help, retail, and credit intermediation.

US imports are now 50 percent greater than US exports, putting tremendous pressure on the US dollar. US dependence on imported manufactured goods has resulted in exploding trade deficits, which are growing more than five times faster than the US economy. The explosive growth of the US trade deficit since 1990 has turned $3.3 trillion of US assets over to foreigners.

Flooded with US dollars, foreigners perceive their dollar holdings to be rapidly depreciating. The dollar has fallen dramatically against the Euro, gold, and the British pound.

At an international economic meeting in Davos, Switzerland on January 26, the director of a Chinese National Economic Research Institute announced that China has lost faith in the stability of the US dollar. "Now people understand the US dollar will not stop devaluating," said Fan Gang.

One likely result of this realization is that foreigners will cease to use their trade surpluses to mop up American red ink. It makes no sense to purchase dollar assets such as Treasury bonds when they are falling in value. As foreigners continue to move out of dollars, US interest rates will rise, terminating the housing boom and wrecking family finances.

America's growing dependence on imports reflects the outsourcing of manufacturing jobs and knowledge services. Every time a US firm outsources goods or services, it turns domestic production into imports. Half of the US trade deficit with China represents US offshore production for US markets.

Interest groups that benefit from outsourcing and their spokespersons who cloak themselves in free-trade rhetoric maintain that there is nothing to worry about. Outsourcing, they claim, strengthens the US economy and creates jobs. If that were true, wouldn't economic strength translate into dollar strength? If outsourcing creates US jobs, wouldn't some of those jobs be in the export sector?

Average weekly pay in the US is declining in real terms. Obviously, if outsourcing is creating jobs, they are less good jobs than the ones being outsourced. Trading better jobs for worse ones is the road to poverty, not the road to wealth.

Charles McMilion of MBG Information Services notes that normally a 38-month old economic recovery would have raised hours paid by 11% to 14%. The 38-month old Bush recovery has raised hours paid by less than one percent!

The clowns in Washington DC imagine that they sit beside a Superpower. Absorbed in fantasies of invading countries and remaking the world in America's image, little do US deluded leaders realize that America is in the hands of the Chinese and Japanese creditors. Should either of these Asian powerhouses decide to stop mopping up America's red ink, the dollar would collapse to such an extent that it would lose its reserve currency status.

When the dollar ceases to be the reserve currency, America will cease to be a superpower.

Bush's Pillars

The following article is by Ralph Nader, One of America's most effective social Critics and the Prominent Member of American Greens Party.

President George W. Bush's Inaugural Address was perched high on the abstraction ladder. Words like "freedom," "liberty" and "democracy" poured forth not just for Americans but for everyone in the world. Let's bring his rhetoric down to the concrete level of his record-that is, down the ladder of abstraction where regular people live. He spoke in the District of Columbia--a place of gross contrasts between wealth and poverty beneath one unity. D.C. residents--all 600,000 of them--have no voting representatives in the U.S. Congress. They, unlike all other federal districts in all other democracies, are disenfranchised. Some freedom, some liberty, some democracy.

George W. Bush , in his first term, one of his signal prides of authorship was the Patriot Act--considered in its intrusiveness and abandonment of safeguards to be the broadest encroachment on civil liberties and the judiciary in the U.S history-whether in war or peace--by leading civil liberties scholars and practitioners. Under Bush and John Ashcroft, former Bush's Attorney General, there were many arrests without charges, imprisonment without attorneys and indefinite, anonymous detention of alleged witnesses. There now can be perfunctory court approval for searching Americans most personal financial, medical and e-mail records without probable cause or due process of law and for searching Americans homes and business without pre-notifying them. How does this square the assertion in his speech: "We are determined to show the meaning and promise of liberty?"

Mr. Bush made no reference to the "Four Freedoms" speech in January 1941 by one of his Political Heroes-Franklin Delano Roosevelt. One was the "freedom from want." For good reason. The comparisons would not be flattering. Unlike Roosevelt, Bush went out of his way to enact polities that increased poverty among both children and adults in the past four years. He opposed an increase in the minimum wage, now frozen in the past at about 5 dollars an hour. In inflation adjusted terms, this is the lowest minimum wage in over 50 years. One out of every three workers in the U.S earns wages ranging from about 5 dollars to under 10 dollars an hour. In the late nineteenth century, this penury was called "wage slavery."

Within Mr. Bush's address, there were these words: "In America's ideal of freedom, citizens find the dignity and security of economic independence, instead of laboring on the edge of subsistence." Tell that to 47 million Americans working today at or below the edge of subsistence, while the rich, whom Mr. Bush has called "my base," receive trillions of dollars in new tax reductions over the next decade.

Another key pillar of liberty is the freedom of assembly-built into American Constitution alongside freedom of speech. Personally, Mr. Bush has secured new restraints. At his campaign rallies last year, the crowds were selected with remarkable detail from partisan ranks. Once in a while, a lonely figure would be there with an anti-Bush T-shirt or holding silently an anti-Bush sign. They were thrown out, sometimes quite roughly. And at the Inaugural, protesters were kept so far away that their speech was put on remote, causing commentators to decry the use of excessive security as a pretext to exile dissent.

This inaugural address has a global sweep. Bush declared that "it is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture." It would take you a while to count the number of dictatorial and oligarchic regimes that his Administration supports with military and diplomatic assistance.

The billionaire financier, George Soros, has called multinational corporations the major post-Soviet Union threat to democracy in the world. Mr. Bush, their cheerleader, throws the might of the U.S. government behind them and with substantial military cover and subsidies.

The Bush record proliferates its contradictions of Bush's words. Americans founding fathers fought for the people's right to sue wrongdoers and be judged by a jury of their peers in a court of law. Mr. Bush is fanatically pushing Congress to pass federal laws handcuffing state judges and jurors in ways that restrict the freedom of wrongfully injured and defrauded Americans to have their full day in court against corporate defendants.

Mr. Bush has set new records in raising money from corporate interests for his Presidential campaigns, declaring avoiding public financing allowances and worsening the role of "dirty money" in politics. The freedom to have clean elections on the merits, not on the money, has been further eroded under Bush’s monarchy.

The Islamic World and The Second Term of Bush’s Presidency

US President, George W. Bush in a ceremony on Thursday January 20 began his second term of presidency. This was not good news for the people of the world who have witnessed the war-seeking performance of Bush in the first term of his presidency. According to an opinion poll conducted by Globe Scan institute on the eve of Bush’s swearing ceremonies, 47 % of the respondents have considered the world insecure due to his re-election and this feeling of insecurity is observed more in Islamic states. For instance in Turkey about an 82 percent fear of the re-election of Bush has been reported. This comes under circumstances when Bush claims campaign against insecurity and terrorism, and at his oath taking speech ceremony he claimed to defend freedom several times. But apparently the process of distrust toward such unfounded allegations by the US is still growing, for, Bush’s performance in the first four years of his presidency proves the opposite.

Meanwhile, in the past few weeks, political observers have predicted the future policy of George Bush regarding the different regions of the world and one of the most important of them is the Islamic world. For, in the past 4 years, particularly after September 11, 2001 the Islamic world has been the focus of the White House attention. Following the incident, the Bush government and the affiliated mass media propagated that all Muslims are terrorists and are guilty in attacking the towers of the world trade center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington and that’s why the US president termed the anti-terrorism campaign a Crusade. They have launched such a war the military and political dimensions of which are assumed by the Bush government, while its propaganda and cultural aspects are assumed by major western media.

The warlords ruling over the Bush government in the first military measure against the Islamic world attacked and occupied Afghanistan in October 2001 under the pretext of arresting the leader of the al-Qaeda network Osama bin Laden and the other members who are supposed to be involved in the September 11 attacks as it is claimed by the White House.

But this group is still active and its leader is free. The second war-mongering measure of Bush against the Islamic world took place in Iraq. In March 2003, the US along with Britain attacked Iraq under the pretext of the anti-terrorism campaign and development of weapons of mass destruction, killing many people. But the Americans found no weapons and they failed to clarify the relationship between the former Iraqi regime and al-Qaeda terrorists. Nevertheless, it is clear to all that the US’ main objective of occupying Iraq is to loot oil and take in its hand the market of this country.

The other measure of Bush’s government in his first presidential term which is mainly pursued by the media is insults toward Muslims and their holy values. The media try to portray the valuable teachings of Islam as violent and terrorist. Several programs and films have been made in this regard and many books and articles have been written. Moreover, every some often, one of the western political and religious personalities in a speech or article raises unfounded and illogical claims against Islam.

Although, it is clear to those who are familiar with Islam that these negative accusations often stem from the ignorance of those individuals towards Islam or indiscriminating prejudices and that basically they enjoy no logic. Nevertheless, the western media under the blessing of war-seeking and anti-Islamic policies have created a poisonous atmosphere against the Muslims of America and Europe. Of course, the world bodies witness that the Bush government under the title of the anti-terrorism campaign enacted very strict regulations against Muslims and following that the European governments gradually adopted such a discriminating trend.

Generally, according to Bush’s methods in his first term of presidency, experts believe that his violent and expansionist policies against the Islamic world will not be changed in the second round of his presidency. Particularly that in the new Bush cabinet, the Neo-Conservatives who are known for war-seeking and unilateralism have more influence and presence.

The statements of individuals such as Condoleeza Rice who has been appointed as the Secretary of State, Dick Cheney the Vice-President, and the Under Defence Secretary Paul Wolfowitz indicate the continued hostility of Washington towards the Islamic world in the next four years. The American officials have threatened the Islamic states several times in the past years and they have continued them in the past few days. They termed particularly the Islamic Republic of Iran dangerous through unfounded claims and threatened this country. Though, these violent and war-seeking statements were criticized by many governments even the European governments.

In his speech at the presidential oath taking ceremony, Bush focused on freedom and termed this term frequently. But instead he did not use the term terrorism. This issue can be indicative that in his second presidential term, Bush intends to use the term terrorism less for a pretext for enmity towards the Islamic world, for with the clarification of the inhumane and violent intentions of the White House this pretext has lost its competency and less people believe the claim of this government regarding the anti-terrorism campaign. Thus, it seems that in the next years, Bush will try by using terms like anti-freedom and anti-democracy campaign to pressure or attack the Islamic world.

In his speech at the swearing in ceremony, Bush termed establishment of freedom as a mission on behalf of God and warned other governments that freedom in their countries is a major part of relations with America. Thus, it is clear that Bush’s desired freedom is a pretext for the US to interfere in the affairs of other countries or continue hegemony and aggression.

The US-proposed plan the Greater Middle East pursues such an objective. Washington has termed the goal of this plan to create democracy in the Middle East states. Of course fortunately in some Islamic states, not much sign of popular rule is seen and people do not have much of a role in determining their own fate.

Whereas the liberating religion of Islam strongly calls for the participation of people in their own fate and government.

The US also tries to take advantage of this very weak point of some countries.

Democracy is established in a country in its real meaning once the people of that country want it and it is not imposed on them from the outside. On the other hand, the US with the slogan of freedom seeking is seeking to promote western values in the Islamic states and removing the honorable Islamic values in those countries. For this reason, a popularly ruled country like the Islamic Republic of Iran with its governmental organs is shaped directly or indirectly with the people’s votes and has outraged Washington due to its implementation of the teachings of Islam.

Generally, in the second term of Bush’s presidency, like the first term, the Islamic world will witness the illogical campaign-seeking of the US government but this time its pretexts might be different and might turn into the slogans of freedom and democracy-seeking.

Smart Bombs; Wrong House

Brian Cloughley writes on military and political affairs. In his most recent article he has unveiled some aspects of the US occupation forces’ brutalities in Iraq. Excerpt of his article is as follows:

The bomb was delivered by a USAF F-16. Don't you warm to that word, 'delivered' - it's so wonderfully innocuous: "I delivered some flowers"; "You delivered a baby”; "They delivered a 500 pound GBU-30 bomb that obliterated a house and blew its occupants to bits". It was guided to its target by a precision system that depends on amazingly sophisticated devices. It can't miss. And on January 8 it didn't miss. It smashed into the house it was programmed to destroy.

But it was the wrong house.

In all the reports of attacks on US forces in Iraq in early January there was one news item that verged on the banal. It was certainly treated by US mainstream media as if it were completely unimportant, and in the eyes of the US military it was a mere blip, a trivial incident in their records of explosions and deaths, with an average of 75 attacks taking place day in, day out. It was about the wrongly-directed precision-guided US bomb that killed Iraqi civilians - only a dozen or so - in the town of Aitha.

The bomb itself was not to blame for being misdirected. It could hardly be at fault because it performed the manifest duty for which it was constructed at a handsome profit for McDonnell Douglas. It's nice to know that some people are doing so well out of this war. It zoomed down as intended and exploded with devastating force. It was a good and obedient bomb that did what it was told to do. And it killed an Iraqi family in the course of "a cordon and search operation to capture an anti-Iraqi force cell leader", according to a US military statement. So let's examine this official pronouncement.

We'll leave the "anti-Iraqi" reference for the moment, because this is crude propaganda aimed at influencing an audience that doesn't exist beyond the revolving-eyeball supporters of the Bush war on Iraq. But if we consider the tactical and reporting aspects, the part concerned with professional military application, it tells us a great deal about how the US Command in Iraq is performing its duties.

If a military operation is intended to capture someone it is obvious that soldiers have been ordered to take him alive. A cordon and search operation is an effective method of doing this, although it is professionally demanding. What usually happens (or should happen) is that in dead of night a unit of troops (their number dependant on the size of the area to be cordoned) silently surrounds the village or urban locality to be searched. The operation has to be rehearsed beforehand, and every single soldier must know exactly where to go, which is basic routine for a well-trained army.
Given good troops, clear orders, and, especially, capable junior leaders (corporals to lieutenants), the area can be sealed off effectively. Once that is done, the sub-units tasked to capture the designated person move into their sectors through the cordon, before dawn. Their intelligence about the location of the wanted person is precise (it must be, otherwise there would be no point in the operation), so they are able to grab him quickly. If the target and his supporters fire on those who wish to take him, then the most effective means of dealing with such a hardly unexpected situation is to fight through in classic infantry style. If it is necessary in that process to kill the people who opened fire on the searchers, then so be it.

This particular operation was obviously a botched job and was no more a professional cordon and search than it was a moon-shot (like the Tora Bora operation in Afghanistan, when bin Laden escaped). Part of the shambles was misdirection of an F-16 pilot.

Pilots of F-16s don't capture suspects. Pilots - who are people, too : it's not "an F-16" that kills, as if it were some sort of out-of-earth robot, beyond human control - use precision-guided bombs to destroy buildings. And in this so-called cordon and search operation a pilot was ordered to send a 500-pound bomb thundering explosively into the wrong building. The person whom it was intended to capture was not there. If he had been there, he would have been blown to bits, not captured. But other people were blown to bits.

Unfortunately, these days, there is little room for choice because the military in Iraq and Afghanistan have told so many lies to the world concerning their activities. The more high-profile instances were the Keystone Cops farce of the Jessica Lynch 'rescue' in Iraq, and the wicked lies that US Army generals told about the death in Afghanistan of Pat Tillman. We were told in great detail how he died leading a charge against the enemy, but in fact he was killed by his own side, by gross incompetence. It is difficult to imagine how the generals thought that they could get away with such a blatant deceit, but they charged ahead and lied their boots off just the same. And of course they did get away with it, because none of them has been disciplined for their dishonorable conduct.

U.N. Can Survive U.S. Assault

The following article is an excerpt from a speech given last month at the University of Cambridge, by Hans Blix the Former U.N. Chief Weapons Inspector.

The results of a review of the functioning of the U.N., conducted by a panel appointed by the Secretary-General Kofi Annan, will soon be on the table. That there is a need to discuss an array of questions is not in doubt — but the fact that the most powerful member of the organization shows disdain for it is not exactly conducive to a positive intergovernmental debate.

We learned before the invasion of Iraq that in the view of the U.S. administration, the UN Security Council had the choice of voting with the U.S. for armed action — or being irrelevant. A majority on the Council did not allow itself to be pushed into supporting the action, and the invasion took place. Many saw this as a loss of prestige for the Council and as a crisis for the U.N.. In one way it was, and is. Institutions such as the Security Council are like instruments to be played.

If members choose not to play or are completely out of tune, no marching music results. It is only when the construction of the instruments is found deficient or outmoded that repair is meaningful.

The refusal last year of a majority of the SSecurity Council to follow the tune that the U.S. wished the Council to play can also be seen as the saving of the Council's authority and respectability. How would the world look at the Council today if it had endorsed an armed action to eradicate weapons of mass destruction — that did not exist and whose evidence was often prepared, even constructed?

Today most countries and most people consider the action launched in Iraq a grave error or worse, and much of American public opinion — perhaps even a majority — shares this view. Yet the new U.S. administration seems to take victory in the presidential election not only as support for strong positions and actions against the so – called terrorist threats (probably a justified interpretation), but also as support for its decision to launch the war on Iraq and for its scornful attitude to the U.N..

It is as if the U.N. had insulted the U.S. The Republican Convention that re-nominated George Bush erupted in applause when the vice-president said that Mr. Bush would "never seek a permission slip to defend the American people". Fine, except that Iraq was not a threat, not a growing threat, and probably not even a distant threat.

We also see an intense and large-scale campaign of vilification, depicting the U.N. as "corrupt" because the oil-for-food programme instituted and supervised by the Security `Council and its most powerful members, including the U.S. — enabled Iraq, the buyers of Iraqi oil and the sellers of products to Iraq, to siphon off money and pass it on illegally to the Saddam regime.

The fraud, although widely suspected and estimated at about a billion dollars a year in the media, was not easy for the program administration to track down and prove. The Council and its members saw it with open eyes just as they saw the billions that flowed to Saddam from oil exports to neighbouring states. The program functioned as a reasonably effective break against the import of weapons and dual-use items, which was its major objective. Today it serves as a campaign platform against the U.N.. So long as the current climate remains, it is doubtful if any meaningful discussion about U.N. reform can be pursued.

It has been suggested that in the review of the functioning of the U.N., an effort should be made to examine the circumstances in which the use of force can and should be authorized. Some would wish to see a greater use of the Council's power to hold members to their duties to protect their own citizens: to intervene by force, if necessary, in situations of genocide, as in Rwanda or Darfur. Others want to search for a reformulation of article 51 of the charter, in order to give some room for pre-emptive action.

The U.N’s Security Council remains potentially a vital institution. The Iraq war has demonstrated the handicap that followed from not acting with its authorization.

For greater legitimacy, the Security Council needs to represent a large part of the world's population, hence a need for the presence in the Council of the most populous countries in all continents. One argument, not infrequently advanced, those states that pay the greatest contributions to the U.N. budget should merit a seat. The seats should not be for sale.

America; on the Beat Across THE GLOBE

The U.S. foreign policy after the World War II, including that of the Bush administration, has been based on certain assumptions about the nature of the World. But most of those assumptions are suspect.

The most notable assumption is that if the U.S. government does not dominate the globe militarily and ensure security through wanton armed interventions, the World will fall apart. Yet the United States did not even exist for the vast majority of recorded history and the World got along just fine using what scholars call a “balance of power” among great powers.

Evan Eland in an article in the Men’s News Daily says: "In fact, often times the U.S. government has invaded other countries and removed their governments for no good reason, for example, the U.S. invasion of Panama in 1989 and the recent invasion of Iraq. Other times, the US government has used the CIA to remove a foreign country’s democratic government and replace it with one that was friendly to U.S. interests—for example, in Iran in 1953, Guatemala in 1954 and Chile in 1973. Apparently, President Bush—who, according to Time magazine, reads only books that support his way of thinking—loved a recent book that argues U.S. hegemony has deep roots in American history.

Eland who is the author of “the Empire Has No Clothes” goes on to say that: Recent aggressive U.S. behavior should cast doubt on a couple of other assumptions held by the U.S. policy elite and general public. One assumption is that democracies are more peaceful than more authoritarian governments. Scholars have shown that no practical support exists for this proposition.

According to Time, President Bush is also crazy about the Natan Sharansky’s book, the Case for Democracy, which argues that security of the world depends on using any means necessary to support democracy. Even if democracies ultimately went to war less than more authoritarian nations and if they never went to war with each other, the costs of all of the wars needed to convert autocratic countries to democracies would be too high. In addition to expending much blood and treasure, all U.S. wars have eroded civil liberties at home. Even if the U.S. administration could militarily convert all of the nations of the world to real democracies the United States could very well endanger its own community.

Another assumption is that al-Qaeda is attacking the United States because of its freedoms. The Defense Science Board, made up of high-powered consultants to the Department of Defense, recently issued a report rejecting this notion and accurately noting that al-Qaeda attacks the United States because it hates U.S. interventionism in the World. However, the U.S. National Intelligence Council apparently still doesn’t get it. The council recently released a forecast for the next 15 years predicting that the Iraq war and other conflicts will create a professional class of terrorists for whom political violence will become an end in itself. The Council also predicted that al-Qaeda will be replaced with other extremist groups that will oppose globalization in World societies. The council argued that a new U.S. counter-terrorism strategy should be used in the World, in addition to using military power.

Unfortunately, the council buys into all the myths about why al Qaeda and other groups attack the United States.

It is possible to vehemently disagree with the methods of terrorist groups without assuming that they have no motives for what they do other than their bloodthirstiness. In a somewhat contradictory stand, the report seems to argue that these groups are attacking the United States because they oppose globalization. These are all self-serving conclusions designed to mask the real reason that al-Qaeda and like groups attack the United States.

Osama bin Laden has been very clear about why he targets the United States. Time and again, he has listed specific items related to U.S. intervention in the affairs of other countries—especially the U.S. government's propping up of corrupt regimes.

All of this leads to the inescapable conclusion that the US administration runs a “Tarzan” foreign policy—that is, “Me good, you bad.” The US propaganda machine excessively demonizes the motives of anyone or any country that takes actions the United States does not like and asserts that U.S. motives are only idealistic.

Evan Eland concludes that the US administration's excitement is really meant for the American public, the only party that has been bamboozled into believing it. Why doesn’t the public ask its government to explain why Saddam Hussein’s unnecessary invasion of Kuwait was bad and President Bush’s unnecessary invasion of Iraq was good? Also, why don’t they ask if killing innocent civilians, even as collateral damage, in an unnecessary and aggressive invasion is any better than deliberately targeting them as bin Laden does?

These are politically incorrect questions, but the American people should start asking them of their government. Instead, by accepting questionable assumptions from the U.S. government, the American people are allowing it to unnecessarily turn the United States into an international rogue state.

Bush's Grand Plan? Incite Civil War in Iraq

The Bush Administration is desperately trying to steer Iraq toward civil war. But it's a foolhardy move that only magnifies the desperation of the present situation. The Pentagon expected a "runaway victory" and, instead, they've found themselves mired in a guerilla war.

Everyone from Brent Scowcroft to Tom Friedman has speculated on the likelihood of civil war. Their comments are more reflective of the hopes of American elites than they are of realities on the ground. Sure, Friedman would like to see Muslims killing Muslims, but it will never happen. Tom hasn't guessed right on the war yet, and that's not about to change. The same could be said for Rumsfeld. For a Secretary of Defense who regards "information as power", Rumsfeld seems woefully blinkered by the true nature of the fighting. He seems incapable of grasping even the most basic elements of the conflict or the psychology that fuels it.

When you destroy a man's home and kill and disgrace his friends, he'll fight back. And, when you rob a man of everything he has, including his dignity, you leave him with one, solitary passion rage. This rage is now animating the resistance in ways that no one had previously anticipated. The world's lone superpower is roped to the ground like Gulliver and the Pentagon high-command is getting increasingly agitated.

Whatever one may think of the Iraqis at this point, one thing is certain; they know who their real enemy is. They know who Americans are, and they know they want them out.

Rumsfeld finally seems to be grasping the seriousness of the predicament. The security situation has deteriorated so dramatically that even his support among the so-called American elites is eroding. Last week Foreign Policy Gurus, Brent Scowcroft and Zbigniew Brzezinski, fired off a barrage of criticism directed at the mishandling of the situation in Iraq. The normally cautious Brzezinski was particularly savage, slamming the war as a sign of "moral decay"; a euphemism that will undoubtedly send shock waves through America's boardrooms and think-tanks.

James Dobbins of the Conservative Rand Corporation was equally ferocious, stating bluntly that "The beginning of wisdom is to realize that the United States can't win."
Dobbins probably should have added, "Can't win, but won't leave," as the appropriate adjunct to his first observation.

There are signs that the wayward Rumsfeld is beginning to get the message. Last week he dispatched retired General Gary Luck to Iraq to produce a detailed breakdown of force strength and vulnerabilities. When Luck returns he will appear before Congress and make an energetic appeal for more troops and stiffer resolve. He can be expected to draw a dismal picture of a failed state that threatens to destabilize the entire region. Both the Congress and the media will play a role in calling on the American people for steadfastness in the face of a very long and bloody occupation. Many believe that Luck's assessment will determine whether Bush will approach Congress to reinstate the draft.

Enlisting the skills of General Luck is an indication that Rumsfeld is giving ground to his critics; that he is no longer able to elevate his judgment above all others. His bungling of every aspect of the war has limited his ability to act unilaterally. He will either have to demonstrate some level of cooperation or step down. The war's two main debacles so far can be directly pinned on Rumsfeld. First, he went in "too light" without sufficient manpower to secure the peace and second, he dismissed the 400,000 strong Iraqi military, the majority of whom now comprise the resistance.

The siege of Fallujah was a crossroads for the American occupation. The right-wing authorities insisted that the resistance in Fallujah be crushed by any means possible; preferably overwhelming force. The Baghdad enclave of 250,000 was decimated by the relentless pounding of US aerial bombardment and a full-fledged ground assault that left over 700 civilians dead; 70% of whom were women and children.

In the first attack on Fallujah Lt. Col. B. P. McCoy noted that, "We don't want to rubblize, the city." McCoy's injunction was ignored during the second (Nov 8) siege. The city has been both "rubblized" and rendered "uninhabitable". The Bush administration applied the "nuclear option" to Fallujah; leveling the city to send a message that future resistance would be dealt with accordingly. The message was faithfully rejected.

Predictably, the story was buried in the western press, but the implications are clear. The Pentagon has been intentionally misleading the American people about the size and strength of the resistance. These new figures, which are now supported by many independent defense analysts, point to a resistance which is numerically larger than the occupation and fully prepared to fight a long guerilla war. This brings us back to James Dobbins observation "The beginning of wisdom is to realize that the United States can't win."

Powell’s Selective Sense of Horror

The following article is by article by David Lindorff, the Counterpunch Magazine’s Columnist on Colin Powell’s discriminatory stance toward the human lives.

The outrage and dismay over devastation and human suffering seem to have much more to do with how such horrors were caused than the actual horrors themselves, it would seem.

At least, it seems that way when it comes to America’s outgoing Secretary of State Colin Powell, whose sense of horror seems to be remarkably selective.

Touring the wreckage of the recent tsunami in Banda Aceh, Indonesia, an obviously shaken Powell, a former top U.S. Army general, said, "I have been in war and I have been through a number of hurricanes, tornadoes and other relief operations, but I have never seen anything like this. The power of the wave to destroy bridges, to destroy factories, to destroy homes, to destroy crops, to destroy everything in its path is amazing."

You have to wonder what this leading member of the American war machine thought of the power of the U.S. military to destroy bridges, factories, homes, crops, hospitals, dykes, schools, entire towns and cities, rice paddies and indeed "everything in its path" back in Indochina in the years he was there. Especially, as he was busy covering up the massacre of women, children and old people at My Lai. What did he think as he toured burned down villages, mile after mile of defoliated jungle, whole barren moonscapes pockmarked with craters from American bombs, millions of dead and maimed men, women and children.

And you have to wonder what he thinks now about the U.S. Shock and Awe destruction of Baghdad, or more recently, of the leveling of the cities of holy Najaf, Samarah and now Fallujah.

One would think that the carnage caused by man-indeed the carnage for which Colin Powell himself bears considerable responsibility-would be far more troubling than that caused by nature.

But then we are a selectively outraged people. Where is the mass public campaign to raise money for the hundreds of thousands of wounded and displaced in Iraq? Americans' efforts when it comes to charity and fundraising related to the Iraq War is pretty much limited to providing cookies and body armor for US troops.

As Bruce Jackson wrote in the Counterpunch Magazine, America’s media, was quick to display the corpses, and the maimed and orphaned children of the Indian Ocean tsunami, but does not bother to show the carnage US army is causing in Iraq. Oh, we get to see the carnage there when it was caused by the so-called Iraqi insurgents, but not when it's our own bombs and bullets that are doing the killing and maiming. And we don't get to see the sheer magnitude of the destruction that our military has wreaked on Iraq and its long-suffering people.

That level of detail, like Secretary Powell's capacity for horror and concern, is reserved for the workings of nature.

Just as Powell was hardened by his Army boot camp training to accept human suffering as a normal consequence of battle, and to bury his humanity when it comes to war, Americans as a people are being hardened by American compliant pro-government media to put that part of US natural compassion in a lockbox.

Americans rally to the cause when a storm strikes in Florida or a tsunami hits in Indonesia, but avert their eyes when their own military is the agent of destruction.

An Affirmative Measure

United States officials are conducting a war of aggression against the people of Iraq. Under their orders, the U.S. government has killed tens of thousands of civilians, maintained a tyrannical occupation, tortured prisoners, and abused internationally recognized human rights. These acts constitute war crimes, crimes against humanity, and violations of the Geneva Conventions.

The Bush administration plans to continue this conduct in Iraq and is threatening similar action against other countries as well. Indeed, it asserts its right to ignore any international obligation it decides is not in accord with its own definition of national interest.

Jeremy Brecher, a historian and the Author of 12 books including Strike! and Globalization from Below and a regular contributor to Foreign Policy In Focus has more on the issue as follows:

Along with world community, all Americans have a responsibility under U.S. and international law to take “affirmative measures” to bring these crimes to a halt. One possible “affirmative measure” for consideration is: ‘A public statement pledging to encourage and support resistance to draft registration and military activities that violate international law.’

At the height of the Vietnam War, thousands signed a similar statement, A Call to Resist Illegitimate Authority. The Call and the subsequent trial played a significant role in the development of opposition and resistance to the Vietnam War.

In the “Age of Absolutism,” European rulers asserted a monopoly of power within their realms. States were “independent associations not recognizing any superior.” Under such a doctrine, states were the sole judge of the legality of their acts. The sovereign was deemed free to initiate war for “reasons of state.” Rulers had no legally binding responsibilities to anyone but themselves and God. A version of this view was incorporated in the Treaty of Westphalia, and it has generally been referred to as the Westphalian conception of sovereignty.

In the aftermath of World War II, a very different conception of national sovereignty was incorporated in the United Nations Charter. As the famous opening words of the Charter put it, “We the peoples of the United Nations determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war” will ensure that “armed force shall not be used, save in the common interest.”

Under the UN Charter, nations could not legally engage in war without authorization of the United Nations except to repel a direct attack. The Security Council was given “primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security.”

The UN Charter gave the five “permanent members” a veto in the Security Council. As a result, UN peacekeeping has only been possible where the great powers agreed to act together. The UN has been unable to force the permanent members to meet their responsibilities under the Charter. In practice, the great powers have largely ignored those responsibilities, continuing to act on the basis of ‘reasons of state.’ Such action has often been falsely justified on the grounds of morality or self-defense; sometimes it has even been erroneously justified by citing UN resolutions, even though no UN resolution authorized the use of force.

Since World War II there has been a historic struggle to implement the interpretation of national sovereignty articulated in the UN Charter, that is, sovereignty limited by international law. The U.S. attack on Iraq noted that “Much of the world, including the other great powers, has entered a post-national understanding of global governance on questions of world order. France, Germany, Russia, China, and other world powers are now committed to international rules forbidding the unilateral use of force and to a form of consensual global governance.”

Bush administration doctrine aims to undo the commitments made in the UN Charter and the progress made in fulfilling them and revert instead, to a Westphalian view that the state or at least the U.S. has no obligations under international law.

Under the Westphalian doctrine, individuals had no legal obligations higher than those to their own sovereign state. Drawing on the principles of the UN Charter, however, the War Crimes Tribunals at Nuremburg and Tokyo established the responsibilities of individuals to oppose their own states if they engaged in illegal acts.

U.S. Chief Counsel to the Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal, Supreme Court Justice, Robert Jackson, recently noted that, for the first time, powerful nations had agreed upon “the principle of individual responsibility for the crime of attacking the international peace.”

The War Trials Agreement represented an important step forward in “fixing individual responsibility of warmongering, among whatever peoples, as an international crime.” It also represented a step forward in “recognizing an international accountability for persecutions, exterminations, and crimes against humanity when associated with attacks on the peace of the international order.”

The Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal stated the doctrine of individual responsibility even more explicitly. “Anyone with knowledge of illegal activity and an opportunity to do something is a potential criminal under international law unless the person takes affirmative measures to prevent the commission of the crimes.”

People in many countries have found themselves to be citizens of a state that conducts wars of aggression, kills civilians, tyrannizes occupied territories, and tortures prisoners. Historically, the actions of France in Algeria, Britain in the Falklands, the former Soviet Union in Afghanistan; the Zionist Regime of Israel in the occupied Palestine, and Iraq under the dictatorship rule of Saddam Hussein in Kuwait all and all put their citizens at risk for complicity in war crimes and crimes against humanity. U.S. actions in Vietnam, Nicaragua, Serbia, Afghanistan, and Iraq, among other places, have put U.S. citizens at similar risk.

Since the days of Adolph Hitler, the regimes and governments conducting such notorious actions have apparently been elected. Neither established legitimacy nor popular election obviates the responsibilities of governments to obey international law or the responsibility of their citizens to halt their government’s criminal acts. So the US people should shoulder the responsibility and act!

How Individuals Manipulate US Economy

It is no surprise that American billionaire stock investor Warren Buffett continues to flee the U.S. dollar as he pours billions into foreign currencies.

Last year Berkshire Hathaway, Buffett's holding company, reported it had placed some $12 billion in foreign currencies.

Now the Forbes Magazine reports that Buffett continues to exit dollar investments, and Berkshire Hathaway holds some $20 billion in foreign currencies.

Buffett has used foreign currencies as a hedge against his weakly performing U.S. portfolio.

According to the New York Times, the firm reversed a second quarter loss and gained $412 million between July and September, after increasing its share of foreign currency contracts from $12 billion at the close of 2003 to $20 billion now.

Buffett managed to do that by betting the dollar would decline, and it has.

In fact, it has recently hit record lows against the euro, and experts who spoke to the New York Times believe the decline will continue, possibly for years.

Buffett told investors in a letter in last year's annual report: "In 2002, we entered the foreign currency market for the first time in my life, and in 2003 we enlarged our position as I became increasingly bearish on the dollar." He remains bearish on the dollar even now.

Recently Buffett spoke with Forbes, who described him as full of "doom and gloom" for the dollar.

For one thing Buffett fears the $10 trillion of the U.S. economy owned by foreigners.

As they continue to exit the dollar, it could wreak havoc. "If lots of people try to leave the market, we'll have chaos because they won't get through the door," Buffett told Forbes. He believes that a dollar fall off "could cause major disruptions in financial markets."

Today, Buffett continues his strong position in the euro pound, sterling and six other currencies.

The US Federal Reserve has continued to increase interest rates - a conventional method of boosting the value of the American dollar. But Buffett is not sure this will work, and says the move simply will "put off the day of reckoning."

What worries Buffett is the huge deficits being run up by the federal government, adding to the huge existing debt load.

Buffett tells Forbes he may end up owning currencies "for years and years" - and worries U.S. politicians will fix the deficit problem using inflation.

"The dollar is in a decline that will continue for years to come," Jim Rogers, co-founder of the Quantum fund with George Soros in 1969. "Somebody's making a whole lot of money, if not the hedge funds."

In the long run, the dollar's decline will definitely hamper U.S. economic growth. Also, says the Christian Science Monitor, a continued slide in value could cause a run on the dollar, which could affect "everything from mortgages to prices at Wal-Mart."

But there is an upside as well. The dollar's decline makes U.S. goods less expensive and easier for them to be sold overseas. Also, it could be a boon for other industries, such as tourism, as foreign residents find exchange rates cheaper.

Are These the Teachings of the Messiah?

The Christian world is engulfed in mirth and revelry, more like the Bacchanal pleasures of pagan Roman on December 25, rather than the piety and virtuous life that Jesus preached and suffered at the hands of the Israelites and their Roman overlords. What ails the Christian world and why have the teachings of the Messiah ignored and distorted? These are questions that should awaken human conscience, especially so, that unlike the pleasure seeking Evangelists who commit every imaginable sin frowned upon by the Messiah, Jesus is held in high esteem by Muslims and is regarded as one of the five greatest Prophets of God. The Holy Qur’an, which Muslims regard as the Almighty’s final revelation to mankind confirms the Virgin birth of Jesus, relates his miracles and says he spoke from the cradle on the chastity of his mother, Holy Mary (peace upon her), when the wicked Israelites heaped all sorts of accusations. For instance, Ayahs 30 to 33 of Surah Marium say of the Holy Qur’an says about Jesus (peace upon him):

“He said: Surely I am a servant of Allah; He has given me the Book and made me a prophet; And He has made me blessed wherever I may be, and He has enjoined on me prayer and poor-rate so long as I live; And dutiful to my mother, and He has not made me insolent, unblessed; And peace on me on the day I was born, and on the day I die, and on the day I am raised to life.”

To what extent do those calling themselves Christians follow the teachings of Jesus? The answer is negative when we cast a glance at the decadent and depraved culture of the Christian world, especially of the West, and particularly the unprincipled behaviour of politicians such US President, George Bush, who despite his murderous behaviour shamelessly calls himself an Evangelist Christian. Bush claims that he is a religious person and that he has a divine mission to perform by reading from the Gospel, but his deeds prove that he is anti-Christ. He has no connection whatsoever with the peaceful and justice-seeking teachings of the Messiah. In his first presidential term, he waged two bloody wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, killing hundreds of thousands of innocent people and making many others homeless on the pretext of removing tyrannical regimes, which in fact were planted by the US and the CIA. According to a joint research by the American John Hopkins University of Columbia and Iraq’s Baghdad University, over one hundred thousand Iraqi civilians have been killed since the US attack on this country in March 2003. The figures for the injured and the homeless are even more shocking. Does it mean, Bush and his buddies who like to call themselves devout Christians, acting according to the teachings of the Bible?

It is obvious they are not. The American administration behaves more like the incarnation of the devil, and that was the reason that the sage of the age, the late Imam Khomeini (may his soul rest in peace) had called the US 'The Great Satan.'

All know Jesus (PBUH) strove for the cause of the oppressed and stood firmly against oppressors. During his blessed life, he did not harm even a single person so how come Bush and his buddies kill hundreds of thousands of people and still claim to be Christians?

The Messiah says that the one who can prevent oppression but refrain from doing is the same as the oppressors.

George Bush and predecessors in the White House thus stand naked in the dock of history because of their un-Christian policies. We all remember how the Christian US dropped atomic bombs on the unsuspecting Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In the past half a century, in several wars, the Americans have victimized millions of people. In Vietnam the US forces several times used internationally banned chemicals and napalm bombs, massacring tens of thousands of people and making agricultural lands are unusable. In addition to the US, the Christian countries of Europe have for several centuries engaged in occupying and looting third world countries, killing and imprisoning millions of people on the pretext of opposition to their policies and crushing the bids of freedom. Can the perpetrators of such crimes be considered the followers of Jesus (PBUH) the Prophet of mercy?

The racial discriminatory policies of the present day Christians and their support of the Zionists, who openly insult Jesus, are not in harmony with the Messiah’s teachings. The reckless policies of the US that is destroying the environment are in fact open violation of the message of Prophet Jesus (PBUH). The differences between blacks and the whites, Europeans and non-Europeans, are against what the blessed Son of Mary strove for. The scornful treatment of the poor and the deprived was not the way Jesus behaved. The West, especially the US, in contrast to the way and manner of Prophet Jesus (PBUH), brazenly supports the Zionist regime, which has usurped the land of the Palestinians, carries out a systematic genocide against them and has made millions of people homeless. Meanwhile, a new sect calling itself into Zionist Christians is actually insulting the Messiah by calling for Washington’s stronger and more decisive support for the crimes against humanity of the illegal entity called Israel. In other words, this sect considers the killing of thousands of innocent Palestinians necessary for making the Messiah reappear. Prophet Jesus (PBUH) never advised his followers to oppress and kill. Jesus (PBUH) in fact, as is evident from the Gospel of St. John prophesied about the coming of the last great divine Messenger, that is, Prophet Mohammad (blessings of Allah upon him and his progeny). As Muslims believe, Prophet Jesus will surely reappear, and when he does he will disown Christians like Bush and the Evangelists for having distorted his teachings. Jesus will act as the lieutenant of the 12^th Imam, Mahdi (may God hastens his reappearance) in order to cleanse the world of all vestiges of injustice, oppression, corruption and exploitation, and to establish the global government of peace, order and justice. Today, the West has become devoid of the teachings of the Messiah, but in Islam and among Muslims, Prophet Jesus is venerated and held in high esteem. The Holy Qur’an confirms his piety, and the chastity of his Virgin mother, Mary (peace upon her). Ayah 47 of Aal-e Imraan says that when Mary was given the good news of having a blessed baby who would be a great Prophet, she felt sudden embarrassment, and said:

“…My Lord! When shall there be a son (born) to me, and man has not touched me? He said: Even so, Allah creates what He pleases; when He has decreed a matter, He only says to it: Be; and it is.”

Compare this purity in Islam with the present illicit affairs relations between males and females of all ages and even married with each other despite the fact that Prophet Jesus (PBUH) explicitly said: " Adultery and fornication are grave sins. Even worse, the Christian world is not indulging in the sordid practice of sodomy but has legalized this capital sin under the label of Gay Rights. There are shocking figures from Europe and the US that say over one-third of the babies born are out of wedlock. So how could these illegitimate children grow into becoming good Christians? To worsen the situation, even Churches have turned into centers of sodomy with the supposedly celibate priests seducing children and still calling themselves Christians. Thus, it is obvious the Western society has deviated from the moral guidelines and teachings of Prophet Jesus (PBUH). Wars, violence, sexual perversion, corruption and all sorts of vices are not limited to the policies of the Western governments but are openly advocated through TV, cinema and the Internet. This is a firm proof of the absence of spirituality in the so-called Christian world, which is far removed from the message and mission of the Messiah. We once again ask the question: Are These the Teachings of the Messiah?

Giuliani Haunted by Abuse of Power

Former New York City Mayor, Rudy Giulianu left City Hall with a legacy as "America's Mayor" – but he left something else behind: a large number of lawsuits costing the city big bucks.

In the three years since Michael R. Bloomberg succeeded Giuliani, the New York Times reports, the city has spent almost $2 million to settle lawsuits brought by residents and city workers who charged the Giuliani administration with running roughshod over their free speech or other constitutional rights.

In 2002 the city settled with Limousine Driver, James Schillaci for $290,000. He had sued because the very day he was quoted in a newspaper article about a red-light sting set up by the police in the Bronx, police arrived at his home to arrest him for a 13-year-old unpaid ticket. The next day, Giuliani obtained - illegally, Schillaci said - the record of his arrests from decades earlier and discussed it, inaccurately, at a news conference.

A Correction Department worker charged that he was bypassed for promotion because he supported a Giuliani political opponent and that city investigators videotaped the guests arriving at his home for a political fund-raiser. The city paid him $325,000 this year, but the city's lawyers argued that they agreed to pay to make the best deal for the public and not because of any wrongdoing by Giuliani or other officials.

Dantae Johnson of the Bronx has charged in a lawsuit that after he was allegedly shot by a police officer in May 1999, Giuliani and then-Police Commissioner, Howard Safir falsely described him as a criminal to justify the shooting. The officer was convicted of assault. The city denies responsibility.

Eric H. DeVarin III, an Assistant Deputy Warden in the Correction Department, has claimed in a lawsuit that he was denied promotion because of a dispute with Former Police Commissioner, Bernard Kerik's former girlfriend. Kerik has said that is untrue.

The city paid $490,000 in February 2002 to Timothy Donovan, a police captain, and promoted him to settle his suit claiming that he was punished by Police Commissioner Howard Safir because he would not rewrite a sexual harassment investigation document to put certain senior chiefs in a more favorable light. "It was a case that Bloomberg quickly cleaned up," said Matthew Brinckerhoff, the lawyer for Donovan.

In March 2000, after Patrick Dorismond, a Times Square security guard, was shot to death in a confrontation with an undercover police officer, Giuliani responded to criticism of the shooting by releasing Dorismond's sealed juvenile record. In a wrongful-death suit against the city, his family cited Giuliani's release of the criminal record as part of a pattern of smearing people hurt by the police. The city paid $2.25 million to settle the suit in 2002.

According to the coming issue of the journal CityLaw, a federal magistrate has said that an AIDS housing group can proceed with a suit to recover $35 million in government contracts that it claims to have lost as punishment for protests against Giuliani's policies. The city lawyers say the Giuliani administration had many sound reasons to stop doing business with the group, called Housing Works.

According to New York Times the Housing Works case is part of "a continuing saga of the policies and litigating tendencies of the Giuliani administration," Ross Sandler, Director of the Center for New York City Law at New York Law School, which publishes CityLaw, told the Times.

Speaking about the mounting total of cases directly involving senior officials in the Giuliani administration, Jeffrey D. Friedlander, the First Assistant Corporation Counsel in the city's Law Department, told the Times, "Decisions to settle cases involve questions of litigation judgment, and should not be taken as an acknowledgement of truth as to the validity of a plaintiff's argument - or the city's acceptance of that argument."

Moreover, says Michael D. Hess, the city's chief lawyer under Giuliani and now his partner in a private consulting firm, settlements often were preferable to risk a jury trial with a jury that could prove to be irrational or biased. Given that the city spends hundreds of millions on lawsuits, Hess told the Times: "Two million is nothing. Sadly, this is a drop in the bucket."

While the city is sued more than 20,000 times a year, the Times reported, cases have been rarely brought in which a mayor - or top City Hall aides - are charged with personally harming an individual. Even more rarely have they succeeded.

While Giuliani was widely applauded after Sept. 11 2001, questions continue to be raised about his judgment. In the months after Sept. 11 Giuliani was rebuffed in his attempt to suspend the 2001 mayoral elections in an effort to prolong his stay in office.

In the wake of the Kerik fiasco, the Times report indicates the major media will continue to put a spotlight on Giuliani, touted as a possible 2008 Republican presidential candidate.

A Defeat For an Empire

The following article is by Robert Jensen, a Journalism Professor at the University of Texas at Austin, and an American Columnist.

The United States has lost the war in Iraq, and that's a good thing. It doesn't mean that the loss of American and Iraqi lives is to be celebrated. The death and destruction are numbingly tragic, and the suffering in Iraq is hard for most of citizens in the United States to comprehend.

The tragedy is compounded because these deaths haven't protected Americans or brought freedom to Iraqis. They have come in the quest to extend the American empire in this "new so-called American century."

So, U.S. citizens, welcome the U.S. defeat for a simple reason: That it isn't the defeat of the United States -- its people or their ideals -- but of that empire. And it's essential that the American empire be defeated and dismantled.

The fact that the Bush administration says the U.S. is fighting for freedom and democracy does not make it so.

Americans must look at the reality, no matter how painful. The people of Iraq are better off without Saddam Hussein's hated regime, but that does not prove American humane intentions or guarantee that the United States will work to bring meaningful democracy to Iraq.

In Iraq, the Bush administration invaded not to liberate but to extend and deepen U.S. domination. When on Nov. 11, 2002 Bush said, "We have no territorial ambitions; we don't seek an empire,, he told a half-truth. The United States doesn't want to absorb Iraq or take direct possession of its oil. That's not the way of empire today; it's about control over the flow of oil and oil profits and not ownership.

In a world that runs on oil, the nation that controls the flow of oil has great strategic power. U.S. policy-makers want leverage over the economies of competitors -- Western Europe, Japan and China -- that are more dependent on Middle Eastern oil.

The Bush administration has invested money and lives in making Iraq a platform from which the United States can project power.

That requires not the liberation of Iraq but its subordination. But most Iraqis don't want to be subordinated, which is why the United States in some sense lost the war on the day it invaded. One lesson of contemporary history is that occupying armies generate resistance that, inevitably, prevails over imperial power.

When the U.S. admits defeat and pulls out -- not if, but when -- the fate of Iraqis will depend in part on whether the United States makes good on legal and moral obligations to pay reparations and allows international institutions to aid in creating a truly sovereign Iraq.

American people shouldn't expect their politicians to do either without pressure. An anti-empire movement -- the joining of anti-war forces with the movement to reject corporate globalization -- must create that pressure.

American people should all carry a profound sense of sadness at where decisions made by U.S. policy-makers -- not just the gang in power today but a string of Republican and Democratic administrations -- have left them and the Iraqis. But that sadness should not keep them from pursuing the most courageous act of citizenship in the United States today for assuring to dismantle the American empire.

The planet's resources do not belong to the United States. The century is not America's. The U.S. own neither the world nor time. And if Americans don't give up the quest and if it doesn't find its place in the world instead of on top of the world -- there is little hope for a safe, sane and sustainable future.

Can a Vietnamese-American be Heard?

The following article is by Tiana Thi Nga, a Filmmaker and Actor, who is the award winner of "From Hollywood to Hanoi."

Vietnam is a country, not a war. Vietnamese people have survived foreign invasions for thousands of years. Amidst all these charges and counter charges, let’s have some understanding for the Vietnamese who gave so much for their independence and reunification. To lance Vietnamese wounds, they have to examine and reconcile with the past, so all sides can participate in a healing that has only just begun. It is tragic that to this day, most American soldiers did not know why they were sent halfway across the world on missions to kill for 10,000 days. Americans should care how survivors on both sides are still coping with the damage. Like in the media coverage of the war, the voices and experiences of native Vietnamese continue not to be heard.

Kerry's critics are selectively using their Vietnam experiences today as they did then, to justify a brutal war that most Americans turned against and prefer to forget. Their false charges are being widely debunked. But who is remembering the millions of Vietnamese non-combatants who died in that conflict? They have become non-persons once again in this debate. Their families live in Apocalypse Forever, and the reasons why remains in America an argument without end.

Vietnam’s TV war memories are etched in the hearts and minds of millions of Americans. Just go to the Vietnam Memorial in Washington and witness a daily review of the victims of the U.S. Government cruelties the same is true in Vietnam. This includes American vets who returned to Vietnam to help rebuild what their government forced them to destroy.

What many Americans don't know is that the two men Johns Kerry and McCain who fought in Vietnam, turned US-Vietnam relations around for the better. For example, both worked tirelessly to convince President Bill Clinton to lift the trade embargo, thereby preventing future deaths of malnourished Vietnamese babies in need of antibiotics. It took a great deal of personal courage for these two United States Senators to debunk the myths of thousands of Prisoners of War's for reconciliation.

Next April 30th marks the 30 year anniversary of the war’s official end. Vietnamese who live in the U.S. have the opportunity to mark the past in a manner that positively affects future generations. The Swift Boat controversy has brought Vietnam back to the front pages but for the wrong reasons. Yet, this critical juncture presents the opportunity to reclaim the skeletons so that Vietnamese may learn from the past and take essential steps to separate reality from myth.

Look in the mirror, American leaders are rewriting a new history of Vietnam in their version. Many of Vietnamese living in America now, and along with the 80 million Vietnamese in Viet Nam, all share a common bond: they want the truth and have to resist the U.S. Governors false claims and versions on Vietnam war.

Islam in the US

The presence of Islam in different parts of the world has made caught the attention of international circles and world bodies. Islam, which Muslims believe as the last and final code for all mankind, caters to every single aspect of human life even anticipating issues that would crop in the future. This dynamism has made Islam the focal point for people in the so-called industrialized world of Europe and North America with more and more people embracing the divine religion. Islamic associations have sprung up in Germany, Belgium, Italy, France, Britain, and in South and North America. These bodies act as centers of life for the rapidly growing Muslim population in these countries. This trend for reforming humanity has, however, alarmed certain narrow-minded western politicians as well as godless researchers, who have made common cause with the Zionists to try to undermine Islam and Muslims in Europe and North America. Unable to stop the decreasing number of Church attendants in the disillusioned population of the US, a group calling itself Evangelists has tried to propagate the misconstrued idea that by divine religions only Judaism and Christianity are meant. The plot is to tarnish the image of Islam and isolate and excommunicate Muslims from participating in the so-called multi-religious and polyglot community of the US. But behind these intricacies are other realities that should be investigated.

Ms. Ivan Yazbec the professor of Islamic history at the US University of Massachusetts and Ms. Adir T. Lumpes, Research Scholar at the Hartford center of religious and social sciences, have conducted extensive studies on religions. These two academicians have for the past two years studied the situation of Muslim immigrants in the United States and published their joint researches under the title of “Spread of Islamic Values in the US”. These researchers believe that today Islam in America has turned into a brilliant phenomenon. A religion, portrayed as an ideology alien from Judaism and Christianity, today Islam has influenced a broad spectrum of the American society and is evolving into a dominant religious movement. Presently there are over 1100 active mosques and Islamic religious centers in the US where the number of Muslims has risen to over 8 million. This has alarmed the Zionists and their allies in the current neo-conservative administration of President George Bush that has placed a serious anti-Islamic struggle atop its agenda and always accuses Muslims of violence and terrorism. The US government has adopted a hostile and discriminatory attitude against American Muslim citizens on various pretexts.

An example in this regard was the recent diversion of a regular United Airlines flight from London to Washington that was diverted and forced to land a thousand kilometers away by the US airport authorities on the assumption that a Muslim passenger could be a terrorist. But when the US security forces found nothing against the rules in the luggage of the Muslim passenger as well as on his body, instead of apologizing for their insult they declared the innocent traveler as undesirable person, denied him permission to enter the US and forced him to return home by the next available flight. Former professor of philosophy at New York University, Dr. Mohammad Legenhawzen, who currently teaches in Iran after embracing Islam, says: After the suspicious incidents of September 11, 2001 in the US over three years ago, an extensive propaganda campaign has been launched against Islam. The aim is to portray Muslims as anti-American. The propaganda is repeated in the US TV and press to the extent that some simple and unsuspecting people have begun to believe in the lies being dished out. But, notes Professor Legenhawzen, despite the negative wave in the west, the trend of tendency towards Islam is growing. He says: When asked about the role of religion in the present day world, 51 percent of the American people complained of the absence of religion in socio-political life and called for its increase. Another 80 percent considered the impact of religion on life as positive. Questioned whether Islam is a good or not, 38 percent of the American people considered Islam a good religion while only 33 percent viewed with pessimism largely because of their unfamiliarity with Islam.

Legenhawzen added that if the message of Islam were to be conveyed to the American people through proper ways, the religion would win more adherents. He pointed out to the bias of certain groups and said Christian missionaries unable to convince Americans are working feverishly to distort the image of Islam far from its realistic thoughts and dynamic ideas.

However, despite the hurdles being created by the American government, Islamic organizations like the Union of the world Muslims, composed of both migrants and native US Muslims, today play a very important role in different social fields through Islamic centers and mosques. In the past two decades many changes have taken place in the structure and leadership of Muslim groups in the US. Today, prayer leaders and those addressing congregations at Islamic centers and Mosques are multi-ethnic and are well versed in various socio-cultural issues in addition to being experts in Islamic law. The audience is also well educated with academic degrees and one can say that the American Muslims are much more qualified than the Muslims of other states. In the recent years, a large number of Muslims in the US by studying the works of Muslim thinkers have gained a better understanding of Islam. They live in a society in which many parameters and factors are against them. Nevertheless, they try in any possible way to preserve their Islamic values and beliefs. US Muslims with their strong logic have demonstrated that they are messengers of humanism and humanitarian values. Islam neither violates the privacy of a person nor does it yield to oppression. At the same time, it frowns upon sabotage and terrorism. American researcher Jane Smith in her book “Islam in America”, writes: Belief in Islam is rooted much more deeper than what the Americans think, for there are lasting principles in Islam which are very attractive for many of the audience. This has made Islam expound its dynamism to the US society.

Is It Running out? Bush's Capital

The following article is by Gary Leupp is Professor of history at the US Tufts University, and Adjunct Professor of Comparative Religion.

"I earned capital in the campaign---political capital---and now I intend to spend it. It is my style. That's what happened after the 2000 election: I earned some capital. I've earned capital in this election, and I'm going to spend it for what I told the people I'd spend it on." This is what President George W Bush said no November 4^th, 2004 after reelection.

President Bush is not known for his extensive vocabulary. But occasionally he employs a term outside the eighth-grade lexicon, like "historical revisionism," although he always misuses that term. Or for instance his use of the term"contiguous borders." But having said he wants a Palestinian state with such borders he appears to misunderstand the meaning of that term too. Bush's latest favorite phrase is "political capital." Maybe Dick Cheney, who keeps calling the victory a "mandate," also told Bush it was political capital. Perhaps Karl Rove informed him, late on the night of the election. "You've won a great victory, sir, and earned a lot of political capital," and that's why Bush relieved and exuberant immediately announced this to the people.

A week later on November 12 Bush explained that he would spend his capital "to establish a Palestinian state." In Santiago, on November 21, he assured the Mexican president he would use his "political capital" to grant guest-worker status to millions of Mexican immigrants to the U.S.. In Canada December 1 he assured the Canadians, too, that he had political capital relevant to their interests. The president likes that phrase.

But, what is capital? Capital, of course, refers to money or other forms of wealth that are intended to make more wealth. Money assigned not to buy a shirt or a sandwich or a house but to make more money. Capital like everything has a history. The feudal lord in medieval Europe was content to bind his serfs to the land, force them to work his fields and fork over a share of their crops; the system wasn't based upon money, investment and wage-labor, but on different principles that kept the nobles fat and happy through many generations. When the accumulation of capital, as opposed to the mere collection of tribute, became the driving force in economic life, capitalism was born. There'd always been wealthy merchants of one kind or another, if only to service the needs of noble courts. But merchants whose income derives mainly from collecting and employing workers who produce goods or services for the general market are a particular feature of capitalism.

The capitalist must always think about how much money he can make from his connections to people.

Into this world of capital was the current US president born, and he has always been comfortable with the power it has conferred on him, even through repeated business failures. Dad's busy, helpful friends gave him a non-demanding National Guard post during the Vietnam War and shelter from scandal, while enrolling him in the Harvard Business School where one professor recalls him as "lazy" and "unprepared." After Harvard, of course, Bush thanks to the influence of his father, became governor of Texas, presiding over 152 judicial executions. The next natural step was the White House.

How does Bush intend to use this latest capital to enhance his power? He wants to press on with his Christian right social agenda, using the halo-stripped preachers among his religious base, and lawyers and scientists embracing his "faith based" agenda, to promote even more "naked, shameless, direct, brutal exploitation." He also wants to build an American empire, and as his new cabinet appointments show, he remains committed to the neocons' "regime change" program in Southwest Asia, and would like to leave office having established pro-U.S., Israel-friendly client states controlled by foreign capital throughout the region.

Bush's nomination of Alberto Gonzalez, famous for his dismissal of what he calls "obsolete" and "quaint" provisions of the Geneva Accords, as the nation's top law officer suggests a preference for more thuggery as policy. None of the scandal-dogged Neo-Cons have been removed from power, and some will likely be promoted. Donald Rumsfeld, criticized by some Neo-Cons for an inadequately vicious assault on the Iraqi insurgency, has been confirmed as Defense Secretary. Maybe this is because Congress wouldn't likely confirm Paul Wolfowitz as Secretary of Defense. Maybe Rumsfeld argued that were the position pass to Wolfowitz, the "war on terror" might get out of hand and make a draft essential. Rumsfeld's been an opponent of conscription since the 1970s, and seems to hope for an end to the "all-volunteer" deployment in Iraq by 2008. In any case, it looks like Washington will continue to confront Syria and Iran as well as the bourgeoning Iraqi resistance in the expectation that all this will ultimately increase American capital in the New American Century.

But this means confronting other advanced capitalist nations, imperialist nations, whose interests may conflict with those of the Bush administration. Russia for one has not been happy with Washington's colonization of Iraq, a former trade partner, and its demands that foreign creditors cancel Iraq's outstanding debts. It's even more unhappy about U.S. plans to expand NATO right up to Ukraine's border with Russia. Let's say President Putin, miffed by U.S. behavior and wooed by "Old Europe," takes the perfectly legal measure of pricing Russian oil exports in euros rather than dollars, producing an immediate abrupt decline in the already plummeting dollar and a sudden withdrawal of Chinese and Japanese capital from U.S. banks. Public opinion polls immediately show the country divided, with a narrow majority favoring the president and conscription, large-scale antiwar rallies, some violent, in major cities.

Bush's Pick of Kerik, a Political Windfall for New York Mayor

The buzz in Washington and New York is that George Bush's pick of Bernard Kerik as Secretary of Homeland Security is a political make-good to Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who strongly endorsed George Bush for his race in 2004.

Washington insiders were surprised by the choice. Kerik was not considered the most qualified person for the critical security job.

During his tenure as New York City Police Commissioner, Kerik received mixed reviews as a manager. But he was considered a close friend of Mayor Giuliani.

Kerik got to know Giuliani during his days as a prosecutor, and he served Rudy as a bodyguard and driver when he ran for mayor.

The personal connection paid off for Kerik, who quickly rose in the Giuliani administration to head the city's Police Department. Kerik is also known for his strong Republican Party leanings.

Kerik is best known for heading New York's Police Department at the time of the Sept. 11 attacks.

Some families of the Sept. 11 victims criticized Giuliani and Kerik for not properly coordinating police and fire communication radio systems.

The Washington Post noted that Sept. 11 commission member and former Navy Secretary John F. Lehman "sharply criticized Kerik and Former Fire Commissioner, Thomas Van Essen for failures of leadership during the terrorist attacks, saying that rivalry between the departments hampered rescue efforts. The command and control of their Departments, Lehman said, were 'not worthy of the Boy Scouts.'"

In 2003, Kerik also served briefly in Iraq, heading up efforts to train Iraq's new police force. But Kerik left abruptly after just four months on the job.

Kerik's pick by President Bush is viewed as a tremendous windfall for Giuliani.

Giuliani, who just announced the launch of his own investment bank, is expanding his private businesses centered around his consulting firm, Giuliani Partners LLC. Kerik has been a member of the firm since 2001.

Giuliani apparently has no interest in taking a position in the Bush administration as he ponders a run for president in 2008.

But having Kerik in Homeland Security may be the next-best thing.

Kerik, among Giuliani's most trusted aides, will be in the prized position of controlling over 22 government agencies employing some 180,000 people.

Moreover, he will control a budget of $40 billion -- with one of the richest allocations of discretionary contracts to private businesses. No doubt that will give tremendous political leverage to Giuliani for his business and political ambitions.

Insiders say Kerik's association will also offer Giuliani a tremendous launch pad for fund raising if he plans to run for president in 2008.

The Bush Administration's Strategy, off Beam

No doubt, most of the former US administrations were faced with anti-US sentiments at one time during their rule. In 1958, when former US President Richard Nixon visited Latin America, he was welcomed with a wave of anti-US sentiments. In 1960, when President Dwight Eisenhower intended to travel to Tokyo, anti-US demonstrations were so wide-scale that he was forced to cancel his trip. In the late 60s, the anti-US sentiments ran high in Europe due to America's crimes in Vietnam and Ronald Reagan's decision for manufacturing a new generation of middle-range nuclear missiles only added fuel to the already peaked sentiments.

Yet none of the said examples are comparable to the intensity of anti-US approaches today. According to an opinion poll recently carried out in Europe by the PEW Institute, the people of France, Germany and Britain's dislike for the US has significantly grown in the past two years.

The US status in the world of Islam is even worse. Many Muslims believe that under the pretext of campaign against terrorism, the US only intends to hold its grip on the entire world.

Given such widespread anti-US attitudes it is no surprise if we find the American university professors and political experts unable to promote and propagate what they try to define as

'US values'. Worse of that still is US President George W Bush and his advisors' insistence on promoting these so-called values through lethal weapons and bullying in different parts of the world.

As regards politics, strategy is made up of certain tactics to reach a certain objective. The Bush administration's foreign policy is however very weak, not only because Bush has somehow tried to distance himself from his predecessors, but because his foreign policy is incapable of helping him get what he seeks. In other words there is no conformity between Washington's tactics and goals.

Bush's National Security Advisor, Condoleezza Rice says that the US administration's strategy is based on three major principles: 1. Fighting terrorism and rogue states 2. Uniting big powers 3 and promoting democracy and welfare at world level. Yet one should remind Rice that even trying to eliminate what she calls terrorism and rouge states through prejudgment, hegemony and unilateralism not only does not unite countries, but deviates the process of democracy. A true well-defined strategy never goes against the principles according to which it was drawn up. Take Bush's claims on promotion of democracy for example. He says that all world nations including the Middle Easterners are thirsty for freedom and a peaceful coexistence. However based on the ' Democratic Peace' theory, no democratic country launches a war against another country. This is while long before beginning its so-called campaign against terrorism; Washington had backed the most dictatorial and undemocratic rulers of the region.

The September 11^th, 2001 incidents in New York and Washington not only revolutionized US foreign policy, but also altered the world countries' attitude toward Washington. Before Bush's election in 2000, Rice used to say that US military might should not be wasted on such minor concerns as the spread of welfare in societies while Bush emphasized that by pursuing US national interests, such values as freedom, democracy and peace could be automatically materialized. Such a doctrine could greatly help the US amend its status at world level once pursued. Yet the 9/11 event revolutionized everything. In a statement issued in September 2002, Bush stressed that what is of utmost importance for his administration is the American principles and not interests. The 9/11 events actually made the White House leaders more belligerent in their approaches. Before the event the US was mostly concerned about the probable two other big powers namely China and Russia's rise against it rather than the issue of terrorism, although it seems that in hidden the Bush administration was drawing up a plan to invade Iraq since long ago.

Bush Helplessly Tried to Win Support at APEC

US President George W. Bush in his first official international summit after the November 2^nd elections, tried to make the best of the APEC summit as an opportunity to mend fences with world leaders following his blunders in Iraq. Thus, putting up a brave face, he tried to participate in a series of individual meetings with Asian and Western leaders on the sidelines of the 12th Summit of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation or APEC in Santiago, Chile, November 20-21. But Bush was given a red carpet welcome, and was instead jeered by thousands of protesters upon arrival in San Tiago, holding placards calling him “asesino”, or “murderer” and burning the US flag.

One protester said: “We are protesting not only because of APEC, but also because Bush is coming. He is the number one terrorist of the world. And he is coming to do his utmost to ensure that people become further impoverished.”

While at the APEC conference Bush met with the leaders of Canada, China, Japan, South Korea, Indonesia, Russia and Mexico, he stayed in Santiago on November 21 for discussions with Chilean President Ricardo Lagos then traveled to Cartagena, Colombia, on November 22 for a meeting with Colombian President Alvaro Uribe.

The member economies of APEC are Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, China, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Peru, the Philippines, Russia, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, the United States and Vietnam.

The main one-to-one meetings however where those between Bush and Putin of Russia and Bush and Hu Jinato of China.

In his meeting with Chinese President, Hu Jintao, Bush reviewed the Six-Party Talks on halting what the US alleges as North Korea's nuclear weapons programs. China has played an instrumental role in the negotiations so far, thus it seems that convincing the Chinese President would be a great help to the US in pushing through with its campaign against North Korea.

In his meeting with Russian President, Vladimir Putin, which many consider as the most significant meeting on the sidelines of the APEC summit, President Bush’s efforts to win Putin’s support for the US his Middle East policy was mostly in vain. Putin repeated Russia’s opposition to Bush’s plans to withdraw from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Pact. However, at a joint news conference Bush repeated his stereo-typed description of the 1972 ABM treaty as ‘‘outmoded and outdated,” and he tried to justify his logic by citing the suspicious events of September 11. But obviously no one was convinced.

The Bush administration hopes that a U.S. offer of deep cuts in its nuclear arsenal will make Russia open to modifications in the ABM treaty that would allow missile tests not permitted under the accord.

The Bush administration claims that a missile defense is needed to protect the United States against what it calls adversary nations that are developing long-range missile capabilities. Bush did not give Putin a timetable for when the U.S. would pull out of the ABM treaty.

As regards the issues of Iraq and Afghanistan, it was a disappointment for Bush, who wanted more support for his military campaign in the two countries, as he couldn’t unite the other participants for his invasion and occupation of the two Middle Eastern countries.

The US Disgrace in the Middle East

The US government has been facing for years the distrust of the people of the Third World particularly the Muslims. The expansionist and profiteering policies of Washington have been the cause behind this growing distrust. But following the highly suspicious incidents in New York and Washington on September 11, 2001 and the severe propaganda launched by the officials and the mass media of the west particularly America against the Islamic world, the distrust of Muslims concerning Washington has assumed wider dimensions. Once the White House dispatched its soldiers to Afghanistan and Iraq and occupied these two countries under pretext of the so-called anti-terrorism campaign, this trend intensified to the extent that American officials were forced to increase the budget related to improvement of US prestige around the world and to double it in the Middle East.

Despite the efforts of Washington, researches and opinion polls indicate that at world level and particularly in the Middle East, the hatred of America is still growing at a rapid rate. The US-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in its recent report has acknowledged the dimensions of American disgrace in the Middle East. In the report, the opinion polls clearly indicate that anti-American feelings have alarmingly grown in the Middle East. According to the opinion polls, in addition to the Middle East, opposition to the war-mongering policies of the White House rulers has intensified throughout world including in Europe despite its traditionally close relations with the US. The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace considers one of the facts behind the disgust of the Middle East people towards America to be what it calls the Islamic upsurge in these areas. The report says: Elections held in the Middle East in the recent years is a good test to indicate that Islamic movements and Islamic-oriented political parties in several countries are enjoyed growing popularity.

According to this American organization the US-backed dictatorial regimes in the Middle East are not only unable to prevent the spread of anti-American thoughts but they are forced to permit harsh criticisms against Washington in order not to be seen as American stooges by their own people. In other words, not only the masses but also the despotic governments and affiliated regimes are at odds with the unilateral and illogical American policies in the Middle East.

The Carnegie report also referred to the suspicion of intellectuals in the Middle East towards Washington. It seems that it is hard for the writers of the report to understand why these intellectuals and the educated elite show such disgust for US conspiracies in their country and the region. Elsewhere, in the report, mention has been made of the US plan for establishment of its own distorted version of democracy in the Middle East. In this part, regarding the cause of the regional states opposition to the American democracy, we read: “Most of the Arab analysts have mentioned three reasons. First, America has used democracy as a pretest to distort public opinion from its main and concealed objectives in the Middle East. Second, the claims made by the US about democracy are not convincing because of America’s past performance and its own domestic affairs where the American blacks and other ethnic groups are openly discriminated against. Third, the United States has a record of interference in the internal affairs of the Arab states.

These facts have been analyzed several times by prominent writers. One of the objectives that the US attempts to conceal through its slogan of democracy for the Middle East is to loot the rich oil resources of the region.

The White House by propagandizing the deceitful slogan of democracy exerts pressure on Arab governments to act in line with Washington’s interests. The Carnegie reports quotes Arab experts as saying: "Under the guise of democracy in the Middle East, the Americans intend to exert pressure on Arabs and other Muslim states to fall in line with Washington’s policies and ignore the problems caused by wrong US policies in Palestine, Iraq, Sudan, and Afghanistan."

The US confrontation with countries opposing its war-seeking policies is among the US objectives behind harping on so-called democracy in the Middle East. For instance, the Islamic Republic of Iran is a country that has several times over the past 25 years held free elections and referendums. Nevertheless, Tehran, due to its firm resistance against Washington’s expansionist policies has always been the target of the US propaganda attacks as well as political and economic pressures.

Also in the 1990s in some Muslim states, Islamic parties were voted to power and this was opposed by the US. Such a shabby US record has caused regional people to reach the conclusion that America is only seeking a type of a democracy and political order in the Middle East that secures only the illegal interests of the White House.

According to the Carnegie report, the US government’s disgrace in the Middle East has two main causes. The first one is the suppression and massacre of Palestinian people by the US-backed Zionist regime. The organization quotes a Lebanese writer as saying: "How does America, which supports the brutal massacre in Palestine and the systematic annihilation of Palestinian people by Zionist Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon expects to be portrayed as angel for the Lebanese and the establisher of democracy? The other cause behind the US disgrace in the Middle East is its long record in supporting the dictators who secure US interests at the expense of their people. Among the Middle East dictators supported by the US, was the Iraq’s Saddam, who was ousted solely because he had outlived his purpose and was no longer deemed useful for Washington. It The Carnegie report quotes an Arab writer as saying: "The Americans now tell us that Saddam was not democrat but was an oppressor who dropped chemical bombs on Iraqi people. How interesting to hear these sentences two decades after the Halabche tragedy from the governments which were themselves the supporters of Saddam in his war against Iran and the massacre of the Iraqi people!

In case of continuation of Washington’s war mongering and domineering policies, observers predict that the US disgrace will increase day by day, not only in the Middle East but also to all people of the world.

Media in the Service of Power

The emergence of today’s mass media which was shaped by the release of a handful newspapers and weeklies in Europe and America in late 18^th century and later got a more technological shape by the invention of radio and TV, plays a pivot role in the social and political life of the world particularly the western societies, in a way that the principles of western democracy such as people’s rule, general elections and an elected government are among the results of the affective role of the mass media. In fact, the mass media in these countries has assumed a meddlesome role between people and the government. It is claimed that the free release of thoughts and ideas forced the governments to respond to their performances and the rulers’ performance was brought under the people’s supervision. The mass media become so prominent in political and social life that it was referred to as the 4^th organ of democracy in addition to the Executive, Legislative and Judiciary branches of the government. The role of the mass media could be gauged by the fact that article 11 of the human rights declaration stressed free expression of thoughts and ideas.

The article says the free transfer and release of free thoughts and ideas is one of the most basic human rights. Therefore, every citizen has the right to speak, write and publish freely. In other words those preventing these rights are liable to prosecution at the court. So far so good, but the reality is something different. In the western societies those possessing wealth and power skillfully exploit this so-called free expression of the mass media, against the spirit of the human rights declaration. They have restricted the activities of the mass media and are using it as a tool to enforce their viewpoints on the public at home and as a pressure lever against other countries, especially the Third World. The result is however beginning to boomerang on the western societies. The mass media in these countries, which are strictly under the control of governments run by capitalists, is being misused to promote moral and financial corruption, violence and promiscuity in order to make the power hungry capitalists more richer and the masses more poverty-stricken. Several books and articles have recently been written on this grave issue. A recent book in this relation is ”Tell Me No lies” written by prominent French Reporter John Pilger, who begins by questioning about the hidden motives of journalism. He points to a statement by Irish journalist Claude Cockburn saying: “Never believe anything which has not been denied officially.”

Pilger in his book by quoting some prominent writers seeks to prove that the era of free journalists and reporters is already over. He questions the credibility of the BBC and has some very critical comments for the super rich Jew, Rupert Murdoch’s global media empire that includes newspapers, TV channels and Internet sites. Pilger explaining the way of reflection of news and developments in the western media writes: “The common destiny of western societies is seen in a unilateral mirror. The reports related to these societies are mainly drawn up according to what has already been decided by the manipulators of power. It is a media where terrorism has double meanings. There are good terrorists and there are bad terrorists. There are victims to feel sympathized about and victims whose death and sufferings are meaningless. This is what the western media does. For instance, the al-Qa’eda, which is actually a creation of the US and CIA is called terrorist, while the state terrorism of the west, especially that of the US, is mentioned in the glowing terms and it’s the crimes of the Zionist entity and Washington are depicted as acts necessary for peace. The writer of the book “Tell me no Lies” points to the policies of the US media towards the crisis of Iraq and writes: “In the United States, which according to its constitution is supposed to have the most free media of the world, there is no harm in eliminating nations, such as was seen in Vietnam. In the same context the Iraqis are not considered people but viewed as evil persons to be mistreated.

The French critic points to a news report in the US paper New York Daily News that brazenly says: “In return for any US solider killed, 20 Iraqis should be executed.”

The two mass-circulation US dailies, New York Times and Washington Post, had played an outstanding role in promoting the myth of former American ally Saddam Hussein’s arsenal of weapons of mass destruction. They even ignored the lies of US President, George Bush. If they had been fair to the rules of journalism and had exposed Bush’s lies, tens of thousands of people would have remained alive today. The book “Tell me no Lies” seeks to prove this unmentioned fact that although every day the number of diversity of the mass media increase, the media comes under the tighter control of the owners of power and wealth. This in short is the sorry state of journalism and the exploitation of the mass media to serve the interests of the west, especially of the US.

Nuclear Weapons at the Service of US War-mongering

About half a century passes since the development of the first nuclear bomb. A weapon the destruction power and bad impacts of which are not comparable to other warfare. Actually, with the development of nuclear weapons a great step was taken in killing human beings and devastating the vital installations of countries. According to the constant tradition of history the most horrible warfare and methods of fighting have been innovated by the governments, which have pursued the most inhumane and satanic objectives. For this reason, America developed the first nuclear weapon in order to dominate the world and enforce oppression and aggression.

Washington rulers immediately after gaining access to the atomic bomb displayed its sinister intentions in the worst possible way.

On August 6, 1945 the people of Hiroshima were not scared upon seeing the giant US B-29 planes. For they were usually setting for bombing Tokyo. But this optimism did not last too long and during a few seconds of atomic bombardment about 90 percent of Hiroshima was destroyed. While the world was amazed with this unprecedented massacre, another Japanese city Nagazaki on August 9 was exposed to the same heart-rending fate of Hiroshima and it was turned to ruins after the US atomic bombardment. Hundreds of thousands of innocent people were victimized by the war mongering and expansionism of a government, which planned to build a Satanic empire on the devastations of world war two.

Of course it did not take long before the former Soviet Union gained access to nuclear weapons and the horrible competition between this country and America over the development of atomic weapons created a heavy atmosphere of fear and insecurity among the world people particularly the people of America and the former Soviet Union. America by relying on its financial sources and technology developed masses of nuclear weapons and carriers such as planes, ships, submarines and missiles. According to estimates, the White House, over the past 50 years has funded more than 5 trillion dollars for the project of nuclear weapons. Whereas if this huge sum was spent to remove poverty in the world or even improve the welfare conditions in America, spectacular changes would have been created in the conditions of the people of the world.

From 1945 to 1990 America has produced over 70,000 nuclear warheads in 65 types, which are capable of destroying the earth several times. So far 4680 nuclear bombers and thousands of nuclear missiles have been developed to destroy the targets desired by the White House. In this way America has turned into a depot of types of nuclear weapons, which is considered a great risk to the entire world. The aspects of this danger are clarified when these nuclear warfare fall in the hands of a government which has a black record in using horrible and destructive weapons. Therefore, it may benefit from them more than any other government.

Of course, the use of nuclear weapons in the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagazaki has not been the mere US utilization of nuclear weapons,rather this country over the past years has used this weapon, however in smaller dimensions.

Shortly after the first Persian Gulf war in 1991, it became known that America had used weapons containing depleted uranium which are known as little atomic bombs. These deadly weapons after hitting the target severely catch fire and have a great destructive power. For this reason, according to international laws the use of arms containing depleted uranium has been prohibited like other weapons of mass destruction. But the American generals used such dangerous weapons not only in the first Persian Gulf war but also in the Balkan war, the offensive on Afghanistan and the recent attack on Iraq.

In the regions where America has used weapons containing depleted uranium many civilians have been killed or wounded and this still continues. Leukemia, paralysis, castrating of men, giving birth to deformed children and their death are among the consequences of such inhumane weapons. But the US officials evade responding to such crimes. They even do not give accurate information to their military patients. For, a number of American soldiers have been affected with such diseases as a result of the use of depleted uranium on the battlefronts. This created a controversy in America. The famous British journalist

Robert Fisk in a report in the Britain-based daily Independent writes:” The utility of depleted uranium in Iraq has increased sudden death among children, Leukemia and other cancers in southeastern Iraq and around Basra.”

SInce long ago American scientists have been engaged in developing new nuclear weapons, which are known as Mini nuclear weapons. These light warfare, which have a horrifying explosive power have been designed for devastating underground targets. Observers believe that the development of such weapons is the first step for the production of a nuclear revolver. With the development of mini nuclear weapons even the innocent people inside underground shelters would not be immune. Thus, America is developing types of horrifying nuclear weapons in different sizes and for different military purposes, which mainly harm civilians.

Not only is America considered a great nuclear threat to the world but it is the source of exporting such a threat. The Canadian expert Paul Harris says: “The US has so far sold depleted uranium to 29 countries. Thus, it is clear that the risk of contributing such weapons by the US is spreading. Harris adds:

“America provided Israel with weapons containing depleted uranium which were applied in the 7-day Arab-Israeli war in 1973.” Many observers believe that Washington is the supporter of Tel Aviv plans for development of nuclear weapons and it has rendered a great help to the Zionist regime in this regard.

According to experts, this regime which refrains from joining the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty NPT presently has at least 200 atomic bombs.

Undoubtedly, nuclear weapons are destructive and their impacts remain in mankind and the environment for long. Those who have survived the Hiroshima and Nagasaki tragedy are still suffering from incurable diseases and give birth to paralyzed children. Paul Harris stresses that even depleted uranium is deadly and its impacts will for a long remain on earth after the annihilation of the human generation.

Nevertheless, America the only country which has utilized the atomic bomb in great and small sizes is still spreading its atomic arsenal. It is noteworthy that America accuses its opposition countries of possessing such weapons and threatens them while concurrently it supports the nuclear activities of the Zionist regime.

Actually, the nuclear weapons of the big powers particularly the US threaten the peace and security of the human society. Different countries and international organizations should seriously try to remove the risk of nuclear warfare in the world. It seems that the best way to remove this threat is the dismantling of all these weapons all over the world with the supervision of international organizations.

On Media and the Election

The following article is by Robert W. McChesney a Professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Author or of Several Books.

Perhaps the most important function American media serves is to provide voters with the information they need to make sound decisions in the voting booth. If the U.S. people don't know what they're voting for, their democracy is in serious trouble.

Unfortunately, it appears that Americans are in serious trouble. This election has been marked by a staggering amount of voter ignorance. Polls show that voters -- especially Bush supporters -- were grossly misinformed about their candidate's position on a broad range of issues. Surveying supporters of the U.S. President, a University of Maryland PIPA/ Knowledge Networks poll found:

72 percent of Americans still believe that there were WMD's in Iraq. 75 percent believe that Iraq was providing substantial support for al-Qaeda. 66 percent believe that Bush supports participation in the International Criminal Court, and 72 percent believe that he or she supports the treaty banning land mines. But,none of these statements are true.

How do American citizens know who their candidates are and what they stand for when the media fixates on polls, controversy and spin instead of the issues? How do Americans have meaningful elections when they don't know what they're voting for?

The U.S. media are responsible for giving Americans a balanced inspection of all claims, careful fact checking, and reasoned analysis. But that was all but abandoned in this presidential campaign. And it is exactly what Americans would expect. As a result of media consolidation and pressures to cut costs, media corporations have gutted investigative journalism and hard-hitting analysis. Hence American citizens get hours and hours of coverage of the baseless and idiotic "swift boats for truth" story, and barely a look at what the actual policies of this administration are, and how they affect the people of the nation and the world.

The U.S. media companies have a conflict of interest; they benefit from seeing the re-election of George W. Bush and his industry-friendly policies.

There is a central tension in the U.S. democracy, and Americans have to get off this downward spiral of misleading political campaigns driven by massive contributions from corporations and wealthy individuals. Reforming the media is not the only issue that faces America, but it is an unavoidable one.

Reform means giving citizens more outlets of independent news and analysis that isn't beholden to the bottom line. It involves giving citizens more access to their own airwaves to let Americans know what's really going on in their cities and neighborhoods. It involves making sure that access to information is equitable and affordable. For the most part, the Bush Administration is no friend to media reform, but there is cause for hope. Liberals and conservatives alike oppose letting American big media corporations get bigger.

There was a reason President Bush did not brag about his plans to let media companies get bigger and have less competition on the campaign trail -- he knows Americans from all walks of life oppose the idea. For him, this is an issue best kept behind closed doors. While the short-term prospects for structural reform at the federal level are limited, there is important defensive work to be done. Remember that three million Americans organized in 2003 to stop the Federal Communications Commission from relaxing media ownership rules.

The past few months reminds again that media reform is not a left-versus-right, technocratic or obscure issue; it addresses the singular importance of media to a self-governing society. Never again should American citizen allow their media system to send the voters to the polls without the information they need to make well-reasoned decisions. There is a national emergency when voters go to the polls ignorant of the most elementary facts about their economy, foreign policy, health care, and environment. It is unacceptable. Now is the time to plug in and take action to create a better media system so that when the next big election comes along, Americans actually have a clue about what their candidates stand for.

Stand and Fight

The following article is by Katrina Vanden Heuvel, an American Journalist and the Bush’s Administration Critic.

One thing Americans can say for certain at this point, after the grieving, the anger, is that the U.S. is still bitterly divided. American people saw two turnouts and Two Nations at the night of election. Both sides of the chasm saw a major turnout of its voting base. Karl Rove talked about creating a permanent Republican majority. But the truth is, he has a divide-and-rule strategy. And the Electoral College amplifies the rural, socially conservative vote. Twenty percent of voters considered "moral values" more important than the economy or Iraq in this election.

Perhaps some answersto this doubtful election are that:

1) Perhaps some answers to this doubtful election are that: American people really are confused and manipulated, they have a mainstream media that continues to focus on irrelevant stories abrogating its responsibility to focus on what's important and significant; and too much of it keeps giving head instead of keeping its head. This makes an expansion of the progressive media echo chamber all the more important; And,

2) Neoliberalism is broken beyond repair and people need to be offered a real alternative not just despair at this point. This is truly a non-violent Civil War between those who think government is basically screwed up and that they're on their own, and those who believe....what exactly?

But in the morning of election, American people woke to a country at war with itself--as well as al-Qaeda. American progressives are re-fighting the Enlightenment at home.

This is war at a very deep level about how the U.S. will proceed and this war isn't over, it's just renewed.

The American Right understands that the U.S. citizens are two nations, and careless about healing than about holding power. A Bush win forces American people to understand, in a very deep way, what that means for them and for the values and institutions they care about. Not that they are wrong, or rejected or weighed down by "identity politics" or some other rationale for surrender. But that they are in desperate danger and Americans need to start thinking along the lines of how to resist, delay, deflect, oppose and ultimately defeat the assault on their true freedoms. As progressives, they will need to marshal at least as much dedication, purpose, strategic focus and tactical ruthlessness. And American people should be thinking about the indispensable work of resistance. They need to identify legislative and administrative choke points where Bush's initiatives can be blocked, and make clear to both legislators and their constituents that the days of go-along in the interest of non-partisan comity have to stop.

American people need to give a clear sense of priorities and red-lines so that people aren't fatigued by constantly being asked to protest--and they need to identify and work for some early victories, at the local national and international levels. In the end, this election is about what kind of people are Americans, what kind of country the U.S. will be. More than half of the electorate dissents from Bushism. The election still represents an expression of the strength of opposition to the radical and reckless course Bush has followed, despite the ugly campaign.

Progressives should build on those structures put in place in this last cycle and redouble their commitment to economic justice, peace and environmental movements that can make real change.

Don't Blame the Bible-Thumpers for Bush Victory

The following article is by Ira Chernus.

A nation divided in two, red versus blue? A president elected by the half of the population that carries a Bible and claims to care only about God, and guns? NO. NO. The simple story being touted by the U.S. mainstream media is not only wrong. It’s dangerously wrong. It’s wrong because the numbers don’t add up. Estimates of evangelical Christians in the U.S. range between