In today's snapshot, C.I. covers some of The Diane Rehm Show and the question has come up before of how we decide what to cover if we are both planning to cover the same thing?
First, C.I.'s on the road so I am one of the ones calling and leaving messages. I will say, "I think there was something on Iraq during ____ that you might want to put in the snapshot." Again, I am not the only one doing that. If C.I. hears about a program I generally listen to, hears from someone else, I get a phone call asking, "Are you highlighting this?" If I am highlighting a section, C.I. either grabs something else or just notes my post in a later snapshot.
On the issue of the first hour of The Diane Rehm Show, C.I. called and asked what I planned to write about if I heard the show? I was planning on highlighting a discussion that followed Leila Fadel's report. C.I. asked, "Are you sure you don't want to grab Fadel?" I was sure. No offense to Ms. Fadel, a wonderful reporter, but to cover her, you really needed to be willing to write down every word. She was not opining, she was offering reporting.
Except for "thank you" at the beginning, to Diane Rehm for having her on the program, C.I. has all of Ms. Fadel's words.
I was more interested in Steven Lee Myers, a DC reporter for The New York Times. There were two other reasons for that, two besides the transcription issue.
1) The New York Times wants war with Iran and it was very obvious to hear that as Mr. Myers disccused Iran -- a country he gave a new pronuciation to that reminded of when Saddam Hussein's name went from "Suh-dom" to "Sodom" from the likes of then Secretary of State Colin Powell. Were we not supposed to notice that? Were we not supposed to notice that a name that had been on news broadcasts for years was suddenly being connect to sodomy?
Mr. Myers had a very interesting way of pronouncing Iran.
In addition, he was eager to blame Iran for all of Iraq's problems. I asked C.I., because I do not follow the paper that closely, and, no, Mr. Myers does not report from Iraq ever. Mr. Myers is in D.C., writing about D.C. But that point might have been lost as he spoke with an authority he did not really possess to insist that the Iran was doing this and doing that.
At one point, Ms. Rehm pointed out to him that weapons have a way of floating across borders all on their own with no need of help from governments. He took that and spun it into he was not sure what branch of the Iranian government was getting weapons into Iraq but they were doing it.
That was not the point Ms. Rehm made. That was the talking point he pushed over and over throughout his comments on Iran.
2) The other issue was one I had agreement with him.
It is actually a point C.I.'s made about the "Awakening" Council members for some time. A woman called in to ask about them and the $300.00 a day they receive. She felt that very few were covering it and Ms. Rehm rightly pointed out that her program has covered it, usually ever Friday. I can vouch for that. She also said Senator Chuck Hagel had addressed it on her show yesterday and I am sure she is telling the truth about that; however, I only heard the first hour yesterday due to a peditrician's appointment for my grandson. I will try to listen to that online this week to note Senator Hagel's remarks.
Mr. Myers pointed out that when you buy 'support,' you really are not getting support or at least not enduring support.
I had a huge disagreement with Mr. Myers on Iran and he may argue, possibly correctly, that he was not pushing war with Iran. However, he assumes the government of Iran is shipping weapons and he has no basis for that. He may have heard whispers and, if that is the case, we have all heard the White House talking point on that. More importantly, his paper, The New York Times, pushed the Iraq War. So if he is being judged unfairly by me, it goes to the situation his own employers created, one of distrust.
With Mr. Myers, I had a point of agreement and one of disagreement so I felt it was better to grab him for my post tonight. That is generally how it works when C.I. and I are both grabbing the same program to note. C.I. always insists I identify what I want and if C.I. has additional thoughts they get noted when a post gets linked to in the snapshot.
There is no competition. For one, I do not see the point. For another, C.I. will tell you, anything someone else can grab, great. That means C.I. just has to provide a link for it in the snapshot and not utilize time to write about it.
It is Women's History Month and I am not sure I have done anything to note that as the month winds down. So let me note this by US House Rep Debbie Wasserman, "Celebrating Women: A Note from Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz" (HillaryClinton.com):
This entry is part of a series in celebration of Women's History Month.
One hundred thirty-three years after the adoption of the U.S. Constitution, women were granted the right to vote. It took marches, petitions, unyielding activism and finally a constitutional amendment, but working together women changed the law and changed history. Today, our generation of voters has a chance to complete the work of those strong women leaders who made great change possible in America. We can elect the first woman president – Hillary Rodham Clinton.
We are facing challenging times. Too many children are living without health care, too many parents are worried about losing their family’s home, and too many Americans lack the job security they need to build the life they deserve. We need a leader who will be ready to step in on day one and push America back on top.
Hillary has always had the wisdom to look beyond the challenges that confront us and come up with the solutions to move us forward. She once told the story of meeting a woman who said she wouldn’t want to be Hillary for anything in the world. "She wouldn't want to live today," Hillary said, "and look ahead to what it is she sees because she’s afraid. Fear is always with us, but we just don’t have time for it. Not now." These were not the words of Hillary Clinton, future President of the United States; these were the words of Hillary Rodham during her 1969 Commencement speech at Wellesley College.
At 22 years of age, Hillary knew that fear was not a solution for America. Like the leaders of the suffrage movement, she understood that to fight was the only solution. Hillary has fought for over 35 years to give a voice to the ones who needed it the most, and Hillary will fight for us every day in the White House.
She is making history. This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot" for today:
Wednesday, March 26, 2008. Chaos and violence continue, the US and UK announce deaths, the assault on Basra continues, Barack Obama returns from his R&R to hide behind Iraq and more.
Starting with war resistance. Canada's CTV offers a report on war resister Phil McDowell which features text and a video clip. Below is a transcript of the video report.
Tom Hayes: Phil McDowell and Michelle Robidoux hang out with a morning coffee but it's a relationship that goes much deeper. McDowell is a US army deserter and Robidoux is helping him out. It was this day [Sept. 11th, footage of NYC and the Pentagon shown] back in 2001that sent McDowell running to the enlistment office. After all he felt he had to defend his country. Then his country decided it was going into Iraq.
Phil McDowell: There's no doubt that he [Saddam Hussein] has weapons of mass destruction. There's no doubt that he has, that Saddam Hussein has ties with al Qaeda.
Tom Hayes: Did they convince you?
Phil McDowell: They convinced me I believed it.
Hayes: McDowell wants to be clear: He's not afraid to go into combat, not afraid to pick up a gun. We know this because he's already been there. McDowell served a year in Iraq. He was a model soldier. He survived and was sent home. He was then discharged. No longer in the army, he was told to go off and get on with his life. But a few months later, Uncle Sam wanted him back, back to fight a war he no longer believed in.
Phil: This can't be right, I don't want to have anything to do with this. They said, well you don't have a choice. You're going back whether you like it or not. I signed up to defend my country. I didn't sign up to take part in wars of aggression.
Tom Hayes: There are about 150 US deserters now in Toronto. They are seeking refugee status on the grounds the US is fighting an illegal war. But it's a tough sell. Much tougher than in the sixties when Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau welcomed Vietnam draft dodgers with open arms. Prime Minister Stephen Harper isn't so keen on a motion to allow the deserters to stay. The House of Commons will decide that by mid-April but that could already be too late for eight US war resisters who have already received deportation notices. And if they are sent back, they will be arrested the minute they step foot on US soil. Robidoux runs the group Resisters.ca. She's currently helping out more than fifty US deserters. McDowell calls her a good friend. His wife has also joined him here in Toronto. If he is allowed to stay, however, he faces a future without an extended family. If he's not allowed to stay, he faces up to five years in prison.
Phil McDowell: I would definitely go back to visit my relatives but if it's -- the choice I made here to move to Canada rather than fight in an illegal war, I'd make the same decision any time.
Tom Hayes: Tom Hayes, CTV News.
For those in Canada, the nation's Parliament remains the best hope for safe harbor war resisters have, you can make your voice heard by the Canadian parliament which has the ability to pass legislation to grant war resisters the right to remain in Canada. Three e-mails addresses to focus on are: Prime Minister Stephen Harper (pm@pm.gc.ca -- that's pm at gc.ca) who is with the Conservative party and these two Liberals, Stephane Dion (Dion.S@parl.gc.ca -- that's Dion.S at parl.gc.ca) who is the leader of the Liberal Party and Maurizio Bevilacqua (Bevilacqua.M@parl.gc.ca -- that's Bevilacqua.M at parl.gc.ca) who is the Liberal Party's Critic for Citizenship and Immigration. A few more can be found here at War Resisters Support Campaign. For those in the US, Courage to Resist has an online form that's very easy to use. That is the sort of thing that should receive attention but instead it's ignored. We will note war resisters in Canada tomorrow. There is not time today, my apologies.
There is a growing movement of resistance within the US military which includes Matt Mishler, Josh Randall, Robby Keller, Justiniano Rodrigues, Chuck Wiley, James Stepp, Rodney Watson, Michael Espinal, Matthew Lowell, Derek Hess, Diedra Cobb, Brad McCall, Justin Cliburn, Timothy Richard, Robert Weiss, Phil McDowell, Steve Yoczik, Ross Spears, Peter Brown, Bethany "Skylar" James, Zamesha Dominique, Chrisopther Scott Magaoay, Jared Hood, James Burmeister, Eli Israel, Joshua Key, Ehren Watada, Terri Johnson, Clara Gomez, Luke Kamunen, Leif Kamunen, Leo Kamunen, Camilo Mejia, Kimberly Rivera, Dean Walcott, Linjamin Mull, Agustin Aguayo, Justin Colby, Marc Train, Abdullah Webster, Robert Zabala, Darrell Anderson, Kyle Snyder, Corey Glass, Jeremy Hinzman, Kevin Lee, Mark Wilkerson, Patrick Hart, Ricky Clousing, Ivan Brobeck, Aidan Delgado, Pablo Paredes, Carl Webb, Stephen Funk, Blake LeMoine, Clifton Hicks, David Sanders, Dan Felushko, Brandon Hughey, Logan Laituri, Clifford Cornell, Joshua Despain, Joshua Casteel, Katherine Jashinski, Dale Bartell, Chris Teske, Matt Lowell, Jimmy Massey, Chris Capps, Tim Richard, Hart Viges, Michael Blake, Christopher Mogwai, Christian Kjar, Kyle Huwer, Wilfredo Torres, Michael Sudbury, Ghanim Khalil, Vincent La Volpa, DeShawn Reed and Kevin Benderman. In total, at least fifty US war resisters in Canada have applied for asylum. Information on war resistance within the military can be found at The Objector, The G.I. Rights Hotline [(877) 447-4487], Iraq Veterans Against the War and the War Resisters Support Campaign. Courage to Resist offers information on all public war resisters. Tom Joad maintains a list of known war resisters. In addition, VETWOW is an organization that assists those suffering from MST (Military Sexual Trauma).
Turning to Iraq, battles continue. Today on NPR's The Diane Rehm Show, McClatchy Newspapers' Leila Fadel provided a report and overview, calling in from Baghdad.
Diane Rehm: Can you talk about what set off the fighting in Basra and where things stand right now?
Leila Fadel: Well Basra has been spiraling out of control for months now, the British military pulled out late last year basically handing it over to Shia militias in a city that are battling for power. Maliki, the prime minister here, finally declared a security operation on Monday night and the battle has been fierce mainly between Iraqi government forces and the Mehdi Army which is loyal to the Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. Basra is a strong-hold for the Mehdi Army and the Sadrists are saying this is a battle against them to consolidate power for their Shia rivals, the Supreme Council here in Iraq.
Diane Rehm: And what is Prime Minister Maliki threatening? What is he demanding? What is he threatening?
Leila Fadel: Well Prime Minister Maliki is saying that he wants every weapon in the hands of the government. He wants all weapon smugglers, this is a very important city, 90% of Iraq's oil comes from there, it's a border town. It has the main port of Iraq there. And a lot of the weapon smuggling, oil smuggling happens there. And so the main families that deal with oil smuggling, weapon smuggling have been targeted in Basra. He has given what he calls outlaws 72 hours to surrender while the battle continues it seems that the main targets and the people fighting back are the Medhi army and the Sadrists are saying that they are the targets, the sole targets, of this operation.
Diane Rehm: And how likely are they to respond to al-Maliki's demands?
Leila Fadel: Well today Moqtada al-Sadr asked Maliki to leave Basra and to try to deal with the situation through dialogue. The response has been fierce from the Mahdi army. The cease-fire is not intact in Basra, they are battling and they are battling hard in that city. So far it's unclear how many people have died. We have a number of thirty-three but residents are telling us there are dead bodies in the street and at least one Sadr neighborhood the dead bodies are being put in the mosque because they can't get to the morgues and the hospitals because of the curfew. And hospitals are barely functioning with little to no medical staff and medical supplies. The whole city and the province has been sealed off and curfews have been implemented all throughout the south.
Diane Rehm: And Leila, you're in Baghdad what's the situation there right now?
Leila Fadel: Well the Medhi army has done a forced sit-in in all Medhi army neighborhoods and so what has happened is that they sealed off neighborhoods where they have large control and, at gun point, told shopkeepers to close, the kids are not allowed to go to school, in one situtation they evacuated the school that was functioning. In Sadr City there have been violent clashes between Iraqi security forces, US forces and the Medhi army in Sadr City. Sadr officials are saying that at least 20 people have died and a hundred were wounded, among them women and children. But it's unclear what's happening there because it's completely sealed off by the militia.
Diane Rehm: So do you see this as the end of Moqtada al-Sadr's cease fire that was first called in August and then renewed in February?
Leila Fadel: At this point it is unclear if Moqtada al-Sadr can really afford to lift that cease-fire. His statement from the Mehdi army yesterday was to pass out the Quran, holy book of Islam, and olive brances to the police. He only said police, though, not the army. But the cease-fire doesn't seem to be intact. The Green Zone has been coming under heavy, heavy mortar fire for three days now. Three US citizens, government workers, were injured seriously today. And throughout the capitol, police have abandoned their checkpoints inside the Mehdi army controlled neighborhoods and they're now only on the main roads now. There have been attacks on police checkpoints, on Badr offices which is the military wing of the Supreme Council the biggest Shia of rival of the Sadrists in Iraq. In Basra, they're reacting fiercely and fighting hard and so watching what's happening on the ground doesn't seem to be a cease-fire. Although the military, the US military, is trying to say this is only special groups, splinter groups, from Moqtada al-Sadr's movement which doesn't seem to be the case on the ground.
Diane Rehm: Well Leila, final question for you. How much of the drop in violence during this US troop surge can be attributed to Moqtada al-Sadr's cease fire?
Leila Fadel: I think a lot of the drop in violence can be attributed to the cease-fire.
At that point, Fadel's call was lost (actually during "cease"). Fadel filed a report today noting that, "U.S. forces joined Iraqi troops in Baghdad to fight Mahdi Army militants, and police said that at least 20 people had been killed in the Sadr city neighborhood, a stronghold for Sadr's backers. . . . In Baghdad, Mahdi Army-dominated neighborhoods remained sealed off, angering residents who couldn't open their businesses, get to hospitals or send their children to school. In the south the fighting spread to Kut as Maliki sent more forces from Karbala to supplement the 15,000 troops he already had. U.S. air support attacked targets on major roadways and the homes of suspected weapons smugglers, said Abdel Kareem Khalaf, a spokesman for the Ministry Interior." Sam Daghr (Christian Science Monitor) echoes Fadel's observations on Baghdad being shut down ("Buses stopped running and shops closed") and writes, "Residents and Mahdi Army militans alike appeared to be bracing for a coming battle, guarding against US and Iraqi forces advancing to stop the rockets allegedly fired from Sadr City that hit the Green Zone again Wednesday for the third day since Saturday." Alexandra Zavis and Ned Parker (Los Angeles Times) note that not only has the violence spread elsewhere in Iraq, so have the demonstrations. Leila Fadel and Ali al Basri (McClatchy Newspapers) describe a popular chant in Najaf yesterday: "Oh Nouri, you coward. You spy of the Americans." In Basra, Atul Aneja (The Hindu) explains, "the Mahdi Army has now apparently established control over the main road from the town of Amara to Basra, allowing it to cut off military supplies for the government troops which pass through this way. Fearing an attack from the Mahdi Army, members of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq (ISCI) and the Da'wa Party have fled their headquarters in the city. The ISCI is led by the Shia cleric Abdul Aziz Al-Hakim, while Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki heads Da'wa." Zavis and Parker cite analysts describing the Basra conflict as a struggle for political power, note the upcoming provincial elections (October 2008) and how Da'wa and ISCI have failed to deliver anything to mos Iraqis. Ben Lando (UPI) quotes Congressional Research Service's Kenneth Katzman who says the battle "was planned a month ago" by the central government in Baghdad and that what is going is "an internal Shiite war for who is going to represent the Shiite community in Iraq." On the first hour of today's The Diane Rehm Show, of the US Institute of Peace and the James Baaker circle-jerk, expressed surprised that Mosul was not the focus, couldn't imagine why Basra was where Iraqi and US forces were moving and made it clear that he didn't believe the US military initiated the action. Fadel and al Basri explain that "Maliki is taking a major political risk in attemptin gto recover Basra, which was virtually handed over to militias when the British military withdrew late last year. The risk was heightened by his presence at the start of the operation. His critics were quick to portray his decision as a political gunpoint." AFP describes the events this way, "The city has become the theatre of a bitter turf war between the Mahdi Army and two rival Shiite factions -- the powerful Supreme Iraqi Islamic Council (SIIC) of Abdel Aziz al-Hakim and the smaller Fadhila party -- ahead of provincial elections in October. The three factions are fighting to control the uge oil revenues generated by the city, seen as the economic nerve centre of the country."
Focusing on some of today's reported violence . . .
Bombings?
Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports that in addition to the mortar attack Fadel noted above (that wounded three US 'officials') the Green Zone was hit with six more mortar shells while another hit outside and killed 1 person and left six more wounded, a Baghdad bombing left two people wounded, a mortar attack in Baghdad's Karrada neighborhood claimed 3 lives and left fifteen more people wounded, another 3 were killed in a southeast Baghdad mortar attack that also left twelve wounded, a downtown Baghdad mortar attack claimed 2 lives and left five more people wounded, an east Baghdad mortar attack left four people injured, a Baghdad bombing left three people wounded, a Basra rocket attack killed 4 police officers, a Basra mortar attack on "the detainees affairs department" left seven prisoners injured, 60 dead in Babil as a result of US helicopters that "bombed the neighborhoods" and another US air strike claimed 8 lives "including Judge Munaf al Azawi a court judge and his two sons, two women, a child and a man". Reuters notes a US air strike in Hilla which led to dthe deaths of 11 people and eighteen wounded (at least, on both figures).
Shootings?
Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports armed clashes in Sadr City between residents and US (and presumably Iraqi) forces resulted in 20 civilians dead and 115 wounded, the Mahdi army shot dead eleven people in downtown Baghdad in a half hour this morning,
Corpses?
Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 3 corpses discovered in Baghdad, in Tikrit the corpse of Mohammed Shakir Mahmou was turned over (he "died after being tortured by a US sponsored militia"),
Today the US military announced: "A Mulit-National Division -- Baghdad Soldier was killed by hostile fire in eastern Baghdad at approximately 4:30 p.m. March 26." And they announced: "A Multi-National Division -- Baghdad Soldier was killed during a small-arms fire attack at approximately 12:35 p.m. March 26 while conducting a combat patrol. After being shot, the Soldier was medically evacuated to a Coalition forces combat support hospital, where he succumbed to his wounds." The current total number of US service members killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war is 4003. The UK Ministry of Defence announced: "It is with deep regret that the Ministry of Defence must confirm the death of a British soldier in Iraq today, 26 March 2008. The soldier died as a result of gunshot wounds sustained during a firefight in the early hours of this morning." Thomas Harding (Telegraph of London) explains that the death took place "during a covert operation" somewhere in Baghdad and "It is believed the trooper from 22 Special Air Service Regiment was part of a troop of Special Forces who were carrying out the raid . . . A firefight broke out as the soldiers broke into the location and the soldier, who was wearing body armour, was killed in the exchange of gunfire.". The total number of UK forces killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war stands at 176.
Turning to US campaign politics. Today Barack Obama, of all people, had the nerve to toss out Iraq as his latest excuse to hide behind. Before we get there, Barack has been hiding out in the Virgin Islands (see Wally, Cedric, Rebecca, Wally and Cedric again and Mike). Taking a page from the 'successful' John Kerry 2004 presidential campaign, Obama decided hiding out in the Virgin Islands was the perfect way to address the Jeremiah Wright controversy that is not going away. Jeremiah Wright would be Barack's friend, mentor, pastor, and just about everything but helpmate -- for over 20 years. Hiding out in the Virigin Islands does you little good when Wright can't stop making the news. Specifically Anna M. Tinsley (Fort Worth Star-Telegram) reports on TCU (Texas Christian University) deciding that Jeremiah Wright -- who used his pulpit to damn the United States -- wasn't appearing on their campus. Fredreka Schouten (USA Today) reports that a Tampa, Florida church has also cancelled a schedule appearance (and, no, it wasn't due to 'security'). AP reports that THREE Houston churchs have cancelled appearances by Wright scheduled to take place this Sunday. The issue is what USA Today notes as "God d—- America for treating our citizens as far less than human." Wright damned America. It offended many.
But Obama ignored it last week and the press ran with the distraction. He refused to address specifically the offensive remark in last week's nearly 5,000 word speech. It should have been addressed. Instead we got nonsense. Lots and lots of nonsense. And drooling in the media (mainly White) because that speech wasn't about race. In fact, I keep waiting for someone to point out the most offensive aspect of Barack's speech. He wanted to take it to historical oppression and go back to what he dubbed "original sin" in the region we call the US today. Well gee, Bambi, long before anyone, ANYONE, sailed over by choice or force, Native Americans populated this region so if you're going to talk about "originial" anything, trying getting your facts right. Or try being inclusive -- Liang offered her response to that bad speech here. But as Ava and I noted, the MSM is never going to be honest about race and Panhandle Media has made sure to convey that they too only see race in two shades: Black and White. It's amazing to hear all the gushers gushing over a speech that ignored race in the US so completely. But the speech was never supposed to be about race. It was supposed to distract Americans -- that is who will be voting in the presidential election in November -- from the fact that Barack Obama believes it is perfectly okay to belong to a church whose pastor uses the pulpit to damn the United States -- to damn the country Barack Obama says he can represent, says he wants to represent, says he can defend. Defend or damn? That's the question on many minds.
Today AP reports that Bambi showed up in North Carolina to claim that Wright's comments were nothing but "a half-minute sound clip" -- that's all they were? -- and that "We cannot solve the problems of America if everytime somebody somewhere does something sutpid, that everybody gets up in arms and forgets about the war in Iraq and we forget about the economy." Uh, excuse me, Barack Obama, but who forgot the illegal war. That would be you. That would be you who told Elaine and I, when you were running for the US Senate and begging for money, that the US was in Iraq now and so the troops had to stay to win. And, sure enough, when you made it into the US Senate, you didn't do a thing to end the illegal war. And in your campaign, you haven't done a thing. In fact, Samantha Power -- your then foreign advisor -- revealed to the world -- via BBC -- that you didn't mean a word you were saying about "combat troops out in 16 months" which you lie in your speeches and reduce to "We want to end the war now!" That's the extent you offer on Iraq -- a bumper sticker. Now you spoke for nearly 5,000 words last week. Yes, you appear to have cribbed my points and words (and, no, you did not have permission) but it was a bad, bad speech. And the reality is, you haven't even tried to speak like that about Iraq. So don't blame the fact that your pastor of 20 years, in the church you made your home, damned the United States for the fact that you won't address the Iraq War. The president of the United States is expected to defend the US. But when Wright damned the US, you didn't leave the church. You still haven't called him out on it or distanced yourself from his remarks damning the US. You want to be the leader of the US and America's not even sure you can be counted onto verbally defend the US because Wright damned the country and you did nothing.
As Craig Unger (Vanity Fair) points out, should Barack get the Democratic Party nomination (he means presidential, but apply it to the v.p. slot as well), the "Wright scandal" is not going away and "you can bet that it will be an issue in the general election". Yesterday, Hillary Clinton was asked about the issue in an newspaper editorial meeting and again at a press conference. CNN reports:Speaking to reporters Tuesday, Clinton referenced a speech she gave nearly a year ago after talk-radio host Don Imus' controversial remarks about the Rutgers women's basketball team. "I said it was time for standing up for what is right, for saying enough is enough, for urging that we turn a culture of degradation into a culture of empowerment, for saying that while we of course must protect our right of free expression, it should not be used as a license or an excuse to demean or humiliate our fellow citizens. Sen. Obama spoke eloquently at that time as well," she said. "Everyone will have to decide these matters for themselves. They were obviously very personal matters," Clinton added. "But I was asked what I would do if he was my pastor and I said I think the choice would be clear for me."
No she would not have stayed and no one running for president should have stayed with that church. This isn't minor. This has nothing to do with race. It has to do with the character required to be president. Barack Obama can agree with many of Wright's points regarding racism (I happen to) but when it comes to the issue of damning the United States and doing so from the front of the church, a pastor using all his presumed power/pull with God to damn the United States, there are serious problems and serious questions and last week's speech was the distraction from that issue. But the issue is not going away. USA Today cites Obama flack Bill Burton declaring that Hillary -- responding to direct questions -- is offering a "transparent attempt to distract attention." No, Burton, she was answering a question. The transparent attempt to distract was sending Barack off to the Virgin Islands to lay low and hope the outrage died down. As the cancelled appearances for Wright suggest, it has not died down. Now Barack's showing up in North Carolina to claim that anyone raising the issue is preventing talk about Iraq. No, that's not preventing talk about Iraq and Mr. Pretty Words offered nothing but bumper stickers for months and months when no one was talking about Iraq. He may think Americans are that stupid but that's not the case. The only stupidity is a campaign that's refused to address an issue that won't die down. And, again, shouldn't. The people of the United States have a right to expect that someone running for president will defend the country. Barack Obama has yet to prove that defending the US is a concern for him.
While Barack pretends that he could address Iraq if only pesky Americans would stop focusing on questions his own actions raise, Senator Hillary Clinton underscored the differences between herself and Senator John McCain on Iraq:
While there is much to praise in Senator McCain's speech, he and I continue to have a fundamental disagreement on Iraq. Like President Bush, Senator McCain continues to oppose a swift and responsible withdrawal from Iraq. Like President Bush, Senator McCain discounts the warnings of our senior military leadership of the consequences of the Iraq war on the readiness of our armed forces, and on the need to focus on the forgotten front line in Afghanistan. Like President Bush, Senator McCain wants to keep us tied to another country's civil war, and said "it would be fine with me" if U.S. troops were in Iraq for 50 or even 100 years. That in a nutshell is the Bush/McCain Iraq policy.
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Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Amy Goodman airs Moyers repeats
Is there a worse program these days than Democracy Now?
If so, let me know. Today, Amy Goodman decided to do the show Bill Moyers did on PBS Friday night. I guess she has nothing left but the ability to copy.
She must be running on fumes. If you doubt that, wait until her book comes out. C.I. passed along the galley version and I have laughed non-stop ever since. It is bad, it is very, very bad.
When you read the snapshot, notice that C.I.'s stressing James Burmeister again. His father is asking for people to stand with his son.
You think he would say "no" to an offer to go on TV? But Amy Goodman ignored his son in real time so we should not expect her to give a damn now, should we?
Remember, watch Mr. Moyers on Friday night so you will know what Amy Goodman intends to air next week.
This is "Just Embellished Words: Senator Obama’s Record of Exaggerations & Misstatements" (HillaryClinton.com):
Once again, the Obama campaign is getting caught saying one thing while doing another. They are personally attacking Hillary even though Sen. Obama has been found mispeaking and embellishing facts about himself more than ten times in recent months. Senator Obama’s campaign is based on words –not a record of deeds – and if those words aren’t backed up by facts, there’s not much else left.
"Senator Obama has called himself a constitutional professor, claimed credit for passing legislation that never left committee, and apparently inflated his role as a community organizer among other issues. When it comes to his record, just words won't do. Senator Obama will have to use facts as well," Clinton spokesman Phil Singer said.
Sen. Obama consistently and falsely claims that he was a law professor. The Sun-Times reported that, "Several direct-mail pieces issued for Obama's primary [Senate] campaign said he was a law professor at the University of Chicago. He is not. He is a senior lecturer (now on leave) at the school. In academia, there is a vast difference between the two titles. Details matter." In academia, there's a significant difference: professors have tenure while lecturers do not. [Hotline Blog, 4/9/07; Chicago Sun-Times, 8/8/04]
Obama claimed credit for nuclear leak legislation that never passed. "Obama scolded Exelon and federal regulators for inaction and introduced a bill to require all plant owners to notify state and local authorities immediately of even small leaks. He has boasted of it on the campaign trail, telling a crowd in Iowa in December that it was 'the only nuclear legislation that I’ve passed.' 'I just did that last year,' he said, to murmurs of approval. A close look at the path his legislation took tells a very different story. While he initially fought to advance his bill, even holding up a presidential nomination to try to force a hearing on it, Mr. Obama eventually rewrote it to reflect changes sought by Senate Republicans, Exelon and nuclear regulators. The new bill removed language mandating prompt reporting and simply offered guidance to regulators, whom it charged with addressing the issue of unreported leaks. Those revisions propelled the bill through a crucial committee. But, contrary to Mr. Obama’s comments in Iowa, it ultimately died amid parliamentary wrangling in the full Senate." [New York Times, 2/2/08]
Obama misspoke about his being conceived because of Selma. "Mr. Obama relayed a story of how his Kenyan father and his Kansan mother fell in love because of the tumult of Selma, but he was born in 1961, four years before the confrontation at Selma took place. When asked later, Mr. Obama clarified himself, saying: 'I meant the whole civil rights movement.'" [New York Times, 3/5/07]
LA Times: Fellow organizers say Sen. Obama took too much credit for his community organizing efforts. "As the 24-year-old mentor to public housing residents, Obama says he initiated and led efforts that thrust Altgeld's asbestos problem into the headlines, pushing city officials to call hearings and a reluctant housing authority to start a cleanup. But others tell the story much differently. They say Obama did not play the singular role in the asbestos episode that he portrays in the best-selling memoir 'Dreams From My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance.' Credit for pushing officials to deal with the cancer-causing substance, according to interviews and news accounts from that period, also goes to a well-known preexisting group at Altgeld Gardens and to a local newspaper called the Chicago Reporter. Obama does not mention either one in his book." [Los Angeles Times, 2/19/07]
Chicago Tribune: Obama's assertion that nobody had indications Rezko was engaging in wrongdoing 'strains credulity.' "…Obama has been too self-exculpatory. His assertion in network TV interviews last week that nobody had indications Rezko was engaging in wrongdoing strains credulity: Tribune stories linked Rezko to questionable fundraising for Gov. Rod Blagojevich in 2004 -- more than a year before the adjacent home and property purchases by the Obamas and the Rezkos." [Chicago Tribune editorial, 1/27/08]
Obama was forced to revise his assertion that lobbyists 'won't work in my White House.' "White House hopeful Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) was forced to revise a critical stump line of his on Saturday -- a flat declaration that lobbyists 'won't work in my White House' after it turned out his own written plan says they could, with some restrictions… After being challenged on the accuracy of what he has been saying -- in contrast to his written pledge -- at a news conference Saturday in Waterloo, Obama immediately softened what had been his hard line in his next stump speech." [Chicago Sun-Times, 12/16/07]
FactCheck.org: 'Selective, embellished and out-of-context quotes from newspapers pump up Obama's health plan.' "Obama's ad touting his health care plan quotes phrases from newspaper articles and an editorial, but makes them sound more laudatory and authoritative than they actually are. It attributes to The Washington Post a line saying Obama's plan would save families about $2,500. But the Post was citing the estimate of the Obama campaign and didn't analyze the purported savings independently. It claims that "experts" say Obama's plan is "the best." "Experts" turn out to be editorial writers at the Iowa City Press-Citizen – who, for all their talents, aren't actual experts in the field. It quotes yet another newspaper saying Obama's plan "guarantees coverage for all Americans," neglecting to mention that, as the article makes clear, it's only Clinton's and Edwards' plans that would require coverage for everyone, while Obama's would allow individuals to buy in if they wanted to.” [FactCheck.org, 1/3/08]
Sen. Obama said 'I passed a law that put Illinois on a path to universal coverage,' but Obama health care legislation merely set up a task force. "As a state senator, I brought Republicans and Democrats together to pass legislation insuring 20,000 more children. And 65,000 more adults received health care…And I passed a law that put Illinois on a path to universal coverage." The State Journal-Register reported in 2004 that "The [Illinois State] Senate squeaked out a controversial bill along party lines Wednesday to create a task force to study health-care reform in Illinois. […] In its original form, the bill required the state to offer universal health care by 2007. That put a 'cloud' over the legislation, said Sen. Dale Righter, R-Mattoon. Under the latest version, the 29-member task force would hold at least five public hearings next year." [Obama Health Care speech, 5/29/07; State Journal-Register, 5/20/04]
ABC News: 'Obama…seemed to exaggerate the legislative progress he made' on ethics reform. "ABC News' Teddy Davis Reports: During Monday's Democratic presidential debate, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., seemed to exaggerate the legislative progress he has made on disclosure of "bundlers," those individuals who aggregate their influence with the candidate they support by collecting $2,300 checks from a wide network of wealthy friends and associates. When former Alaska Sen. Mike Gravel alleged that Obama had 134 bundlers, Obama responded by telling Gravel that the reason he knows how many bundlers he has raising money for him is "because I helped push through a law this past session to disclose that." Earlier this year, Obama sponsored an amendment [sic] in the Senate requiring lobbyists to disclose the candidates for whom they bundle. Obama's amendment would not, however, require candidates to release the names of their bundlers. What's more, although Obama's amendment was agreed to in the Senate by unanimous consent, the measure never became law as Obama seemed to suggest. Gravel and the rest of the public know how many bundlers Obama has not because of a 'law' that the Illinois Democrat has 'pushed through' but because Obama voluntarily discloses that information." [ABC News, a=href"http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2007/07/obama-exaggerat.html">7/23/07]
Obama drastically overstated Kansas tornado deaths during campaign appearance. "When Sen. Barack Obama exaggerated the death toll of the tornado in Greensburg, Kan, during his visit to Richmond yesterday, The Associated Press headline rapidly evolved from 'Obama visits former Confederate capital for fundraiser’ to ‘Obama rips Bush on Iraq war at Richmond fundraiser' to 'Weary Obama criticizes Bush on Iraq, drastically overstates Kansas tornado death toll' to 'Obama drastically overstates Kansas tornado deaths during campaign appearance.' Drudge made it a banner, ensuring no reporter would miss it." [politico.com, 5/9/07]
This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"
March 25, 2008. Chaos and violence continue, the US military announces another death, the cease-fire/true appears off, spying on journalists and NGOs and more.
Starting with war resisters and returning to something from last week, James Burmeister.
Courage to Resist reported that "Burmeister recently returned from Canada and turned himself in to the Army at Fort Knox, Kentucky on March 4. In May 2007, James refused redeployment to Iraq. He lived in Canada for the last ten months with the help of the War Resisters Support Campaign. James' father Erich Burmeister of Eugene, Oregon believes that the Army is getting ready to prosecute James. He is asking people to call the Fort Knox Public Affairs office at 502-624-7451 and let them know you are concerned about PFC James Burmeister." Burmeister returned to the United States, many still remain in Canada.
For those in Canada, the nation's Parliament remains the best hope for safe harbor war resisters have, you can make your voice heard by the Canadian parliament which has the ability to pass legislation to grant war resisters the right to remain in Canada. Three e-mails addresses to focus on are: Prime Minister Stephen Harper (pm@pm.gc.ca -- that's pm at gc.ca) who is with the Conservative party and these two Liberals, Stephane Dion (Dion.S@parl.gc.ca -- that's Dion.S at parl.gc.ca) who is the leader of the Liberal Party and Maurizio Bevilacqua (Bevilacqua.M@parl.gc.ca -- that's Bevilacqua.M at parl.gc.ca) who is the Liberal Party's Critic for Citizenship and Immigration. A few more can be found here at War Resisters Support Campaign. For those in the US, Courage to Resist has an online form that's very easy to use. That is the sort of thing that should receive attention but instead it's ignored. We will note war resisters in Canada tomorrow. There is not time today, my apologies.
There is a growing movement of resistance within the US military which includes Matt Mishler, Josh Randall, Robby Keller, Justiniano Rodrigues, Chuck Wiley, James Stepp, Rodney Watson, Michael Espinal, Matthew Lowell, Derek Hess, Diedra Cobb, Brad McCall, Justin Cliburn, Timothy Richard, Robert Weiss, Phil McDowell, Steve Yoczik, Ross Spears, Peter Brown, Bethany "Skylar" James, Zamesha Dominique, Chrisopther Scott Magaoay, Jared Hood, James Burmeister, Eli Israel, Joshua Key, Ehren Watada, Terri Johnson, Clara Gomez, Luke Kamunen, Leif Kamunen, Leo Kamunen, Camilo Mejia, Kimberly Rivera, Dean Walcott, Linjamin Mull, Agustin Aguayo, Justin Colby, Marc Train, Abdullah Webster, Robert Zabala, Darrell Anderson, Kyle Snyder, Corey Glass, Jeremy Hinzman, Kevin Lee, Mark Wilkerson, Patrick Hart, Ricky Clousing, Ivan Brobeck, Aidan Delgado, Pablo Paredes, Carl Webb, Stephen Funk, Blake LeMoine, Clifton Hicks, David Sanders, Dan Felushko, Brandon Hughey, Logan Laituri, Clifford Cornell, Joshua Despain, Joshua Casteel, Katherine Jashinski, Dale Bartell, Chris Teske, Matt Lowell, Jimmy Massey, Chris Capps, Tim Richard, Hart Viges, Michael Blake, Christopher Mogwai, Christian Kjar, Kyle Huwer, Wilfredo Torres, Michael Sudbury, Ghanim Khalil, Vincent La Volpa, DeShawn Reed and Kevin Benderman. In total, at least fifty US war resisters in Canada have applied for asylum. Information on war resistance within the military can be found at The Objector, The G.I. Rights Hotline [(877) 447-4487], Iraq Veterans Against the War and the War Resisters Support Campaign. Courage to Resist offers information on all public war resisters. Tom Joad maintains a list of known war resisters. In addition, VETWOW is an organization that assists those suffering from MST (Military Sexual Trauma).
Turning to Iraq. In August, Moqtada al-Sadr declared a cease-fire truce with the US and the puppet government of Baghdad which is widely credited as part of the 'success' of the escalation. In February, he extended the cease-fire/true. Leila Fadel and Nancy A. Youssef (McClatchy Newspapers) reports, "A cease-fire critical to the improved security situation in Iraq appeared to unravel Monday when a militia loyal to radical Shiite Muslim cleric Muqtada al Sadr began shutting down neighborhoods in west Baghdad and issuing demands of the central government. Simultaneously, in the strategic southern port city of Basra, where Sadr's Mahdi militia is in control, the Iraqi government launched a crackdown in the face of warnings by Sadr's followers that they'll fight government forces if any Sadrists are detained. By 1 a.m. Arab satellite news channels reported clashes between the Mahdi Army and police in Basra." Ned Parker and Saif Hameed (Los Angeles Times) add these details: "The capital witnessed its own friction between Shiite factions Monday as the Sadr movement organized protests in west Baghdad. Leaders from Sadr's movement vowed to mount daily protests until the Shiite-run Iraqi government stops targeting its members in raids, releases detainees and apologizes for the conduct of security force members. They accused the government of trying to weaken Sadr's organization ahead of provincial elections scheduled for October." Those descriptions were of yesterday. Gina Chon (Wall St. Journal) reports,
"Fighting broke out Tuesday on the streets of Sadr City . . . and the Mahdi Army militia announced it had taken over Iraqi army checkpoints in an escalation of tension with Iraqi government security forces. The sound of gunfire could be heard in Sadr City throughout the morning and Mahdi Army members walked down the streets carrying rifles, rocket-propelled grenade launchers and other weapons in what appeared to be a show of force, accodring to two witnesses." AFP reports that fighting was ongoing in Baghdad, Basra, Kut and Hilla with the clash between Sadr's forces and the US in Baghdad being "the first time since last October". Atul Aneja (The Hindu) explains, "The Iraqi government's decision to establish its hold over the oil city of Basra dominated by Shia armed militias has sparked heavy fighting there" and that "field commanders of the Mahdi army in Najaf ordered to the militia 'to strike the occupiers' and their Iraqi allies." Robin Stringer (Bloomberg News) notes 18 dead and forty wounded from the Basra fighting alone and threats that the actions will go "nationwide."
The southern port of Basra was shut down, Leila Fadel and Ali al Basri (McClatchy Newspapers) report, while citizens of the area "cowered in their homes as Mahdi Army militiamen and Iraqi security forces battled" and a college student on the outskirts of the city saw the corpses of two members of Mahdi Army and one child. PBS' NewsHour quotes Um Hussein who was caught by suprise by the outbreak and she states, "It is a difficult situation. Not many shops or grocery stores are open since the curfew and since the fighting began. We have not stored households items at all." Sam Dagher (Christian Science Monitor) adds "US air power" to the battle. Alex Kingsbury (US News and World Reports) sees the current clashes as an indication of a power struggle for control of more than Basra -- control of Iraq -- and offers, "There are indications that the United States is, to some extent, choosing sides in the inter-Shiite power struggle. When Vice President Dick Cheney made a visit to Baghdad earlier this month, his one foray outside the heavily fortified Green Zone was to visit Hakim's office in Baghdad. Hakim also traveled to the White House and met with President Bush in December 2006." Hakim is Abdul Aziz al-Hakim whose political party (Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council) is the largest. Alexandra Zavis (Los Angeles Times) points out, "Sadr loyalists accuse his Shiite rivals in the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council and Maliki's Islamic Dawa party of using the Iraqi army and police to round up the cleric's followers ahead of the Oct. 1 elections." This believe is noted by Reuters as well, "Sadrists say the truce has been abused by US and Iraqi forces to make indiscriminate arrests ahead of provincial elecitons due in October, but the US military says it only targets 'rogue' members who have ignored the ceasefire." Paul Wood (BBC) maintains that it is Iraqi military and US military against Sadrists because the British are sitting it out, "saying the Iraqi army is demonstrating it is capable of acting on its own" and also states "Moqtada Sadr believes his hundreds of thousands of followers, many of them armed, will eventually deliver power into his hands." CNN puts the Basra dead at "at least 50 . . . and 150 others were wounded, an official with Basra's Provincial Council said" and notes Sadrists are credited with taking "down part of a bridge in nothern Basra" via bombings today. Leila Fadel and Ali al Basri (McClatchy Newspapers) report al-Sadr has "ordered his followers to remain calm and said they should give copies of the Quran and olive branches to the police."
In some of today's other reported violence . . .
Bombings?
Mohammed Al Dulaimy (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a Baghdad roadside bombing that claimed 1 life and left eight people wounded, a mortar attack on the Green Zone, a mortar or rocket attack on the Green Zone and a Baghdad mortar attack that wounded two police officer, a Najaf rocket attack on "the technical institute that the American forces". Reuters notes that "[a]t least three people were wounded" from the Green Zone attacks
Shootings?
Mohammed Al Dulaimy (McClatchy Newspapers) reports "the director of forensic medicine in Mosul" was shot dead and three Iraqi soldiers were wounded in a shooting attack on "the house of Babil province governor in Hilla". Reuters notes a Mosul morgue worker was shot dead in front of his Mosul home.
Kidnappings?
Mohammed Al Dulaimy (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 6 police officers were kidnapped in Baghdad. Reuters notes, "Gunmen abducted the son of an official of the journalists' union, Ghanim Ismail, outside his house in eastern Mosul".
Corpses?
Mohammed Al Dulaimy (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 5 corpses discovered in Baghdad. Reuters notes 6 corpses discovered in Mosul.
Meanwhile today the US military announced: "A Multi-National Division -- Big Baghdad Soldier was killed by a hostile fire attack at approximately 5 p.m. March 25 while conducting combat operations." The death brings the current total of US service members killed in Iraq during the illegal war to 4001. Karen DeYoung and Michael Abramowitz (Washington Post) note Bully Boy declared at the US State Department yesterday that his illegal war of choice "will merit the sacrifice" of others. The Post's Richard Cohen observed of the 4,000 mark, "This week we reached the mark of 4,000 American dead in Iraq. It is a sad milestone in a grinding war that can never be won and is already lost in so many ways."
Returning to Iraq Veterans Against the War's Winter Soldier for the panel Saturday night entitled The Cost of the War at Home. Unlike what John Stauber has rightly called the "corporatist peace movement," the various costs were addressed on the panel. Yesterday's snapshot noted Military Families Speak Out's Nancy Lessin (and Charley Richardson) noted the costs to families both while their loved ones were serving and upon return which included emotional costs, time lost and much, much more including the cost of care not being provided by the VA and a veteran making the decision to end his or her life; Brooks Sunket addresing the costs of Iraqis attempting to unionize in the allegedly 'free' Iraq; Fernando Suarez del Solar and Carolos Arredonod spoke movingly and passionately about losing their sons -- Jesus Alberto Suarez del Solar Navarro and Alexander Arredondo [his name was wrongly mixed up yesterday, my apologies] -- and how the loss is not a day or a month but an ongoing pain; and Catherine Lutz who addressed where the money goes (military spending). Veteran Adrienne Kinne also served on the panel and her testimony (like her testimony the day before) should have been amplified, should have been heard across the nation. Kinne spoke of serving before 9-11 and after in Military Intelligence.
Adrienne Kinne: I think that one of the costs of war at home is the cost to our freedom and our Constitution. In Military Intelligence there are specific guidelines and one of those specific guidelines is supposed to cover how we conduct ourselves is a guideline called USSID 18 which stands for United States Signals Instructive 18 -- which says that in an effort to uphold Americans Constitutional rights, Military Intelligence cannot collect on Americans. And to show the seriousness with which we took this directive in 1997 or thereabouts I intercepted a radio transmission of a Middle Eastern military entity which referenced the name of an American diplomat that was visiting the Middle East. Because an American's name was referenced we decided to delete every single record that that cut was ever collected It wasn't even directly collecting on American but just the reference And maybe that was something that we didn't necessarily have to do but we took our oath to not collect on Americans very seriously. And so we erased every single record that that cut ever took place. After 9-11 when I was again activated, I was again stationed at the same field site for the NSA in the States and I was assigned not to collect radio transmission of Middle Eastern military entities but Inmarsat satellite phone calls from Iraq, Afghanistan and a huge swath of that region And initially all the cuts -- this is a brand new system Why they put 20 reservists in charge of it, I will never know. With virtually no oversight whats over, which was another problem. But, in the beginning, we were getting all of these cuts which were unidentified -- it was a brand new system, it was just, we had a front end out there that was collecting all these satellite phone conversations, sending it back to the United States and we would go through and just listen, randomly, through all of these identified cuts just kind of like fishing for whatever we could find. And as time passed, I saw in this computer system, you could -- once you identified the telephone number, who it belongs to -- you can actually program the computer to come up with a name of whatever group belongs to it and the priority for whatever priority the cut is. So for instance "priority one" would have been a terrorist affiliated organization. As time passed, I saw our que not fill up so much with anything that had to do with terrorism but, um, humanitarian aid organizations, NGOs and even to include journalists. And this was not by any means the majority of the cuts we collected but even after we knew that it was the International Red Cross/Red Crescent rather than block their phone number, which we could have done, we continued to collect. And these are the two reasons we were given that allowed us to collect on these organizations. One was that these people were eyes on the ground and as they were going through Iraq they might happen upon weapons of mass destruction and give their location. So we could monitor them in case they ever referenced the location of WMDs. The other reason was that they could potentially, the organization could potentially lose their phone and it could be picked up by a terrorist and they would start using it. So we had to make sure that no terrorist ever secured the phone of another organization and then started using it and we had to maintain coverage on those phone numbers just in case. And this kind of came to a head for me in probably sometime in the beginning to middle of 2002 when I was listening to a conversation between a British aid worker and an American aid worker in the area And they weren't talking about anything of particular relevance. They were talking about whatever was going on in their office. It was so irrelevant that I can't really remember what the conversation was about. But what I do remember is that the British aid worker said to the American, "You know you really should be careful what you say on the phone because the Americans are listening." And the American, rightly thinking that he was protected from being monitored by our government said, "No they can't collect against me because I am an American citizen and I'm protected by USSID 18." And when he referenced USSID 18 I don't know why but that just kind of because that's Military Intelligence lingo, I thought that that might be of some relevance. Either the person was prior military which is probably very likely and was familiar with what was going on or come to find out most aid workers working outside of our country know about USSID 18 because they know their USSID 18 rights are being violated all the time by our government. I drew that cut to the attention of my officer in charge and he relayed it to the watch office and everybody actually got into a mini-uproar because this American referenced USSID 18 to a non-American. And they acted as if this American had just enacted some form of treason by referencing USSID 18 to a British -- an ally, supposedly, person. So shortly after that there was all this hubbub about whether or not we can collect on Americans, whether or not USSID 18 is even relevant anymore, whether or not we should be monitoring these NGOs. And they consulted -- whoever "they" is, I don't know. I was in my little spot where I was told I was a collector and I wasn't allowed to ask questions about anything. I couldn't analyze, I couldn't ask questions, my job was to collect and pass the information on. And it was shortly thereafter that we were told we were given a waiver that we could collect on Americans in the Middle East. And this included conversations that took place with people in the Middle East calling their family members in the United States. And we could hear both sides of the conversation but we were told that in order to protect the Americans in the United States we would just not report on their half of the conversation -- even though we were collecting it, even though we were listening to it, we would just not add that to the report. Why it matters where an American is in this world as to whether or not their rights are protected by our Constitution I do not know. But apparently, I've been kind of somewhat reviewing all the changes that are happening to Military Intelligence and FISA law, all of this is no longer just a matter of a verbal waiver, it's all legal. And that our government is using these occupations to destroy our Constitutional rights as Americans is, personally, I think, impeachable but in any reference criminal. I could kind of go through the different instances where I feel that information was collected which we could have very well known it was misinformation, we would pass it on anyway. But I think more importantly I just want to speak to the fact that it is not only our soldiers, marines, National Guard reservists, Air men and women, fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan that are supporting these wars. It is every single member of the military whether or not you are State side, whether or not you are abroad, whether or not you are intercepting transmissions in country. By serving in the military we are all supporting the occupations. And I really just think that's incredibly important for all of us to recognize because people always want to look and put so much on the shoulders of our veterans who have witnessed so much in Iraq and Afghanistan and act as if they're the only ones that have to bear the burden of ending these occupations. But I for one having served many years before 9-11and before Afghanistan and before Iraq am so sorry that through my service I in any way shape or form supported the initiation of wars which put you all in such horrible, horrible positions. And I just wanted to say one last thing that I think in many ways it's ironic -- and I may be using that word inappropriately or incorrectly -- that I served in the military for ten years and it's only been since joining Iraq Veterans Against the War that I feel like I've done anything good.
"Adrienne Kinne" is the spelling and an earlier snapshot may have another spelling ("Adrienne Kinee"). Though that panel isn't part of the archives, if you missed other Winter Soldier panels you can stream online at Iraq Veterans Against the War, at War Comes Home, at KPFK, at the Pacifica Radio homepage and at KPFA, here for Friday, here for Saturday, here for Sunday for other panels. Aimee Allison (co-host of the station's The Morning Show and co-author with David Solnit of Army Of None) and Aaron Glantz were the anchors for Pacifica's live coverage. We're going to stay with Kinne for her testimony on Friday March 14th at the panel on veterans healthcare. Kinne spoke of after leaving the military and pursuing her education further. She did some college internships at VA hospitals and then was an assistant on a research study. The study was on PTSD and TBI -- Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and Traumatic Brain Injury. The group devised a way to screen for TBI, hammered down the details and were ready to proceed.
Adrienne Kinne: And then they went to go to the next step, to actually make this happen. And I was actually on a conference call when someone said, "Wait a second. We can't start this screening process. Do you know that if we start screening for TBI there will be tens of thousands of soldiers who will screen positive and we do not have the resources available that would allow us to take care of these people so we cannot do the screening." And their rationale was that medically, medical ethics say if you know someone has a problem, you have to treat them. So since they didn't have the resources to treat them, they didn't want to know about the problem.
That is an important revelation and one that should have been carried throughout the media but the last half of the sentence really describes the 'healthcare' offered and how the government gets away with it: "they didn't want to know about the problem." That explains the Walter Reed Army Medical Center scandals as well as all the others. Last week Minnesota's The Free Press reported on Ryan Marti and two other members of the Minnesota National Guard who had deployed to Iraq met with US House Rep Tim Walz to discuss "the delays in the payments owed to them, about the uncertainty about when the next deployment might come and about the complexity and communication problems rampant in the Veterans Affairs system." As Minnesota's Austin Daily Herald notes, Waltz will be holding a forum for veterans at the Austin American Legion Post No. 91 this Friday starting at one in the afternoon.
As Ava and I noted, last week -- the fifth anniversary of the Iraq War, most 'news' and 'public affairs' programs either ignored Iraq or thought the way to address an ongoing, illegal war just completing it's fifth year was to again bore us all by going back to 2003 as if nothing happened since. One notable exception was last Friday, on PBS, Bill Moyers Journal explored the journey of Iraq veteran Tomas Young with Ellen Spiro and Phil Donahue who have made the documentary Body of War about his experiences. In a clip of their movie Young explains:
I called my recruiter on around September 13, 2001 when if you all can remember the president stood on the ruble with the bullhorn and said we were going to get the evildoers that did this. And, oh man, hold on a second . . . But I, and he led the rah rah around the country and got everybody really excited and I was excited. And I wanted to go to Afghanistan and get the people that did this to us. But, after I joined the Army it became clearer and clearer to me that we weren't going to go to Afghanistan. That we were going to go to Iraq. And more and more began to feel with statements like George Bush saying that he sought the approval of a higher father than his own and things like that, it really concerned me that President Bush was trying to use Jesus Christ as an advocate for the war.
Bill Moyers explained of Young, "And five days after arriving there [Iraq], he was shot in the chest and severely wounded. He was 24 years old at the time and will spend the rest of his life in a wheel chair." Tomas Young produced the soundtrack for Body of War and offers some thoughts on it at the Moyers blog. Remember Bill Moyers Journal is accessible to all with computer access -- you can read transcripts, stream audio or stream video and audio.
iraq
iraq veterans against the war
aimeee allisondavid solnit
aaron glantz
kpfa
leila fadel
mcclatchy newspapers
nancy a. youssef
the los angeles times
ned parker
alexandra zavis
gina chon
the washington post
richard cohen
karen deyoung
michael abramowitz
If so, let me know. Today, Amy Goodman decided to do the show Bill Moyers did on PBS Friday night. I guess she has nothing left but the ability to copy.
She must be running on fumes. If you doubt that, wait until her book comes out. C.I. passed along the galley version and I have laughed non-stop ever since. It is bad, it is very, very bad.
When you read the snapshot, notice that C.I.'s stressing James Burmeister again. His father is asking for people to stand with his son.
You think he would say "no" to an offer to go on TV? But Amy Goodman ignored his son in real time so we should not expect her to give a damn now, should we?
Remember, watch Mr. Moyers on Friday night so you will know what Amy Goodman intends to air next week.
This is "Just Embellished Words: Senator Obama’s Record of Exaggerations & Misstatements" (HillaryClinton.com):
Once again, the Obama campaign is getting caught saying one thing while doing another. They are personally attacking Hillary even though Sen. Obama has been found mispeaking and embellishing facts about himself more than ten times in recent months. Senator Obama’s campaign is based on words –not a record of deeds – and if those words aren’t backed up by facts, there’s not much else left.
"Senator Obama has called himself a constitutional professor, claimed credit for passing legislation that never left committee, and apparently inflated his role as a community organizer among other issues. When it comes to his record, just words won't do. Senator Obama will have to use facts as well," Clinton spokesman Phil Singer said.
Sen. Obama consistently and falsely claims that he was a law professor. The Sun-Times reported that, "Several direct-mail pieces issued for Obama's primary [Senate] campaign said he was a law professor at the University of Chicago. He is not. He is a senior lecturer (now on leave) at the school. In academia, there is a vast difference between the two titles. Details matter." In academia, there's a significant difference: professors have tenure while lecturers do not. [Hotline Blog, 4/9/07; Chicago Sun-Times, 8/8/04]
Obama claimed credit for nuclear leak legislation that never passed. "Obama scolded Exelon and federal regulators for inaction and introduced a bill to require all plant owners to notify state and local authorities immediately of even small leaks. He has boasted of it on the campaign trail, telling a crowd in Iowa in December that it was 'the only nuclear legislation that I’ve passed.' 'I just did that last year,' he said, to murmurs of approval. A close look at the path his legislation took tells a very different story. While he initially fought to advance his bill, even holding up a presidential nomination to try to force a hearing on it, Mr. Obama eventually rewrote it to reflect changes sought by Senate Republicans, Exelon and nuclear regulators. The new bill removed language mandating prompt reporting and simply offered guidance to regulators, whom it charged with addressing the issue of unreported leaks. Those revisions propelled the bill through a crucial committee. But, contrary to Mr. Obama’s comments in Iowa, it ultimately died amid parliamentary wrangling in the full Senate." [New York Times, 2/2/08]
Obama misspoke about his being conceived because of Selma. "Mr. Obama relayed a story of how his Kenyan father and his Kansan mother fell in love because of the tumult of Selma, but he was born in 1961, four years before the confrontation at Selma took place. When asked later, Mr. Obama clarified himself, saying: 'I meant the whole civil rights movement.'" [New York Times, 3/5/07]
LA Times: Fellow organizers say Sen. Obama took too much credit for his community organizing efforts. "As the 24-year-old mentor to public housing residents, Obama says he initiated and led efforts that thrust Altgeld's asbestos problem into the headlines, pushing city officials to call hearings and a reluctant housing authority to start a cleanup. But others tell the story much differently. They say Obama did not play the singular role in the asbestos episode that he portrays in the best-selling memoir 'Dreams From My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance.' Credit for pushing officials to deal with the cancer-causing substance, according to interviews and news accounts from that period, also goes to a well-known preexisting group at Altgeld Gardens and to a local newspaper called the Chicago Reporter. Obama does not mention either one in his book." [Los Angeles Times, 2/19/07]
Chicago Tribune: Obama's assertion that nobody had indications Rezko was engaging in wrongdoing 'strains credulity.' "…Obama has been too self-exculpatory. His assertion in network TV interviews last week that nobody had indications Rezko was engaging in wrongdoing strains credulity: Tribune stories linked Rezko to questionable fundraising for Gov. Rod Blagojevich in 2004 -- more than a year before the adjacent home and property purchases by the Obamas and the Rezkos." [Chicago Tribune editorial, 1/27/08]
Obama was forced to revise his assertion that lobbyists 'won't work in my White House.' "White House hopeful Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) was forced to revise a critical stump line of his on Saturday -- a flat declaration that lobbyists 'won't work in my White House' after it turned out his own written plan says they could, with some restrictions… After being challenged on the accuracy of what he has been saying -- in contrast to his written pledge -- at a news conference Saturday in Waterloo, Obama immediately softened what had been his hard line in his next stump speech." [Chicago Sun-Times, 12/16/07]
FactCheck.org: 'Selective, embellished and out-of-context quotes from newspapers pump up Obama's health plan.' "Obama's ad touting his health care plan quotes phrases from newspaper articles and an editorial, but makes them sound more laudatory and authoritative than they actually are. It attributes to The Washington Post a line saying Obama's plan would save families about $2,500. But the Post was citing the estimate of the Obama campaign and didn't analyze the purported savings independently. It claims that "experts" say Obama's plan is "the best." "Experts" turn out to be editorial writers at the Iowa City Press-Citizen – who, for all their talents, aren't actual experts in the field. It quotes yet another newspaper saying Obama's plan "guarantees coverage for all Americans," neglecting to mention that, as the article makes clear, it's only Clinton's and Edwards' plans that would require coverage for everyone, while Obama's would allow individuals to buy in if they wanted to.” [FactCheck.org, 1/3/08]
Sen. Obama said 'I passed a law that put Illinois on a path to universal coverage,' but Obama health care legislation merely set up a task force. "As a state senator, I brought Republicans and Democrats together to pass legislation insuring 20,000 more children. And 65,000 more adults received health care…And I passed a law that put Illinois on a path to universal coverage." The State Journal-Register reported in 2004 that "The [Illinois State] Senate squeaked out a controversial bill along party lines Wednesday to create a task force to study health-care reform in Illinois. […] In its original form, the bill required the state to offer universal health care by 2007. That put a 'cloud' over the legislation, said Sen. Dale Righter, R-Mattoon. Under the latest version, the 29-member task force would hold at least five public hearings next year." [Obama Health Care speech, 5/29/07; State Journal-Register, 5/20/04]
ABC News: 'Obama…seemed to exaggerate the legislative progress he made' on ethics reform. "ABC News' Teddy Davis Reports: During Monday's Democratic presidential debate, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., seemed to exaggerate the legislative progress he has made on disclosure of "bundlers," those individuals who aggregate their influence with the candidate they support by collecting $2,300 checks from a wide network of wealthy friends and associates. When former Alaska Sen. Mike Gravel alleged that Obama had 134 bundlers, Obama responded by telling Gravel that the reason he knows how many bundlers he has raising money for him is "because I helped push through a law this past session to disclose that." Earlier this year, Obama sponsored an amendment [sic] in the Senate requiring lobbyists to disclose the candidates for whom they bundle. Obama's amendment would not, however, require candidates to release the names of their bundlers. What's more, although Obama's amendment was agreed to in the Senate by unanimous consent, the measure never became law as Obama seemed to suggest. Gravel and the rest of the public know how many bundlers Obama has not because of a 'law' that the Illinois Democrat has 'pushed through' but because Obama voluntarily discloses that information." [ABC News, a=href"http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2007/07/obama-exaggerat.html">7/23/07]
Obama drastically overstated Kansas tornado deaths during campaign appearance. "When Sen. Barack Obama exaggerated the death toll of the tornado in Greensburg, Kan, during his visit to Richmond yesterday, The Associated Press headline rapidly evolved from 'Obama visits former Confederate capital for fundraiser’ to ‘Obama rips Bush on Iraq war at Richmond fundraiser' to 'Weary Obama criticizes Bush on Iraq, drastically overstates Kansas tornado death toll' to 'Obama drastically overstates Kansas tornado deaths during campaign appearance.' Drudge made it a banner, ensuring no reporter would miss it." [politico.com, 5/9/07]
This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"
March 25, 2008. Chaos and violence continue, the US military announces another death, the cease-fire/true appears off, spying on journalists and NGOs and more.
Starting with war resisters and returning to something from last week, James Burmeister.
Courage to Resist reported that "Burmeister recently returned from Canada and turned himself in to the Army at Fort Knox, Kentucky on March 4. In May 2007, James refused redeployment to Iraq. He lived in Canada for the last ten months with the help of the War Resisters Support Campaign. James' father Erich Burmeister of Eugene, Oregon believes that the Army is getting ready to prosecute James. He is asking people to call the Fort Knox Public Affairs office at 502-624-7451 and let them know you are concerned about PFC James Burmeister." Burmeister returned to the United States, many still remain in Canada.
For those in Canada, the nation's Parliament remains the best hope for safe harbor war resisters have, you can make your voice heard by the Canadian parliament which has the ability to pass legislation to grant war resisters the right to remain in Canada. Three e-mails addresses to focus on are: Prime Minister Stephen Harper (pm@pm.gc.ca -- that's pm at gc.ca) who is with the Conservative party and these two Liberals, Stephane Dion (Dion.S@parl.gc.ca -- that's Dion.S at parl.gc.ca) who is the leader of the Liberal Party and Maurizio Bevilacqua (Bevilacqua.M@parl.gc.ca -- that's Bevilacqua.M at parl.gc.ca) who is the Liberal Party's Critic for Citizenship and Immigration. A few more can be found here at War Resisters Support Campaign. For those in the US, Courage to Resist has an online form that's very easy to use. That is the sort of thing that should receive attention but instead it's ignored. We will note war resisters in Canada tomorrow. There is not time today, my apologies.
There is a growing movement of resistance within the US military which includes Matt Mishler, Josh Randall, Robby Keller, Justiniano Rodrigues, Chuck Wiley, James Stepp, Rodney Watson, Michael Espinal, Matthew Lowell, Derek Hess, Diedra Cobb, Brad McCall, Justin Cliburn, Timothy Richard, Robert Weiss, Phil McDowell, Steve Yoczik, Ross Spears, Peter Brown, Bethany "Skylar" James, Zamesha Dominique, Chrisopther Scott Magaoay, Jared Hood, James Burmeister, Eli Israel, Joshua Key, Ehren Watada, Terri Johnson, Clara Gomez, Luke Kamunen, Leif Kamunen, Leo Kamunen, Camilo Mejia, Kimberly Rivera, Dean Walcott, Linjamin Mull, Agustin Aguayo, Justin Colby, Marc Train, Abdullah Webster, Robert Zabala, Darrell Anderson, Kyle Snyder, Corey Glass, Jeremy Hinzman, Kevin Lee, Mark Wilkerson, Patrick Hart, Ricky Clousing, Ivan Brobeck, Aidan Delgado, Pablo Paredes, Carl Webb, Stephen Funk, Blake LeMoine, Clifton Hicks, David Sanders, Dan Felushko, Brandon Hughey, Logan Laituri, Clifford Cornell, Joshua Despain, Joshua Casteel, Katherine Jashinski, Dale Bartell, Chris Teske, Matt Lowell, Jimmy Massey, Chris Capps, Tim Richard, Hart Viges, Michael Blake, Christopher Mogwai, Christian Kjar, Kyle Huwer, Wilfredo Torres, Michael Sudbury, Ghanim Khalil, Vincent La Volpa, DeShawn Reed and Kevin Benderman. In total, at least fifty US war resisters in Canada have applied for asylum. Information on war resistance within the military can be found at The Objector, The G.I. Rights Hotline [(877) 447-4487], Iraq Veterans Against the War and the War Resisters Support Campaign. Courage to Resist offers information on all public war resisters. Tom Joad maintains a list of known war resisters. In addition, VETWOW is an organization that assists those suffering from MST (Military Sexual Trauma).
Turning to Iraq. In August, Moqtada al-Sadr declared a cease-fire truce with the US and the puppet government of Baghdad which is widely credited as part of the 'success' of the escalation. In February, he extended the cease-fire/true. Leila Fadel and Nancy A. Youssef (McClatchy Newspapers) reports, "A cease-fire critical to the improved security situation in Iraq appeared to unravel Monday when a militia loyal to radical Shiite Muslim cleric Muqtada al Sadr began shutting down neighborhoods in west Baghdad and issuing demands of the central government. Simultaneously, in the strategic southern port city of Basra, where Sadr's Mahdi militia is in control, the Iraqi government launched a crackdown in the face of warnings by Sadr's followers that they'll fight government forces if any Sadrists are detained. By 1 a.m. Arab satellite news channels reported clashes between the Mahdi Army and police in Basra." Ned Parker and Saif Hameed (Los Angeles Times) add these details: "The capital witnessed its own friction between Shiite factions Monday as the Sadr movement organized protests in west Baghdad. Leaders from Sadr's movement vowed to mount daily protests until the Shiite-run Iraqi government stops targeting its members in raids, releases detainees and apologizes for the conduct of security force members. They accused the government of trying to weaken Sadr's organization ahead of provincial elections scheduled for October." Those descriptions were of yesterday. Gina Chon (Wall St. Journal) reports,
"Fighting broke out Tuesday on the streets of Sadr City . . . and the Mahdi Army militia announced it had taken over Iraqi army checkpoints in an escalation of tension with Iraqi government security forces. The sound of gunfire could be heard in Sadr City throughout the morning and Mahdi Army members walked down the streets carrying rifles, rocket-propelled grenade launchers and other weapons in what appeared to be a show of force, accodring to two witnesses." AFP reports that fighting was ongoing in Baghdad, Basra, Kut and Hilla with the clash between Sadr's forces and the US in Baghdad being "the first time since last October". Atul Aneja (The Hindu) explains, "The Iraqi government's decision to establish its hold over the oil city of Basra dominated by Shia armed militias has sparked heavy fighting there" and that "field commanders of the Mahdi army in Najaf ordered to the militia 'to strike the occupiers' and their Iraqi allies." Robin Stringer (Bloomberg News) notes 18 dead and forty wounded from the Basra fighting alone and threats that the actions will go "nationwide."
The southern port of Basra was shut down, Leila Fadel and Ali al Basri (McClatchy Newspapers) report, while citizens of the area "cowered in their homes as Mahdi Army militiamen and Iraqi security forces battled" and a college student on the outskirts of the city saw the corpses of two members of Mahdi Army and one child. PBS' NewsHour quotes Um Hussein who was caught by suprise by the outbreak and she states, "It is a difficult situation. Not many shops or grocery stores are open since the curfew and since the fighting began. We have not stored households items at all." Sam Dagher (Christian Science Monitor) adds "US air power" to the battle. Alex Kingsbury (US News and World Reports) sees the current clashes as an indication of a power struggle for control of more than Basra -- control of Iraq -- and offers, "There are indications that the United States is, to some extent, choosing sides in the inter-Shiite power struggle. When Vice President Dick Cheney made a visit to Baghdad earlier this month, his one foray outside the heavily fortified Green Zone was to visit Hakim's office in Baghdad. Hakim also traveled to the White House and met with President Bush in December 2006." Hakim is Abdul Aziz al-Hakim whose political party (Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council) is the largest. Alexandra Zavis (Los Angeles Times) points out, "Sadr loyalists accuse his Shiite rivals in the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council and Maliki's Islamic Dawa party of using the Iraqi army and police to round up the cleric's followers ahead of the Oct. 1 elections." This believe is noted by Reuters as well, "Sadrists say the truce has been abused by US and Iraqi forces to make indiscriminate arrests ahead of provincial elecitons due in October, but the US military says it only targets 'rogue' members who have ignored the ceasefire." Paul Wood (BBC) maintains that it is Iraqi military and US military against Sadrists because the British are sitting it out, "saying the Iraqi army is demonstrating it is capable of acting on its own" and also states "Moqtada Sadr believes his hundreds of thousands of followers, many of them armed, will eventually deliver power into his hands." CNN puts the Basra dead at "at least 50 . . . and 150 others were wounded, an official with Basra's Provincial Council said" and notes Sadrists are credited with taking "down part of a bridge in nothern Basra" via bombings today. Leila Fadel and Ali al Basri (McClatchy Newspapers) report al-Sadr has "ordered his followers to remain calm and said they should give copies of the Quran and olive branches to the police."
In some of today's other reported violence . . .
Bombings?
Mohammed Al Dulaimy (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a Baghdad roadside bombing that claimed 1 life and left eight people wounded, a mortar attack on the Green Zone, a mortar or rocket attack on the Green Zone and a Baghdad mortar attack that wounded two police officer, a Najaf rocket attack on "the technical institute that the American forces". Reuters notes that "[a]t least three people were wounded" from the Green Zone attacks
Shootings?
Mohammed Al Dulaimy (McClatchy Newspapers) reports "the director of forensic medicine in Mosul" was shot dead and three Iraqi soldiers were wounded in a shooting attack on "the house of Babil province governor in Hilla". Reuters notes a Mosul morgue worker was shot dead in front of his Mosul home.
Kidnappings?
Mohammed Al Dulaimy (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 6 police officers were kidnapped in Baghdad. Reuters notes, "Gunmen abducted the son of an official of the journalists' union, Ghanim Ismail, outside his house in eastern Mosul".
Corpses?
Mohammed Al Dulaimy (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 5 corpses discovered in Baghdad. Reuters notes 6 corpses discovered in Mosul.
Meanwhile today the US military announced: "A Multi-National Division -- Big Baghdad Soldier was killed by a hostile fire attack at approximately 5 p.m. March 25 while conducting combat operations." The death brings the current total of US service members killed in Iraq during the illegal war to 4001. Karen DeYoung and Michael Abramowitz (Washington Post) note Bully Boy declared at the US State Department yesterday that his illegal war of choice "will merit the sacrifice" of others. The Post's Richard Cohen observed of the 4,000 mark, "This week we reached the mark of 4,000 American dead in Iraq. It is a sad milestone in a grinding war that can never be won and is already lost in so many ways."
Returning to Iraq Veterans Against the War's Winter Soldier for the panel Saturday night entitled The Cost of the War at Home. Unlike what John Stauber has rightly called the "corporatist peace movement," the various costs were addressed on the panel. Yesterday's snapshot noted Military Families Speak Out's Nancy Lessin (and Charley Richardson) noted the costs to families both while their loved ones were serving and upon return which included emotional costs, time lost and much, much more including the cost of care not being provided by the VA and a veteran making the decision to end his or her life; Brooks Sunket addresing the costs of Iraqis attempting to unionize in the allegedly 'free' Iraq; Fernando Suarez del Solar and Carolos Arredonod spoke movingly and passionately about losing their sons -- Jesus Alberto Suarez del Solar Navarro and Alexander Arredondo [his name was wrongly mixed up yesterday, my apologies] -- and how the loss is not a day or a month but an ongoing pain; and Catherine Lutz who addressed where the money goes (military spending). Veteran Adrienne Kinne also served on the panel and her testimony (like her testimony the day before) should have been amplified, should have been heard across the nation. Kinne spoke of serving before 9-11 and after in Military Intelligence.
Adrienne Kinne: I think that one of the costs of war at home is the cost to our freedom and our Constitution. In Military Intelligence there are specific guidelines and one of those specific guidelines is supposed to cover how we conduct ourselves is a guideline called USSID 18 which stands for United States Signals Instructive 18 -- which says that in an effort to uphold Americans Constitutional rights, Military Intelligence cannot collect on Americans. And to show the seriousness with which we took this directive in 1997 or thereabouts I intercepted a radio transmission of a Middle Eastern military entity which referenced the name of an American diplomat that was visiting the Middle East. Because an American's name was referenced we decided to delete every single record that that cut was ever collected It wasn't even directly collecting on American but just the reference And maybe that was something that we didn't necessarily have to do but we took our oath to not collect on Americans very seriously. And so we erased every single record that that cut ever took place. After 9-11 when I was again activated, I was again stationed at the same field site for the NSA in the States and I was assigned not to collect radio transmission of Middle Eastern military entities but Inmarsat satellite phone calls from Iraq, Afghanistan and a huge swath of that region And initially all the cuts -- this is a brand new system Why they put 20 reservists in charge of it, I will never know. With virtually no oversight whats over, which was another problem. But, in the beginning, we were getting all of these cuts which were unidentified -- it was a brand new system, it was just, we had a front end out there that was collecting all these satellite phone conversations, sending it back to the United States and we would go through and just listen, randomly, through all of these identified cuts just kind of like fishing for whatever we could find. And as time passed, I saw in this computer system, you could -- once you identified the telephone number, who it belongs to -- you can actually program the computer to come up with a name of whatever group belongs to it and the priority for whatever priority the cut is. So for instance "priority one" would have been a terrorist affiliated organization. As time passed, I saw our que not fill up so much with anything that had to do with terrorism but, um, humanitarian aid organizations, NGOs and even to include journalists. And this was not by any means the majority of the cuts we collected but even after we knew that it was the International Red Cross/Red Crescent rather than block their phone number, which we could have done, we continued to collect. And these are the two reasons we were given that allowed us to collect on these organizations. One was that these people were eyes on the ground and as they were going through Iraq they might happen upon weapons of mass destruction and give their location. So we could monitor them in case they ever referenced the location of WMDs. The other reason was that they could potentially, the organization could potentially lose their phone and it could be picked up by a terrorist and they would start using it. So we had to make sure that no terrorist ever secured the phone of another organization and then started using it and we had to maintain coverage on those phone numbers just in case. And this kind of came to a head for me in probably sometime in the beginning to middle of 2002 when I was listening to a conversation between a British aid worker and an American aid worker in the area And they weren't talking about anything of particular relevance. They were talking about whatever was going on in their office. It was so irrelevant that I can't really remember what the conversation was about. But what I do remember is that the British aid worker said to the American, "You know you really should be careful what you say on the phone because the Americans are listening." And the American, rightly thinking that he was protected from being monitored by our government said, "No they can't collect against me because I am an American citizen and I'm protected by USSID 18." And when he referenced USSID 18 I don't know why but that just kind of because that's Military Intelligence lingo, I thought that that might be of some relevance. Either the person was prior military which is probably very likely and was familiar with what was going on or come to find out most aid workers working outside of our country know about USSID 18 because they know their USSID 18 rights are being violated all the time by our government. I drew that cut to the attention of my officer in charge and he relayed it to the watch office and everybody actually got into a mini-uproar because this American referenced USSID 18 to a non-American. And they acted as if this American had just enacted some form of treason by referencing USSID 18 to a British -- an ally, supposedly, person. So shortly after that there was all this hubbub about whether or not we can collect on Americans, whether or not USSID 18 is even relevant anymore, whether or not we should be monitoring these NGOs. And they consulted -- whoever "they" is, I don't know. I was in my little spot where I was told I was a collector and I wasn't allowed to ask questions about anything. I couldn't analyze, I couldn't ask questions, my job was to collect and pass the information on. And it was shortly thereafter that we were told we were given a waiver that we could collect on Americans in the Middle East. And this included conversations that took place with people in the Middle East calling their family members in the United States. And we could hear both sides of the conversation but we were told that in order to protect the Americans in the United States we would just not report on their half of the conversation -- even though we were collecting it, even though we were listening to it, we would just not add that to the report. Why it matters where an American is in this world as to whether or not their rights are protected by our Constitution I do not know. But apparently, I've been kind of somewhat reviewing all the changes that are happening to Military Intelligence and FISA law, all of this is no longer just a matter of a verbal waiver, it's all legal. And that our government is using these occupations to destroy our Constitutional rights as Americans is, personally, I think, impeachable but in any reference criminal. I could kind of go through the different instances where I feel that information was collected which we could have very well known it was misinformation, we would pass it on anyway. But I think more importantly I just want to speak to the fact that it is not only our soldiers, marines, National Guard reservists, Air men and women, fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan that are supporting these wars. It is every single member of the military whether or not you are State side, whether or not you are abroad, whether or not you are intercepting transmissions in country. By serving in the military we are all supporting the occupations. And I really just think that's incredibly important for all of us to recognize because people always want to look and put so much on the shoulders of our veterans who have witnessed so much in Iraq and Afghanistan and act as if they're the only ones that have to bear the burden of ending these occupations. But I for one having served many years before 9-11and before Afghanistan and before Iraq am so sorry that through my service I in any way shape or form supported the initiation of wars which put you all in such horrible, horrible positions. And I just wanted to say one last thing that I think in many ways it's ironic -- and I may be using that word inappropriately or incorrectly -- that I served in the military for ten years and it's only been since joining Iraq Veterans Against the War that I feel like I've done anything good.
"Adrienne Kinne" is the spelling and an earlier snapshot may have another spelling ("Adrienne Kinee"). Though that panel isn't part of the archives, if you missed other Winter Soldier panels you can stream online at Iraq Veterans Against the War, at War Comes Home, at KPFK, at the Pacifica Radio homepage and at KPFA, here for Friday, here for Saturday, here for Sunday for other panels. Aimee Allison (co-host of the station's The Morning Show and co-author with David Solnit of Army Of None) and Aaron Glantz were the anchors for Pacifica's live coverage. We're going to stay with Kinne for her testimony on Friday March 14th at the panel on veterans healthcare. Kinne spoke of after leaving the military and pursuing her education further. She did some college internships at VA hospitals and then was an assistant on a research study. The study was on PTSD and TBI -- Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and Traumatic Brain Injury. The group devised a way to screen for TBI, hammered down the details and were ready to proceed.
Adrienne Kinne: And then they went to go to the next step, to actually make this happen. And I was actually on a conference call when someone said, "Wait a second. We can't start this screening process. Do you know that if we start screening for TBI there will be tens of thousands of soldiers who will screen positive and we do not have the resources available that would allow us to take care of these people so we cannot do the screening." And their rationale was that medically, medical ethics say if you know someone has a problem, you have to treat them. So since they didn't have the resources to treat them, they didn't want to know about the problem.
That is an important revelation and one that should have been carried throughout the media but the last half of the sentence really describes the 'healthcare' offered and how the government gets away with it: "they didn't want to know about the problem." That explains the Walter Reed Army Medical Center scandals as well as all the others. Last week Minnesota's The Free Press reported on Ryan Marti and two other members of the Minnesota National Guard who had deployed to Iraq met with US House Rep Tim Walz to discuss "the delays in the payments owed to them, about the uncertainty about when the next deployment might come and about the complexity and communication problems rampant in the Veterans Affairs system." As Minnesota's Austin Daily Herald notes, Waltz will be holding a forum for veterans at the Austin American Legion Post No. 91 this Friday starting at one in the afternoon.
As Ava and I noted, last week -- the fifth anniversary of the Iraq War, most 'news' and 'public affairs' programs either ignored Iraq or thought the way to address an ongoing, illegal war just completing it's fifth year was to again bore us all by going back to 2003 as if nothing happened since. One notable exception was last Friday, on PBS, Bill Moyers Journal explored the journey of Iraq veteran Tomas Young with Ellen Spiro and Phil Donahue who have made the documentary Body of War about his experiences. In a clip of their movie Young explains:
I called my recruiter on around September 13, 2001 when if you all can remember the president stood on the ruble with the bullhorn and said we were going to get the evildoers that did this. And, oh man, hold on a second . . . But I, and he led the rah rah around the country and got everybody really excited and I was excited. And I wanted to go to Afghanistan and get the people that did this to us. But, after I joined the Army it became clearer and clearer to me that we weren't going to go to Afghanistan. That we were going to go to Iraq. And more and more began to feel with statements like George Bush saying that he sought the approval of a higher father than his own and things like that, it really concerned me that President Bush was trying to use Jesus Christ as an advocate for the war.
Bill Moyers explained of Young, "And five days after arriving there [Iraq], he was shot in the chest and severely wounded. He was 24 years old at the time and will spend the rest of his life in a wheel chair." Tomas Young produced the soundtrack for Body of War and offers some thoughts on it at the Moyers blog. Remember Bill Moyers Journal is accessible to all with computer access -- you can read transcripts, stream audio or stream video and audio.
iraq
iraq veterans against the war
aimeee allisondavid solnit
aaron glantz
kpfa
leila fadel
mcclatchy newspapers
nancy a. youssef
the los angeles times
ned parker
alexandra zavis
gina chon
the washington post
richard cohen
karen deyoung
michael abramowitz
Monday, March 24, 2008
Delegates and letting the race continue
On NPR's The Diane Rehm Show today, the first hour was about the Democratic primary race for president and, I have to say, the callers seemed much wiser than the guests.
Callers were the ones stating that allowing a race to continue is not the end of the world and, in fact, democracy. One woman who called in opened with something like, "I think they should have stopped the Superbowl in the third quarter." She was attempting to make the point that you do not stop in the middle of the game. Tad Devine always comes off like a professional worrier and today was no different.
Everyone needs to take a deep breath, a convention fight is not the end the world. Someone, I believe it was the governor of Tennesee, made the point that super delegates who have endorsed are not legally bound to remain with a candidate. That was the point that Ava and C.I. made Sunday ("TV: Broadcasting False Narratives ") and when they brought that point up I was shocked at myself.
That is something I once knew but the media spin has been so intense I had forgotten and was assuming those counts of "___ has X super delegates" meant something. It means nothing.
Adding, this is Peter Daou's "Three Myths About the Democratic Race:"
MYTH: Barack Obama is running a positive campaign that will unite Americans.
FACT: Barack Obama and his advisers have conducted a divisive "full assault" on Hillary's character.
While talking a lot about the politics of hope, change and unity, Sen. Obama and his campaign have been conducting a relentless and singularly personal assault on Hillary's character. They have blanketed big states with false negative mailers and radio ads and have described Hillary and her campaign as "disingenuous," "divisive," "untruthful," "dishonest," "polarizing," "calculating," "saying whatever it takes to win," "attempting to deceive the American people," "one of the most secretive in America," “deliberately misleading,” “literally willing to do anything to win,” and “playing politics with war."
This "full assault" on Hillary's integrity and character has reached a new peak since Hillary's victories on March 4th. One of Sen. Obama's top surrogates equated President Clinton with Joe McCarthy; another called Hillary a "monster;" and his campaign manager held an angry conference call claiming that Hillary is "deeply flawed" and has "character issues." That's neither unifying nor hopeful. If Sen. Obama really is the prohibitive favorite some say he is, these negative attacks make absolutely no sense. Why would a frontrunner seek to attack and divide? If Sen. Obama can't unify Democrats in a primary, how can he unify Americans in a general election?
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MYTH: The delegate "math" works decisively against Hillary.
FACT: The delegate math reflects an extremely close race that either candidate can win.
"The Math" is actually very simple: with hundreds of delegates still uncommitted, NEITHER candidate has reached the number of delegates required to secure the nomination. And EITHER candidate can reach the required number in the coming weeks and months. That is indisputable. No amount of editorials, articles, blog posts, charts, graphs, calculations, formulas, or projections will change the basic fact that either candidate can win. Pundits who confidently proclaim that Hillary has no hope of winning because of "the math," have counted Hillary out of this race three times before. Each time they based their sober assessments on 'facts' and 'realities' -- and each time they were wrong.
In a campaign with dozens of unexpected twists and turns, bold prognostications should be viewed with a healthy dose of skepticism. Look no further than Sen. Obama's "full assault" on Hillary's character to judge whether he thinks this election is over. The fact is this: Hillary and Sen. Obama are locked in a very close, hard-fought campaign and Hillary is demonstrating precisely the strength of character required of a president. Her resilience in the face of adversity, her faith in the voters, her capacity to rise to every challenge, are part of the reason she is the best general election candidate for Democrats. And it is why she is increasingly strong against John McCain in the polls at the same time that Sen. Obama is dropping against Sen. McCain.
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MYTH: For Hillary to win, super delegates must "overturn the will of the people."
FACT: The race is virtually tied, the "will of the people" is split, and both candidates need super delegates to win.
The Obama campaign and Sen. Obama's surrogates have engaged in a sustained public relations effort to convince people that the election is over and that if super delegates perform their established role of choosing a candidate who they believe will make the best nominee and president, they are somehow "overturning the will of the people." They have the audacity to make this argument while quietly and systematically courting those very same super delegates. They are courting them because they know that Sen. Obama needs super delegates to win. The Obama spin is being parroted daily by pundits, but it is patently false. The race is virtually tied; the "will of the people" is split. By virtually every measure, Hillary and Sen. Obama are neck and neck -- separated by less than 130 of the more than 3,100 delegates committed thus far and less than 1% of the 27 million+ votes cast, including Florida and Michigan. Less than 1%.
An incremental advantage for one candidate or the other is hardly a reason for super delegates to change the rules mid-game. Despite the Obama campaign's aggressive spin and pressure, the RULES require super delegates to exercise their best independent judgment, and that is what they will do. Even Sen. Obama's top strategist agrees they should. If not, then why don't prominent Obama endorsers like Senators Kerry (MA) and Kennedy (MA), and Governors Patrick (MA), Napolitano (AZ) and Richardson (NM) follow the will of their constituents and switch their support to Hillary? After all, she won their states. And if this is truly about the "will of the people," then Sen. Obama's short-sighted tactic to run out the clock on a revote in Florida and Michigan accomplishes exactly two things: it disenfranchises Florida and Michigan's voters; and it hurts Democrats in a general election. Apparently, for the Obama campaign, the "will of the people" is just words.
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This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot" for today:
Monday, March 24, 2008. Chaos and violence continue, the 4,000 mark has been reached, what's al-Sadr and his movement up to, and more.
War resisters in Canada were dealt a setback in November the Canadian Supreme Court refused to hear the appeals of Jeremy Hinzman and Brandon Hughey. Though Panhandle Media can't be bothered with that story Ben Ehrenreich (the New York Times' Sunday Magazine) reported:
Next month, the Canadian House of Commons is slated to debate a resolution that would allow conscientious objectors "who have refused or left military service related to a war not sanctioned by the United Nations" to apply for residency in Canada. The phrasing is vague but the intent is not. The war in question is the Iraq war, and the resolution represents the culmination of a four-year debate about what to do with the small but steady stream of American soldiers who have fled across our northern border to avoid fighting in Iraq. It all began in Jan. 2004, when a young American with a long, serious face walked into the Toronto law office of Jeffry House to ask for help with what was at the time a highly unusual immigration case. The American turned out to be a soldier named Jeremy Hinzman, an infantryman in the Army's 82nd Airborne Division. He told House that his petition for conscientious-objector status was denied while he was stationed in Afghanistan. He crossed the border into Canada just days before his unit was to be deployed to Iraq. Of the more than 25,000 American soldiers who, according to the United States Department of Defense, have deserted since 2003, the Toronto-based War Resisters Support Campaign estimates that 225 have fled to Canada. (The D.O.D defines a deserter as anyone who has been AWOL for 30 consecutive days or who seeks asylum in a foreign country; desertion carries a maximum penalty of five years' imprisonment.) The majority of the deserters in Canada have chosen not to make the authorities aware of their presence. Like any other illegal immigrants, they have settled for invisibility. A few dozen, though, followed Hinzman's lead. Most found their way to Jeffry House. One young Army medic named Justin Colby read an AOL news posting about Hinzman's case while stationed in Iraq. He telephoned House from Ramadi and showed up in his office a few months later. House would eventually represent between 30 and 35 American deserters. Most of them, like Colby, say they joined the military in part out of patriotism. "I thought Iraq had something to do with 9/11," Colby says, "that they were the bad guys that attacked our country."
Canada's Parliament remains the best hope for safe harbor war resisters have, you can make your voice heard by the Canadian parliament which has the ability to pass legislation to grant war resisters the right to remain in Canada. Three e-mails addresses to focus on are: Prime Minister Stephen Harper (pm@pm.gc.ca -- that's pm at gc.ca) who is with the Conservative party and these two Liberals, Stephane Dion (Dion.S@parl.gc.ca -- that's Dion.S at parl.gc.ca) who is the leader of the Liberal Party and Maurizio Bevilacqua (Bevilacqua.M@parl.gc.ca -- that's Bevilacqua.M at parl.gc.ca) who is the Liberal Party's Critic for Citizenship and Immigration. A few more can be found here at War Resisters Support Campaign. For those in the US, Courage to Resist has an online form that's very easy to use. That is the sort of thing that should receive attention but instead it's ignored. We will note war resisters in Canada tomorrow. There is not time today, my apologies.
There is a growing movement of resistance within the US military which includes Matt Mishler, Josh Randall, Robby Keller, Justiniano Rodrigues, Chuck Wiley, James Stepp, Rodney Watson, Michael Espinal, Matthew Lowell, Derek Hess, Diedra Cobb, Brad McCall, Justin Cliburn, Timothy Richard, Robert Weiss, Phil McDowell, Steve Yoczik, Ross Spears, Peter Brown, Bethany "Skylar" James, Zamesha Dominique, Chrisopther Scott Magaoay, Jared Hood, James Burmeister, Eli Israel, Joshua Key, Ehren Watada, Terri Johnson, Clara Gomez, Luke Kamunen, Leif Kamunen, Leo Kamunen, Camilo Mejia, Kimberly Rivera, Dean Walcott, Linjamin Mull, Agustin Aguayo, Justin Colby, Marc Train, Abdullah Webster, Robert Zabala, Darrell Anderson, Kyle Snyder, Corey Glass, Jeremy Hinzman, Kevin Lee, Mark Wilkerson, Patrick Hart, Ricky Clousing, Ivan Brobeck, Aidan Delgado, Pablo Paredes, Carl Webb, Stephen Funk, Blake LeMoine, Clifton Hicks, David Sanders, Dan Felushko, Brandon Hughey, Logan Laituri, Clifford Cornell, Joshua Despain, Joshua Casteel, Katherine Jashinski, Dale Bartell, Chris Teske, Matt Lowell, Jimmy Massey, Chris Capps, Tim Richard, Hart Viges, Michael Blake, Christopher Mogwai, Christian Kjar, Kyle Huwer, Wilfredo Torres, Michael Sudbury, Ghanim Khalil, Vincent La Volpa, DeShawn Reed and Kevin Benderman. In total, at least fifty US war resisters in Canada have applied for asylum. Information on war resistance within the military can be found at The Objector, The G.I. Rights Hotline [(877) 447-4487], Iraq Veterans Against the War and the War Resisters Support Campaign. Courage to Resist offers information on all public war resisters. Tom Joad maintains a list of known war resisters. In addition, VETWOW is an organization that assists those suffering from MST (Military Sexual Trauma).
Sunday night MNF announced, "Four Multi-National Division – Baghdad Soldiers were killed at approximately 10 p.m. March 23 after terrorists attacked them with an improvised-explosive device in southern Baghdad while conducting a mounted vehicular patrol. One additional Soldier was injured from this attack." With that announcement, the number of US service members killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war reached the 4,000 mark. Hannah Allem and Leila Fadel (McClatchy Newspapers) note it is "a new milestone to mark the start of the sixth year since the U.S. invasion in 2003." Alexandra Zavis (Los Angeles Times) explains, "At least 426 of the Americans killed in the war were from California, more than any other state". Deborah Haynes for the Times of London adds, "The morbid milestone will likely strengthen calls for US forces to be withdrawn from the country; a contentious topic in this year's Presidential elections. A US military spokesman played down the significance of the 4,000th death, which followed a day of bombings and rocket fire across the country that killed at least 60 Iraqis and left many more wounded". Chair of the US House of Representatives' Armed Services Committee Ike Skelton issued this statement, "My heart is broken 4,000 times over. When the history of the Middle East is written, I hope it will have been worth it. My thoughts and prayers go out to all of our service members and military families, whose daily sacrifices must never be taken for granted." US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi issued a statement as well: "Today we mourn American's fallen heroes; the deaths of 4,000 American soldiers is a grim reminder of the enormous costs of war in Iraq: the human costs. We honor those soldiers, America's best and bravest who have paid the ultimate price, and pray for their families and loved ones. With 4,000 American lives lost and thousands injured, many of them permanently, Americans are asking how much longer must our troops continue to sacrifice for the sake of an Iraqi government that is unwilling or unable to secure its own future." US Senator and Democratic presidential nominee contender Hillary Clinton declared:
Five years after the start of the war in Iraq, there have now been 4,000 U.S. military deaths in Iraq. On this solemn day, we remember the sacrifice of our brave men and women in uniform. We honor the tens of thousands more who have suffered wounds both visible and invisible, wounds that scare bodies and minds, and hearts as well. We honor the sacrifices of their families, a price paid in empty places at the dinner table, in the struggle to raise children alone, in the wrenching reversal of parents burying children. In the last five years, our soldiers have done everything we asked of them and more. They were asked to remove Saddam Hussein from power and bring him to justice and they did. They were asked to give the Iraqi people the opportunity for free and fair elections and they did. They were asked to give the Iraqi government the space and time for political reconciliation, and they did. So for every American soldier who has made the ultimate sacrifice for this mission, we should imagine carved in stone: 'They gave their life for the greatest gift one can give to a fellow human being, the gift of freedom.' I recall the great honor of meeting many of our brave men and women who have served our country. In meeting them, I am always struck by how, no matter how great their suffering, no matter how grave their own injuries, they always say the same thing to me: 'Promise that you'll take care of my buddies. They're still over there. Promise you'll keep them safe.' I have looked those men and women in the eye. I have made that promise. And I intend to honor it by bringing a responsible end to this war, and bringing our troops home safely.
Zavis also notes that "more than 60 Iraqis were killed and dozens injured in attacks in Baghdad and north of the capital" on Sunday while Allem and Fadel describe "the heavily fortified Green Zone, where the U.S. and Iraqi governments are headquartered, smoking from a barrage of rockets and mortars" on Sunday. Let's turn to some of today's violence . . .
Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 2 Baghdad bombings that wounded four police officers, 1 person killed in Salahuddin province in a mortar attack and a Diyala Province bombing that claimed the lives of 3 police officers and left two people wounded.
Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 4 corpses discovered in Baghdad.
al-Sadr, or 'his' movement, is back in the news and let's drop back to the February 22nd snapshot when the cease-fire/truce was being renewed for the following:
Alexandra Zavis and Tina Susman (Los Angeles Times) note, "But in recent days, Sadr's followers, including loyalists in the national Parliament, have complained that their foes have used the cease-fire to try to crush his movement politically and militarily. Until the last minute, they had held out the possibility that Sadr might order his militia back into action." So the real issue isn't al-Sadr now. Having agreed to an extension, he is now out of the picture. He is also out of Baghdad and whether or not the Mahdi Army will continue to listen to him from out of town, while he labors away as a hotel clerk and busies himself with studies, is the real issue at this point. The anger and resentment that has been breeding in the Sadr City section of Baghdad has been doing so without al-Sadr's oversight. How much pull he will have, how much control, is in doubt. Residents of Sadr City have complained of mistreatment and abuses (including raids) throughout the truce/cease-fire and many noises were made by "aides" and "loyalists" throughout (made publicly to the press) that there was no way al-Sadr would renew the truce/cease-fire. He has now done that and how much weight he will have now as someone not living in Sadr City is up in the air. Deborah Haynes (Times of London) reports that his supporters are in the "thousands" and can al-Sadr control "thousands" via communiques he has delivered to mosques? Is he the remote-control leader? Haynes quotes Abu Zahra'a al-Saadi complaining of the cease-fire, "We decided on peace and they decided to put us in jail." "They" refers to "US and Iraqi forces". Despite the reports of al-Sadr being in Najaf (and working a hotel there), AFP notes, "Sadr did not appear publicly at Friday prayers" in Sadr City "and it is not clear where he is now based. Some reports have suggested that he has crossed the border into Iraq's neighbour Iran, but his group would not confirm this." AFP further notes that his announcement "was not universally welcomed by Sadr's supporters" and that goes to the issue that they're living in Sadr City and he isn't. Is he really going to be able to control the area from outside of it? Will a new leader emerge? Will it faction off instead with some following his latest decree and others ignoring it? Those are valid options under any study of resistance or rebellion. Mark Kukis (Time magazine) offers another, "Sadr could just as easily be simply biding his time until surge troops leave in July."
Today, Alalam News reports that Hazim al-Araji, "Sadr office spokesman," has informed them that "that the US troops along with some of the Iraqi forces have detained members of the Sadr Movement in several Iraqi provinces. He put the number of the detainees at more than 1500." Ahmed Rasheed and Waleed Ibrahim (Reuters) report that al-Sadr has instituted a "civil disobedience campaign" in which stores "in some Baghdad neighborhoods" were closed today and quote a Sadr spokesperson, Sheikh Mahmoud al-Sabihawi, declaring, "U.S. forces mistakenly thought that the extension of the truce was a sign of weakness on the Mehdi Army. That is not true, they are still strong, but we are obeying the orders of Moqtada al-Sadr."
Turning to the US. "Why would people not want to believe these [Winter Soldier] stories. Which are so -- they're so many of them that say so much of the same thing which have so much evidence for them. And I think there are four reasons and the first three are money, money, and money. Meaning there are massive amounts of money and human labor that go into the project every single day of convincing the American public that these stories are not true. From 2003 to 2005, a GAO report found that the Department of Defense spent 1.1 billion dollars on contracts with advertising, public relations and media firms. $1.1 billion in just those couple of years a number on sharp upswing since trouble with public sentiment on the occupations. That money is meant to convince us of what we would otherwise not believe for a second." Who said that? Catherine Lutz.
We're back on Iraq Veterans Against the War's Winter Soldier which took place over four days. We're focusing on the last panel on Saturday: The Cost of the War at Home. When it was noted that we'd include Military Families Speak Out's Nancy Lessin's remarks in this, e-mails came in from visitors stating Nancy Lessin didn't speak at Winter Soldier. She did. This panel wasn't broadcast on KPFA and apparently isn't part of The War Comes Homes. Among those appearing on the panel were MSFO's Charley Richardson who noted "the biggest myth of all, that funding the war is somehow funding for the troops -- when what we as military families know is funding the war is killing our troops and the people of Iraq." From there we'll move in to a large excerpt from Lessin.
Nancy Lessin: In fall 2002 when MSFO was founded the drum beats for war were getting deafening, we noticed that all those who were saying "We got to go to war" weren't going anywhere nor were their loved ones. It was our loved ones who would be sent off as cannon fodder to kill and die in an illegal, unjustifiable invasion. And people said to us, "But you're loved ones volunteered." We told them about contracts which is something Charley and I know something about, our days jobs are in the labor movement. We both are adjunct faculty right here at the National Labor College. All in the military signed a contract to defend the Constitution. But contracts have two sides. The implied vow of the United States government is that you will never be sent into harm's way for no good reason for wars based on lies and that's the side of the contract that's been broken. We tried to prevent the invasion. We even brought a lawsuit against George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld. Plantiffs included three service members, fifteen parents of soldiers and marines and twelve members of Congress. We sought a restraining order to prevent an invasion of Iraq absent a real Congressional declaration of war. The lawsuit went two rounds in the First Circuit Court of Appeals and ultimately failed on March 18, 2003. The bombs dropped on March 19th. We wanted to prevent the invasion for so many reasons. Among them was a deadly equation we learned from the history of this country from the Vietnam war: Racism + dehumanization = horror. From early on the invasion, we got e-mails like this, "My son will be leaving for Iraq in a month and in his last phone call he said he was ready to go over there and kill any Muslim in sight. He even said he'd kill women and children and anyone whose skin is brown. Ironically, he's Asian, his skin is very brown. He was calling the Iraqis "ragheads." How does a mother respond to that kind of anti-human ranting? He was calling the Iraqi people sub-human. Probably a common tactic for hyping up soldiers but I don't understand who this person is becoming." Our loved ones began telling us about fellow troops putting laxatives in detainees food without comprehending that there was something terribly wrong with this. We heard cadences that you march to about killing grandmothers and children. We heard about, pardon me, bitch in a box -- an interrogation technique where Iraqis are put in the trunks of black cars and driven around in 120 degree heat. On November 14, 2003 we asked one of our members with long military experience if he could write something for our loved ones and all service members about not losing their humanity -- that's how we put it. The next day Stan Goff had written an open letter to GI's "Hold Onto Your Humanity," it's out there on the table and it ends this way -- "You are never under any obligation to hate Iraqis, you are never under any obligation to give yourself over to racism and nihilsim and the thirst to kill for the sake of killing, and you are never under any obligation to let them drive out the last vestiges of your capacity to see and tell the truth to yourself and to the world. You do not owe them your souls. Come home safe, and come sane. The people who love you and who have loved you all your lives are waiting here, and we want you to come back and be able to look us in the face. Don't leave your souls in the dust there like another corpse. Hold on to your humanity." We tried to find ways to ask this of our loved ones. MSFO member Rick Hanson wrote about saying good-bye to his son at the airport, "I was a father talking to a son with total absence of reference. I had no wisdom to offer. Instead I asked more of him. I asked him to stay focused, I asked him not to let his guard down ever. I asked him to do what he was trained to do. I asked him to do what he needed to do survive and yet maintain his moral compass in the middle of it all. I asked my 19-year-old son to do all of that and then I apologized as a father for being so asleep, for being so cynical and complacent that I let this country send him to this war. In what might have been my next last hug of Eric I left my tears on his right shoulder as he left his tears on my right shoulder. We held our breaths for seven, twelve, fifteen, eighteen month deployments, back-to-back deployments, third, fourth fifth deployments, the stop-loss deployments, the ringing of the phone, a knock on our door carried new sinister meaning. We held our loved ones close in our hearts until we could once again hold you close in our arms." Today Military Families Speak Out includes almost 4,000 military families from across the US and on bases around the world, many with loved ones now in Iraq. MSFO also includes families of war resisters. A growing number of MSFO members are spouses living on bases and in base towns and there are over 130 Gold Star Families, members of our national chapter, Gold Star Families Speak Out. Their loved ones died as a result of this invasion and occupation. For those of us lucky enough to have our loved ones come home, all is not well. Every day we get e-mails like this, "I need your help. My son's body showed up at the house for Christmas but his mom and I did not know the person who claimed to be our son. He was severely drunk every day, belligerent. He has nightmares every night of the murdered innocent children and Iraqi civilians and the army abandoned him. As far as giving him help, they will go out of their way to help him re-enlist however." Or this one, from MSFO member Stacy Bannerman, "I got my husband back whole physically and I think his heart is here too but I'm not so sure about his mind. He still checks to see where his weapon is every time we get in a vehicle. Although his body is back, there is a war that remains between us. I am left to deal with the lost years of time, the lost love of my life. I want to talk with my husband about what he's going through but I don't have the words. Hell, I don't even have the questions. What's the conversational opener to this, 'So you inadvertantly killed Iraqi children, how's that going for you? How are you living with that now? How am I supposed to? How are we?'" You heard yesterday from MSFO family members Joyce and Kevin Lucey about their son [Jeffrey] taking his own life because of what he saw and did in an invasion and occupation that should never have been and because of the failures of the VA system. Also here with MSFO is April Somdahl whose brother Sgt. Brian Rand was declared psychologically undeployable after his second deployment to the Middle East. The army yet again deployed him to Iraq. Some months after returning from that deployment, he took a gun and killed himself. With suicide rates in the military sky rocketing the army's top psychiatrist, Elspeth Richie, blames failed personal relationships, legal and financial problems. And then, this January she explained it this way, "Families are getting tired therefore sometimes they are more irritable. Sometimes they don't take care of each other the way they should, are not as nurturing as they should be." Shame on Col. Richie for these lies. Economist Stiglitz and Bilmes' new book puts the cost of the Iraq invasion and occupation at three trillion dollars. The title of the article about the book read "Cost of Iraq War Now Beyond Human Comprehension." For military families, the cost -- the human cost -- has always been beyond our comprehension -- before day one and now on its one thousand and eight hundred and twenty-first day. There's a line in a poem about the first Gulf War that bears repeating here. It goes, "If I'm sad, how do you think that Iraqi mother feels?"
US Labor Against the War's Brooks Sunket also spoke and he noted "this illegal and unjust war needs to come to an end, it needs to come to an end immediately" and then presented This war has cost us many things. Most of all the lies of our precious children. It has cost us the lives of Iraqi children, thousands and thousands."
Brooks Sunket: We pay for this war in many ways. We pay for this war in lost jobs and services that billions of dollars of our money could have created. The funds that went to war were no longer available to meet our needs at home. Instead of serving the common good, as government should, the Bush administration, with the support of Congress, took our country to an illegal war. They did so over the objections of the world community. They did so in violation of international law and our treaty obligations. In 2007, the decision to go to war cost us $137 billion.
He concluded noting Iraqi union members Iraq unionism goes back to the 1920s when the labor movement formed the working class based on the struggle of British authority. The Iraqi Trade Union Labor Organization was abolished in 1987. It is after '87 [Saddam] Hussein made it illegal to have trade unions in Iraq. When US invaded Iraq it still remained illegal to have trade unions there. As much as they talk about democracy, democracy's really not exended when they have the opportunity. I'm told I've only got a few seconds left so I just want to make one other point: That even though labor unions are illegal in Iraq, people have risked their lives, they have been kidnapped, there have been bombings of their work place, they have been shot, they have been targeted for assassinations, tortured and yet they still maintain that they will have a union. Thank you very much."
Also on the panel was Fernando Suarez del Solar whose son Jesus died March 27, 2003 in Iraq. After some technical problems with the sound to a video, Fernando explained what was being shown.
Fernando Suarez del Solar: The video is when I visited Iraq in December 2003 with a family delegation . . . because we need to find the same place where my son died. And I need to show the Iraqi families the ordinary Americans no support the invasion, no support the war and like Iraqi people lost the member of the family, American people lost the member in the war. I have an opportunity to meet with the families in Iraq [who] lost 2, 3, 4, 5 members in the same time. And these people opened the door and opened the heart and give me a beautiful welcome. When my son died . . . I got very crazy. Carlos [Arredondo] . . . Entering the fire . . . I have the other reaction. I have a grandson. Jesus have a baby. Only 16 months old. Everybody cry in the house and my baby watched everybody and no understand what happened and cried. And I gathered my grandson and going to the park and played with him for he is mine. I no have opportunity to cry for my son. I no have opportunity because the government told me 'Your son died with a shot on the head. It's impossible you see the body. We no pay the funeral for you because you chose the civil cementary. It's impossilbe you see the body because the face is destroyed and is no good for the family." Morally, I understand, the military system of the government lied me. My son not die when received shot on the head when he stepped on illegal American cluster bomb and waiting two hours for medical assistance and died. He no have opportunity. I miss my son. . . . I cry every single day for Jesus. In five years, the next 27 is five years my son die in Iraq. But when I come in here today with Iraq Veterans Against the War and I see Camilo and I see Juan and I see [Geoff?], I see Jesus. This my new family. This my boys. My sons and my daughters are here in Iraq Veterans Against the War.
He spoke of the importance of speaking out and a lack of understanding in his family over that. How many more stories you need?" He noted Carlos Arredondo who was also on the panel and whose son, Alexander Arredondo was killed in Iraq while on his second deployment there. CNN reported, "After being infomred that his 20-year-old son was killed while serving in Iraq, a Florida man doused a U.S. government van with gasoline and set it on fire while sitting inside." That was August 25, 2004.
Carlos Arredondo: I born in Costa Rico. I come here as an illegal alien. I tried to do the best I can to take care my family because it's the most beautiful thing that happened in my life and I call my sons my American Dreams. And I thank God every minute that I have experience with them because they are my greatest teachers. This is Alexander. [Slide of Alexander del Solar graduating.] Many, many of you go through this moment in life. That pretty much was the moment recruiters go to his high school and seduce him with $20,000 cash to sign up is so many thousand dollars for him to go into the military at age of 17. They only require one parent to sign up for him to join the military and the other parent is left behind. That's what happened to me. I am not a sperm donor. This is my son I love so very much and they didn't have the respect to bother to even ask me if it is okay for him to go? They just expect that they can come and grab our sons and daughters from anywhere they wanted to, no matter if you're English, you're Spanish. They're seducing our sons in many ways with fake promises. My son never have the opportunity to enjoy the cash or the school that's not even enough to go to college because you're going to a community college, the liars, they didn't tell him. My son was one more victim like many of us of this immoral, illegal war that is happening right now. It is effecting the whole world.
And we're back to Brown University anthropologist Catherine Lutz (Homefront: A Military City and the American 20th Century) addressed "some more invisible costs" $700 billion is being spent on the US military in 2008, a doubling since 2001.
Catherine Lutz: We now spend more than 60% of our discretionary dollars on the military including the war in Iraq and other spending so three in five of all dollars that the Congress votes on each year are allocated to the military. . . . This money is being spent on the war not because it's being lavished on soldier pay or on veterans but because the main benificiary of that military spending is American military coporations. That is the majority of the military budget goes to weapons system and operations. That is to say to the military corporations, to the oil companies that put the fuel in jets and battleships. These are where those dollars go. How does this spending effect our society? And I think many of us don't realize how that military spending shapes our communities. Many people have been convinced over many decades of the Cold War and a long propaganda campaign that that money waters American communities, that war is good for the economy, that funding flows into the community in the way of military salaries, contracts, worker salaries in those military industries. But the military spending, obviously, that money goes somewhere, but it is a massive redistribution mechanism. It comes first out of those same communities in the form of taxes and then it goes back not into those communities but mainly into the pockets of the very wealthy CEOs of these corporations, to the Halliburtons, to the Raetheons, to all those corporations and only trickles then into the pockets of the E1s, the E4s, the workers who make minimum wage when they get subcontracted jobs from those corporations. That the military budget redistributes funds in ways that are highly unequal and increases inequality in our communities. They make the rich richer and the poor poorer every day. When I first went to Fayetteville, NC, I thought -- I was looking at Fort Bragg and its impact on the community -- and I first thought, "Well, Fort Bragg happens to be located in a very poor community." Well what I came to realize was that, in fact, Fayetteville was poor because Fort Bragg was there. And it was poor because the main jobs created by a military base economy are minimum wage retail jobs. There are no manufacturing jobs to speak of in Fayetteville compared to the other comparable sized cities in North Carolina. There are jobs at Target, there are jobs at Home Depot, there are minimum wage jobs and that's . . . The working poor in Fayetteville are legion -- there are great numbers of them for that reason.
There's actually one more testimony from that panel that we should note. We'll try to do so later this week, hopefully tomorrow. If you missed Winter Soldier you can stream online at Iraq Veterans Against the War, at War Comes Home, at KPFK, at the Pacifica Radio homepage and at KPFA, here for Friday, here for Saturday, here for Sunday for other panels. Aimee Allison (co-host of the station's The Morning Show and co-author with David Solnit of Army Of None) and Aaron Glantz were the anchors for Pacifica's live coverage.
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the new york timesben ehrenreichjeremy hinzmanjustin colby
iraq veterans against the war
aimeee allisondavid solnit
aaron glantz
kpfa
mcclatchy newspapers
leila fadel
hannah allam
alexandra zavisthe los angeles times
tina susmandeborah haynes
Callers were the ones stating that allowing a race to continue is not the end of the world and, in fact, democracy. One woman who called in opened with something like, "I think they should have stopped the Superbowl in the third quarter." She was attempting to make the point that you do not stop in the middle of the game. Tad Devine always comes off like a professional worrier and today was no different.
Everyone needs to take a deep breath, a convention fight is not the end the world. Someone, I believe it was the governor of Tennesee, made the point that super delegates who have endorsed are not legally bound to remain with a candidate. That was the point that Ava and C.I. made Sunday ("TV: Broadcasting False Narratives ") and when they brought that point up I was shocked at myself.
That is something I once knew but the media spin has been so intense I had forgotten and was assuming those counts of "___ has X super delegates" meant something. It means nothing.
Adding, this is Peter Daou's "Three Myths About the Democratic Race:"
MYTH: Barack Obama is running a positive campaign that will unite Americans.
FACT: Barack Obama and his advisers have conducted a divisive "full assault" on Hillary's character.
While talking a lot about the politics of hope, change and unity, Sen. Obama and his campaign have been conducting a relentless and singularly personal assault on Hillary's character. They have blanketed big states with false negative mailers and radio ads and have described Hillary and her campaign as "disingenuous," "divisive," "untruthful," "dishonest," "polarizing," "calculating," "saying whatever it takes to win," "attempting to deceive the American people," "one of the most secretive in America," “deliberately misleading,” “literally willing to do anything to win,” and “playing politics with war."
This "full assault" on Hillary's integrity and character has reached a new peak since Hillary's victories on March 4th. One of Sen. Obama's top surrogates equated President Clinton with Joe McCarthy; another called Hillary a "monster;" and his campaign manager held an angry conference call claiming that Hillary is "deeply flawed" and has "character issues." That's neither unifying nor hopeful. If Sen. Obama really is the prohibitive favorite some say he is, these negative attacks make absolutely no sense. Why would a frontrunner seek to attack and divide? If Sen. Obama can't unify Democrats in a primary, how can he unify Americans in a general election?
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MYTH: The delegate "math" works decisively against Hillary.
FACT: The delegate math reflects an extremely close race that either candidate can win.
"The Math" is actually very simple: with hundreds of delegates still uncommitted, NEITHER candidate has reached the number of delegates required to secure the nomination. And EITHER candidate can reach the required number in the coming weeks and months. That is indisputable. No amount of editorials, articles, blog posts, charts, graphs, calculations, formulas, or projections will change the basic fact that either candidate can win. Pundits who confidently proclaim that Hillary has no hope of winning because of "the math," have counted Hillary out of this race three times before. Each time they based their sober assessments on 'facts' and 'realities' -- and each time they were wrong.
In a campaign with dozens of unexpected twists and turns, bold prognostications should be viewed with a healthy dose of skepticism. Look no further than Sen. Obama's "full assault" on Hillary's character to judge whether he thinks this election is over. The fact is this: Hillary and Sen. Obama are locked in a very close, hard-fought campaign and Hillary is demonstrating precisely the strength of character required of a president. Her resilience in the face of adversity, her faith in the voters, her capacity to rise to every challenge, are part of the reason she is the best general election candidate for Democrats. And it is why she is increasingly strong against John McCain in the polls at the same time that Sen. Obama is dropping against Sen. McCain.
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MYTH: For Hillary to win, super delegates must "overturn the will of the people."
FACT: The race is virtually tied, the "will of the people" is split, and both candidates need super delegates to win.
The Obama campaign and Sen. Obama's surrogates have engaged in a sustained public relations effort to convince people that the election is over and that if super delegates perform their established role of choosing a candidate who they believe will make the best nominee and president, they are somehow "overturning the will of the people." They have the audacity to make this argument while quietly and systematically courting those very same super delegates. They are courting them because they know that Sen. Obama needs super delegates to win. The Obama spin is being parroted daily by pundits, but it is patently false. The race is virtually tied; the "will of the people" is split. By virtually every measure, Hillary and Sen. Obama are neck and neck -- separated by less than 130 of the more than 3,100 delegates committed thus far and less than 1% of the 27 million+ votes cast, including Florida and Michigan. Less than 1%.
An incremental advantage for one candidate or the other is hardly a reason for super delegates to change the rules mid-game. Despite the Obama campaign's aggressive spin and pressure, the RULES require super delegates to exercise their best independent judgment, and that is what they will do. Even Sen. Obama's top strategist agrees they should. If not, then why don't prominent Obama endorsers like Senators Kerry (MA) and Kennedy (MA), and Governors Patrick (MA), Napolitano (AZ) and Richardson (NM) follow the will of their constituents and switch their support to Hillary? After all, she won their states. And if this is truly about the "will of the people," then Sen. Obama's short-sighted tactic to run out the clock on a revote in Florida and Michigan accomplishes exactly two things: it disenfranchises Florida and Michigan's voters; and it hurts Democrats in a general election. Apparently, for the Obama campaign, the "will of the people" is just words.
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This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot" for today:
Monday, March 24, 2008. Chaos and violence continue, the 4,000 mark has been reached, what's al-Sadr and his movement up to, and more.
War resisters in Canada were dealt a setback in November the Canadian Supreme Court refused to hear the appeals of Jeremy Hinzman and Brandon Hughey. Though Panhandle Media can't be bothered with that story Ben Ehrenreich (the New York Times' Sunday Magazine) reported:
Next month, the Canadian House of Commons is slated to debate a resolution that would allow conscientious objectors "who have refused or left military service related to a war not sanctioned by the United Nations" to apply for residency in Canada. The phrasing is vague but the intent is not. The war in question is the Iraq war, and the resolution represents the culmination of a four-year debate about what to do with the small but steady stream of American soldiers who have fled across our northern border to avoid fighting in Iraq. It all began in Jan. 2004, when a young American with a long, serious face walked into the Toronto law office of Jeffry House to ask for help with what was at the time a highly unusual immigration case. The American turned out to be a soldier named Jeremy Hinzman, an infantryman in the Army's 82nd Airborne Division. He told House that his petition for conscientious-objector status was denied while he was stationed in Afghanistan. He crossed the border into Canada just days before his unit was to be deployed to Iraq. Of the more than 25,000 American soldiers who, according to the United States Department of Defense, have deserted since 2003, the Toronto-based War Resisters Support Campaign estimates that 225 have fled to Canada. (The D.O.D defines a deserter as anyone who has been AWOL for 30 consecutive days or who seeks asylum in a foreign country; desertion carries a maximum penalty of five years' imprisonment.) The majority of the deserters in Canada have chosen not to make the authorities aware of their presence. Like any other illegal immigrants, they have settled for invisibility. A few dozen, though, followed Hinzman's lead. Most found their way to Jeffry House. One young Army medic named Justin Colby read an AOL news posting about Hinzman's case while stationed in Iraq. He telephoned House from Ramadi and showed up in his office a few months later. House would eventually represent between 30 and 35 American deserters. Most of them, like Colby, say they joined the military in part out of patriotism. "I thought Iraq had something to do with 9/11," Colby says, "that they were the bad guys that attacked our country."
Canada's Parliament remains the best hope for safe harbor war resisters have, you can make your voice heard by the Canadian parliament which has the ability to pass legislation to grant war resisters the right to remain in Canada. Three e-mails addresses to focus on are: Prime Minister Stephen Harper (pm@pm.gc.ca -- that's pm at gc.ca) who is with the Conservative party and these two Liberals, Stephane Dion (Dion.S@parl.gc.ca -- that's Dion.S at parl.gc.ca) who is the leader of the Liberal Party and Maurizio Bevilacqua (Bevilacqua.M@parl.gc.ca -- that's Bevilacqua.M at parl.gc.ca) who is the Liberal Party's Critic for Citizenship and Immigration. A few more can be found here at War Resisters Support Campaign. For those in the US, Courage to Resist has an online form that's very easy to use. That is the sort of thing that should receive attention but instead it's ignored. We will note war resisters in Canada tomorrow. There is not time today, my apologies.
There is a growing movement of resistance within the US military which includes Matt Mishler, Josh Randall, Robby Keller, Justiniano Rodrigues, Chuck Wiley, James Stepp, Rodney Watson, Michael Espinal, Matthew Lowell, Derek Hess, Diedra Cobb, Brad McCall, Justin Cliburn, Timothy Richard, Robert Weiss, Phil McDowell, Steve Yoczik, Ross Spears, Peter Brown, Bethany "Skylar" James, Zamesha Dominique, Chrisopther Scott Magaoay, Jared Hood, James Burmeister, Eli Israel, Joshua Key, Ehren Watada, Terri Johnson, Clara Gomez, Luke Kamunen, Leif Kamunen, Leo Kamunen, Camilo Mejia, Kimberly Rivera, Dean Walcott, Linjamin Mull, Agustin Aguayo, Justin Colby, Marc Train, Abdullah Webster, Robert Zabala, Darrell Anderson, Kyle Snyder, Corey Glass, Jeremy Hinzman, Kevin Lee, Mark Wilkerson, Patrick Hart, Ricky Clousing, Ivan Brobeck, Aidan Delgado, Pablo Paredes, Carl Webb, Stephen Funk, Blake LeMoine, Clifton Hicks, David Sanders, Dan Felushko, Brandon Hughey, Logan Laituri, Clifford Cornell, Joshua Despain, Joshua Casteel, Katherine Jashinski, Dale Bartell, Chris Teske, Matt Lowell, Jimmy Massey, Chris Capps, Tim Richard, Hart Viges, Michael Blake, Christopher Mogwai, Christian Kjar, Kyle Huwer, Wilfredo Torres, Michael Sudbury, Ghanim Khalil, Vincent La Volpa, DeShawn Reed and Kevin Benderman. In total, at least fifty US war resisters in Canada have applied for asylum. Information on war resistance within the military can be found at The Objector, The G.I. Rights Hotline [(877) 447-4487], Iraq Veterans Against the War and the War Resisters Support Campaign. Courage to Resist offers information on all public war resisters. Tom Joad maintains a list of known war resisters. In addition, VETWOW is an organization that assists those suffering from MST (Military Sexual Trauma).
Sunday night MNF announced, "Four Multi-National Division – Baghdad Soldiers were killed at approximately 10 p.m. March 23 after terrorists attacked them with an improvised-explosive device in southern Baghdad while conducting a mounted vehicular patrol. One additional Soldier was injured from this attack." With that announcement, the number of US service members killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war reached the 4,000 mark. Hannah Allem and Leila Fadel (McClatchy Newspapers) note it is "a new milestone to mark the start of the sixth year since the U.S. invasion in 2003." Alexandra Zavis (Los Angeles Times) explains, "At least 426 of the Americans killed in the war were from California, more than any other state". Deborah Haynes for the Times of London adds, "The morbid milestone will likely strengthen calls for US forces to be withdrawn from the country; a contentious topic in this year's Presidential elections. A US military spokesman played down the significance of the 4,000th death, which followed a day of bombings and rocket fire across the country that killed at least 60 Iraqis and left many more wounded". Chair of the US House of Representatives' Armed Services Committee Ike Skelton issued this statement, "My heart is broken 4,000 times over. When the history of the Middle East is written, I hope it will have been worth it. My thoughts and prayers go out to all of our service members and military families, whose daily sacrifices must never be taken for granted." US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi issued a statement as well: "Today we mourn American's fallen heroes; the deaths of 4,000 American soldiers is a grim reminder of the enormous costs of war in Iraq: the human costs. We honor those soldiers, America's best and bravest who have paid the ultimate price, and pray for their families and loved ones. With 4,000 American lives lost and thousands injured, many of them permanently, Americans are asking how much longer must our troops continue to sacrifice for the sake of an Iraqi government that is unwilling or unable to secure its own future." US Senator and Democratic presidential nominee contender Hillary Clinton declared:
Five years after the start of the war in Iraq, there have now been 4,000 U.S. military deaths in Iraq. On this solemn day, we remember the sacrifice of our brave men and women in uniform. We honor the tens of thousands more who have suffered wounds both visible and invisible, wounds that scare bodies and minds, and hearts as well. We honor the sacrifices of their families, a price paid in empty places at the dinner table, in the struggle to raise children alone, in the wrenching reversal of parents burying children. In the last five years, our soldiers have done everything we asked of them and more. They were asked to remove Saddam Hussein from power and bring him to justice and they did. They were asked to give the Iraqi people the opportunity for free and fair elections and they did. They were asked to give the Iraqi government the space and time for political reconciliation, and they did. So for every American soldier who has made the ultimate sacrifice for this mission, we should imagine carved in stone: 'They gave their life for the greatest gift one can give to a fellow human being, the gift of freedom.' I recall the great honor of meeting many of our brave men and women who have served our country. In meeting them, I am always struck by how, no matter how great their suffering, no matter how grave their own injuries, they always say the same thing to me: 'Promise that you'll take care of my buddies. They're still over there. Promise you'll keep them safe.' I have looked those men and women in the eye. I have made that promise. And I intend to honor it by bringing a responsible end to this war, and bringing our troops home safely.
Zavis also notes that "more than 60 Iraqis were killed and dozens injured in attacks in Baghdad and north of the capital" on Sunday while Allem and Fadel describe "the heavily fortified Green Zone, where the U.S. and Iraqi governments are headquartered, smoking from a barrage of rockets and mortars" on Sunday. Let's turn to some of today's violence . . .
Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 2 Baghdad bombings that wounded four police officers, 1 person killed in Salahuddin province in a mortar attack and a Diyala Province bombing that claimed the lives of 3 police officers and left two people wounded.
Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 4 corpses discovered in Baghdad.
al-Sadr, or 'his' movement, is back in the news and let's drop back to the February 22nd snapshot when the cease-fire/truce was being renewed for the following:
Alexandra Zavis and Tina Susman (Los Angeles Times) note, "But in recent days, Sadr's followers, including loyalists in the national Parliament, have complained that their foes have used the cease-fire to try to crush his movement politically and militarily. Until the last minute, they had held out the possibility that Sadr might order his militia back into action." So the real issue isn't al-Sadr now. Having agreed to an extension, he is now out of the picture. He is also out of Baghdad and whether or not the Mahdi Army will continue to listen to him from out of town, while he labors away as a hotel clerk and busies himself with studies, is the real issue at this point. The anger and resentment that has been breeding in the Sadr City section of Baghdad has been doing so without al-Sadr's oversight. How much pull he will have, how much control, is in doubt. Residents of Sadr City have complained of mistreatment and abuses (including raids) throughout the truce/cease-fire and many noises were made by "aides" and "loyalists" throughout (made publicly to the press) that there was no way al-Sadr would renew the truce/cease-fire. He has now done that and how much weight he will have now as someone not living in Sadr City is up in the air. Deborah Haynes (Times of London) reports that his supporters are in the "thousands" and can al-Sadr control "thousands" via communiques he has delivered to mosques? Is he the remote-control leader? Haynes quotes Abu Zahra'a al-Saadi complaining of the cease-fire, "We decided on peace and they decided to put us in jail." "They" refers to "US and Iraqi forces". Despite the reports of al-Sadr being in Najaf (and working a hotel there), AFP notes, "Sadr did not appear publicly at Friday prayers" in Sadr City "and it is not clear where he is now based. Some reports have suggested that he has crossed the border into Iraq's neighbour Iran, but his group would not confirm this." AFP further notes that his announcement "was not universally welcomed by Sadr's supporters" and that goes to the issue that they're living in Sadr City and he isn't. Is he really going to be able to control the area from outside of it? Will a new leader emerge? Will it faction off instead with some following his latest decree and others ignoring it? Those are valid options under any study of resistance or rebellion. Mark Kukis (Time magazine) offers another, "Sadr could just as easily be simply biding his time until surge troops leave in July."
Today, Alalam News reports that Hazim al-Araji, "Sadr office spokesman," has informed them that "that the US troops along with some of the Iraqi forces have detained members of the Sadr Movement in several Iraqi provinces. He put the number of the detainees at more than 1500." Ahmed Rasheed and Waleed Ibrahim (Reuters) report that al-Sadr has instituted a "civil disobedience campaign" in which stores "in some Baghdad neighborhoods" were closed today and quote a Sadr spokesperson, Sheikh Mahmoud al-Sabihawi, declaring, "U.S. forces mistakenly thought that the extension of the truce was a sign of weakness on the Mehdi Army. That is not true, they are still strong, but we are obeying the orders of Moqtada al-Sadr."
Turning to the US. "Why would people not want to believe these [Winter Soldier] stories. Which are so -- they're so many of them that say so much of the same thing which have so much evidence for them. And I think there are four reasons and the first three are money, money, and money. Meaning there are massive amounts of money and human labor that go into the project every single day of convincing the American public that these stories are not true. From 2003 to 2005, a GAO report found that the Department of Defense spent 1.1 billion dollars on contracts with advertising, public relations and media firms. $1.1 billion in just those couple of years a number on sharp upswing since trouble with public sentiment on the occupations. That money is meant to convince us of what we would otherwise not believe for a second." Who said that? Catherine Lutz.
We're back on Iraq Veterans Against the War's Winter Soldier which took place over four days. We're focusing on the last panel on Saturday: The Cost of the War at Home. When it was noted that we'd include Military Families Speak Out's Nancy Lessin's remarks in this, e-mails came in from visitors stating Nancy Lessin didn't speak at Winter Soldier. She did. This panel wasn't broadcast on KPFA and apparently isn't part of The War Comes Homes. Among those appearing on the panel were MSFO's Charley Richardson who noted "the biggest myth of all, that funding the war is somehow funding for the troops -- when what we as military families know is funding the war is killing our troops and the people of Iraq." From there we'll move in to a large excerpt from Lessin.
Nancy Lessin: In fall 2002 when MSFO was founded the drum beats for war were getting deafening, we noticed that all those who were saying "We got to go to war" weren't going anywhere nor were their loved ones. It was our loved ones who would be sent off as cannon fodder to kill and die in an illegal, unjustifiable invasion. And people said to us, "But you're loved ones volunteered." We told them about contracts which is something Charley and I know something about, our days jobs are in the labor movement. We both are adjunct faculty right here at the National Labor College. All in the military signed a contract to defend the Constitution. But contracts have two sides. The implied vow of the United States government is that you will never be sent into harm's way for no good reason for wars based on lies and that's the side of the contract that's been broken. We tried to prevent the invasion. We even brought a lawsuit against George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld. Plantiffs included three service members, fifteen parents of soldiers and marines and twelve members of Congress. We sought a restraining order to prevent an invasion of Iraq absent a real Congressional declaration of war. The lawsuit went two rounds in the First Circuit Court of Appeals and ultimately failed on March 18, 2003. The bombs dropped on March 19th. We wanted to prevent the invasion for so many reasons. Among them was a deadly equation we learned from the history of this country from the Vietnam war: Racism + dehumanization = horror. From early on the invasion, we got e-mails like this, "My son will be leaving for Iraq in a month and in his last phone call he said he was ready to go over there and kill any Muslim in sight. He even said he'd kill women and children and anyone whose skin is brown. Ironically, he's Asian, his skin is very brown. He was calling the Iraqis "ragheads." How does a mother respond to that kind of anti-human ranting? He was calling the Iraqi people sub-human. Probably a common tactic for hyping up soldiers but I don't understand who this person is becoming." Our loved ones began telling us about fellow troops putting laxatives in detainees food without comprehending that there was something terribly wrong with this. We heard cadences that you march to about killing grandmothers and children. We heard about, pardon me, bitch in a box -- an interrogation technique where Iraqis are put in the trunks of black cars and driven around in 120 degree heat. On November 14, 2003 we asked one of our members with long military experience if he could write something for our loved ones and all service members about not losing their humanity -- that's how we put it. The next day Stan Goff had written an open letter to GI's "Hold Onto Your Humanity," it's out there on the table and it ends this way -- "You are never under any obligation to hate Iraqis, you are never under any obligation to give yourself over to racism and nihilsim and the thirst to kill for the sake of killing, and you are never under any obligation to let them drive out the last vestiges of your capacity to see and tell the truth to yourself and to the world. You do not owe them your souls. Come home safe, and come sane. The people who love you and who have loved you all your lives are waiting here, and we want you to come back and be able to look us in the face. Don't leave your souls in the dust there like another corpse. Hold on to your humanity." We tried to find ways to ask this of our loved ones. MSFO member Rick Hanson wrote about saying good-bye to his son at the airport, "I was a father talking to a son with total absence of reference. I had no wisdom to offer. Instead I asked more of him. I asked him to stay focused, I asked him not to let his guard down ever. I asked him to do what he was trained to do. I asked him to do what he needed to do survive and yet maintain his moral compass in the middle of it all. I asked my 19-year-old son to do all of that and then I apologized as a father for being so asleep, for being so cynical and complacent that I let this country send him to this war. In what might have been my next last hug of Eric I left my tears on his right shoulder as he left his tears on my right shoulder. We held our breaths for seven, twelve, fifteen, eighteen month deployments, back-to-back deployments, third, fourth fifth deployments, the stop-loss deployments, the ringing of the phone, a knock on our door carried new sinister meaning. We held our loved ones close in our hearts until we could once again hold you close in our arms." Today Military Families Speak Out includes almost 4,000 military families from across the US and on bases around the world, many with loved ones now in Iraq. MSFO also includes families of war resisters. A growing number of MSFO members are spouses living on bases and in base towns and there are over 130 Gold Star Families, members of our national chapter, Gold Star Families Speak Out. Their loved ones died as a result of this invasion and occupation. For those of us lucky enough to have our loved ones come home, all is not well. Every day we get e-mails like this, "I need your help. My son's body showed up at the house for Christmas but his mom and I did not know the person who claimed to be our son. He was severely drunk every day, belligerent. He has nightmares every night of the murdered innocent children and Iraqi civilians and the army abandoned him. As far as giving him help, they will go out of their way to help him re-enlist however." Or this one, from MSFO member Stacy Bannerman, "I got my husband back whole physically and I think his heart is here too but I'm not so sure about his mind. He still checks to see where his weapon is every time we get in a vehicle. Although his body is back, there is a war that remains between us. I am left to deal with the lost years of time, the lost love of my life. I want to talk with my husband about what he's going through but I don't have the words. Hell, I don't even have the questions. What's the conversational opener to this, 'So you inadvertantly killed Iraqi children, how's that going for you? How are you living with that now? How am I supposed to? How are we?'" You heard yesterday from MSFO family members Joyce and Kevin Lucey about their son [Jeffrey] taking his own life because of what he saw and did in an invasion and occupation that should never have been and because of the failures of the VA system. Also here with MSFO is April Somdahl whose brother Sgt. Brian Rand was declared psychologically undeployable after his second deployment to the Middle East. The army yet again deployed him to Iraq. Some months after returning from that deployment, he took a gun and killed himself. With suicide rates in the military sky rocketing the army's top psychiatrist, Elspeth Richie, blames failed personal relationships, legal and financial problems. And then, this January she explained it this way, "Families are getting tired therefore sometimes they are more irritable. Sometimes they don't take care of each other the way they should, are not as nurturing as they should be." Shame on Col. Richie for these lies. Economist Stiglitz and Bilmes' new book puts the cost of the Iraq invasion and occupation at three trillion dollars. The title of the article about the book read "Cost of Iraq War Now Beyond Human Comprehension." For military families, the cost -- the human cost -- has always been beyond our comprehension -- before day one and now on its one thousand and eight hundred and twenty-first day. There's a line in a poem about the first Gulf War that bears repeating here. It goes, "If I'm sad, how do you think that Iraqi mother feels?"
US Labor Against the War's Brooks Sunket also spoke and he noted "this illegal and unjust war needs to come to an end, it needs to come to an end immediately" and then presented This war has cost us many things. Most of all the lies of our precious children. It has cost us the lives of Iraqi children, thousands and thousands."
Brooks Sunket: We pay for this war in many ways. We pay for this war in lost jobs and services that billions of dollars of our money could have created. The funds that went to war were no longer available to meet our needs at home. Instead of serving the common good, as government should, the Bush administration, with the support of Congress, took our country to an illegal war. They did so over the objections of the world community. They did so in violation of international law and our treaty obligations. In 2007, the decision to go to war cost us $137 billion.
He concluded noting Iraqi union members Iraq unionism goes back to the 1920s when the labor movement formed the working class based on the struggle of British authority. The Iraqi Trade Union Labor Organization was abolished in 1987. It is after '87 [Saddam] Hussein made it illegal to have trade unions in Iraq. When US invaded Iraq it still remained illegal to have trade unions there. As much as they talk about democracy, democracy's really not exended when they have the opportunity. I'm told I've only got a few seconds left so I just want to make one other point: That even though labor unions are illegal in Iraq, people have risked their lives, they have been kidnapped, there have been bombings of their work place, they have been shot, they have been targeted for assassinations, tortured and yet they still maintain that they will have a union. Thank you very much."
Also on the panel was Fernando Suarez del Solar whose son Jesus died March 27, 2003 in Iraq. After some technical problems with the sound to a video, Fernando explained what was being shown.
Fernando Suarez del Solar: The video is when I visited Iraq in December 2003 with a family delegation . . . because we need to find the same place where my son died. And I need to show the Iraqi families the ordinary Americans no support the invasion, no support the war and like Iraqi people lost the member of the family, American people lost the member in the war. I have an opportunity to meet with the families in Iraq [who] lost 2, 3, 4, 5 members in the same time. And these people opened the door and opened the heart and give me a beautiful welcome. When my son died . . . I got very crazy. Carlos [Arredondo] . . . Entering the fire . . . I have the other reaction. I have a grandson. Jesus have a baby. Only 16 months old. Everybody cry in the house and my baby watched everybody and no understand what happened and cried. And I gathered my grandson and going to the park and played with him for he is mine. I no have opportunity to cry for my son. I no have opportunity because the government told me 'Your son died with a shot on the head. It's impossible you see the body. We no pay the funeral for you because you chose the civil cementary. It's impossilbe you see the body because the face is destroyed and is no good for the family." Morally, I understand, the military system of the government lied me. My son not die when received shot on the head when he stepped on illegal American cluster bomb and waiting two hours for medical assistance and died. He no have opportunity. I miss my son. . . . I cry every single day for Jesus. In five years, the next 27 is five years my son die in Iraq. But when I come in here today with Iraq Veterans Against the War and I see Camilo and I see Juan and I see [Geoff?], I see Jesus. This my new family. This my boys. My sons and my daughters are here in Iraq Veterans Against the War.
He spoke of the importance of speaking out and a lack of understanding in his family over that. How many more stories you need?" He noted Carlos Arredondo who was also on the panel and whose son, Alexander Arredondo was killed in Iraq while on his second deployment there. CNN reported, "After being infomred that his 20-year-old son was killed while serving in Iraq, a Florida man doused a U.S. government van with gasoline and set it on fire while sitting inside." That was August 25, 2004.
Carlos Arredondo: I born in Costa Rico. I come here as an illegal alien. I tried to do the best I can to take care my family because it's the most beautiful thing that happened in my life and I call my sons my American Dreams. And I thank God every minute that I have experience with them because they are my greatest teachers. This is Alexander. [Slide of Alexander del Solar graduating.] Many, many of you go through this moment in life. That pretty much was the moment recruiters go to his high school and seduce him with $20,000 cash to sign up is so many thousand dollars for him to go into the military at age of 17. They only require one parent to sign up for him to join the military and the other parent is left behind. That's what happened to me. I am not a sperm donor. This is my son I love so very much and they didn't have the respect to bother to even ask me if it is okay for him to go? They just expect that they can come and grab our sons and daughters from anywhere they wanted to, no matter if you're English, you're Spanish. They're seducing our sons in many ways with fake promises. My son never have the opportunity to enjoy the cash or the school that's not even enough to go to college because you're going to a community college, the liars, they didn't tell him. My son was one more victim like many of us of this immoral, illegal war that is happening right now. It is effecting the whole world.
And we're back to Brown University anthropologist Catherine Lutz (Homefront: A Military City and the American 20th Century) addressed "some more invisible costs" $700 billion is being spent on the US military in 2008, a doubling since 2001.
Catherine Lutz: We now spend more than 60% of our discretionary dollars on the military including the war in Iraq and other spending so three in five of all dollars that the Congress votes on each year are allocated to the military. . . . This money is being spent on the war not because it's being lavished on soldier pay or on veterans but because the main benificiary of that military spending is American military coporations. That is the majority of the military budget goes to weapons system and operations. That is to say to the military corporations, to the oil companies that put the fuel in jets and battleships. These are where those dollars go. How does this spending effect our society? And I think many of us don't realize how that military spending shapes our communities. Many people have been convinced over many decades of the Cold War and a long propaganda campaign that that money waters American communities, that war is good for the economy, that funding flows into the community in the way of military salaries, contracts, worker salaries in those military industries. But the military spending, obviously, that money goes somewhere, but it is a massive redistribution mechanism. It comes first out of those same communities in the form of taxes and then it goes back not into those communities but mainly into the pockets of the very wealthy CEOs of these corporations, to the Halliburtons, to the Raetheons, to all those corporations and only trickles then into the pockets of the E1s, the E4s, the workers who make minimum wage when they get subcontracted jobs from those corporations. That the military budget redistributes funds in ways that are highly unequal and increases inequality in our communities. They make the rich richer and the poor poorer every day. When I first went to Fayetteville, NC, I thought -- I was looking at Fort Bragg and its impact on the community -- and I first thought, "Well, Fort Bragg happens to be located in a very poor community." Well what I came to realize was that, in fact, Fayetteville was poor because Fort Bragg was there. And it was poor because the main jobs created by a military base economy are minimum wage retail jobs. There are no manufacturing jobs to speak of in Fayetteville compared to the other comparable sized cities in North Carolina. There are jobs at Target, there are jobs at Home Depot, there are minimum wage jobs and that's . . . The working poor in Fayetteville are legion -- there are great numbers of them for that reason.
There's actually one more testimony from that panel that we should note. We'll try to do so later this week, hopefully tomorrow. If you missed Winter Soldier you can stream online at Iraq Veterans Against the War, at War Comes Home, at KPFK, at the Pacifica Radio homepage and at KPFA, here for Friday, here for Saturday, here for Sunday for other panels. Aimee Allison (co-host of the station's The Morning Show and co-author with David Solnit of Army Of None) and Aaron Glantz were the anchors for Pacifica's live coverage.
iraq
the new york timesben ehrenreichjeremy hinzmanjustin colby
iraq veterans against the war
aimeee allisondavid solnit
aaron glantz
kpfa
mcclatchy newspapers
leila fadel
hannah allam
alexandra zavisthe los angeles times
tina susmandeborah haynes
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