Al-Jazeera Puts Focus on Reform (washingtonpost.com, 05/08/05) reveals that the Bush Administration likes Al-Jazeera when it reports news that Bush likes!! Who knew!

Interesting: If you want to know how representatives of Iraq's Kurdish minority, the U.S. occupation's greatest beneficiaries and allies, perceive the current conflicts in Iraq officially, read What Do the Insurgents Want? by Hiwa Osman (washingtonpost.com, 05/08/05).

It's an amazing coincidence that the position Osman reflects matches almost exactly with press releases from Washington. Amazing.

Hey, Homeland Security: Will ya just listen to this, please? by Omar Khan (csmonitor.com, 05/03/05) is one of those sensible proposals to make currently boneheaded Homeland Security airport practices efficient and sensible.

Which it currently isn't.

I like the part of this article in which one of the security supervisors is getting delayed by such checks, and there is NOTHING the security personnel can do about it, because the current system is so pathetic.

This is a good, short read.

Baghdad Burning: the hostage crisis (riverbendblog.blogspot.com) is about the non-existent hostage crisis that was covered in western media as if it were a real event. I've read references to the alleged hostage taking of dozens of Shias in a town in the western press, and am shocked that no one investigated to be sure it was real, despite the conditions in Iraq. GO READ THIS. Yes, the BBC recently put out some articles explaining that bodies recently found in a river aren't those of any alleged hostages, because no one has been reported missing where the hostages were allegedly taken.

Riverbend's blog is very informative, and she has some great insights of the sort that never make it to the U.S. newspapers.

Marla died. Marla was a young activist who founded a group to help Iraqi civilians called CIVIC Worldwide. She recently died in Iraq, along with others from her organization. Raed in the Middle: Remembering Marla Ruzicka has more information.

This is extremely sad. As is so much news from Iraq...

*

One sad thing is all of the unproductive hate mail Raed received in response to his tribute to Marla. Not only is poor Raed risking his life to document civilian losses in Iraq, but he has people demanding that he make loyalty oaths and denounce all Iraqi resistance, especially so-called insurgents. The demands and insults are pointless and unproductive: they won't make Raed safer, they won't bring Marla back, they won't help move their non-profit's work forward.

It's unfortunate that he has to deal with nutcases on all sides.

Who are the random Iraq checkpoints working for? Christian Science Monitor Blog | Notebook: Iraq Archive March, 2005 describes a foreign journalist's frightening experiences with American checkpoints.

"You're driving along and you see a couple of soldiers standing by the side of the road - but that's a pretty ubiquitous sight in Baghdad, so you don't think anything of it. Next thing you know, soldiers are screaming at you, pointing their rifles and swiveling tank guns in your direction, and you didn't even know it was a checkpoint.

If it's confusing for me - and I'm an American - what is it like for Iraqis who don't speak English?"

US (mostly) lets Iraq form its cabinet (csmonitor.com, 04/28/05). This is a great article on how the U.S.' past meddling with Iraq is impacting the ongoing efforts to form an Iraqi government, though it doesn't put it that way.

It describes current meddling - phone calls, political pressure, chiding from Condi.

It describes past meddling, though not in enough detail to make it clear that the current interim government is set up based on rules laid out by the U.S., and the inherent weakness of using a U.S. structured system to prevent majority rule is complicating the government's legitimacy.

It mentions that "government by the numbers," the factionalized system inherited by the U.S., may result in years of instability. It even mentions that historical U.S. support for the Kurds is complicating negotiations by allowing the Kurds to bargain out of proportion to their numbers, confident in U.S. backing.

I am not saying that proportional representation is an evil thing: I'm saying it's going to be difficult to legitimize because it was imposed by a self-interested foreign power with a minority ally. I'm saying it's unusual among democracies, which complicates its acceptance by majorities who will experience minority veto. I'm saying it raises questions about why different groups forced together by the British years ago must be forced to act as one nation now, even though some groups (most notably the Kurds) want their own country.

While we're on the subject of how tough it is for women in Afghanistan, let's look at this: Taliban coming in from cold (csmonitor.com, 04/28/05).

President Karzai offered an olive branch to rank-and-file Taliban fighters last year and said all but a core group of 150 militants wanted for human-rights violations would be able to rejoin the political process. 'Not only the Taliban but all Afghans who are afraid of their past political affiliation can return home and resume their normal lives,' says Jawed Luddin, a Karzai spokesman. 'It is the time to rebuild our country.'

On the surface, this sounds like a nice step toward peace. However, peace generally requires that war criminals be brought to justice, and it's highly unlikely that the myriad atrocities done during the Taliban's long reign were performed by a mere 150 militants.

Other nations, such as Argentina, which let war criminals on the loose who had been prematurely forgiven by the government have failed to advance: the burdens of the crimes left unresolved have been too much for civil society to bear. The Afghan people have surely been through enough of an ordeal already, and don't need to bump into their torturers and the people who executed their relatives walking free in the streets.

The current Afghan government may think that it cannot afford to hold people accountable for their crimes during this tenuous and decisive time, but if it can't now, it may never be able to.

Why things haven't improved much for women in Afghanistan since the election: To understand why things are still dismal, you need to go back and look at how the candidates ran. BBC NEWS | World | South Asia | Silence over Afghan women's rights (news.bbc.co.uk, 10/07/04) describes the horrific societal conditions which lead to women's lives being ruined by male relatives and husbands (or their lack), yet which weren't touched upon by politicians for fear of backlash. In a country with 40% of voters being female, one would hope that there would be some movement toward improved conditions. But no. No one stuck their proverbial neck out, figuring women didn't have a choice.

That doesn't say much about democracy. Not much that's good, anyway.

Still winning hearts and minds around the world: BBC NEWS | World | South Asia | Afghan civilians die in air raid (news.bbc.co.uk). Yes, this is a small incident, but it's one of many, and they're adding up in the public's list of things to be angry about.

One of the more entertaining things about this article is this quote:

"All possible efforts are taken to prevent non-combatant injuries and deaths," the US military said in a statement issued from their base at Bagram.

All possible efforts, EXCEPT for wildly throwing bombs when civilians are around, it appears.

The U.S. is losing its popularity (such that it was) and influence in the region, and small incidents like this are contributing to that decline.

Why does popular protest work elsewhere in the world, but not in the U.S.?
t r u t h o u t - Mexico's Lopez Obrador Wins Round One: "People Power Rattling Politics of Latin America" by Danna Harman of The Christian Science Monitor (truthout.org, post dated 04/29/05). I'll provide a sample of this article since I'm reviewing and recommending it, but only to induce you to read the entire thing.

Mexico City - First came the indignation, then the street protests and the disapproving comments from foreign countries. It culminated last Sunday with an estimated 1.2 million Mexicans marching silently through center of the capital. But President Vicente Fox moved to defuse the political crisis Wednesday night by accepting the resignation of his attorney general, who had been leading the criminal case against popular Mexico City Mayor and 2006 presidential hopeful Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador.

Chalk up another victory for Latin American people power. In the 1990s, what politicians feared most was apathy. But lately, Latin Americans from Mexico City to Quito, Ecuador - much like the citizens of Ukraine and Lebanon - have been taking to the streets in unprecedented numbers. Civic protest is emerging as an increasingly effective - if controversial - political tool....

Since 1990, 10 South American leaders have had to step down before their terms ended, many eased out by mass protests against them, according to the Argentine think tank Nueva Mayoria. A popular uprising brought down Bolivian President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada in 2003, and then almost toppled his replacement, President Carlos Mesa, earlier this year; Peru and Argentina have all seen their governments fall, with angry crowds thronging the capital. In Ecuador, Mr. Guti[e]rrez is the third president in a decade to be forced from office. And Haiti has seen several elected leaders brought down by mass protests.

Go read it all, and then figure out what is different - why it is possible for mass protest to work elsewhere.

Of course, you should know that authoritarians HATE these popular revolts - they think that the public is a mob, and that any mass action to exert pressure is mob rule, no matter how peaceful. They don't explicitly say that they prefer secret rule by elites, which is tidier because it isn't democratic or inclusive, but I am suspicious.

t r u t h o u t - Pressured by FOIA Demands, Pentagon Releases Coffin Photos (truthout.org/latimes.com, 04/29/05)

Explain this: t r u t h o u t - Iraq Gets Partial Cabinet, Chalabi Deputy PM (truthout.org/AP, 04/28/05):

Ahmad Chalabi, a Shiite Arab and former Pentagon favorite, will be one of four deputy prime ministers and acting oil minister.

Actually, don't explain this if your explanation includes the phrase "pact with Satan."

Duh. t r u t h o u t - Tenet Admits WMD 'Slam-Dunk' Remark "Dumbest Ever" (truthout.org/repost from cnn):

Former CIA Director George Tenet said he regretted assuring President Bush in 2002 that he had 'slam dunk' evidence that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.

'Those were the two dumbest words I ever said,' Tenet told about 1,300 people at a Kutztown University forum Wednesday.

It's different in England: In England, people are still concerned about the legality of invading Iraq, and some are using the word "impeachment" with regard to legal memoranda that were kept secret by the government on that same topic. UK Election 2005 | Iraq war legal advice published (news.bbc.co.uk, 04/28/05).

In the This Modern World by Tom Tomorrow: Life During Wartime (thismodernworld.com, 04/17/05) Tom Tomorrow excerpts transcripts from Meet the Press which describe how heavily guarded American media representatives are, how it costs $35,000 for a semi-secure ride to the airport, and how the government is paying a fraction of the value of destroyed homes in Fallujah...

For a big picture discussion of what Bush and his allies really want from the region, see this entry, immediately prior to the one above.

Really, there are no WMDs: US closes book on Iraq WMD hunt (news.bbc.co.uk, 04/26/05).

The qualifiers about how someone in Iraq MIGHT KNOW how to make WMDs under theoretically better conditions is just pathetic.

Also not a surprise: Top [US] brass cleared over Iraq abuse (news.bbc.co.uk, 04/23/05).

No surprise here: US troops cleared over shooting (news.bbc.co.uk, 04/25/05):

US military investigators have cleared American soldiers of any wrongdoing over the death of an Italian agent, who was shot at a checkpoint in Baghdad.

There are several follow up articles with the Italian saved-from-Iraqis-shot-by-US hostage saying she thinks this is bull, and you can find those on your own. They abound.

The funny thing, for people who read the whole article, is realizing that the military clears everyone of wrongdoing with a very special technique: they make up a rule ('shoot whoever you want' could be a theoretical example), and then say that anyone who was complying with THEIR OWN RULE could not POSSIBLY have engaged in any "wrongdoing," because "wrongdoing" can only be defined relative to their own rule.

This is one reason the US is terrified of international laws: they actually involve REAL rules.

Saying sorry is SO difficult: The New York Times: Rice Ordered Release of German Sent to Afghan Prison in Error (nytimes.com, 04/23/05). What is the appropriate apology for a man who was wrongly imprisoned for months, tortured, and photographed naked by the U.S. -- who took him from the Serbian-Macedonian border to AFGHANISTAN?

Note to the Administration: "Don't sue us" is not an apology.

History lost in dust of war-torn Iraq (news.bbc.co.uk, 04/25/05) talks about the massive damage looting has caused to the cultural antiquities of Iraq.

It points out the shame of people looting the sites made by their ancestors... but also notes that many of the looted items are turning up in such nations as Italy and The United States. Plus, it provides this quote from a representative of the British Museum:

"US military vehicles crushed 2,600-year-old brick pavements, archaeological fragments were scattered across the site, more then 12 trenches were driven into ancient deposits and military earth-moving projects contaminated the site for future generations of scientists."

There is more. It is bad.

If you recall, the U.S. press initially reported looting, then recanted when the U.S. Administration said it could not have been that bad, and has been ambivalent about reporting it since. So this is a useful update.

The Washington Post delivers again: Eyes On Iraq: Second Impressions (flash slideshows with audio) (washingtonpost.com) provides the photographs and words from 11 photojournalists in Iraq. Each has a different perspective, based on their experiences; each provides interesting insights.

Highlights: Observations by several reporters that kidnappings and violence against Iraqis is underreported in favor of publicity for foreign kidnap victims; Ron Haviv's report on prison conditions, and the ongoing abuses still reported by recent prisoners, resulting in what locals describe as "you go in as an innocent man, and come out as an insurgent;" Anja Niedringhaus' report on a children's hospital's dismal conditions, and her surprise that foreign doctors and citizens are still attempting to help directly. None of these topics are emphasized in most American newspapers.

Even the optimists among these reporters, who believe that Iraq will soon be better off, provide comments which reflect the serious problems plaguing occupied Iraq. It's worth listening to all of these reports to get the diversity of opinion provided.

That which I have read jokes and comic strips about is true: 04/15/2005 | Bush administration eliminating 19-year-old international terrorism report (realcities.com):

WASHINGTON - The State Department decided to stop publishing an annual report on international terrorism after the government's top terrorism center concluded that there were more terrorist attacks in 2004 than in any year since 1985, the first year the publication covered.

Go read the entire article.

And then, if you like profane comics, read the 2nd and 3rd Get Your War On (Page 36) strips here. (mnftiu.cc)

You knew this: Iraqis 'suffer a lack of rights' (news.bbc.co.uk, 04/12/05). Particularly, lacks of rights guaranteed by international law for occupied nations.

It's a shame the U.S. only believes in international law when it's time to invade!

Iraq cannot produce enough drinking water to meet its needs. So how is the U.S. helping? Iraq blighted by poor services (news.bbc.co.uk,04/05/05).

The Americans have allocated $18.4bn dollars for reconstruction in Iraq, but Mr Misocni says more than 70% of the money his ministry was originally granted has now been reallocated to spending on defence and security.

Since the Iraqis don't have security, where is the money going?

Oh. To keep Americans safe. Americans, who should not BE there.

This approach will not get the water clean.

"The Americans brought the terrorists here. They weren't here before." This is from BBC NEWS | In pictures: Iraqi lives two years after Saddam, photos of Iraqis and commentary about what their situation is currently like. Many express optimism that a new government can help them, but nearly all also mention that there is no security, and corruption is now rampant, including among the police.

Where U.S. tax money is going: Fury at 'shoot for fun' memo (guardian.co.uk, 04/03/05). Private contractors doing the U.S.' dirty work abroad are embarrassing.

Dated 7 March and bearing the name of Blackwater's president, Gary Jackson, the electronic newsletter adds that terrorists 'need to get creamed, and it's fun, meaning satisfying, to do the shooting of such folk.'

The essential information that is lacking in the memo, but which would reveal much more about this sentiment expressed by a major mercenary agency, is what they define as a "terrorist."

The suspicion of many of us is that it is a) anyone who is not white, b) anyone who one is paid to shoot.

Speaking of laws that Bremer dissolved, read this: Squatters in ruins of Iraq build hopes on new government (guardian.co.uk, 04/04/05). It tells of how Iraqis who support the elected government wound up homeless and squatting in the ruins of Baghdad.

When the US-led invasion toppled the Ba'athist regime in April 2003, the system of price controls which kept rents artificially low evaporated.

Landlords across the country seized the opportunity to increase rents and to evict those who could not pay. Within weeks thousands of families were homeless and trekking to the capital in search of accommodation.

Yaay, capitalism?

Juan Cole is quoted in the BBC! Iraqi compromise fuels angry debate (news.bbc.co.uk, 04/06/05) discusses how the transitional laws put in place by the U.S. prevent majority rule from occurring in the someday "democratic" Iraq.

Under the U.S.'s rules, a 2/3 majority is required for all sorts of actions to pass, unlike in other democracies which require just 51%. So Iraq is held to a different standard than democracies in the rest of the world, and coincidentally, one of the minority parties that favors US involvement gets veto power over anti-US positions held by other groups.

It is an interesting case of social engineering and foreign intervention for many purposes. This article provides a good overview.

The occupation of Iraq by U.S. corporations: The BBC has a good article covering a few of the odd occupation orders issued by the U.S.' representative in Iraq that don't relate to the immediate well-being of the Iraqi people. US legal legacy for Iraqi economy (news.bbc.co.uk, 04/07/05) describes a few of the big items that the occupation saw fit to change, despite the limits on occupying powers in wartime. They are all economic, and all benefit U.S. and other multinational corporations. Excerpt:

Orders 37 and 49 slash top tax rates from 45% to 15% - one of the lowest rates in the world. Order 54 erases all duties on imports to Iraq. Order 39 allows 100% foreign ownership of Iraqi companies except in the oil, gas and banking sectors.

There are also quotes by pro-free-market-capitalist publications describing this arrangement as a "capitalist's dream."

The inherently undemocratic nature of having an occupying military authority issuing economic edicts favoring foreign control of local resources doesn't bother the cheerleaders, who believe that capitalism and democracy are inherently intertwined, even when only capitalism is in evidence.

Perhaps because the cheerleaders are foreign corporations.

It looks like the UK's odds are slightly better than the US': Hundreds arrested, few convicted (news.bbc.co.uk, 03/11/05). Out of 201 arrests on terrorism charges, 17 have been convicted of terrorism-related offenses, and some of those were related to the IRA or crimes committed Sikkhim or Sri Lanka. They found a few who had "Islamic" ties, but considering the number of people arrested...

Well, it's still not as bad as the U.S.' figures.

The U.S. isn't agonizing over smuggling suspects to torture-using nations as much as the British are agonizing over being used as an airport for the practice: Does UK turn a blind eye to torture? (news.bbc.co.uk, 04/05/05).

It's really difficult to have a vision of positive futures for your country and the world, and see others driving people apart for greed and empire. REALLY difficult. As if the only way to live in the world is through the violent, military oppression of others.

I guess it's easy to think like that if you assume everyone is violent and greedy, but the people who usually argue that usually appear to be projecting.

Just in case you haven't looked at images from the last country the U.S. "liberated," look at these images reflecting the status of women in Afghanistan: BBC NEWS | In pictures: The darkness within. (news.bbc.co.uk). Recall that Afghan women were *supposed* to be the major beneficiaries of U.S. intervention.

Yes, I was paying attention to the peace marches & protests around the world on the anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. And I've been paying attention to how protests still work in governments that still claim to be representative, like Ukraine or Kyrgyzstan, where threats to democracy, like the dubious elections that the U.S. has had in recent years, are overturned promptly after popular protest.

I think protest hasn't been working as effectively in the United States, because the ruling classes that dominate both of the official political parties feel completely insulated from any consequences of their actions. Having a media run by the same interests that own the politicians, plus a federal judiciary with partisan outbursts, enables all sorts of unpleasant facts to be kept from the public or made to look legitimate, whose votes may or may not be counted anyway.

I haven't been writing because I've been trying to find a positive way to present a solution to this, but it isn't materializing.

I do believe that, what little democracy remains in the U.S. will have to be very heavily nursed by a lot of people to survive. That people who were used to saying that they 'aren't political' and 'just want to do their own thing' will actually have to work to maintain the right to live that way by SOME active involvement in the nation, beyond shopping, partying, and praying.

If I can find a way to present this sensibly, I'll post it here.

Well, at least the genetic engineering companies feel safe in Iraq: With all the unrest in Iraq, you'd think that the U.S. would stay focused on what it claims it is there to do, which is currently maintaining order.

This would be more compelling if there was some evidence that it was what the U.S. was doing. But it looks like occupation authority's attention has been elsewhere: Plowing for Profits: U.S. agribusiness eyes Iraq's fledgling markets -- In These Times (inthesetimes.com, 03/28/05 issue) describes some strange things, including one of the legal orders Bremer left behind.

Order 81 paves the way for genetically modified crops (GMOs), stating: "Farmers shall be prohibited from reusing seeds of protected varieties." The order... etches into Iraqi law WTO-style patent protections for genetically engineered crops -- assuring U.S. GMO-producing firms a legally protected niche in the country's future.

Yes, while the Iraqi people were looking for safe drinking water, Bremer was concerned with corporate patent rights for products which haven't even been forced on the Iraqi people yet.

It's just amazing.

This was discussed in the foreign press and blogosphere ages ago, but now it's hitting the mainstream: US held youngsters at Abu Ghraib (bbc.co.uk, 03/11/05). Yes, there were kids as young as 11 in the prison where abuses occurred. Yes, there are documented incidents involving drunken American soldiers and underaged female detainees. And this:

In her interview, she said Maj Gen Walter Wodjakowski, then the second most senior army general in Iraq, told her in the summer of 2003 not to release more prisoners, even if they were innocent.

'I don't care if we're holding 15,000 innocent civilians,' she said Maj Gen Wodjakowski told her. 'We're winning the war.'

There's an attitude for you.

I think when the U.S. said that it wanted to "liberate" the Iraqi people, it really should have provided a definition of what "liberate" means to a country that until recently executed juveniles, had a big debate about executing the retarded, and who aren't concerned about whether incarcerated Iraqis are innocent or not.

Image of the Day: New Liberty.

Getting the Purple Finger, by Naomi Klein (thenation.com, 02/10/05) explains that the Iraqis voted for continued public investment, guarantees of jobs for all who need them, subsidized housing, and a U.S. withdrawal. That's not what they're going to get, according to U.S. officials who are contradicting 'the will of the people,' and instead feigning pride at the vote itself, not what was voted for.

It's amazing. Go read this.

This sucks: Agent Orange legal case dismissed (bbc.co.uk, 03/10/05). All the people who believe they were poisoned by the scary herbicide 'Agent Orange' during the American military operation in Vietnam (Vietnam War to Americans, American War to the Vietnamese) have been told by a U.S. judge that they no valid claims ANYWHERE (something of a reach). This long after the maker of the herbicide settled with American veterans for health problems they suffered.

For those of you paying attention, you may remember that Iraq is paying reparations to American corporations for projected profits they lost during the war that followed Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. Why is war-torn Iraq giving $190,000 to Toys R Us?, by Naomi Klein (guardian.co.uk and elsewhere, 10/16/04) So it's okay for the loser of one war to pay reparations for IMAGINARY BUSINESS LOSSES, but NOT okay for the loser of a devastating invasion in SE Asia to pay damages for health problems they actually caused?

What?

Creepy quote:

The US justice department had urged the federal judge to dismiss the lawsuit.

In a brief filed in January, it said opening the courts to cases brought by former enemies would be a dangerous threat to presidential powers to wage war.

All that talk about responsibility and morality, and THIS is what the U.S. government does?

Pretend to be surprised.

"Ramadi Madness?" US troops 'made Iraq abuse video' (bbc.co.uk) Yes, another abuse video. This one with titles for each sequence.

What is wrong with this people? Our military is good at brainwashing our troops to dehumanize our opponents, and Americans are already terrified of everyone else in the world, but still.

Things are not really improving in the U.S.' posture for war. I read a good interpretation this morning: that the Democrats are afraid that our wholly tabloid media will blame them for losing the war in Iraq if they criticize it, say anything negative about it, or (heaven forfend) demand that the U.S. forces leave Iraq, either immediately OR on ANY timetable.

That's exactly the sort of thing our (tabloid posing as news) media would do.

But it's created a gridlock legislatively, where the few Dems who stand up for troop withdrawals are attacked by other Dems trying to look good to a media which will never be their friend. Go figure.

Are you following this story? About how the US shot up the car containing rescued Italian hostage Guiliana Sgrena, injuring her and killing the secret service agent who had negotiated her release? Funeral for Italian shot in Iraq is the understated headline today. (bbc.co.uk, 03/07/05), though earlier articles on Ms. Sgrena's belief that there's no way such an incident could be accidental, were more lively.

The U.S. has been killing people in cars in Iraq near its checkpoints, including entire families, for some time, but most of their victims have been Iraqis, and the press has largely excused such behavior. Now that it is Italians dying under wild U.S. fire, the practice is coming under greater scrutiny.

The U.S. responded that it's ridiculous to believe that U.S. soldiers would target her. The quote from the article is: "It's absurd to make any such suggestion, that our men and women in uniform would target individual citizens." That's one of those strange, selectively worded answers which suggests that it IS perfectly reasonable to suggest that the uniformed US personnel DO target groups of citizens.

I suppose the U.S. will try to offer a few hundred dollars to this intelligence officer's family, the way they do to the bereaved in Iraq?

US comes to grips with 1500 dead (bbc.co.uk, 03/04/05).

Pitt's blog now has audio! Check out the Truth Out Overview with Will Pitt. (truthout.org)

Committee to Protect Bloggers announces its first campaign: Free Arash and Mojtaba. This is a campaign to free dissidents in Iraq and elsewhere who have been imprisoned for blogging about their situation. While the campaign is about 'bloggers' specifically, the concerns are human rights and freedom of speech - blogging is just a tool for speech, not the focus of this campaign.

Must read item of the day: as the U.S. media maintains its sunny outlook on the future of Iraq - perhaps because, regardless of who won, the corporate tax rate is permanently capped at 15 percent? - things are going to hell for moderates, secularists, and women who live there. Go read this at Riverbend's blog: Baghdad Burning: Groceries and Election Results. (riverbendblog.blogspot.com, 02/18/05).

Having recently read Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis, Riverbend's conversation and worries on what it's like for women in Iran, with the men saying it's not so bad, is especially creepy.

A nice, long explanation about how the Sunnis may not benefit from even the tiny consolation of a constitutional veto: Informed Comment's Guest Editorial by Andrew Arato points out that the alleged protection for Sunnis, the right to veto the constitution put forth by the people elected in the election they boycotted or couldn't get to, isn't guaranteed. This is a little long, but good, as everything on Dr. Cole's website is.

Also of interest, from his summary of Chalabi's recent interview, this quote:

“The agreement will deal with the right or how those U.S. forces detainees Iraqis. There are thousands of Iraqis now detained by U.S. forces. We don't know why. We don't know how. And we don't know under what legal structure they are being detained. I believe that this process should be an Iraqi process.”

Chalabi is a spooky guy, with a lot of ambition, and some undemocratic tendencies. (Cole accurately describes him elsewhere as a "corrupt expatriate financier and Iranian asset.") I'm surprised that even he is concerned about the U.S.' mass arrests, but it's worth noting.

Actually, there are so many informative things to read at juancole.com that you should just go, now, and read until your brain is full. He reports on the low turnout, the dubious assertions by the western press that various elected Iraqis are secular even though they espouse fundamentalist views publicly, etc.

Elections In Iraq: I like how the U.S. press, despite the fact that turnout wasn't very good, now pretend that everything is fine in Iraq because they had an election.

I mean, only 2% of Sunnis turned out in some areas, but that's FINE! (Fine for whom?) And now we can pretend that, even if the U.S. government pre-approved who could run in the election, that everyone will accept the results - even all those Sunnis who didn't vote - and all is legitimate now.

I have no idea why they think that. An optimistic guess would be that they think it will go over simply because fundamentalist-led, anti-occupation parties won seats far and away beyond the puppet government's. Yet, whenever someone is quoted about how great it is, the person quoted is never an Iraqi. So it comes across as a bit... off.

For those of you, like me, who need a short recap, the BBC FAQ about the election is here: BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | Q&A: Iraqi election (bbc.co.uk, 02/13/05).

Remember Afghanistan? That other country we invaded? Want to know how they're doing? Read this: UN warns of fresh Afghan chaos (bbc.co.uk, 02/21/05). The answer: things are extremely bad, getting worse, and may pose a threat to its neighbors.

It makes you think other nations might think twice before accepting U.S. "help."

Elections in Iraq. I'm not sure I understand the glowing reports about the recent elections in Iraq.

Firstly, the initial returns I've read about demonstrate that the result will be very much anti-occupation. Which is good, but not what the U.S. had in mind.

Secondyly, I'm unclear on how this is a step forward for democracy. If we were invaded by a foreign nation, and they picked out a slate of parties we could vote for in an election, without specific people being on the ballot, we'd call it a joke. A farce. Not legit. And then, when the election is held without international observers... Well. WE would never put up with such nonsense here.

And do we need to discuss Negroponte's role in this? His history of saying, 'death squads? I don't see any death squads?'

The International Action Center (iacenter.org) folks have written some good articles on this topic. This is from The Antiwar Movement and the Iraqi Elections:

This election is being conducted at gunpoint, administered by a war criminal, and stage-managed by CIA front companies. To pretend that this has anything to do with democracy is outrageous. The Iraqi people recognize this --among expatriates, 90 percent haven't even bothered to register to vote on Sunday.


What, then is the purpose of the phony election? It is actually directed at the U.S. public, which is growing increasingly disillusioned with the war. The sole intent of the election is to provide legitimacy for the occupation, to marginalize the resistance movement, and create an illusion of progress. The election, like the phony transfer of power, will change nothing on the ground in Iraq. On January 31, the day after the election, more than 150,000 U.S. troops will still occupy Iraq, the torture chambers of Abu Ghraib will still be full of Iraqi prisoners, and CIA employee Iyad Allawi will still be the U.S.-appointed dictator.

I've been told that many Americans are feeling better about the invasion, the massive civilian casualties, and the absence of WMDs now that an election for non-specific candidates has been held.

There must be something in the water.

I also found this interesting, from the IAC's statement on the elections in Iraq (also at iacenter.org, within frames I can't link directly to):

Returning Iraq to 1955. It is telling that the Bush Administration is claiming this is the first democratic election to be held in Iraq in fifty years. The election referred to as the last democratic election was held under a U.S. & British appointed monarchy to select an advisory body that had no executive or legislative power. Its only function was to provide a façade of legitimacy to the puppet regime; the election did not change the fact that the people of Iraq were under the thumb of U.S. and British oil companies. Less than 3 years later, a massive popular revolutionary upheaval overthrew the corrupt monarchy and, since that time, the U.S. and Britain have been trying to return Iraq to the same semi-colonial status. This election is part of their plan.

I will be interested to know how our media reports the election results, especially if they are going as I've read.

The bureaucracy of torture: read t r u t h o u t - CIA Abductions of Terror Suspects Are 'Out of Control' (truthout.org). There are two articles at this link, both are worth reading.

The first is about the U.S. abducting suspects from around the world, taking them abroad to allies who torture them, and then... well, largely realizing they have been abducting and torturing people with no connection to terror. The second story is about someone who was abducted, tortured into confessing to being in an Al Queda camp and video just to make the torture stop, and then being cleared by the British government who could prove they were in England at the time of their alleged crimes.

Yes, the U.S. is abducting and torturing people who weren't even in Afghanistan during the time periods for which they are concerned!! Depriving innocents of their freedom is not the same as 'protecting freedom.' No matter what the press releases say.

I love the idea of the major news networks struggling to come up with a dramatic slogan and graphic for an ongoing campaign of admitting how wrong they in their WMD reporting. Read WMDUH! Don't expect four months of round-the-clock truth coverage, by Matt Taibbi (www.nypress.com).

Yes, I've been following all of the dismal war news, including the British scandal over their soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners, the slaying of parents in front of their six children by U.S. soldiers at a checkpoint, the ever increasing violence in Iraq on the run up to the elections, the Iraqi women who are afraid to leave their homes and are unsure if they can vote, or if voting will even be fair.... but I haven't had anything nice to say about it, and so I've said nothing.

But I can say this short thing, on behalf of the peace movement: We Were Right. We are still right, so right it HURTS. Make the pain stop. Bring the troops home.

For the news I haven't been discussing, I recommend Mykeru.com on the checkpoint parent slaying (and a nice piece on MLK just below it), and Professor Cole's Informed Comment for everything else, plus a nice piece on the portions of the U.S. Constitution violated by the Bush Administration.

Iraqis angry with abuse sentence (english.aljazeera.net, 01/16/05). For some reason, the media here though that the sentence was very serious. They were SO EXCITED when the conviction came through, it was almost as if they'd won some prize. I still don't fully understand it, though I suspect that those reporters who think 'this proves the system works' are unclear on who the system works for. It appears Iraqis have figured that out...

If you're not already reading the blog Baghdad Burning, go read it now. Sample: "It feels like just about everyone who can is going to leave the country before the elections. " Her comments about the Bush Administration finally admitting that there are no WMDs, after all she and her countrymen have suffered... It's very painful.

From the Pitt blog at t r u t h o u t:

"I think the burden is on those people who think he didn't have weapons of mass destruction to tell the world where they are."

Ari Fleischer, Press Secretary
Press Briefing
7/9/2003

Yes, the press really was relying on people this dumb to sum up why we should support a doomed war based on shaky evidence. Yes, it is amazing. No, he wouldn't understand the answer, even if we didn't use swear words.

Doctors aided in detainee abuse, journal says / Pentagon denies report of tailored torture (sfgate.com reprint from washingtonpost.com, 01/06/05). This comes just after two dozen FBI agents reported witnessing "interrogation excesses."

Oh, and some of the U.S. forces who are committing these abuses are now threatening other American agents who witness the abuses. New documents excerpted by the ACLU (aclu.org) included complaints from the DIA, who reported that:

TF 62-6 personnel have done the following to DIA interrogators/debriefers: threatened them, confined them to the compound, ordered them not to talk to anyone in the US and informed them that their emails are being screened.

These task force people appear to be abusing their positions as well as their other-agency colleagues and the detainees in their care. Their behavior undermines the U.S. claim to represent, respect, and want the rule of law.

This Amnesty International Report on detainees is very up to date, for those of you who have been wondering why Guantanamo Bay dropped out of the headlines despite having its four year anniversary this month. USA: Guantanamo - an icon of lawlessness (amnestyusa.org, 01/06/05).

Forever detained: This is a horrific article: Long-Term Plan Sought For Terror Suspects (washingtonpost.com, 01/02/05):

The Pentagon and the CIA have asked the White House to decide on a more permanent approach for potentially lifetime detentions, including for hundreds of people now in military and CIA custody whom the government does not have enough evidence to charge in courts.

Whatever happened to 'innocent until proven guilty?' Did that get burned along with our belief in the rule of law and the U.S. Constitution?

The Friends Committee has written a good article on why the U.S. needs to withdraw troops from Iraq immediately. Free Iraq: The Responsibility of Withdrawal - FCNL Issues (www.fcnl.org) asks whether the failed policies of the past two years will be blindly continued, or if the reality of the antagonism and violence the presence of U.S. forces fuels will be recognized. Here's a sample:

Some argue that U.S. responsibility under international law to restore security and protect civilians in Iraq demands that the U.S. military remain and help stabilize the country. In fact, the presence and offensive operations of U.S. troops have become the greatest threats to Iraq%92s future. U.S. offensives, including aerial bombings, city sieges (witness Fallujah), and neighborhood sweeps, foster resentment among Iraqis, fuel the insurgency, and threaten civilian lives. Iraqi security forces are attacked more often when U.S. troops are present, and the Green Zone--a barricaded neighborhood housing the interim Iraqi government along side the U.S. embassy--has become a prime target for suicide bombings and mortar attacks.

I still know people who argue that the U.S. cannot leave Iraq until it is peaceful, but since the U.S. has engendered so much hatred, the U.S. military presence appears to preclude peace, making the situation circular.

Read the entire Friends' article. It outlines specific steps which should be taken to end the violence in Iraq.

No WMDs

U.S. Wraps Up Search for Banned Weapons in Iraq (Reuters.com01/12/05). Gee, who aside from the entire world peace movement could possibly have foreseen this?

The U.S. makes mistakes? Of course, I'm being sarcastic: the only surprise here is that it is being reported.

U.S. troops in Iraq open fire at checkpoint, killing eight, hospital officials say; roadside bomb kills U.S. soldier (sfgate.com, 01/09/05) reports: "...at least eight people were killed in the second mistaken American attack in two days to have deadly results."

The weird part of this article is that, after admitting they bombed the wrong house, the military then claims to know how many people were in the wrong house. It's not like they have credibility on this point, but they try:

The attack came just hours after the United States acknowledged dropping a 500-pound bomb on the wrong house during a search for terror suspects outside the northern city of Mosul. The military said in a statement that five people were killed.

The owner of the house, Ali Yousef, said 14 people were killed when the bomb hit at about 2 a.m. Saturday in the town of Aitha, 30 miles south of Mosul. An Associated Press photographer at the scene said the dead included seven children and seven adults. The discrepancy between the death counts could not be reconciled.

You should go read this sfgate article to review that last sentence over and over again. Yes, actual eyewitness and verified journalist counts must be fairly compared against absentee military spokesmodel counts which may have been for the house they had intended to bomb.

Can I mention that, too? That bombing people's homes at night with their families in them is not a way to 'win hearts and minds,' it is not the way to win the moral high ground, and it is very much not the way to enforce the concept of the rule of law. As the U.S. wallows in Christian sentiment, more hands should be flying up to point out that executing entire families is completely un-Christian. There are a few hands, but surprisingly few. Is that not obvious to everyone?

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As an aside, there is also a fascinating article at SFGate about the politics of "supporting the troops." A Bush/war supporter is reported to say that yellow ribbon car magnets, even if made abroad cheaply and sold without a non-profit beneficiary, are an apolitical way of "supporting the troops," a position which they also consider to be apolitical. It takes a while to get down to someone who is actually using the proceeds from magnet sales to ACTUALLY send something to the troops, and no one is seeing irony there.

No irony in cheap magnets made abroad.
No irony in making a profit off something allegedly done to support the troops.
No irony in putting this dislay on oil-consuming cars, a hot topic and the driving force between what had been called "Operation Iraqi Liberation" until someone looked at the acronym.

There is no actual troop support happening here.

IF any of these people cared to actually support the troops, they would have demanded that Bush restore all the veterans funding and pay cuts he's made at the troops expense. They would allow soldiers and their families to live in decent housing. They would demand that injured vets not become invisible to the public, politicians, and media upon their return. They would notice that too many of the family interviews of the soldiers' families are taking place in trailer parks within areas with no decent economic opportunities, and demand that every American who joins up had a REAL choice to join the 'volunteer' military services. They would demand that for all Americans.

But most of these people do not. Instead, they drive around with little foreign-made magnets on their cars. Which tells you about the level of their commitment.

Not a good way to differentiate the U.S. from Saddam Hussein:t r u t h o u t - Pentagon May Use Death Squads in Iraq (truthout repost from Newsweek, 01/08/05): "The Pentagon may put Special-Forces-led assassination or kidnapping teams in Iraq." Yes, the Pentagon thought that the mass killing of innocents in El Salvador was a small price to pay for the strategic advantage of preventing popular governments from emerging. YIPES!! Go read this.

It still bothers me that mass graves are only of concern when a country isn't our "friend." BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | Mass grave unearthed in Iraq city (news.bbc.co.uk, 12/27/05). This is only of consequence because Iraq's former leader is now our enemy. It was no big deal to the U.S. at the time.

THAT is ridiculous. It is the predictable outcome of disregarding international law until it is politically opportune, and then only using it to punish political enemies.

The BBC often invites readers to comment on world events, and it is invariably fascinating. BBC NEWS | Have Your Say | Falluja offensive: Your reaction (bbc.co.uk, 11/22/04) is amazing. This was printed while I was away on vacation, along with the release of the video showing a U.S. soldier killing an injured, unarmed man laying on the ground. (I failed to post anything about that, or about the report interviewing soldiers who admitted to killing large numbers of civilians accidentally, which, if representative, indicates a wholesale slaughter of civilians by the occupation.)

There is a lot of reframing of reality going on, to measure the events in Falluja by completely different yardsticks than could ever be used at home, within one's own communities. This is a discussion between foreign people who want another country to change to their liking, and largely aren't concerned with distant consequences.

One writer remarks that, if compared to other battles in which large militaries battle militias in urban combat, this has been a great victory, because fewer soldiers died than in other situations.

Another remarks that Afghanistan is free and safe (!!!), showing that foreign invasions can be successful. (I can only assume this person is one of the free and safe Afghan warlords.)

Another says that it's okay that there are so many people dying, because that is normal for wars.

And that it's okay to level Falluja, because this is a war. And it "had to be done." Because we said so.

With the right keyword, a supposedly morality-obsessed nation can check its morals at the door.

I remember when Salam Pax wrote that "shock and awe" was a horrible concept if it was about to happen to your home town, to a city you love. Any normal, healthy person couldn't wish that upon themselves, or their loved ones, or anyone else. And yet, here are cheerleaders -- with a sprinkling of people pointing out the immorality of the situation, and praying for victims -- doing just that.

It's just amazing.

As someone living in a country that gained its independence through what would now be coined terrorism, the U.S. of A., it's amazing to see how the idea of such tactics is completely self-serving.

Iraq 2004: What went wrong (bbc.co.uk, 01/01/05): "In 2004, Iraq went badly wrong - except for supporters of the insurgency, in which case it went grimly well."

This is one of those articles which ONLY looks at 2004, and assumes that the war was going to occur regardless... It almost approaches comedy by the end, with comments about the country still being 'on track.' But on track to where?

Professor Cole (and one of his readers) have some good points to make about how the war in Iraq is hampering the U.S. response to the Tsunami crisis in Asia. Informed Comment, 12/28/04:

Bush's underlining of the $2.5 billion he says the United States gave in emergency humanitarian aid last year annoyed the hell out of me.... Bush said 'billion' as though it were an astronomical sum. But he spends a billion dollars a week in Iraq, without batting an eye. That's right. Two weeks of his post-war war in Iraq costs as much as everything the US spent on emergency humanitarian assistance in 2003 for all the countries in the world.

Ah, priorities.

Head Scarves Now a Protective Accessory in Iraq - Fearing for Their Safety, Muslim and Christian Women Alike Cover Up Before They Go Out (washingtonpost.com. 12/30/04). The complete collapse of order has allowed women of all religions in Iraq to be targeted for abuse. When a woman whose religion doesn't require a head covering is (or feels) unsafe without one, things have gone seriously downhill.

This is no surprise to anyone who has been following the situation in Iraq, with its bombings, kidnappings, and the horrific rape of young girls which has inspired "honor killings" by male relatives of victims. This is more of the same, on a more personal level. Now, half of the population may be pressured into giving up any public persona... *shudder*

POSIWID

Watching the despair of the people of Iraq, I've often wondered what Bush believed he was celebrating when he had that terrible, comic photo-opportunity aboard an aircraft carrier that bore a huge, "Mission Accomplished" banner. What mission had he believed was accomplished?

A potentially useful tool for contemplating this is a principle used in analyzing complex systems. It is called POSIWID - the purpose of a system is what it does (users.globalnet.co.uk/~rxv). In examples of economic analysis, it is used to look at why things are done a certain way. If a bank set up a very complex accounting system that hides transactions from regulators while spewing unnecessary data, the purpose of the system is, in fact, to hide transactions.

This tool can easily be misapplied or misinterpreted, but I believe it can be useful for looking at a variety of systems. If a college requires exorbinant fees to consider student applications which have the effect of blocking low-income students, the purpose of the application may, in fact, be to block low-income students. If the political primary system in the U.S. is set up in a way that only millionaires can participate, the purpose of the primary system may be to limit our options to millionaires. Some of these effects may appear to be unintentional, but if there is no larger impact and no alternative achievable purpose provided, the effect I point out is the MAIN effect, and becomes a sort of default.

So if we look at the invasion of Iraq, we hear a list of stated purposes:

-protection from WMDs
-increased stability
-safer lives for Iraqis
-democracy

and then we have a list of actual effects:

-weapons spread across unlawful groups
-decreased stability
-less safe lives for Iraqis (higher death rate than under Saddam)
-anarchy (in a bad way)
-U.S. military expansionism (including military bases)
-suppression of dissent in U.S. and Iraq
-redirection of U.S. tax funds to military contractors/political donors and away from social services
-passage of undemocratic laws in U.S. consolidating government power
-persecution of peace and democracy advocates in U.S.

POSIWID can be used in this situation as a tool, but does not provide a final analysis.

The invasion of Iraq has been very lucrative and advantageous for a variety of interests. The negative consequences of the invasion have not fallen on the same people who have benefited most. This is by design. I find this approach useful for analyzing the situation we find ourselves in with this war.

Winning hearts and minds, part 43: Inside Falluja: 'Nothing to come back to' (bbc.com, 12/24/04).

A good list of election reforms urgently needed here in the U.S. Here is a good list of basic reforms needed to call what we have a democratic system: t r u t h o u t - Hill and Richie | Cries for Electoral Standards Mount (truthout.org, 12/22/04)

F.B.I. E-Mail Refers to Presidential Order Authorizing Torture (truthout.org, 12/20/04).

t r u t h o u t - Majority Says Iraq War a Mistake, Rumsfeld Should Go, Subtitle: "56 Percent in Survey Say Iraq War Was a Mistake". (truthout.org repost from washingtonpost.com, 12/21/04).

New Papers Suggest Detainee Abuse Was Widespread (washingtonpost.com reposted at yahoo, 12/21/04) demonstrates again that actual truth doesn't aid the U.S. image abroad. Theft, long-term abuse, deadly shootings of detainees....

The most deadly attack against U.S. forces in Iraq just occurred. Yahoo! News - Rocket Hits U.S. Base in Iraq, Killing 22 (news.yahoo.com, 12/21/04) reports of an attack on a military base mess camp.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan, responding to a question about how Iraqis will be able to safely get to some 9,000 polling places if U.S. troops can't secure their own bases, said there was "security and peace" in 15 of Iraq's 18 provinces.

And we just never see those 15? Do they have NAMES? I might like to see that list.

In case you're having a hard time wrapping your mind around the death tolls in Iraq, look at this: Iraq Body Count Visual Aid (mykeru.com).

Professor Cole discusses the probable religious government outcome of a democratic vote in Iraq. (juancole.com, 12/17/04) I'm not sure why Americans think this result is preventable: religion has a huge impact on elections here, and fundamentalists always wield some influence.

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Some of my friends have been discussing Brad Carson's piece in the New Republic called "Vote Righteously!" (tnr.org, registration required), about losing to fundamentalists here in the U.S. I've received odd comments about this, from shock that there are fundamentalists who vote for religious issues rather than what government is actually supposed to do, to comments about needing to be more 'in touch' with fundamentalists here at home.

Here's my response to part of this discussion, which included a question as to whether or not the U.S. is in an internal culture war between fundamentalists/extremists and everyone else. It may not apply to the discussion Iraqis are having internally -- I'm not sure they feel free to have a discussion about what their nation's government should look like when they're occupied by an increasingly hostile and destructive foreign force, combined with a hostile and destructive internal resistance movement. But some of the same ideas may apply, so I'm posting this here.

We live in a country where 'equal pay for equal work' is still controversial, so I would propose that we have ALWAYS been in a culture war. Heck, the former slave-holding states all dumped the Democrats over civil rights, and have been living in a bitter enmity with the "culture" of the rest of multicultural (bad word!) America ever since. (There's a map floating around the web suggesting that the [so-called] red [Bush-majority] states, with just one exception, all were states or territories permitting slavery in our nation's history. [This was prior to the resolution of 3 state outcomes.])

I don't see 51% Bush vs. 48% Kerry as a "mandate" for taking on the values of our most socially regressive citizens. Even if it meant we could "win" the 51 by announcing that minorities and women need to 'know their place' and everyone needs to [take on fundamentalist beliefs] it wouldn't really be winning. We'd lose our own 48%. And we'd be living under our own version of the Taliban.

We should note that all my pro-choice groups note that they've gained five seats in Congress, and that every single pro-choice incumbent supported by Emily's List (a group I'm in that develops and supports pro-choice Democratic women) won re-election. South Dakota elected its first female rep; Wisconsin elected its first ever African-American rep, who also happens to be female. So the "too liberal" concept doesn't apply: choice isn't "too liberal" for everyone, and people are happy to elect women and minorities to federal offices. So it's not just "liberalism."

There are other cultural factors at work. I've read that southern white men will now only vote for one of their own, preferably a governor, preferably a Baptist, which is how Carter and Clinton made it in, and therefore that's all the Democrats should put forth as Presidential nominees forever. But that seems likely to alienate the rest of us over time, so I doubt it's a good solution. Better solutions may rest in removing social issues from the federal front pages through efforts that appeal to states-rights advocates -- making marriage solely the purview of religions, for example, as an example of how government should be smaller and less intrusive.

We may have to face the fact that some Americans don't want a democracy: they want a theocracy which reflects only their own belief systems, and which forbids the belief systems of others. Things we think of as practical government functions - like paved roads, post offices, foreign policy, equal opportunity enforcement and the EPA - as irrelevant. Kicking ourselves over not appealing enough to such folks [22-27% of the Bush voters for "morality"] won't help us, so I don't think we're having the right discussion if we're including them.

I think we can only appeal to the people who DO want democracy. I haven't heard 'Bush moderates' defined in any way; many of the Dems who I've heard interviewed voted for Bush based on WMDs they think were found, or other misinformation. But I think the people to appeal to, the Clinton-Republican-types, are a limited group who can be appealed to by the 'reality based community' on issues that don't require all of us who are brown or female to become serfs.

Here in the U.S. the situation is very different from that in Iraq in myriad ways, obviously. But one of the biggest ways is the long history of secular democracy here, and the fact that religious institutions have not rivaled the government for power in a significant way since our laws were established. Many western churches have a long history of supporting whatever government is in power, and using the government's authority to reinforce its own. There are notable exceptions, but the U.S. has never known a church-state rivalry that threatened the state seriously.

In Iraq, religious leaders hold more influence than the U.S. backed regime(s), and have stepped into the apparent power vacuums to provide basic services. In that respect, they are in a very strong position which U.S. fundamentalists would envy. If a religious coalition takes a strong position against the occupation and wins big, that will be perceived as a mandate for all their purposes, including a religious state. If a squeaker victory here is a "mandate," imagine what a big victory in Iraq for religious parties would look like.

So. The issue of fundamentalism and government are not as distant as Iraq to U.S. voters.

My vacation/special assignment have ended, although later than planned. And so I belatedly worked toward catching up on the news about war and peace in the world.

It has not been a good process.

There have been some particularly appalling reports about U.S. actions abroad this month. As we celebrate Peace on Earth and Goodwill Towards Men, I read about the U.S. intentionally bombing hospitals in Iraq to suppress reports of civilian casualties. The December 6th issue of the Nation included 'What Happened to Hearts?' by Jonathan Schell, which points out that without a hospital to report casualties, "there would be no international outrage, and all would be well."

Also see Controlling Information in the Attack on Fallujah by Bob Allen (laborstandard.org)

Since July when the Allawi government began ?authorizing? U.S. airstrikes against Fallujah, the hospital?s medical staff provided aid to a steady flow of casualties. Their daily accounts and accompanying photos exposed the U.S. war propagandists? claims of ?precision attacks.?

It wasn't just Falluja General that the U.S. bombed, either: US strikes raze Falluja hospital (news.bbc.co.uk, 11/06/04) describes the leveling of another hospital (Nazzal Emergency) by U.S. forces. Something called the Popular Clinic ("Fallujah residents say clinic bombed," abc.net.au, 11/09/04) was taken out by the U.S. There are also reports on other hospitals damaged by the U.S., and of U.S. forces firing on ambulances...

Things are so bad that the International Red Cross' Iraq web pages have quotes about how NO WARS ARE EXCLUDED FROM INTERNATIONAL LAW.

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If it was the goal of the hijackers who attacked the U.S. two years ago to reduce the U.S. to a nation whose forces level civilian hospitals and don't abide by international law on the treatment of civilians, they've won.

It would almost be nice if the hijackers had SAID that was their goal: our proud military strategists might have tried to avoid the current situation just to save face.

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The big mystery in reading the news is whether anyone actually believes a "democracy" can be brought about through war crimes and force against the voting public. I've seen no historical evidence that such an approach would work.

[I'm on a combination of vacation and 'special assignment' for the duration of November. I'll resume writing in December. Happy Thanksgiving.]

Clean elections make legitimate governments

As dismal news from Iraq reports on more of the country spiraling into chaos and violence (truthout.org, 11/13/04), the promise of January national elections seems to be at risk. Though even if elections are held, there are serious doubts in Iraq and abroad that the elections will be credible.

In her commentaryDon't Rig the Iraqi Election, by Marina Ottaway (truthout.org, repost from washingtonpost.com, 11/09/04), Ottaway points out that the U.S. would prefer:

less-risky, noncompetitive elections, in which the outcome would be predetermined. Their preference is to push for a "monster coalition" of major political parties, which would agree among themselves ahead of time how to apportion parliamentary seats and cabinet posts.

She also points out that Shiites are unlikely to accept the legitimacy of an election in which "security concerns" prevented them from voting.

Elections Will Not End the Fighting in Iraq, by Patrick Cockburn (truthout.org repost from Independent U.K., 10/05/04) points out that the proposed election system, which favors exile-run political parties which are unpopular within Iraq, is unlikely to result in a system that Iraqis will embrace.

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It's amazing to me that the U.S. is trying to guarantee a fair election in a war-torn land, while it can't guarantee one at home. Worst Voter Error Is Apathy toward Irregularities by Donna Britt, (truthout.org repost from washingtonpost.com, 11/12/04), contains some comments about the disenfranchisement of poor and minority voters here in the land of the free that ring true among people I've spoken to:

Why aren't more Americans exercised about this issue? Maybe the problem is who's being disenfranchised -- usually poor and minority voters. In a recent poll of black and white adults by Harvard University professor Michael Dawson, 37 percent of white respondents said that widely publicized reports of attempts to prevent blacks from voting in the 2000 election were a Democratic 'fabrication.' More disturbingly, nearly one-quarter of whites surveyed said that if such attempts were made, they either were 'not a problem' (9 percent) or 'not so big a problem' (13 percent).

We all need to be sure our democracy really is democratic: if citizens in thee comfortable U.S. can't be guaranteed their constitutionally mandated voting rights, how can other nations moving toward democracy feel confident in democracy overall? If the U.S. government constantly holds itself out as a model to the world, it should actually be a positive model. And that's not happening right now.

Here's a message I shared with a few friends recently:

You folks are great! Several of you have forwarded fabulous clippings to me about the even uglier side of this election: organized efforts to prevent people, especially people of color in swing states, from exercising their rights to vote. By the time the Supreme Court affirmed the right of the Republican Party to stand in Ohio polling places and legally challenge any brown person of their choosing, you know our nation had sunk to a new low.

There are some great materials on attempts to block voters, and attempts to prevent votes from being counted ranging from legal spoilage to outright fraud. I've compiled some excerpts and links here.

(For a longer article from the NAACP and People for the American Way, read 'The Long Shadow of Jim Crow: Voter Intimidation and Suppression in America Today.' (naacp.org. It's 27 pages long.))

[My partner] observed yesterday that many Democrats have absorbed the Republican message after the Supreme Court intervened in 2000: 'Accept your loss and close your eyes.' 'Get over it.' 'Recounts HURT us.' 'Legitimacy is less important than the stability that comes from a quick-if-inaccurate decision.' None of this supports democracy. To me, our democracy is in jeopardy if any of us are denied our fundamental rights. It's inexcusable that the problems found in 2000 weren't fixed, and that new problems have been introduced.

There are a couple of organizations attempting to act on the problems. One is blackboxvoting.org, which is attempting to raise money to audit the election results wherever paper ballots are available. They've already issued FOIA requests. Another is thepen.us, which has a campaign demanding an investigation of fraud from the Democrats, for what that is worth. [I think the best research could be performed by a press consortium like the one that investigated Florida, but whose results were suppressed after 9-11. They have the funds, credibility, and means to publicize the results that ordinary citizens lack, but I don't know if they are interested in investigating. The founder of BlackBoxVoting says her media contacts have been forbidden from reporting on irregularities, however, so it's unclear that any media company will go this route.]

I've read the arguments against examining this election from both of the corporate parties, and they are framed incorrectly. To them, the question is whether or not the Democrats won the philosophical & cultural war of "values," and the conclusion both sides have reached is no. But that is not the actual question. The question is whether or not we had a fair election in which all American citizens, regardless of their skin color or place of residence, freely exercised their rights to vote and could confidently believe their votes were counted. The answer to that question appears to be no, and it is much more important than which rich guy won.

I do sincerely believe that we can never have a fully legitimate government while people are being denied their right to vote. The attempt to deny people their voting rights through means both legal and illegal damages the very idea of legitimate government. That is why the elections in Iraq need to be fair and transparent, just as they should be here and everywhere else in the world.

The effects of the disenfranchisement here in the U.S. have already led to doubts about the accuracy of national elections. Rumors abound, but so do analyses: The Unexplained Exit Poll Discrepancy, by Professor Steven F. Freeman, Ph.D. (truthout.org, 111404) lays out an excellent context for what exit polls are used for around the world, and raises questions about why a time-honored process used as a check against corruption around the world conflicts so dramatically with the results the U.S. is reporting. It's a good piece, and worth reading. Even if you don't like to rely on statistics, the fact that the U.S. experiences wildly different results than the rest of the world from using the same methodology raises many new questions.

A must read for the well-informed American: The Nation: November 15, 2004 issue. On domestic issues, the editorial entitled Fix the Electoral System concisely lists the steps which need to be taken to end the routine, systemic disenfranchisement of minorities and poor people. Something I didn't know: the Carter Center couldn't perform election monitoring, because our messy, states-make-up-their-own-procedures system wasn't consistent enough to observe, unlike so-called "Third World" countries which can manage to have a standard system. Oh, and the two main parties didn't agree to cooperate. That didn't help...

Jeff Morley (of the Washington Post) has an item noting that the Iraqi Health Ministry has stopped releasing civilian casualty figures to journalists on orders from the interim government. Morley also has some interesting things to say about the counting methodology of NGOs.

Jonathan Schell's Looking Tough discusses the outcome of all the detention and torture schemes the US has enacted during this period, and the fact that of the thousands of people detained, "not one has been successfully convicted of terrorism - the only conviction obtained having been thrown out by a federal judge in Detroit."

Find it and read it!

Free Press News : Iraq tells media to toe the line (freepress.net). Iraq has a media regulation agency which is supposed to be independent from both the interim government and occupation authority. But...

It said news organizations should "guide correspondents in Fallouja … not to promote unrealistic positions or project nationalist tags on terrorist gangs of criminals and killers....[to] set aside space in your news coverage to make the position of the Iraqi government, which expresses the aspirations of most Iraqis, clear."

"We hope you comply … otherwise we regret we will be forced to take all the legal measures to guarantee higher national interests," the statement said. It did not elaborate.

Sunni clerics call for boycott of January elections because of Fallujah attack (sfgate.com, 11/09/04).

Another source of information from within Iraq: Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches (dahrjamailiraq.com). He's a reporter who has spent 5 months in occupied Iraq, and is now functioning as a correspondent for several news outlets. Read The Fire is Spreading… as a sample of his reporting.

It's grim but educational stuff.

A multimedia web exhibit: Iraq Uncensored: "seven independent photographers and filmmakers have worked exclusively in Iraq documenting US troops and Iraqi civilians, resistance fighters and child laborers, imprisoned women and incarcerated youths." It's a good exhibit, though not a happy one. But if you're reading this, you're probably not surprised by that.

Voices in the Wilderness : What We Call Peace is Little Better Than Capitulation To a Corporate Coup: excerpts from a speech by Arundhati Roy (vitw.org, 11/04/04):

It is becoming more than clear that violating human rights is an inherent and necessary part of the process of implementing a coercive and unjust political and economic structure on the world. Increasingly, human rights violations are being portrayed as the unfortunate, almost accidental, fallout of an otherwise acceptable political and economic system.

The link doesn't appear to provide the entire text of her speech, but it's worth reading the entire thing.

On The Daily Show, host Jon Stewart joked that the Iraqis have been observing our election, and remarked: 'You invaded us... to give us THIS?!?' :-)

Perhaps, before we force our brand of "democracy" on the Iraqi people, they should be allowed to shop around a bit. In projectcensored.org:
Democracy Fails: Corporations Win, Peter Phillips comments on the state of things here:

November 2 gave us a choice between war and more war, corporate globalization and more corporate globalization, the continuation of gifting billions of dollars to Israel, the Patriot Act and an expanded Patriot Act, a police state and an seriously growing police state, media monopoly and even bigger media monopolies, and wealth inequality or an even greater wealth divide. With the only alternative to these issues being minor candidates without a snowball's chance, for many voting seemed meaningless.

Isn't it great that WE get to be the model for other democracies? He has other points: go ahead and read 'em.

I don't know how I missed this.TheStar.com - Crude dudes by Linda McQuiag of the Toronto Star (www.thestar.com, 09/20/04). It's an article with comments from Fadel Gheit, a Wall Street oil analyst.

"Think of Iraq as virgin territory .... This is bigger than anything Exxon is involved in currently .... It is the superstar of the future," says Gheit, "That's why Iraq becomes the most sought-after real estate on the face of the earth."

Gheit just smiles at the notion that oil wasn't a factor in the U.S. invasion of Iraq. He compares Iraq to Russia, which also has large undeveloped oil reserves. But Russia has nuclear weapons. "We can't just go over and ... occupy (Russian) oil fields," says Gheit. "It's a different ballgame." Iraq, however, was defenceless, utterly lacking, ironically, in weapons of mass destruction. And its location, nestled in between Saudi Arabia and Iran, made it an ideal place for an ongoing military presence, from which the U.S. would be able to control the entire Gulf region. Gheit smiles again: "Think of Iraq as a military base with a very large oil reserve underneath .... You can't ask for better than that."

There's something almost obscene about a map that was studied by senior Bush administration officials and a select group of oil company executives meeting in secret in the spring of 2001. It doesn't show the kind of detail normally shown on maps ? cities, towns, regions. Rather its detail is all about Iraq's oil.....

Follow the link and read the whole thing. It's adopted from a book, which looks like a fascinating read. (It's especially interesting when you read about how trade deals force Canada to export to the U.S. regardless of its own demand situation. How any government could have signed such an agreement is a great mystery.)

Electile Dysfunction?

Yes, Virginia, there were some odd things about the 2004 Presidential election.

I'd already written elsewhere about the very unpleasant attempts to disenfranchise new voters who were registering to vote. (Compilation in the previously cited/linked audio file special report on voter fraud at thisamericanlife.org. (Real audio file) Combined with the overt attempts of elected officials in places like Florida to de-register tens of thousands of ethnic minority voters in Democrat-heavy regions, attempts by officials in some states to refuse to accept voter registrations due to paper weight regulations, and other antics, it is cause for alarm and investigation. Word of these things occurred in advance of the election, far ahead enough for it to be announced (and in some cases, for arrests to be made), but late enough for those harmed to be unable to register.

But come election day, there was some more weirdness. For example, the exit polls. I watched them "live" on cnn.com for Ohio and a few other key states. Kerry was ahead, Kerry was ahead, Kerry was ahead... and then when everything was declared for Bush they retroactively changed the results. Which was weird, but I'm completely open to believing that exit polls aren't accurate. The problem is that they should be inaccurate in more than one direction -- they shouldn't always favor Kerry inaccurately, they shouldn't always be inaccurate by about the same percentage. See Odds of Bush gaining by 4 percent in all exit polling states 1 in 50,000; Evoting/paper variance not found to be significant (bluelemur.com, 11/08/04).

Then, there were the "glitches" that resulted in more votes than voters. In Should America Trust the Results of the Election? Commentary (washingtondispatch.com, 11/05/04), Shane Cory points out a few fun (not) facts:

In one voting precinct in Gahanna, Ohio, 4,258 voters supposedly cast an electronic ballot for George Bush while only 260 voted for John Kerry. While it is vaguely possible that over 94% of voters in the precinct supported George W. Bush, it is a hard number to believe considering that only 638 voters were counted at the polling center.

Ooops. What was it that Barbie doll used to say? "Math is hard?"

There are also some odd results out of Florida: the average Republican gain was 29%, which isn't too far ahead of the Dems, but doesn't really explain a 700% gain in Republican votes in one particular county.

Seven hundred percent? Congrats to whoever organized that voter drive, but because it's so far out of the norm for the state, it really ought to be checked for accuracy. Unless they also have a town called Gahanna, in which case everything is explained. :-)

Infamous Broward County had a problem to put it back into the news. Software Flaw Found in Florida Vote Machines (michaelmoore.com repost from the Palm Beach Post, 11/05/04) provides this:

Tallies should go up as more votes are counted. That's simple math. But in some races, the numbers had gone ... down.

It turns out the software used in Broward County can handle only 32,000 votes per precinct. After that, the system starts counting backward. Why a voting system would ever be designed to vote backward was a mystery to Broward County Mayor Ilene Lieberman.

Here's a nationwide compilation of computer voting glitches and other problems compiled from the media at votersunite.org. This list shouldn't be interpreted to mean that each and every problem resulted in people being denied votes, I should emphasize: it just belies the "everything went perfectly" stories you've likely heard.

Greg Palast argues in 'Kerry Won' (tompaine.com, 11/04/04) that racist "spoilage" practices which results in minority voters having their ballots or identity rejected are responsible for Bush's margin of "victory."

New Mexico reported in the last race a spoilage rate of 2.68 percent, votes lost almost entirely in Hispanic, Native American and poor precincts?Democratic turf... Hispanic voters in the Enchanted State, who voted more than two to one for Kerry, are five times as likely to have their vote spoil as a white voter.... Chaves County, in the "Little Texas" area of New Mexico, has a 44 percent Hispanic population, plus African Americans and Native Americans, yet George Bush "won" there 68 percent to 31 percent.

I spoke with Chaves' Republican county clerk before the election, and he told me that this huge spoilage rate among Hispanics simply indicated that such people simply can't make up their minds on the choice of candidate for president....

Santiago Juarez who ran the "Faithful Citizenship" program for the Catholic Archdiocese in New Mexico, told me that "his" voters, poor Hispanics, whom he identified as solid Kerry supporters, were handed the iffy provisional ballots. Hispanics were given provisional ballots, rather than the countable kind "almost religiously," he said, at polling stations when there was the least question about a voter's identification. Some voters, Santiago said, were simply turned away.

Racism is pretty icky, too.

And there was some odd behavior on the part of Republican election officials. In George, John, and Warren (msnbc.com), Keith Oberman reports on some odd events in Ohio:

[Friday] the Cincinnati Enquirer reported that officials in Warren County, Ohio, had ?locked down? its administration building to prevent anybody from observing the vote count there.

...County Commissioners confirmed that they were acting on the advice of their Emergency Services Director, Frank Young. Mr. Young had explained that he had been advised by the federal government to implement the measures for the sake of Homeland Security.... The State of Ohio confirms that of all of its 88 Counties, Warren alone decided such Homeland Security measures were necessary.

In other counties, reporters were allowed to observe the balloting.

Have I already mentioned that Bush campaign co-chair & Ohio Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell was in charge of the election and vote counting there? (michiganimc.org) And after failing to mail absentee ballots out, had to be taken to court to allow those who hadn't received their ballots to vote?

In The Ultimate Felony Against Democracy (commondreams.org, 11/04/04), Thom Hartmann asks:

Why are We The People allowing private, for-profit corporations, answerable only to their officers and boards of directors, and loyal only to agendas and politicians that will enhance their profitability, to handle our votes?

Which is an excellent question.


*

My e-mail peer group, most of whom I believe to be Democrats, have split into two camps. One camp wants the voting irregularities investigated, so this administration won't hang under the cloud of illegitimacy that the first Bush Administration held. The other camp thinks that we need to absorb a Kerry loss unquestioningly and immediately, and ignore anything dubious because it's unlikely to change the outcome.

I am uncertain as to who actually won the election: it looks like Bush, but enough doubts have been raised that some verification is in order. But that's not what concerns me about the comments I've heard. I'm shocked that anyone I know finds the disenfranchisement of large numbers of Americans -- many of whom happen to be ethnic minorities -- acceptable. Even if we were all satisfied with a Bush win, we cannot say it's fine that "non-white" and/or poor people had their right to vote 'challenged' by partisan monitors and were forced to vote provisionally, that people in swing states had to appear in court to verify their identity in the face of baseless charges from local Republican Party officials, that people were turned away from polling places, and that voting equipment can't do basic math can be tolerated. These issues need to be corrected NOW. I don't see how our nation benefits from "getting over" discrimination and math-impairments without correcting it.

We're a great country with a long tradition of opportunity. Now isn't the time to backslide. Let's get this right. Let's get this fixed now. And let's toss everyone who tried to defraud citizens of their voting rights in jail, regardless of who won, as a deterrent to future anti-democratic activism here.

The U.S. election has ended, and as expected, the impact on Iraq is largely negligible. Both candidates wished to continue and win the war: they only disagreed on how it would be funded and who should be obligated to staff it.

And so the dire misery of the Iraqi people and the soldiers stationed there continues.

*

Conveniently just after the U.S. elections are over, Iraq declares state of emergency. Violence is on the upswing, and insurgents are increasingly successful at killing large numbers of police in single attacks.

One aspect of violence which will not be curtailed by the declaration of the state of emergency is the U.S.' planned attack on Falluja.

The BBC's Paul Wood, embedded with the US Marines, says they believe that Falluja will be their biggest engagement since Hue, the Vietnamese city they captured in 1968, losing 142 men and killing thousands of the enemy.

It is reported from inside Falluja that insurgents, tribal chiefs and Sunni Muslim clerics have invited the media to enter the city under their protection to witness any assault, which they described as a crusade against Islam.

This is the success story that U.S. president Bush has been trumpeting. If this is success, I would hate to see what failure looks like.

Concerns mount as the U.S. plans to invade Falluja(h) with a vast military force: Kofi Annan's letter: Falluja warning (news.bbc.co.uk, 11/06/04): "UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has sent a letter to the leaders of the US, UK and Iraq expressing concern that the planned assault on the Iraqi city of Falluja could undermine elections due in January."

Fixing the problem of Falluja (news.bbc.co.uk, 11/07/04):

Some of those who took part in Operation Iraqi Freedom - as last year's invasion is called - wonder what happened to the 'flowers and sweets' that greeted them so promisingly at first.

'Everyone was so friendly when we got to Iraq,' said one 19-year-old, slightly bewildered. 'I just don't know what happened.'"

The inability of US forces to comprehend the impact on people of occupation, even at this date, is stunning. But it gets weirder:

"The marines that I have had wounded over the past five months have been attacked by a faceless enemy," said Colonel Brandl.

"But the enemy has got a face. He's called Satan. He lives in Falluja. And we're going to destroy him."