|
Thursday, March 15, 2012. Chaos and violence continue, the government
refuses to follow the rules for disclosure in their case against Bradley
Manning, the State Dept goes after one of their own, the illegal wars compete
for time and attention with the administration's war against the Constitution
and the public's right to know, Iraqi youths continue to be targeted, and more.
Chanel Curry: I started off as as a veteran
during Operation Iraqi Freedom. I'm from Cleveland, Ohio and I joined the
military in 2008. As I served overseas and came back to the United States, I
suffered many difficulties finding employment. So I recently relocated to
Atlanta, Georgia because I had a job opportunity available to me almost
immediately. So I relocated and during my process of living in
Atlanta, Georgia, a lot of different circumstances forced me to have to move
back to Cleveland, Ohio where I was originally stationed. Coming back to
Cleveland, Ohio, it was very hard to find a job. So basically, I bounced around
from different relatives homes, different friends and it just became definitely
a burden because a lot of people I knew suffered their own hardships and no one
could afford to accomodate another adult. So that forced me to have to contact
the VA and I contacted the Ohio Coalition for the Homeless and I spoke to a
veteran by the name of William and he directed me over to a female by the name
of Toni Johnson. Toni Johnson is a representative of the women's homeless
outreach program. And she, herself, actually opened up a lot of possibilities
for me to get back on my feet. She told me about the Grant Per Diem program and
I lived in a homeless shelter, a women's homeless shelter, known as the Westside
Catholic Center and there there were other things available for me such as the
Employment Connection and I met with a representative by the name of Angela Cash
and she basically helped me to get a job at the Cleveland Clinic. So she offered
me classes, computer training, basically everything that I needed to be readily
available for work. And also she had her own non-profit organization known as
the Forever Girls At Heart which is a group of beautiful women who helped me get
all of the things I needed for my apartment. Now with that being said, I will
be moving into my place as of Friday if everything goes as planned. And I do
have everything I need. So the VA definitely went above and beyond to make sure
that I was not -- that I did not remain a homeless veteran.
Curry's testimony goes to what Senator Scott Brown rightly termed "a lack
of consistency." While the VA was able to assist her, Sandra Strickland's
testimony to the Committee made clear that the VA practices a scatter-shot,
non-consistent response.
Chanel Curry is an Iraq War veteran and among a growing number of veterans
of the current war who have or are becoming homeless. She testified to the
Senate Veterans Affairs Committee yesterday as part of the hearing on homeless
veterans. The first panel was made up of veteran Sandra Strickland, National
Women Veterans Committee's Marsha Four, Deputy Assistant IG for VA Linda
Halliday and Reverend Scott Rogers. The first panel was covered in yesterday's snapshot, by Ava in " Scott Brown (Ava)" and by Kat with " Glad someone's back, not impressed with
hearing."
Senator Patty Murray is the Chair of the Committee. In her opening
remarks, she noted:
VA must focus on a new and unfortunately growing segment of the
homeless veteran population -- female veterans. Like their male counterparts,
women veterans face many of the same challenges that contribute to their risks
of becoming homeless. They are serving on the front lines and being exposed to
some of the same harshest realities of war. They are screening positive for
PTSD, experiencing military sexual traum, suffering from anxiety disorder, and
having trouble finding a job that provides the stability to ease their
transition home. Yet when our female veterans find themselves homeless, they
have needs that are unique from those of male veterans. And, as the VA's
Inspector General found in a report released on Monday, some of those unique
needs are not being addressed. The IG found that there were serious safety and
security concerns for homeless women veterans, especially those who have
experiences Military Sexual Trauma. They found bedrooms and bathrooms without
sufficient locks, halls and stairs without sufficient lighting and mixed gender
living facilities without access restrictions. They also found that the VA
should do a better job at targeting places and populations that need help the
most. And in addition to this IG report, GAO released a report at the end of
last year that cited VA for the lack of gender-specific privacy, safety and
security standards. Following that report, I sent a letter to VA and HUD with
Senators [Jon] Tester and [Olympia] Snowe seeking answers to a number of
questions it raised. I have heard from HUD that they are reviewing their data
collection process in order to capture more information on homeless women
veterans. I have also heard from VA tha they are working to develop and provide
training for staff and providers to better treat veterans who have experienced
traumatic events and modifying their guidance on privacy, safety and security
for providers who serve homeless women veterans. As more women begin to
transition home and step back into lives as mothers, wives and citizens, we must
be prepared to serve the unique challenges they face. As we continue to learn
about the alarming number of homeless women veterans, we must be sure that VA is
there to meet their needs.
The second panel was Chanel Curry and the VA's Executive Director of the
Homeless Veterans Initiative Pete Dougherty. (Lisa Pape, of the VA, accompanied
Dougherty.) VA's Dougherty noted a variety of figures including that 29,074
Veterans and family members are housed, as of last month, through the HUD-VASH
program, 37,549 Housing Choice vochers have been handed out, Veterans Justice
Outreach (legal services) have served 15,706 veterans, 366 is the number of
homeless veterans (or formerly homeless) that the VA has hired in the Homeless
Veterans Supported Employment Program (hires are since September of last year),
"in FY 2011, VA helped 83 percent of veterans in default retain their homes or
avoid foreclsoure, an increase from 76 percent in FY 2010" and "VA paid pension
benefits exceeding $4.2 billion to over 500,000 veterans and survivors in FY
2011. Because pension benefits are paid to veterans and survivors whose income
fall below Congressionally established minimum standards, it inherently assists
in income issues related to homelessness."
We'll note this exchange from the second panel.
Chair Patty Murray: Mr. Dougherty, we heard from Ms. Strickland on
the first panel. She reached out to the VA and was told there was no help --
literally [they] hung up [and left her] with nothing. We just heard Ms. Curry
obviously a totally different story. With a "no wrong door" policy, it's
unacceptable that more help wasn't given to Ms. Strickland and others like her.
Ms. Curry, I wanted to ask you, what was the turning point that led you to the
VA?
Chanel Curry: Actually, it was a very long time
before the resources were actually known to me. I had to do some research. I
actually contacted Military One Source which is a very
helpful resource who helps you basically get to a lot of different resources.
But what led me to the VA was the fact that I was just tired of being homeless.
I was tired of not having a stable job and having to ask people for things. And
I'm the type of person where I like to get everything on my own so it was
definitely a challenge for me. So I had to make an adult decision and go to a
shelter where the HUV Ash program would be availabe for me.
Chair Patty Murray: Mr. Dougherty, both the GAO and IG found that
the VA has to improve the way it serves homeless veterans -- homeless women
veterans -- especially those who have experienced Military Sexual Trauma. I am
deeply concerned about women veterans -- or any veteran -- but women veterans
being placed in a place with no privacy, no locks on doors, no locks on
bedrooms. It just is implicit that that should be available. I understand that
the department is developing this new, gender-specific, privacy, safety and
security standard for the facilities and I want that done quickly -- obviously.
But I wanted to ask you: Is that enough to make sure we have protection for
women -- to make sure there's no registered sex offenders? Are we following
that? And especially for women who are victims of Military Sexual Trauma, are
we really making sure we're focused on those issues?
Pete Dougherty: [microphone not on or working . . .] and her staff
are working very closely on making those corrections. I would also say that one
of the things that we have and are asking the Committee to do is to change the
Contract Care Authority Requirement. Currently under law, you have to have a
serious mental illnesee diagnosis in order to get contract residential care.
And I think as the IG [Linda Halliday] just said a few minutes ago, that one of
the issues is that in some small communities, we may not have enough need to
develop a whole program that's big enough to support a community program and in
those places what we need is more flexibility in contracted residential care in
order to make that work.
Chair Patty Murray: Well, okay, let me be very clear given the
strong oversight work that this Committee has done leading up to just this
hearing, I think it's very clear we're going to be following this very
carefully. We want to make sure this is implemented. It's absolutely a top item
for all of us.
We'll jump to another exchange.
Senator Scott Brown: Mr. Dougherty, how is VA working to improve
the data collected so that the VA and Congress have information to effectively
allocate the resources to ensure homeless veterans receive the needed services?
And that's based on the GAO report saying that the information's lacking.
[Doughtery speaking with Pape.] Either one.
Lisa Pape: We have been collecting information on homeless
veterans for over 20 years now. What we've done to really enhance in the last
several years is roll over into an electronic system, enhancing the kind of data
we're really asking for so that there's more questions related to people's
experience, their medical issues, their housing issues prior and-and-and leaving
the program. But what really is where we're shooting for is connecting with the
community and aligning our data collection system with the homeless management
collection system that the continuum of care do so that we have a coordinated
and integrated collection system to look at what veterans are entering the VA
and the community and bed capacity and things like that.
From the panel on homeless veterans to an Iraq War veteran imprisoned for
over a year, Bradley Manning. In January, Josh Gerstein (POLITICO) reported, "Another military
officer has formally recommended that Army Pfc. Bradley Manning face a
full-scale court martial for allegedly leaking thousands of military reports and
diplomatic cables to the online transparency site WikiLeaks." In addition,
Article 32 hearings are almost always rubber stamps. Monday April
5th, WikiLeaks released US
military video of a July 12, 2007 assault in Iraq. 12 people were
killed in the assault including two Reuters journalists Namie Noor-Eldeen and
Saeed Chmagh. Monday June 7,
2010, the US military announced that they had arrested Bradley
Manning and he stood accused of being the leaker of the video. Leila Fadel
(Washington Post) reported in August 2010 that Manning had
been charged -- "two charges under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. The
first encompasses four counts of violating Army regulations by transferring
classified information to his personal computer between November and May and
adding unauthorized software to a classified computer system. The second
comprises eight counts of violating federal laws governing the handling of
classified information." In March 2011, David S. Cloud
(Los Angeles Times) reported
that the military has added 22 additional counts to the charges including one
that could be seen as "aiding the enemy" which could result in the death penalty
if convicted. The Article 32 hearing took place in December.
The Associated Press reports the latest in
government ridiculous, the military insisted to the court today that the release
Bradley is accused of aided al Qaeda. They tossed in the word "indirectly."
You know what directly aids al Qaeda, endless war. So throw some charges at
Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and the rest of the crooked gang making up the
administration. Know what else aids al Qaeda? Keeping Guantanamo open. So
throw some more charges at Barack. The latest development only underscores that
Barack Obama is no different from George W. Bush, that idiots like Naomi Wolf
who swore he was a Constitutional lawyer (Memo to Naomi: Constional lawyers take
cases involving Constitutional issues -- they don't generally represent slum
lords) were wrong (and have refused to own their errors) when they insisted
Barack would protect the Constitution. He's done nothing of the sort and now
he's attempting to 'ohn Walker Lindh' Bradley Manning.
Jessica Gresko (Huffington Post)
reports, "An attorney for an Army private accused of leaking hundreds of
thousands of pages of classified information asked a military judge Thursday to
dismiss the charges, arguing the government bungled the handover of documents to
the defense." At issue are documents that the government refuses to hand over.
Since this is a criminal prosecution, discovery attached at the beginning of the
case. Therefore, the documents should have been turned over long ago.
Discovery is the process by which the defense learns the evidence the
prosecution has. This is standard procedure and the claim by US Capt Ashden
Fein that the defense is attempting to launch a fishing expedition is outrageous
and puts a stain on the already questionable concept of 'military justice.'
Fein whined to the court that they had to produce "as much as possible" for the
defense. Someone needs to explain the law to Fein, "as much as possible" is not
how discovery works. You're compelled to turn over everything. "As much as
possible" claims should get you up on charges before a legal board.
Speaking to RT on Thursday about that afternoon's hearing, Zack
Presavento of the Bradley Manning Support Network said that the prosecutors in
the case continue to defend their right to withhold material from the defense,
something he says is just "one more absurd allegation in a long train of
absurdities."
Coombs says he has repeatedly asked the government to supply him
with documents that pertain to the case, but the military is defaulting to the
claim that the material in question is classified and therefore must be shielded
from civilian eyes. For two years, Coombs says, he has asked for documents that
the government has still refused to deliver and, at this point, he believes the
US should forfeit their case.
Coombs asked the government to provide an assessment of the damage
Manning caused to US national security by sending WikiLeaks military field
reports from Afghanistan and Iraq, a quarter million State Department cables and
war videos.
But military prosecutor Ashden Fein said the State Department "has
not completed its damage assessment."
Any 'asssessment' should have been completed prior to charges being
brought. That's basic. Yet again, the Obama administration, in their haste to
punish whistle blowers, sets the law aside and goes off like a vigilante posse
bound and determined to take the law into their own hands. America has never
been more at risk from their own government then with these crooks and clowns in
the administration. They make Bully Boy Bush look like a Constitutional
defender by contrast.
There are many other Tweets Ratner's done but this may really sum up just
how much lying the prosecution thinks it can get away with:
We were the ones, at Third, who pointed out the lie from the government
that they had to keep Bradley naked to 'protect him.' We were able to point out
that flaw because a very good friend of mine runs an adolescent recovery center
so I know about the procedures and about scrubs and the rest. I also know when
someone's basically on lockdown, Cameras are recording. Bradely was kept on
watch, videos were made. The government's lie is just the latest effort by the
Barack Obama administration to lie and lie and lie again. When confronted with
the regulations -- and military regulations (I've just been told on another
phone) include recording people like Bradley both for his protection and for the
militaries -- the government will most likely trot out a new lie: The tapes were
erased! Or taped over. The military is supposed to preserve those tapes. They
knew a legal case was likely. If they next try to lie that the tapes no longer
exist, then they should be able to provide a list of names that the defense can
use as witnesses (names of people doing monitoring while the taping was going
on) and a list of names of people fired for failure to follow procedure (which
includes preseving the tapes).
Bradley is only one alleged whistle blower the administration is going
after. , Lisa Rein (Washington Post) reports on career
diplomat Peter Van Buren: Now the
State Department is moving to fire him based on eight charges, ranging from
linking on his blog to documents on the whistleblowing site WikiLeaks to
disclosing classified information.
Van Buren's supervisors admittedly singled him out, and are
monitoring all of his online activities taken on his personal time using his
personal computer. They have insisted that he "preclear" all of his blog posts,
tweets, and other social media activities as well as live radio and TV
appearance - all First Amendment-protected activities Van Buren conducts on his
personal time. How is anyone supposed to pre-clear a live radio
interview?
The proposed removal alleges that Van Buren mishandled sensitive
information by linking - NOT leaking - to a publicly-available Wikileaks
document on his blog, which contains a disclaimer that Van Buren is writing in
his personal capacity and that the State Department does not endorse his
views.
The State Department's lame canned
quote defending against the retaliation claims offers no
explanation as to why the Agency has singled Van Buren out to monitor his social
media activities and selectively enforce the policies against Van
Buren.
"There are protections within the
government for freedom of expression and for whistleblowers," spokesman Mark C.
Toner said. "The State Department has followed process and acted in accordance
with the law."
How does it protect freedom of expression to propose firing an
employee for exercising his First Amendment right to speak on matters of public
concern in his private capacity?
Adding to the trumped-up nature of the charges, the State
Department accuses Van Buren of "bad judgment" because he mocked Michele
Bachmann and criticized Hillary Clinton's laughing at Libyan leader Qaddafi's
death. Does the State Department really need to be told that the First Amendment
covers political speech?
The US State Dept goes to war on Peter, but they refuse to publicly rebuke
the killing of Iraqi youths. The Department won't make a statement on the record
nor will Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Iraqis thought to be gay and/or Emo
are beign threatened, bullied and killed. And the State Dept is silent. And
wishing Americans would shut up already because then the State Dept could
function without accountability and below the radar. Today, State Dept
spokesperson Victoria Nuland opened her press briefing by drawing attention to a
sheet on US humanitarian assistance to Syria.
Hey, those Syrians getting humanitarian assistance? Al Qaeda. So when are
we prosecuting the State Dept and the administration?
If you're not getting how unaccountable and ineffectual the State Dept is,
Al Mada
reports this morning that the Ministry of the Interior will be removing the
February statement attacking the Emo kids. That statement, reported on by
Reuters, CNN and other outlets, has been up the entire time. Why did they
finally take it down? Because the press kept pointing to it. Not
because the State Dept lodged a complaint. Not because the State Dept did a damn
thing. They've done nothing. The US Embassy in Baghdad gave an interview to
Iraqi TV station Al Sumaria and they had a private e-mail exchange with a San
Francisco LGBT group -- a private exchange that went public. Today they posted
the following:
We strongly condemn the recent violence and killings in Iraq by
groups who appear to be targeting individuals based on their sexual orientation,
gender identity, or personal expression. These acts of intolerance have no
place in democratic societies.
We are monitoring this situation closely on the ground and in
Washington, and have expressed our concern to the Government of
Iraq.
Additionally, in recent days, some of Iraq's religious leaders and
members of Parliament have denounced these attacks and taken steps to address
this issue. A representative for Grand Ayatollah Sistani has condemned this
violence and the Chairperson of the Human Rights Committee within Iraq's
Parliament has condemned these actions as well.
As Secretary of State Hilary Clinton said, "Like being a woman,
like being a racial, religious, tribal, or ethnic minority, being LGBT does not
make you less human… It is violation of human rights when people are beaten or
killed because of their sexual orientation, or because they do not conform to
cultural norms about how men and women should look or behave."
At the State Department, we will continue to advance a
comprehensive human rights agenda that includes the elimination of violence and
discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
Don't applaud Hillary. That quote is not on the Iraqi youth, it's pulled
from her December 6th speech on Human Rights Day. In addition, the Embassy was
forced to put that up and forced to make it appear it had been up. But the
Baghdad embassy is only one and State Dept friends called to inform me if I
visited ___ embassy and ___ embassy, I would find embassies
that did not backdate the statement. I did find those and I've got screen
snaps if it becomes an issue we need to document. For not, we'll note that
Hillary and the State Dept are feeling the pressure over their silence -- enough
so to basically forge a press release. They should continue to feel the heat.
Shawkat al Bayati (Niqash) reports:
Since February Iraqi extremists have been threatening, even
murdering, Iraq's "emo" teenagers. They believe them to be Satanists, vampires
or homosexuals. While religious authorities say the anti-emo campaign is wrong,
activists now suspect police involvement in the threats.
Ahmad is only 16 – but for the time being, he sits, virtually
imprisoned, in a small room on the roof of a building on the outskirts of
Baghdad. His crime? Dressing like a teenager.
Ahmad is what is being referred to in Iraq as an "emo". In the
West, the description emo has become shorthand for a certain style of dressing
and music. The teenage devotees of emo tend to prefer their rock music with punk
overtones and emotional lyrics and they like to dress all in black, have black
hair and accessorise with slightly Gothic imagery, such as skulls or bleeding
hearts.
Emo in Europe and North America was the latest evolution of music
that started off as "emotional hard core" and the look and music resonated with
a certain sort of melancholy outsider.
And whereas in the West, an emo teenager might expect to be
harassed by those who didn't understand their funereal obsession or their
dressing up – a lot of critical bystanders thought the costumed nature of the
emo look meant the wearer must be homosexual – in Iraq, emo kids are at far more
risk.
Emo kids first started to appear in Iraq in 2008; most of them are
aged between 12 and 18, the vast majority are male and one imagines the same
elements of rebellion that attract Western teens, also attract the Iraqi
youth.
In other news, Al Rafidayn
reports that KRG President Massoud Barzani has made clear that Iraqi Vice
President Tareq al-Hashemi is safe in the KRG and they will not hand him over to
Baghdad. Nouri is targeting Iraqiya and that includes al-Hashemi. Nouri accuses
the vice president of terrorism. That ongoing crisis hasn't been resolved
either (Barzani wants the three presidencies to resolve it -- that's Iraqi
President Jalal Talabani, Speaker of Parliament Osama al-Nujaifi and Nouri). The
State Dept's done nothing to help their either. Since October of last
year, the State Dept was supposed to be running the US mission in Iraq. Thus
far, they're an abject failure.
| 
Michael
Ratner 
