Saturday, October 20, 2007

Betinna goes to Harlem (the White section)

"I'm not interviewing for maids," barked the shar-pei with the beagle nose.

Betinna, I told myself, you're a long way from the People's Republic of Brooklyn.

I looked over to my right where a sheepish Cathy Pollitt did a shoulder shrug while scarfing down a pint of Ben & Jerry's -- insisting, "It's for the environment."

Cathy and her food. That's probably how the hell I ended up here. She was slamming down Twinkies like they were Jello shots a few hours earlier and that likely gave me some sort of contact sugar high just by standing next to her.

"Betinna," she drawled out in that nasal whine, "we have to see The Resister. The answer lies with the resister."

Camilo Mejia?

"Camilio?" asked a dazed Cathy, open mouthed, Twinkies sloshing around inside. "Betinna, not everything is rap music. "Oh, don't look shocked. I know Camilio. I loved 'Gangsta Paradise' when they used it in that Jon Lovitz film."

I snapped, "That's Coolio, you idiot! Camilo Mejia. The first Iraq veteran to return and refuse to go back to Iraq."

"Who?" Cathy asked bored as she headed to my kitchen. "You got any Hershey's syrup? I need a quick drink to wet my whistle."

Okay, so we weren't going to see Mejia. Maybe it was Stephen Funk, or Carl Webb, or Aiden Delgado? Or Pablo Paredes? Or Ehren Watada?

Was it Watada? His court-martial, his second court-martial, had been put on hold while a federal judge attempted to figure out if the military -- a US entity -- had to follow the Constitution of the United States like everyone else.

"Camilio, Watada," Cathy repeated plopping seven heaping spoonfuls of grape jelly into a coffee mug and stirring, "Betinna, you and your posse with their street names."

Were we going to Canada? I was trying to figure out if I would need a heavy jacket for such a trip and asking if we were seeing war resister Joshua Key, Ross Spears, Kyle Snyder, Jeremy Hinzman, Brandon Hughey, or . . . there were so many who'd said no and gone to Canada. Maybe it was the latest to go public, Michael Espinal.

Cathy just stared at me as she furiously stirred her mug of grape jelly.

"What in the world are you talking about?" she finally asked. "Who are these people I have never heard of?"

Nearly five years the illegal war has dragged on and Cathy Pollitt, self-described feminist, food-a-holic and bad writer for the allegedly left-leaning political magazine "The Nation" didn't have a clue.

She made slurping sounds as she gulped down the grape jelly.

We were off to see The Resister, she informed me, The Resister would have the answers.

Putting aside my better judgement, I joined her outside on the curb as we hailed a taxi.

"Harlem," she told the cabbie before turning to me and adding, "Don't get excited. We're not going to The Apollo."

Now I wished we had. I wish there was some pulling Cathy and the annoying shar-pei off stage. I wished I was back at home reading that delicious letter Richard Martin had sent to my husband. What had he written? Oh, yes, that my husband Thomas Friedman "never met a generalization he couldn't inflate into a 700-word column." Some people probably get requests for autographs. Thomas Friedman's "fan mail" could probably be best summed up as, "Friedman, take your Prozac."

"I'm not applying for the position of maid," I informed the shar-pei.

"Well, we already have a cook. You're a woman, so you can't be the butler."

Always quick to join a non-feminist dog pile, Cathy nodded and verbalized her agreement with the latter, "Absolutely, Katrina. We start letting women be butlers and the next thing you know some broad will want to be president. We're dainty flowers."

Where to start? With how sexist the two women were or how there was nothing dainty about Cathy?

My dilemma was solved for me when Cathy explained that I was Betinna Friedman, wife of Thomas. Or as she so Victorian-era-like put it, "Katrina, this is Mrs. Thomas Friedman."

That captured the shar-pei's interest. She tossed aside the floppy hat she'd been trying on and looked me up and down.

"Cathy, are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

Cathy gurgled her agreement.

"Mrs. Friedman," the shar-pie said leaning far too closely in to my face, probably due to the fact that she was speaking in a breathy whisper that was cultivated from too many viewings of "The Prince & The Show Girl," "the despicable David Corn has jumped ship. He couldn't take my criticism and refused to write a 4,000 word piece on Barack Obama's power pecs -- fortunately, Patti Williams has tackled that assignment -- and left me in the lurch. Would you like to write a column for my magazine?"

I tried explaining I was a second year college student and not interested in becoming a columnist.

"Oh, nonsense," exhaled the shar-pei. "We could call it --"

"'Mrs. Thomas Friedman's Rebuttal'! How do you like that? Pretty good, huh?"

"No, Cathy, I think 'Mrs. Thomas Friedman Regrets'."

"First off," I explained, "my name is Betinna. And since this isn't the era of Edith Wharton and Henry James, I'd appreciate it if you both stopped referring to me as 'Mrs. Thomas Friedman'."

"She's a modern," the shar-pei said to Cathy before turning back to me. "No, it isn't the era of Wharton and James but I do like to pretend. Back then, this area was White, mighty, mighty White."

Did she just say that?

Seeing the look on my face, the shar-pei tried to change the subject.

"Betinna," she extended a hand, "I am The Peace Resister Katrina vanden Heuvel."

I must have gasped. I'd heard of her but since I'm not a fan of bad offerings on basic cable, I'd managed to avoid the sight of her.

"I get that a lot," she said smiling. "It's always a shock to some people when they meet me face to face."

Well no wonder, that nose could poke an eye out.

Cathy Pollitt, my apparent friend, my BFF in waiting due to some cruel trick fate had played on me -- wasn't I suffering enough considering my husband? -- had told me the answer to bringing Thomas Friedman down lay with "The Resister." And "The Resister" turned out to be The Peace Resister Katrina vanden Heuvel -- a woman better known for girlish scribbles about "American Idol" than for doing anything political.

I was truly in hell and thinking, "Someone get the word to Cotton that there's no reason to come to Harlem anymore -- they're bussing in White people."

Grabbing her floppy hat, Katrina purred that we'd discuss it all later, after she won her award. Award?

"I'm getting a Peacemaker!" she gushed. "It will be loads of fun, gads even. Oh, you must come! I believe there will be dancing!"

"Pacemaker?" I asked thinking I'd misunderstood.

"No, Peacemaker."

"Are you sure?"

"I should be," she confided. "I paid enough money for it. Oh, girls, what a world we live in! What a glorious world! It's not like the old times! Today, we can buy awards and women are free to talk about the really important themes of the day --"

"Like 'American Idol'?" I interrupted with no effort to hide my sarcasm.

"Oh my goodness," Katrina exclaimed. "Betinna, you are an angel. An angel! If you hadn't just reminded me, I would have forgotten to set the TiVo to 'American Idol: Rewind.' They're up to the Clay Aiken episodes!"

I looked over at Cathy Pollitt who was noshing on a small ham and wondered at what point the "better" popped into my life?



"Iraq snapshot" (The Common Ills)
Friday, October 19, 2007, Iraq Moratorium Day. Chaos and violence continue, the US military announces two more deaths, Amy Goodman shines a light on the Iraqi wounded, and more.

Starting with war resistance. War resister Camilo Mejia speaks Saturday in Madison, Wisconsin. Janet Parker (The Capital Times) notes, "This weekend at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, energy is building among student activists who are hosting a national event, Students Rising: The 5th Anniversary Summit of the Campus Antiwar Network. Their featured speaker will be brave conscientious objector to war, Camilo Mejia. In 2004 Staff Sgt. Mejia applied for a discharge from the Army. He was the first known Iraq veteran to refuse to fight, citing moral concerns about the war and occupation. His public talk will be in the Humanities Building, Room 3650, at 8 p.m. Saturday." Pablo Paredes is another war resister. On Wednesday, he was in Berkeley with CODEPINK and other activists to protest the recruiting center on Shattuck Ave. Henry K. Lee (San Francisco Chronicle) reports on the right wing activists descending upon the area to demonstrate their support for recruiting centers to send more people off to die in an illegal war and points out one right winger made a fool out of himself. The right-winger's son died in Iraq (this isn't in the article) and -- the then under-age son was able to join the military only because he signed a waiver. Instead of addressing that, he elected to scream at Pablo Paredes, "Are you a soldier? They wouldn't let you looking like that!" A soldier? Paredes was in the navy and was a Petty Officer Third Class. Lee writes, "Paredes said later that he had served five years in the Navy and that people of color like himself bore the brunt of military service. 'I think the color of my skin shouldn't make me be on the front line,' Paredes said, adding that he left the Navy because he refused orders and opposed the war in Iraq." Along with Mejia, Stephen Funk and Aiden Delgado, Paredes is one of the early faces of war resistance and they -- and many others including Carl Webb -- demonstrated from the start that the movement was not "White" -- despite the mistaken claims of many.

Demonstrating further the diversity is the fact that one Iraq War resister is the first officer to publicy refuse to serve in the illegal war. That officer is Ehren Watada. Today is Iraq Moratorium day and many participants will be showing their solidarity with Watada whose legal status is on hold as federal judge Benjamin Settle reviews issues arising from the first court-martial of Watada (in February) when Judge Toilet (aka John Head) declared a mistrial over defense objection which should have prevented any further court-martials due to the double-jeopardy clause in the US Constitution. In a letter to People's Weekly World entitled "Watada's Leadership," T. Kyoshi Nagano explains how Watada's refusal to engage in an illegal war was upholding the highest of military standards by juxtaposing Watada's statements with those of US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates.

Watada: "I refuse to be silent any longer. I refuse to be party to an illegal and immoral war against people who did nothing to deserve our agression. My oath of office is to protect and defend America's laws and its people. By refusing unlawful orders for an illegal war, I fulfill that oath today."

Gates: "For a real leader, the elements of personal virtue -- self-reliance, self-control, honor, truthfulness, morality -- are absolute. They are absolute even when doing what is right may bring embarrassment or bad publicy to your unit or the service or to you. Those are the moements that will truly test the leader withing you -- test whether you will take the hard parth or the easy path, the wrong path or the right path. The willingness always to take the right path, even if it is the hard path, is called character. In every aspect of your life, whether personal or professional, you must always maintain the courage of your convictions -- your personal integrity."

T, Kyoshi Nagano observes, "There is a tradition in the Japanese American community to act on personal belief from volunteer 442/Nisei Linguist (while their family and friends were in camps), the NoNo Boys and the Vietnam War resisters. There are words, yet actions speak loudly." While the federal court examines the issue of double-jeopardy, a stay has been issued through at least October 26th.

New war resisters pop up daily and some go public and some don't. One who has decided to go public is Michael Espinal who self-checked out and went to Canada after serving in Iraq. Denis St. Pierre (The Sudbury Star) reports that Espinal "witnessed -- and participated in -- authorized missions that saw hundreds -- perhaps thousands of innocent Iraqis killed, injured, imprisoned and humiliated, their homes destroyed, their families ripped apart. In Espinal's view, he and his colleagues committed numerous human rights abuses and criminal acts. When his first tour of duy in Iraq ended, he resolved not to return. . . . Espinal and his partner, Jennifer Harrison, who are expecting their first child in April, have been living in Sudbury for the last few weeks. They are the first Americans to attempt to settle in the city with the help from the War Resisters Support Campaign. War Resisters is a country-wide coalition of community, faith, labour and other organizations and individuals helping U.S. soldiers who seek asylum in Canada rather than fight in Iraq." [Note: They are posting video to go with the text. If you click on the link try later. There's also an excerpt of the article in this entry.]

There is a growing movement of resistance within the US military which includes James Stepp, Matthew Lowell, Derek Hess, Diedra Cobb, Brad McCall, Justin Cliburn, Timothy Richard, Robert Weiss, Phil McDowell, Steve Yoczik, Ross Spears, Peter Brown, Bethany "Skylar" James, Zamesha Dominique, Chrisopther Scott Magaoay, Jared Hood, James Burmeister, Eli Israel, Joshua Key, Ehren Watada, Terri Johnson, Carla Gomez, Luke Kamunen, Leif Kamunen, Leo Kamunen, Camilo Mejia, Kimberly Rivera, Dean Walcott, Linjamin Mull, Agustin Aguayo, Justin Colby, Marc Train, Abdullah Webster, Robert Zabala, Darrell Anderson, Kyle Snyder, Corey Glass, Jeremy Hinzman, Kevin Lee, Mark Wilkerson, Patrick Hart, Ricky Clousing, Ivan Brobeck, Aidan Delgado, Pablo Paredes, Carl Webb, Stephen Funk, Blake LeMoine, Clifton Hicks, David Sanders, Dan Felushko, Brandon Hughey, Clifford Cornell, Joshua Despain, Joshua Casteel, Katherine Jashinski, Dale Bartell, Chris Teske, Matt Lowell, Jimmy Massey, Chris Capps, Tim Richard, Hart Viges, Michael Blake, Christopher Mogwai, Christian Kjar, Kyle Huwer, Wilfredo Torres, Michael Sudbury, Ghanim Khalil, Vincent La Volpa, DeShawn Reed and Kevin Benderman. In total, at least fifty US war resisters in Canada have applied for asylum.
Information on war resistance within the military can be found at The Objector, The G.I. Rights Hotline [(877) 447-4487], Iraq Veterans Against the War and the War Resisters Support Campaign. Courage to Resist offers information on all public war resisters. Tom Joad maintains a list of known war resisters.

The National Lawyers Guild's convention begins shortly: The Military Law Task Force and the Center on Conscience & War are sponsoring a Continuing Legal Education seminar -- Representing Conscientious Objectors in Habeas Corpus Proceedings -- as part of the National Lawyers Guild National Convention in Washington, D.C. The half-day seminar will be held on Thursday, November 1st, from 8:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., at the convention site, the Holiday Inn on the Hill in D.C. This is a must-attend seminar, with excelent speakers and a wealth of information. The seminar will be moderated by the Military Law Task Force's co-chair Kathleen Gilberd and scheduled speakers are NYC Bar Association's Committee on Military Affairs and Justice's Deborah Karpatkin, the Center on Conscience & War's J.E. McNeil, the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee's Peter Goldberger, Louis Font who has represented Camilo Mejia, Dr. Mary Hanna and others, and the Central Committee for Conscientious Objector's James Feldman. The fee is $60 for attorneys; $25 for non-profit attorneys, students and legal workers; and you can also enquire about scholarships or reduced fees. The convention itself will run from October 31st through November 4th and it's full circle on the 70th anniversary of NLG since they "began in Washington, D.C." where "the founding convention took place in the District at the height of the New Deal in 1937, Activist, progressive lawyers, tired of butting heads with the reactionary white male lawyers then comprising the American Bar Association, formed the nucleus of the Guild."

Each Wednesday, CODEPINK protests at the military recruiting center in Berkeley. As Medea Benjamin explained to Kristin Bender (Alameda Times-Star), "Our message is very clear. We are peaceful people. We don't want to send our sons and daughters into this war. I think the sentiment of Berkeley is on this side of the street." Bender notes, "The Golden State in 2001 was the nation's largest source of new enlistees, with 23,503 residents joining the military in 2001. But in 2006, 2,400 fewer residents heeded the call, and today California ranks second behind Texas in recruitment." Aimee Allison and David Solnit address counter-recruiting in their book Army Of None: Strategies to Counter Military Recruitment, End War, and Build a Better World (published by Seven Stories Press and available at Courage to Resist). Speaking with Matthew Rothschild last week on The Progressive Radio, Allison noted, "One of the things that I think the military recruiters on the ground rely on are sustained access, regular access to high school kids in particular so they can develop relationships. For the recruiter, they become father or friend or guide and take students out to Burger King and, you know. But of all of the messages that they learn, that recruiters learn, through their hard sell and sustained selling techniques, they never mention the word 'kill.' And the reason why is because it's very deeply ingrained in human beings not to kill. And we've all had these kind of, someone makes us mad and there's a reason we don't act on that because our church, and our family and our society condition us against that kind of violence. So it's the center of the recruiters' message to tell them all the things they can do with their life without letting them know about what the military really is and that is an institution designed to train someone to kill on command and that was the most surprising thing for me in my own experiences." CODEPINK's actions (and the actions of many others throughout the US) are an attempt to break the myths and silence.

A backdoor draft currently exists and is more popularly known as "stop loss." In addition, the US government has set up the framework that would be utilized should the draft be reinstated -- including Selective Service boards. Kyle Knight (University of Southern Indiana's The Shield) explores what would quickly happen if the draft were reinstated, "First, all 20 year-olds must report to their local draft board then 21, 22, and so on. Other aspects of the draft also differ from Vietnam. The S.S.S. states that no one can cite school as a possible deferment. At most, the student could postpone until the end of the semester and not until they finish their degree. The S.S.S. states 'beliefs which qualify a registrant for C.O. status may be religious in nature, but don't have to be. Beliefs may be moral or ethical; however, a man's reasons for not wanting to participate in a war must not be based on politics, expediency, or self-interest.' To claim conscientious objector you must appear before your local draft board and present a written statement on the influence of your beliefs on your life and how you arrived at them. You can even include someone to speak on your behalf, then the Selective Service Appeal Board will either reject or accept your claim. If accepted you must engage in one of two alternative service choices."

From yesterday's snapshot: "Reuters notes that 'three tribesmen, members of a local "Awakenings Council" aligned to U.S. forces' were whot dead in Dhuluiya. On Tuesday, Sheikh Saleh Fezea Shneitar, his son and nephew were killed outside of Falluja -- the sheikh was a member of "Anbar Awakenings Council," a group that works closely with the US military and whose members have been increasingly targeted for their collaboration. In a White House press conference today Nouri al-Maliki's spokesperson denied that the resistance was 'getting more sophisticated in who they go after'." Today, Ali al-Fadhily (IPS) explores the issue of collaborators zooming in on Abdul Sattar Abu Risha who was killed on September 13th, "It is no secret in Anbar province that Abu Risha's activities were not legal either before or after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. When the U.S. government began to support the 'Awakening of Anbar' led by Sattar Abu Risha, which operated under the flag of fighting al-Qaeda [in Iraq], some people did begin to think differently. 'Americans always choose the worst of their collaborators to be leaders of their campaigns,' Sheikh Ahmed Ali of the Muslim Scholars Association told IPS in Baghdad. 'Look at the governments and councils they choose to lead Iraq. This Sattar Abu Risha only provoked a division among the people of Anbar, and that was exactly what the Americans wanted'."

In some of today's reported violence . . .


Bombings?

Reuters notes a Baghdad mortar attack that left three wounded.

Shootings?

Reuters notes an attack on a Riyadh police chief that left two guards injured.

Corpses?

Mohammed Al Dulaimy (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 6 corpses were discovered in Baghdad. Reuters notes two corpses were discovered in Muwailha.

Today the US military announced: "A Multi-National Division-Baghdad Soldier was killed and one other wounded when their unit was attacked by an improvised explosive device and small arms fire in a southern section of the Iraqi capital Oct. 18." And they announced: "A Task Force Lightning Soldier based in Salah ad Din province died as a result of a non-combat-related illness Wednesday after being evacuated to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, Germany." ICCC's total for the month of October thus far is 26 dead with 3832 US service members killed in the illegal war since it started.

Turning to the topic of wounded US service members, yesterday on NPR's The Diane Rehm Show, Rehm spoke with the Washington Post's Anne V. Hull and Dana Priest about the issue of medical care provided by the Veterans Affairs Dept. (for Hull and Priest's prior reporting at the Post on this issue click here).

Diane Rehm: What's extraordinary is that you say, Dana, the current Veterans Administration is pulled at the seams with some 800,000 cases of backlog.

Dana Priest: Yep. And it seems like it was just a surprise to them that this was going to happen. I don't know if anybody's tried to explain it away but certainly they haven't done a good job if they have. And not only do they have the case backlog, but they also are trying to merge the two disability systems. This is one of the recommendations -- the main recommendation -- of the Donna Shalala and Bob Dole panel that has just given the president their recommendations. They want to merge these two systems and, and -uh, give the burden to the VA to rate, to determine the level of disability that each soldier has and what will be their benefit, their pension, their disability payment from then on. So it's probably a good idea -- a lot of people do think it is a good idea because the army is having such trouble doing it. But it will add a lot of people onto the VA -- into the VA system -- that is already overcrowded and one assumes that they will be getting a lot more funding and some other personnel to do that.

[. . .]

Anne Hull: . . . And the heart of what Bush sent to Congress is, as Dana said, and to let the military determine whether or not a soldier is fit for duty let the VA rate for disability. And that's a huge culture shift and that is going to require legislation. There's already a lot of pushback from veterans' organizations who do not want the disability compensation system tinkered with in any way, it's known as "the third rail." They're afraid that older veterans might lose out and the younger veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan are obviously concerned about their generation. Secondly, it expands family leave. The spouse of a soldier can get up to six months of unpaid leave --

Diane Rehm: Unpaid leave.

Anne Hull: Unpaid leave, that's right. In a two year period. So this is basically to safe guard their job but not to provide them money while they're caring for the wounded.

Diane Rehm: But how do they -- how do they manage while they're taking the six-month unpaid leave?

Anne Hull: This is the big story. This is . . . You know, we had a story on Sunday, one soldier's one year war becomes a wife's endless war. It is put upon the families to carry the burden of having a wounded soldier or marine in their life.

Dana Priest: And it's going to be awfully hard to monitor the getting the job back. I mean, it's already difficult for people who go away in the Guard and Reserve to make sure that they get the job that they had back as required by law and this is virtually unenforceable. The other recommendation they made had to do with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder [PTSD]. And that would -- it opens up the door to say, "You don't have to prove to us when you got it or why you got it. Come on in and get an evaluation if you think you need it."

On Monday, Anne Hull participated in an online exchange at the Washington Post and it needs to be noted that the Turners (the subjects of the Sunday story) have received an outpouring of support from people (donations can be made care of the Washington Post, address at link) but where is the government, where is the VA? On the reporting she and Priest have been doing, Hull responds in the exchange as to how she and Priest have found their stories, "People have asked us this question over and over on the Walter Reed stories and the answer is quite simple: wounded soldiers and their families are frustrated and many feel abandoned by the country that they fought for. They don't feel heard. Many feel out of sight and forgotten, a long way from the bright parades of deployment. So they are okay about opening up and talking and letting us witness the small details of their lives, and almost to a person, the response is always this: 'As long as this will help other soldiers'." And, speaking to Rehm on Thursday, she noted that "we probably still get five calls, ten calls a day".

Staying on the topic of veterans, The War Comes Home's Aaron Glantz (IPS) covers the case of James Eggemeyer, a 25-year-old homeless veteran, "By December 2006, when James Eggemeyer filed a disability claim with the Veterans administration, he had already joined the ranks of the United State's burgeoning population of homeless veterans, and was living out of his girlfriend's Ford Explorer. So when the VA responded with a letter to his old address requesting that he come in for a physical examination, he missed the appointment. It's a vicious cycle so familiar to homeless people across the country. They need help from the government because they don't have a home, but can't receive mail because they don't have an address. . . . Since the start of the Iraq war, the backlog of unanswered disability claims has grown from 325,000 to more than 600,000. On average, a veteran must wait almost six months to have a claim heard. If a veteran loses and appeals a case, it usually takes at about three years. Veterans groups maintain that the backlog amounts to official negligence. Since the launch of the Iraq war more than four years ago, the number of people charged with reviewing and approving veteran's disability claims has actually dropped. According to the American Federation of Government Employees, the VA employed 1,392 Veterans Service Representatives in June 2007 compared to 1,516 in January 2003." An earlier, audio report Glantz did on homeless veterans can be found here.

Turning to US politics, Margaret Kimberley (Black Agenda Reports) weighs in on US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, "Activists must keep protesting at her house and working for her defeat in the 2008 congressional elections. They must also cease cooperating with her. The farce must end before it is too late. Pelosi, like Bush, has no loyalty to her constitutionally based responsibilities. She must no longer be treated as though she is a friend when she has proven herself to to be an enemy. Civil liberties groups and antiwar groups must stop meeting with Pelosi or her staff. They must finally realize that they can only play a role in movement politics. It is said that insanity is defined as repeating the same action over and over yet expecting a different result. Progressives have waged many righteous battles in the last seven years, but they are about to go down in history as insane actors in a badly written play."

Today, Amy Goodman (Democracy Now!) spoke with Cole Miller (No More Victims) about his organizations work in raising awareness on the Iraqi wounded who noted "what was shocking was so many people in South Carolina seemed to be simply unaware that children were being hurt in Iraq. And that's, of course, a pretty profound criticism of the mainstream media." Amy Goodman then interviewed Salee Allawee a ten-year-old victim of a US air strike (precision, no doubt -- that is sarcasm) in which she lost both of her legs and Salee's father Hussein Allawee Feras:

AMY GOODMAN: Salee, you're wearing lots of jewelry. Can you talk about where you got it from?

SALEE ALLAWEE: [translated] This is from Georgia, and this is from South Carolina. So they are both from South Carolina and Georgia.

AMY GOODMAN: So these are all from friends you have made here in the United States?

SALEE ALLAWEE: [translated] These are her best friends, Ann and Cole.

AMY GOODMAN: From here. You have come here to America and have gotten new legs?

SALEE ALLAWEE: [translated] Yes.

AMY GOODMAN: How does it feel?

SALEE ALLAWEE: [translated] It feels good. One of my legs just hurts so much, and so I think it's just infected. It hurts when I wear it.

AMY GOODMAN: Hussein, how has it been for you to come to the United States? Can you -- we just watched the video where you describe what happened to Salee. Can you describe what you felt when you were invited to America?

HUSSEIN ALLAWEE FERAS: [translated] Honestly, I want to start with -- I thank very much the good American people. It is a very late information that we learned that the American people are good people. Because the US military is so harsh, they didn't leave us any time to feel that there are still good people in the US, that we just felt that everyone in the US is like the American army. But honestly, when I came to the US, I just saw a lot of people who were very interested to help Salee and other than Salee. I couldn't believe it. A big difference. Alas, we had a very bad impression on the people in the US. The American soldiers, alas, are really harsh on us.

AMY GOODMAN: You lost -- well, your daughter lost her legs, her best friend. You lost your son?

HUSSEIN ALLAWEE FERAS: [translated] Yes.

AMY GOODMAN: In that attack?

HUSSEIN ALLAWEE FERAS: [translated] Yes, the same incident.

AMY GOODMAN: And your other daughter?

HUSSEIN ALLAWEE FERAS: [translated] Yes. One of her legs has to be cut off.

AMY GOODMAN: Salee, what do you tell American children about what happened to you?

SALEE ALLAWEE: [translated] I want to tell them thank you.

AMY GOODMAN: Are you going back to Iraq, Salee? Are you afraid to go back?

SALEE ALLAWEE: [translated] No, I'm not afraid.

AMY GOODMAN: How do you feel about going back, Hussein?

HUSSEIN ALLAWEE FERAS: [translated] As you know, my body is here, but my soul is over there. And I don't think worse things are going to happen in Iraq.

AMY GOODMAN: What was your experience with the US military before the air attack?

HUSSEIN ALLAWEE FERAS: [translated] There is nothing good to tell. Two months after the incident where Salee was injured, again random shooting started to happen in the neighborhood. At 3:00 in the morning one night, a tank was firing at a house while people were sleeping inside, and I saw the roof of that house collapsing on the people inside. We spent eleven hours to dig through the wreckage, trying to find someone who's alive, because we heard someone's voice who was still alive. Seven people out of eight were killed in that attack. Only one baby, who was four months old, was alive, and we were able to get him outside. And he's still alive. And now he's in Fallujah. This is one of the hundreds of thousands of the incidents and miseries Iraqis face every day.

Closing with TV. Sunday on CBS' 60 Minutes, Valerie Plame shares her story with Katie Couric. On Friday, PBS's NOW with David Brancaccio looks at immigration in America and "catches up with two New Jersey mayors who have sharply different -- and politically surprising -- approaches to dealing with undocumented immigrants in their communities" -- Democrat Don Cresitello (Morristown) wants to use federal enforcement powers, Republican Bob Patten has created "Sanctuary City". (Friday on most PBS stations, check local listings).
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Saturday, October 13, 2007

Friend or foe?

It had been that kind of a morning.

Nothing works out. At the cleaners, I learned my favorite sweater was lost. On the corner, the vendor only had the "New York Post" -- I prefer NYC's other right-wing paper, "The New York Times." And the dismays kept coming. What should have been a half-hour of errands tops ended up taking two hours and when I finally came home -- largely empty-handed -- my stomach was growling reminding me I hadn't eaten which then reminded me that I had groceries on my list that I lost so I hadn't stopped off.

I found some eggs and bread and not a great deal more. I was in the kitcehn making scrambled eggs which I intended to eat on the toast as a sandwich when I heard, "Yoo hoo!"

Yoo hoo?

Who the hell says "Yoo hoo"?

I pictured Thomas Friedman in a brassy red wig, padded bra and Mrs. Garrett outfit as he performed an ode to Charlotte Rae. All things considered, Rae would be a better figure for him to impersonate, considering his own figure.

"What was my cross-dressing husband up to now?" I wondered as I headed to the living room.

His recent column had already set him up in print as the nation's Edna Garrett and I was busy attempting to figure out if Nicky K would be the spirited Tootie or the manly Jo? I couldn't imagine Thomas Friedman allowing anyone to be Blair.

Only it wasn't Thomas Friedman. It was that damn Cathy Pollitt.

Ignoring my question of how she found out where I lived or what she was doing in my apartment, Cathy Pollitt explained she was out of tampons and needed to borrow one. I explained I hadn't been shopping and so I didn't have any either.

"Oh, it doesn't matter. What's cooking?"

And she was off to my kitchen.

By the time I caught up with her, my breakfast was long gone and she was licking the skillet.

"Betinna," she said digging around my kitchen cabinets, "I think we got off on the wrong foot. I'd love for us to be friends. I may not get all the current lingo and be down and rolling and all that but I just have never really known any colored people. Peaches!"

As I watched in schock, Cathy Pollitt used her left eye tooth to pop opn the can of peaches and then slammed it back like it was a shot of tequila.

Wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, Cathy Pollitt explained, "I didn't know your people liked peaches."

I was attempting to hustle her out of the apartment and explaining that "colored" really hadn't been current "lingo" for over 40 years. I also explained that I was far too busy to make new friends.

Cathy Pollitt stopped in her tracks, like a large mule, and declared, "That's too bad. I was hoping we could talk about your husband."

"What do you know about my husband?"

"I know a great deal," Cathy Pollitt declared attempting to sound mysterious but it was Cathy Pollitt so more doubt than mystery hung over her statement.

"Such as?"

"Betinna, I know you aren't his only wife."

I was listening.

"I know he lied to you and I know he hurt you and I know how to help you get back at him."

I waited. Cathy Pollitt held up a finger indicating pause.

I waited.

Suddenly a loud belch filled the room and Cathy Pollitt smiled weakly before passing out.

She lay like a large lump -- no, like a bean bag -- on my floor. I waited for her to come to for about a half hour before going about my business and vacuuming around her. She still wasn't awake when I finished cleaning. I went out to do the rest of my errands and she was still laying there when I got back.

What could Cathy Pollitt know?

And could she really help me get back at Thomas Friedman?

He'd kidnapped me. He'd drugged me. He'd lied to me. He'd threatened me.

The payback he had coming would be intense. I would need all the help I could get.

But could I trust Cathy Pollitt?

At midnight, I was still wondering that. And Cathy Pollitt was still out of it.

So I called it a night and turned in.

I awoke the next morning with no answers, found that Cathy Pollitt was gone as was all the food I'd purchased. She'd apparently come to at some point and emptied out the entire contents of my kitchen.

There was a note.

"Betinna, thanks for the snacks. I'm running out for some ice cream. Don't go anywhere."

And so I wait.

"Iraq snapshot" (The Common Ills)
Friday, October 12, 2007. Chaos and violence continue, a new possible outbreak in Iraq, Democrats in Congress no longer just cave -- now they whine too, torture continues and women remain under attack.


As Denise Winebrenner Edwards (People's Weekly World) notes, this was to be the week of the second court-martial of Ehren Watada until US District Court Judge Benjamin Settle granted a stay through at least October 26th. Ben Hamamoto (Nichi Bei Times) reports on an October 8th San Francisco press conference held by Pacific Islanders Resist and the Watada Support Committee where Luke Hiken (of the National Lawyers Guild Military Task Force) explained, "Under our constitution, the military is under the judiciary of the United States. In other words, all federal court systems, up to the United States Supreme Court, have authority over the conduct of military personnel when appropriate. Accordingly, federal district courts, all the way up to the courts of appeal and U.S. Supreme Court, intervene when there are violations of U.S. military regulations or laws that contravene the U.S. Constitution. The trial council indicated that there was no jeopardy attached to the case, because the defense had not completed its entire presentation, which is nonsense. In (such a case) jeopardy is attached the second the first witness is called by the prosecution." Hiken is referring to the double-jeopardy issue. In February, Watada was court-martialed. Judge Toilet (John Head) presided. Opening arguments were presented. The prosecution called their witnesses. And their witnesses did a pretty good job of making the defense's case. That was day two. Day three was when Watada was supposed to testify. Instead, Judge Toilet was suddenly shocked by a stipulation he had read, he had agreed to, and he had explained to the jury. Despite his own involvement at all steps of the stipulation, suddenly Judge Toilet wanted to say Watada didn't understand it. This was the excuse Judge Toilet created to call a mistrial. He did so over defense objection. Because the trial had started, double-jeopardy had attached -- as National Lawyers Guild president Marjorie Cohn has pointed out since the start.

Through Thursday, November 1st, we'll be including, in the snapshots, this National Lawyers Guild Military Law Task Force announcement: The Military Law Task Force and the Center on Conscience & War are sponsoring a Continuing Legal Education seminar -- Representing Conscientious Objectors in Habeas Corpus Proceedings -- as part of the National Lawyers Guild National Convention in Washington, D.C. The half-day seminar will be held on Thursday, November 1st, from 8:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., at the convention site, the Holiday Inn on the Hill in D.C. This is a must-attend seminar, with excelent speakers and a wealth of information. The seminar will be moderated by the Military Law Task Force's co-chair Kathleen Gilberd and scheduled speakers are NYC Bar Association's Committee on Military Affairs and Justice's Deborah Karpatkin, the Center on Conscience & War's J.E. McNeil, the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee's Peter Goldberger, Louis Font who has represented Camilo Mejia, Dr. Mary Hanna and others, and the Central Committee for Conscientious Objector's James Feldman. The fee is $60 for attorneys; $25 for non-profit attorneys, students and legal workers; and you can also enquire about scholarships or reduced fees. The convention itself will run from October 31st through November 4th and it's full circle on the 70th anniversary of NLG since they "began in Washington, D.C." where "the founding convention took place in the District at the height of the New Deal in 1937, Activist, progressive lawyers, tired of butting heads with the reactionary white male lawyers then comprising the American Bar Association, formed the nucleus of the Guild."

Watada is only one Iraq War resister. Courage to Resist reports on James Circello Jr. who self-checked out in April of 2007 and writes about his experience in the poem "I saw kids turn into animals:"

I saw kids turn into animals.
Members of my own unit, who I will never speak negatively about,
doing things that one day I know
will haunt them.

I saw soldiers mistreating detained Iraqis.
Detained on nothing more than pure suspicion in some cases.
But why not, it was the Old West, anything goes and anything did go.
Honestly.

Questionable shootings.
Questionable decisions by superior commanders.
Nothing ever questioned by your superiors.
You as the Soldier were always in the right.

Courage to Resist also has an interview (transcript and audio) with war resister Mark Wilkerson conducted by The War Comes Home's Aaron Glantz. At one point, Wilkerson explains, "I discussed many of these issues with a lot of other soldiers there [in Iraq]; a lot of them just didn't want to think about it at all. And then when I got back, to see the way the media portrayed the war and the way many people thought the war was going on, and then finally, after a few months, seeing some resisters coming on television -- I remember seeing Camilo Mejia in an interview and thinking, 'Wow, there are people out there like me, who are confused and angry and upset.' This 'conscientious objector' that I applied for, it was a very rough patch for me. It was a period of -- I ended up applying for conscientious objector in June. I took the rules fo conscientious objector home, and in the course of one night, I answered all the questions. I filled out my form. It was mostly seething. I was very angry, so I put all the emotion into what should be a very proper, very well thought-out document and application. I turned it in. I was told that I had a week to fill it out. And then over the next several months, I sometimes got in many arguments and heated debates with my chain of command -- my first sergeant, my platoon sergeant, some military chaplains, military investigators, military psychologists . . ." November 2005, he was denied CO status -- as most who apply are -- and decided to self-check out. He announced he was turning himself in August 2006 at Camp Casey and was eventually sentenced to imprisonment in Fort Still, OK.

Sunday in Corvallis, Oregon (a college town not far from Portland) Gerry Condon will speak at the Odd Fellows Hall, 223 S.W. Second St. at 7:00 pm. Gerry Condon is a war resister from the Vietnam era and he's very active in war resistance today. He can speak about war resisters in Canada -- not just Kyle Snyder, but he knows Snyder's case front to back -- and about the legal process in Canada which has thus far refused to grant any war resisters of this era refugee status. Along with a can't-miss-speech, those attending will also be able to see Michelle Mason's Breaking Ranks -- a documentary about war resisters in Canada today. Paul Fattig (Mail Tribune) reports that Condon will also "give a talk about his work at 6 p.m. Saturday at the Medford Congregational United Church of Christ."

There is a growing movement of resistance within the US military which includes James Stepp, Matthew Lowell, Derek Hess, Diedra Cobb, Brad McCall, Justin Cliburn, Timothy Richard, Robert Weiss, Phil McDowell, Steve Yoczik, Ross Spears, Zamesha Dominique, Chrisopther Scott Magaoay, Jared Hood, James Burmeister, Eli Israel, Joshua Key, Ehren Watada, Terri Johnson, Carla Gomez, Luke Kamunen, Leif Kamunen, Leo Kamunen, Camilo Mejia, Kimberly Rivera, Dean Walcott, Linjamin Mull, Agustin Aguayo, Justin Colby, Marc Train, Abdullah Webster, Robert Zabala, Darrell Anderson, Kyle Snyder, Corey Glass, Jeremy Hinzman, Kevin Lee, Mark Wilkerson, Patrick Hart, Ricky Clousing, Ivan Brobeck, Aidan Delgado, Pablo Paredes, Carl Webb, Stephen Funk, Blake LeMoine, Clifton Hicks, David Sanders, Dan Felushko, Brandon Hughey, Clifford Cornell, Joshua Despain, Joshua Casteel, Katherine Jashinski, Dale Bartell, Chris Teske, Matt Lowell, Jimmy Massey, Chris Capps, Tim Richard, Hart Viges, Michael Blake, Christopher Mogwai, Christian Kjar, Kyle Huwer, Wilfredo Torres, Michael Sudbury, Ghanim Khalil, Vincent La Volpa, DeShawn Reed and Kevin Benderman. In total, forty-one US war resisters in Canada have applied for asylum.
Information on war resistance within the military can be found at The Objector, The G.I. Rights Hotline [(877) 447-4487], Iraq Veterans Against the War and the War Resisters Support Campaign. Courage to Resist offers information on all public war resisters. Tom Joad maintains a list of known war resisters.

Earlier this week, National Lawyers Guild president Marjorie Cohn (at Truthout) addressed the issue of torture noting that the administration continues to deny it tortures when the reality is the White House has okayed torture for some time, "Torture is a war crime. Those who commit or order torture can be convicted under the U.S. War Crimes Statute. Techniques that don't rise to the level of torture but constitute cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment also violate U.S. law. Congress should provide for the appointment of a special independent counsel to fully investigate and prosecute all who are complicit in the torture of prisoners in U.S. custody." AP quoted former president Jimmy Carter declaring this week on CNN, "Our country for the first time in my life time has abandoned the basic principle of human rights. We've said that the Geneva Conventions do not apply to those people in Abu Ghraib prison and Guantanamo, and we've said we can torture prisoners and deprive them of an accusation of a crime." Yesterday the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq released (PDF format warning) "Human Rights Report 1 April -- 30 June 2007" which found many human rights abuses but let's zoom in on the issues having to do with imprisonment. Those being held went from 17,565 in March to 21,112 by the end of June leading to overcrowding in holding facilities across Iraq, prolonged periods of waiting for something resembling justice to arrive, denial of "access to legal counsel and to family visits," and "reports of the widespread and routine torture or ill-treatment of detainees, particularly those being held in pre-trial detention facitilities under Ministry of Interior facilities, including police stations. Several such cases were document during the reporting period, where UNAMI was able to interview and examine victims of physical abuse shortly following their release or following their conviction and transfer to a Ministry of Justice prison." So torture and abuse is alive and well in Iraq. For all the Bully Boy's grand words of creating a torture free Iraq, Abu Ghraib (and other earlier, less well known events) demonstrated that the US will torture so it's no surprise that the Iraqis placed in charge (by the US and its puppets) will as well. Dropping back to the snapshot on September 6th:

Turning to retired generals, Amy Goodman (Democracy Now!) reported today, "A panel of retired US generals is urging the United States to disband and reorganize the Iraqi police force because of infiltration by sectarian militias. The generals also report Iraq's security forces will be unable to fulfill their essential security responsibilities independently for at least another twelve to 18 months." Karen DeYoung (Washington Post) explains that the national police force as well as the Iraq Interior Ministry are "riddled with sectarianism and corruption" by the Independent Commission on the Security Forces of Iraq headed by James Jones (Marine general) in there 150-plus page report which also finds the Iraqi army at least a year to 18 months away from being able to handle "internal security".

The US is as aware of what's going on as is the United Nations -- in fact the US is aware of their own tactics and, if the United Nations knows about the US tactics, it's doubtful they would report them. Joshua Partlow and Column Lynch (Washington Post) report today that the UN report was ready months ago (August) "but release of the final version was delayed for more than a month following a request by the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Ryan C. Crocker, according to a confidential account by a senior U.N. official." Of course, the delay was really to make sure nothing flashed a little reality while Crocker and David Petraeus were in the midst of Operation Happy Talk on Congress. But the reality is that, forget what the US itself does, torture being conducted by Iraqis placed in charge -- known torture -- reflects back to the US and turning a blind eye does not make it any less culpable of War Crimes charges for the torture.

Sticking with war crimes, yesterday Center for Constitutional Rights filed a lawsuit against the mercenary company Blackwater USA. More information can be found here at CCR and in Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez' "EXCLUSIVE - Family Members of Slain Iraqis Sue Blackwater USA for Deadly Baghdad Shooting" (Democracy Now!) from yesterday. The lawsuit is over the September 16th Baghdad slaughter where Blackwater employees killed as many as 17 Iraqi civilians. Anne Penketh (Independent of London) quotes Ivana Vuco ("the most senior UN human rights officer in Iraq") declaring, "For us, it's a human rights issue. We will monitor the allegations of killings by security contractors and look into whether or not crimes against humanity and war crimes have been committed" and -- pay attention because this applies to torture as well -- there is a "responbility to investigate, supervise and prosecute those accused of wrongdoing." "I don't recall" and "To the best of my memory" may have allowed the Reagan administration to avoid convictions but possibly Bully Boy should just stick with the classic "I am not a crook"?

Stayin with the UN report and human rights issues, one of the key areas to emerge in the report is Kurdistan which -- despite the p.r. hype -- has never been 'safe.' Human rights organizations have long been documenting the problems in the northern region. The new UN report (PDF warning) notes the 'peaceful region':The human rights situation in the Kurdistan region remains of concern in a number of areas, including continuing incidents involving violence against women, the abuse of detainees and the prolonged detention without charge or trial of hundreds of detainees held on suspicion of terror-related offences. UNAMI is encouraged, however, by sveral measures adopted by the KRG authorities in recent months in an effort to address some of these concerns, including the review of long-standing detention practices followed by the regional authorities' security forces. UNAMI hopes that such measures, if seriously followed up, would pave the way for greater accountability for government officials suspected or known to have abused their authority.Along with the targeting of journalists (and the Kurdish response that 646 licenses have been given to news outlets -- and how that has nothing to do with the targeting -- arrests and detentions -- of journalists) and the persecution of Assyrians and Turkoman, the region has an 18% increase in violence against women ("15 deaths caused by blunt objects, 87 deaths by burning and 15 deaths by shooting for the first quarter of 2007; for the second quarter, there were 8 deaths caused by blunt objects, 108 deaths by burning and 21 deaths by shooting"), a serious lack of punishments for these deaths (both in arrests and -- when the rare arrest is made -- in sentencing). The situation for women throughout Iraq is awful. Earlier this week, Tina Susman (Los Angeles Times) reported on Article 41 in the still unfinalized constitution which "women's rights activists and legal scholars" argue "opens the door to rule by draconian interpretations of Islamic law that could sanction the stoning of adulterous women, allow underage girls to be forced into marriage and permit men to abandon their wives by declaring, 'I divorce you,' three times" while Basra is demonstrating "signs of religious extremism being used to rein in women. Police say gangs enforcing their idea of Islamic law have killed 15 women in the last month" -- over "what the women wear or because they are using makeup." It smells like 'freedom' to Bully Boy and Laura Bush. To the rest of the world, it smells like something else.

Turning to some of today's violence . . .

Bombings?

AFP reports, "Iraqi civilians bore the brunt Friday of a bloody start to Eid al-Fitr, as a US air raid killed 15 women and children, and a sinister suicide attack on a playground shocked a northern town." This is the attack noted in yesterday's snapshot. Deborah Haynes (Times of London) notes this is "one of the highest civilian death tolls acknowledged by the military since the March 2003 invasion" and also notes the playground attack which claimed the lives of 2 children with seveteen wounded. Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a Baghdad car bombing that claimed 4 lives (Iraqi police officers) and left fifteen more injured and a Salahuddin bombing ("inside a bag of flour on a handcart") in which "[a] woman was killed and 16 people most of them children".

Shootings?

Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a police officer shot dead in an attack in Qadisiyah. Reuters notes a police officer shot dead and his wife injured in a home invasion in Kut.

Corpses?

Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 4 corpses were discovered in Baghdad. Reuters notes a corpse was discovered in Mahaweel.

Torture, bombings, lack of potable water, cholera, what else? Reuters reports the latest issue, "The World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Friday it had asked Iraqi authorities to probe media reports of several cases of Rift Valley Fever in animals. The viral disease primarily affects animals but can infect humans through handling of blood or ogans of infected animals, leading to high rates of disease and death, according to the United Nations health agency."

Turning to US politics. As Cedric and Wally noted yesterday US Senator Barack Obama who would like to be the 2008 Democratic nominee for president has a new "trust me" campaign. Having repeatedly run on the fact that he was against the illegal war in 2002 but unable to vote because he wasn't in the Congress, he's now taking Senator Hillary Clinton -- who would also like to be the 2008 Democratic presidential nominee -- to task for voting for what some see as an authorization for war on Iraqn. Obama is highly offended by Clinton's recent vote in the Senate. So offended that some might wonder how he voted? Answer: He didn't vote. He's taking her to task for what is a bad vote but he didn't care enough about the issue to be present to vote. That's leadership?

Leadership? Let's turn to other non-leaders. US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. On Wednesday, David Swanson (AfterDowningSt) noted Pelosi's latest bits of insanity including her despair that people would protest outside her mansion ("If they were poor and they were sleeping on my sidewalk, they would be arrested for loitering!" hissed our modern day Marie) and how people like her weren't "advocates. We are leaders." Rebecca noted in her post to Pelosi, "poor nancy. oh the horror! in her botox mansion with americans outside! she might have been so troubled by the sight that her frozen face almost registered emotion. the horror! 'they are advocates,' sputters the cowardly trash, 'we are leaders!' well where the hell are you leading the country, princess crap?" Peace Mom Cindy Sheehan notes (at CounterPunch) that Pelosi's attitude "is truly the problem with what was once a Representative Republic and now is a country run by 'elected' officials who believe that they, indvidually and collectively, are above any accountability and are not answerable to their constituents. Our public servants erroneously believe that they are leaders! . . . No, Ms. Pelosi, you are not a leader. You have proven time and again in what you laughably believe is a 'mistake' free run as Speaker of a Democratic House that you will do anything to protect an Imperial Presidency to the detriment of this Nation and the world, particularly the people of Iraq and Afghanistan. This Democratic Congress supported BushCo's disastrous and deadly surge; handed him over billions of their constituent's tax dollars to wage this murder; have by their silence and votes countenanced an invasion of another country; approved more restrictions on the rights of the citizenry to be protected against unreasonable search and seizure; Ms. Pelosi does not even know if 'torture' (which violates international law and the 8th Amendment in our Bill of Rights) is an impeachable offense; and worst of all the impeachment clauses were taken 'off the table' in an ongoing partnership with BushCo to make the office of the presidency a Congressionally protected crime conglomerate that is rapidly sending this Nation down a crap-hold of fascism."

Meanwhile the Dems in leadership are crying. David M. Herszenhorn (New York Times) notes that there is "tension between Democratic lawmakers and their base" and provides the opportunity for Dems to once again blame the voters as opposed to taking a look at their own actions. The Republican base gets frustrated with their leadership all the time. And Republicans generally respond to that. They don't blame the base, they don't whine about the base, they don't publicly insult the base. But, taking the lead from Pelosi, Democrats in Congress have no problem hectoring and trashing the voters who put them in power. When you have to make non-stop excuses for your actions, then the problem is probably you and not the base. When you're so ineffectual that you continue to cite the minimum wage nonsense as your point of pride (blood money because Dems snuck it into an Iraq bill), you've got nothing to be proud of. Instead of whining at and blaming the base, Democrats in Congress need to grow up real damn quick and grasp that the 2008 elections that they feel are the end-all-be-all are not going to benefit from the repeated trashing of Democratic voters. Leadership needs to take some accountability and Pelosi especially needs to stop trashing Democratic voters publicly.

And for those who don't get how weak Congressional Dems have been, note this from Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez' interview with the Boston Globe's Charlie Savage (Democracy Now!):

AMY GOODMAN: Talk about wiretapping, the controversy now, the frustration that people have with the Democrats, supposedly the opposition party, going along with the Republicans.

CHARLIE SAVAGE: Well, the background is that after 9/11, as we all know now, Bush gave the military the authority to wiretap phone calls without warrants, in defiance of a 1978 law that required warrants for that situation. And he used a very aggressive legal theory about the President's powers as commander-in-chief to bypass laws at his own discretion. Because that program was only legal if that theory were true, that meant that the fact that they did this set a precedent that says that theory is true, and future presidents will be able to cite that precedent when they want to evade any other law that restricts their own authority.
So now, going forward, one of the ways this agenda has been able to be so successfully implemented was that there was no resistance from Congress. At the very moment there was this stronger push coming out of the Vice President's office to expand the presidential power as an end to itself in any way possible, because of one-party rule for six years and because of the atmosphere of crisis after 9/11, there was no push back. And that's how the ball was moved so far down the field.
And one of the things that's been very interesting about the last year is now we have split control of government again, and so the question was, how is that going to change things? And what we've seen from the Protect America Act in August and the dynamic going forward is that even with split control of government, the dynamic is still there. Congress is just as it was for the first twenty or thirty years of the Cold War, when the original imperial presidency was growing under presidents of both parties, by the way. Congress is again unwilling to push back against the White House's assertion that it needs ever more authority, and checks and balances will result in bloodshed. And so, I think, going forward, that you can see that this dynamic is going to be with us. And, of course, two years from now, we may have one-party control of government again, the other party, but that will just sort of hurl us further down this path, I think.

JUAN GONZALEZ: And this issue of the President seeking to protect those in the corporate world who go along with his policies -- well, first of all, obviously, there was the retroactive immunity to the airline companies after 9/11 for their failure to act to provide a kind of security on their planes, giving them immunity from any possible lawsuits, and now this effort by the administration to try to provide retroactive immunity to the telecom companies that went along with his surveillance program.

CHARLIE SAVAGE: Well, and what this is, is because Congress has demonstrated that it's really not going to do anything about the basic fact that the President asserted he could bypass a law and then he acted on that assertion, and, you know, that established he can do that, or whoever else is president at any given moment from now on can do that, that the one sort of last place where critics of this sort of extraordinary development could still have some traction was the lawsuit against the companies, which had also evidently broken privacy laws by going along with this. So, by seeking retroactive immunity, it's sort of the last place closing off the possibility of accountability.

Meanwhile the Illinois Green Party holds a fall membership meeting Crystal Lake, IL October 13th and 14th at the McHenry County College.

Candidates in attendance will hold a press conference Saturday from 1 to 2 pm at McHenry County College and they include:Kent Mesplay (Presidential)Jerome Pohlen (U.S. Congress, 3rd District)Moe Shanfield (U.S. Congress, 9th District)Dave Kalbfleisch (U.S. Congress, 10th District)Rodger Jennings ( U.S. Congress, 12th District)Steve Alesch (U.S. Congress, 13th District)Tony Cox (State Representative, 9th District)Kevin O'Connor (State Representative, 41st District)Sandy Lezon (State Representative, 50th District) Charlie Howe (State Representative, 115th District) James Geocaris (McHenry County Board, 3rd District)


On PBS this weekend, Friday October 12th in most markets, NOW with David Brancaccio will air a one hour program, "Child Brides: Stolen Lives" documenting "the heartbreaking global phenomenon of forced child marriage, and the hope behind breaking the cycle of poverty and despair it causes." They've created an e-Card you can send to friends and family or to yourself to provide a heads up to the broadcast (and there is no cost to send the e-Card). Maria Hinojosa will report from Niger, Guatemala, India, etc.













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